Beyond Marriage
I went to a panel discussion today about a nascent societal ideology that will most likely make it onto the table in discussions of Same sex marriage, welfare policies, feminism, etc. Here is the executive summary from www.beyondmarriage.org:
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Beyond Same-Sex Marriage: A New Strategic Vision For All Our Families and Relationships
Executive Summary
The time has come to reframe the narrow terms of the marriage debate in the United States. Conservatives are seeking to enshrine discrimination in the U.S. Constitution through the Federal Marriage Amendment. But their opposition to same-sex marriage is only one part of a broader pro-marriage, “family values” agenda that includes abstinence-only sex education, stringent divorce laws, coercive marriage promotion policies directed toward women on welfare, and attacks on reproductive freedom. Moreover, a thirty-year political assault on the social safety net has left households with more burdens and constraints and fewer resources.
Meanwhile, the LGBT movement has recently focused on marriage equality as a stand-alone issue. While this strategy may secure rights and benefits for some LGBT families, it has left us isolated and vulnerable to a virulent backlash. We must respond to the full scope of the conservative marriage agenda by building alliances across issues and constituencies. Our strategies must be visionary, creative, and practical to counter the right's powerful and effective use of marriage as a “wedge” issue that pits one group against another. The struggle for marriage rights should be part of a larger effort to strengthen the stability and security of diverse households and families. To that end, we advocate:
Ø Legal recognition for a wide range of relationships, households and families - regardless of kinship or conjugal status.
Ø Access for all, regardless of marital or citizenship status, to vital government support programs including but not limited to health care, housing, Social Security and pension plans, disaster recovery assistance, unemployment insurance and welfare assistance.
Ø Separation of church and state in all matters, including regulation and recognition of relationships, households and families.
Ø Freedom from state regulation of our sexual lives and gender choices, identities and expression.
Marriage is not the only worthy form of family or relationship, and it should not be legally and economically privileged above all others. A majority of people - whatever their sexual and gender identities - do not live in traditional nuclear families. They stand to gain from alternative forms of household recognition beyond one-size-fits-all marriage. For example:
· Single parent households
· Senior citizens living together and serving as each other’s caregivers (think Golden Girls)
· Blended and extended families
· Children being raised in multiple households or by unmarried parents
· Adult children living with and caring for their parents
· Senior citizens who are the primary caregivers to their grandchildren or other relatives
· Close friends or siblings living in non-conjugal relationships and serving as each other’s primary support and caregivers
· Households in which there is more than one conjugal partner
· Care-giving relationships that provide support to those living with extended illness such as HIV/AIDS.
The current debate over marriage, same-sex and otherwise, ignores the needs and desires of so many in a nation where household diversity is the demographic norm. We seek to reframe this debate. Our call speaks to the widespread hunger for authentic and just community in ways that are both pragmatic and visionary. It follows in the best tradition of the progressive LGBT movement, which invented alternative legal statuses such as domestic partnership and reciprocal beneficiary. We seek to build on these historic accomplishments by continuing to diversify and democratize partnership and household recognition. We advocate the expansion of existing legal statuses, social services and benefits to support the needs of all our households.
We call on colleagues working in various social justice movements and campaigns to read the full-text of our statement “Beyond Same-Sex Marriage: A New Strategic Vision,” and to join us in our call for government support of all our households.
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the panel consisted of 5 of the 18 authors of the document, all involved in Queer Advocacy to some extent. Although their starting point (as stated above) i wholeheartedly agree with, my friends in the room came up with some good critiques of their polemical platform. While I agree that the traditional nucular family is a thing of the past, as evidenced by the extreme diversity of family units, ideas of kinship and love, and broad definitions of sexuality, support, and legal recognition for care and benefits, I also took away from the evening the panelists framing of marriage as almost a pathology that has permeated the whole of western christian-based governments. They seemed to suggest that anyone who 'thinks' they want to get married has been duped by those in power. I agree with their ideas that marriage is a flawed institution that has served to perpetuate many of the gender and racial inequalities that plague our form of civilization. Do a little research on the intersection of sexuality, race, and class, and you will see.....a good starting off point is "Queering the Color Line" by Siobhan Sommerville and "Is gay-marraige anti-black" which you can find by googling it.
The way many people have framed the current marraige debate is "do you favor or oppose gay marraige?" Most people in my circles would initially say yes to that message.....or if not that, they would say that they would not want to ban same sex marriage like what has been happening across the country. But that yea or nay option precludes a very important discussion from every reaching the table. Why do we, as queer individuals want marriage, when society as a whole is fleeing from that institution. A woman tonight, one of the foremost queer advocates, Amber Hoolibaugh from the Gay and Lesbian Task Force, suggested the following:
Queer bodies and identities have been marginalized in this country, there is no doubting it. For most people who have been marginalized in any way, one of the strongest drives that seems to direct each individuals actions, is the need to "be like everyone else." We have been hurt by a society for so long, that all we want is to stop being hurt and blend in to the masses, stripping ourselves of the thing that set us appart in the begining. When we say we are fighting for equality, we are saying that we want to be absorbed into the system that has institutionalized our marginalization.
A few of the panelists suggested that rather than fight for equality, which is an admission of defeat, we should fight for liberation. Why would you enter a debate offering to take the smallest concession? The most powerful actions are those that start by asking for the largest and most comprehensive option, and only through haggling and making concessions do we make headway. By starting a debate by saying that we would be willing to take the smallest thing, where can we go from there?
I find this argument extremely convincing, especially since it starts to combine many of the progressive advocacy efforts into one: feminism, queer advocacy, anti-discrimination, anti-classism, etc. The language and rhetoric of the debate come straight from feminist socialism, with the debate originating with queer rights.
It is an extremely interesting conversation to be had, and one that cuts across all lines of political progressivism, and one that should be brought into the forefront of modern progressive political debates.
Think about it
-----------------------------------------
Beyond Same-Sex Marriage: A New Strategic Vision For All Our Families and Relationships
Executive Summary
The time has come to reframe the narrow terms of the marriage debate in the United States. Conservatives are seeking to enshrine discrimination in the U.S. Constitution through the Federal Marriage Amendment. But their opposition to same-sex marriage is only one part of a broader pro-marriage, “family values” agenda that includes abstinence-only sex education, stringent divorce laws, coercive marriage promotion policies directed toward women on welfare, and attacks on reproductive freedom. Moreover, a thirty-year political assault on the social safety net has left households with more burdens and constraints and fewer resources.
Meanwhile, the LGBT movement has recently focused on marriage equality as a stand-alone issue. While this strategy may secure rights and benefits for some LGBT families, it has left us isolated and vulnerable to a virulent backlash. We must respond to the full scope of the conservative marriage agenda by building alliances across issues and constituencies. Our strategies must be visionary, creative, and practical to counter the right's powerful and effective use of marriage as a “wedge” issue that pits one group against another. The struggle for marriage rights should be part of a larger effort to strengthen the stability and security of diverse households and families. To that end, we advocate:
Ø Legal recognition for a wide range of relationships, households and families - regardless of kinship or conjugal status.
Ø Access for all, regardless of marital or citizenship status, to vital government support programs including but not limited to health care, housing, Social Security and pension plans, disaster recovery assistance, unemployment insurance and welfare assistance.
Ø Separation of church and state in all matters, including regulation and recognition of relationships, households and families.
Ø Freedom from state regulation of our sexual lives and gender choices, identities and expression.
Marriage is not the only worthy form of family or relationship, and it should not be legally and economically privileged above all others. A majority of people - whatever their sexual and gender identities - do not live in traditional nuclear families. They stand to gain from alternative forms of household recognition beyond one-size-fits-all marriage. For example:
· Single parent households
· Senior citizens living together and serving as each other’s caregivers (think Golden Girls)
· Blended and extended families
· Children being raised in multiple households or by unmarried parents
· Adult children living with and caring for their parents
· Senior citizens who are the primary caregivers to their grandchildren or other relatives
· Close friends or siblings living in non-conjugal relationships and serving as each other’s primary support and caregivers
· Households in which there is more than one conjugal partner
· Care-giving relationships that provide support to those living with extended illness such as HIV/AIDS.
The current debate over marriage, same-sex and otherwise, ignores the needs and desires of so many in a nation where household diversity is the demographic norm. We seek to reframe this debate. Our call speaks to the widespread hunger for authentic and just community in ways that are both pragmatic and visionary. It follows in the best tradition of the progressive LGBT movement, which invented alternative legal statuses such as domestic partnership and reciprocal beneficiary. We seek to build on these historic accomplishments by continuing to diversify and democratize partnership and household recognition. We advocate the expansion of existing legal statuses, social services and benefits to support the needs of all our households.
We call on colleagues working in various social justice movements and campaigns to read the full-text of our statement “Beyond Same-Sex Marriage: A New Strategic Vision,” and to join us in our call for government support of all our households.
--------------------------------------------------------
the panel consisted of 5 of the 18 authors of the document, all involved in Queer Advocacy to some extent. Although their starting point (as stated above) i wholeheartedly agree with, my friends in the room came up with some good critiques of their polemical platform. While I agree that the traditional nucular family is a thing of the past, as evidenced by the extreme diversity of family units, ideas of kinship and love, and broad definitions of sexuality, support, and legal recognition for care and benefits, I also took away from the evening the panelists framing of marriage as almost a pathology that has permeated the whole of western christian-based governments. They seemed to suggest that anyone who 'thinks' they want to get married has been duped by those in power. I agree with their ideas that marriage is a flawed institution that has served to perpetuate many of the gender and racial inequalities that plague our form of civilization. Do a little research on the intersection of sexuality, race, and class, and you will see.....a good starting off point is "Queering the Color Line" by Siobhan Sommerville and "Is gay-marraige anti-black" which you can find by googling it.
The way many people have framed the current marraige debate is "do you favor or oppose gay marraige?" Most people in my circles would initially say yes to that message.....or if not that, they would say that they would not want to ban same sex marriage like what has been happening across the country. But that yea or nay option precludes a very important discussion from every reaching the table. Why do we, as queer individuals want marriage, when society as a whole is fleeing from that institution. A woman tonight, one of the foremost queer advocates, Amber Hoolibaugh from the Gay and Lesbian Task Force, suggested the following:
Queer bodies and identities have been marginalized in this country, there is no doubting it. For most people who have been marginalized in any way, one of the strongest drives that seems to direct each individuals actions, is the need to "be like everyone else." We have been hurt by a society for so long, that all we want is to stop being hurt and blend in to the masses, stripping ourselves of the thing that set us appart in the begining. When we say we are fighting for equality, we are saying that we want to be absorbed into the system that has institutionalized our marginalization.
A few of the panelists suggested that rather than fight for equality, which is an admission of defeat, we should fight for liberation. Why would you enter a debate offering to take the smallest concession? The most powerful actions are those that start by asking for the largest and most comprehensive option, and only through haggling and making concessions do we make headway. By starting a debate by saying that we would be willing to take the smallest thing, where can we go from there?
I find this argument extremely convincing, especially since it starts to combine many of the progressive advocacy efforts into one: feminism, queer advocacy, anti-discrimination, anti-classism, etc. The language and rhetoric of the debate come straight from feminist socialism, with the debate originating with queer rights.
It is an extremely interesting conversation to be had, and one that cuts across all lines of political progressivism, and one that should be brought into the forefront of modern progressive political debates.
Think about it