Today Is The Day Disagree With Andrew Sullivan About Gay Marriage

Andrew Sullivan on marriage:

No other institution has an equivalent power to include people in their own familial narrative or civic history as deeply or as powerfully as civil marriage does. And the next generation see themselves as people first and gay second.

I read Andrew Sullivan every day. His POV is essential reading for anyone who wants to engage in a rational, but impassioned (and sometimes conservative) discussion on the people and events of the day. No matter how frustrating the news feed headlines are, I feel I can always turn to Sullivan to bring me back to a very human earth. So it is with sadness that I must qualify his views on same-sex marriage.

I say "qualify" because I agree with him in his article "My Big Fat Straight Wedding" - to a point.

It's wonderful to read:

Ours was not, we realized, a different institution, after all, and we were not different kinds of people. In the doing of it, it was the same as my sister’s wedding and we were the same as my sister and brother-in-law. The strange, bewildering emotions of the moment, the cake and reception, the distracted children and weeping mothers, the morning’s butterflies and the night’s drunkenness: this was not a gay marriage; it was a marriage.

I had that kind of feeling 33 years ago. I wasn't formally "married" to David, but his family treated me as a welcome addition to the family. Aunts, uncles, grandparents - all accepted me (one time David got visibly jealous that I received more Christmas presents than he did!). It was so wonderful that, when we parted I wanted "custody" of his family. Our loving friendship (his family's and mine) lasted past his death from AIDS in 1986. Yes, I know what a difference joyful acceptance can make.

But it's not an acceptance everyone is lucky enough to savor.

At the time, both David and I - the rest of our gay community - were absolutely certain that once a significant number of people were out of the closet, people everywhere would accept us as equals.

That was not to be. Still isn't.

We didn't count on the ferocity of anti-gay sentiments and the "Christian Right", at first led by Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority, then by various others all over the country. We didn't count on "religious" people demonizing us when AIDS came along. We didn't know then that there were people who needed to hate someone, something... anything.

Andrew: I'm overjoyed at the experiences you have with your family. They make me feel lucky that I ever had them. But please try to understand the sheer volume of people who repudiate you for being gay. And repudiate your family for accepting you.

Gay marriage will be a rallying point for bigotry and homophobia for as long as the two exist. And for as long as CINOs (Christians In Name Only), Fundamentalists and Christofascists continue to work against equality. Even winning in cases like No on Proposition 8 won't make things any better. Yes, "it's a start," but I have a very uneasy feeling that with the defeat of Prop 8, we will inadvertently corner a very dangerous wild animal. I'm for that defeat, but I fear it at the same time.

We're already seeing how angry people are when they attend McCain-Palin rallies. We've known for the whole time that Palin was just a bone tossed to Franklin Graham and the rest. But feeding on the wild (read: ungrammatical) rhetoric of Palin has made them rabid. They're the "sheeple" of the leaders like Robertson (old school), Rod Parsley (new and unschooled) and Rick Warren (new and very very shrewd). They are today's Elmer Gantrys and their followers are Elmer Fudds.

But always remember, Andrew: Fudd is the one with the gun.

Just a thought.