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The tyranny of an ignorant majority
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It is a shameful time in American history. As a country we are on the brink of an important cultural shift to treat homosexuals with equality and respect. A few states have managed to pass legislation allowing same-sex marriages. Yet again and again states are legally having these rights overturned by referendum. Why? Because the majority of the American population don't understand homosexuality and don't consider the infringement of the rights of homosexuals to be a civil rights issue.
Maine's law LD1020 "An Act To End Discrimination in Civil Marriage and Affirm Religious Freedom" was signed by Governor John E. Baldacci back in May of 2009, but was overturned by the referendum vote on November 3, 2009. The split on the vote was 53/47, which shows two things: One, there are more voters who don't want to confer civil rights on homosexuals. Two, nearly half of the voters do want equality for gays. In the 31 state referendums prior to this where the gay-marriage issue was put to a popular vote, every time the anti-gay vote won.
This is not an issue that will ever be resolved by a referendum vote. Civil rights issues where a majority of rights-holders deny rights to a minority can not be decided on by the opinions of the majority. In my research I didn't find any US case where an excluded minority had been conferred rights by the majority through referendum: slavery, women's right to vote and segregation and miscegenation all changed through Federal powers (presidential, congressional or judicial). I expect gay-marriage will be the same, and my only question is when will the government do the right thing and give civil rights to our homosexual citizenry? (By the way, even constitutionally legal marriages are still being barred by closed-minded bigots based on race issues.)
I find such discrimination despicable and in opposition to my vision of America as a country with liberty and equality at the foundation of our society. Not that all of us are free or equal, but that all of us should be afforded the same opportunity to exercise our skills and talents to the end of achieving our personal goals. To build up marriage as an important social construct and then deny it to people who love each other is wrong.
When Proposition 8 - California's referendum to strip homosexuals from being able to marry in California - was being lobbied for, a lot of skeptics got very active to fight it. I worked online to try and fight prop-8, and when it passed I joined members of the Atlanta Skeptics to participate in protests in Atlanta. At that event a reporter from WABE came over to interview me and I think I botched the talk pretty well. I was standing there in the crowd with a sign that said, "I'm Straight. I'm Married. I support gay-marriage rights." He asked me, "Why are you here today?" And for some reason that question completely derailed me. I was prepared to talk about why I support gay-marriage, but his question was about why I was there. And that's a very different question. After thinking about it on the MARTA ride back to my truck I came up with the answer but it's a bit complicated.
Back when I was in high school and we were sitting there in our integrated class rooms learning about the civil rights movement I thought it was strange that so many white northern activists would drive down to the south to try and sign up black voters, to participate in marches and to get water hosed by the state police in Alabama and Georgia. These outsider activists weren't presented as heroes, but as statistics. Yet they were heroes. They were privileged and not being discriminated against - yet they saw an inequality and they fought to end it. I began to wonder if given the same opportunity and risks would I have been someone who would have sat on the sidelines waiting for the government to right these wrongs, or would I be the person who got out and took a hose with strangers just because I knew they were being treated with inequality?
With the gay-marriage issue I had an opportunity to find out what kind of person I am. It turns out that I'm the kind of person who will march, write, lobby and donate to try and get this civil rights issue resolved. This is a civil rights issue. And I think people who are educated on the issue are likely to agree.
But the irony is that religion is trumping humanity. Black Americans, a group who have only begun being treated with a semblance of equality in my lifetime, were a strong force in the passage of Proposition 8. Why? Because religious groups are fighting tooth and nail to deny marriage rights to homosexuals. Churches lobbied to get their members to vote for the proposition.
Yet where would many churches be without gay choir directors, or organists? Quieter, one imagines.
The fact is that homosexuality is not a choice. In fact even human gender is not necessarily one thing or another (hear Quirks and Quarks interview with Dr. Gerald Callahan on this topic). We have social expectations about how people will behave and they are based on a majority of people being heterosexual despite signifigant numbers of people who don't fit that norm. Homosexuals have the same biological imperatives as heterosexuals, only they are biologically driven to seek out same-sex partners. So if people are born with a desire for same sex relations, why do we deny them the benefits of marriage?
The main reason goes back to the two pronged attack on gay-marriage by churches. First they say that homosexuality is a sin. Second they say that marriage is a sacred religious construct.
Is homosexuality a sin? According to the Bible it is.
Leviticus 18:22 Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.
Of course the Bible also tells us that if you ever hit your mother or father you should be killed.
Exodus 21:15 And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death.
In fact, if you even cuss out your parents you should be put to death.
Exodus 21:17 And he that curseth his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death.
And if you have sex outside of marriage when you're engaged you should be put to death.
Deuteronomy 22:23-24 If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbour's wife: so thou shalt put away evil from among you.
Yet the Bible is full of rules that people don't follow. Rules about cutting one's hair, eating pork, eating shellfish and many, many other rules are regularly ignored. For example I don't see churches lobbying to get rid of money, the manufacture of which is a clear violation of the second commandment. But when a rule allows a group to discriminate against another group and claim that God said it was okay, that's too much temptation for most people.
Marriage may be sacred within religious traditions, but it is also a legal construct. You can have all the church weddings you want, but it is the marriage license that makes them "real" marriages. And those licenses are issued by the states, not the church. So as each state has the issue of gay-marriage pop up, the religious response has consistently been to crush the initiative.
The rules of marriage in the Bible don't seem to match up with the modern legal and social construct. The idea of marriage has evolved and is not some monolithic, unchanging construct. In the Bible polygamy is allowed. Many of the old testament's best known characters had multiple wives. And in the past one hundred years marriage has changed to allow women stronger property rights, the ability to get a divorce and the introduction of alimony payments for the many marriages that don't work out.
And the rights that are conferred with marriage aren't just about having rings and having a wedding ceremony. The marriage laws of the US control how property is passed on through inheritence, taxes and how hospitals control who sees patients during hospitalizations. Marriage has hundreds of almost invisible perks that married people take for granted, but which are extremely valuable.
Gay-marriage rights will not be conferred by the bigoted masses who hold the power to deny it. In the end it likely will be a Federal mandate that resolves the issue. I hope that resolution is peaceful, and that once it is passed the population comes to accept gays for what they are - equal citizens with equal rights. Until then, I urge all rational people to eschew apathy and to take action to help get these civil rights to our fellow citizens.
What can you do? Write your congressional representation. Write the president. Write your governor. Give money to groups that support gay marriage. When you hear people denounce gay marriage, call them out on their prejudice. It is shameful that ignorance combined with righteousness produces so much bad will in this country. Let people know that their ignorance is noted and their righteousness is misplaced. Again, I don't think it is possible to fix the gay-marriage issue through a vote - but being vocally in support of gay-marriage may help people begin thinking about the issue so that when the law is finally fixed we might not have to endure decades of ignorant groups lobbying to overturn the decision that finally sets things right.
Oh, one more thing. You might want to listen to what this old Republican war-veteran has to say on the matter.
Artwork Source: Jonathan Embraces David from "Historiae Celebriores Veteris Testamenti Iconibus Representatae" by Caspar Luiken published 1712 (Public Domain)
For the record, I quote the Bible here but I'm confident that all religious texts are cherry-picked. I just happen to be very familiar with the Bible so I quote from that tradition which I know best. Also, there are liberal churches who support gay marriage. Good for them, but the majority of churches who take a stand on gay-marriage work against the civil rights of our gay citizens.
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