# Gay dopers: Any of you against gay marriage? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 24, 2009, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481 "2009-05-24T18:43:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/21 "2009-05-25T19:42:44Z")
The problem those people have is not with normalizing queer life, it’s with making a single version of queer life normal. Ie, the idea (if I understand correctly) is that once queers can marry monogamously, any who doesn’t want to will be “weird,” sort of like I’ve spent 20 years hearing I was at risk of becoming an old spinster (now I AM an old spinster). ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_T-Cups](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ed655f/32.png) [@Sir\_T-Cups](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_T-Cups)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/22 "2009-05-25T19:54:56Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > I’m just wondering what’s wrong with “the normalization of queer life”? That should be the goal of the gay rights movement, it seems to me. I’m all for the stigmitization of sex, I just don’t think gay sex should be stigmitized anymore than straight sex. 🙂 Ditto. If the gays in this world are tiring of being oppressed and hated, then why are they saying they don’t want marriage because it will make them normal? Isn’t that what they want? Doesn’t “we’re here, we’re queer, get used to it” mean just that, we hare here now get used to it. Allowing them to marry I would assume would be us getting used to it, so then why are they all up in arms over the fact that they are finally getting what they want? ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/23 "2009-05-25T20:02:43Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > 10% is HUGE when you’re talking about the voting population of California. As black people make up only 6.2% of the population of California ([wiki is my cite](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_California)), that’s not an _immense_ number in the grand scheme of things. The ~50% of white people, who make up ~60% of the overall population, who voted for Prop. 8, are by far the more significant number. FWIW, there are plenty of black people - including influential politicians - who are pro-gay rights. Two that spring to mind immediately are former Illinois state senate president Emil Jones, who lobbied hard to get a law protecting gay people from employment and housing discrimination passed, and Gov. Paterson of New York, who is pushing for a bill legalizing same-sex marriage to be passed in the state legislature. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/24 "2009-05-25T20:10:14Z")
> [@Aesiron](#): > > Being oppressed doesn’t necessarily make one more sympathetic, and from what I understand, black culture in the US is pretty homophobic (and anti-semetic) on the whole. What really pisses me off is that the black community seems to have forgotten how influential the Jewish community was in the enactment of civil rights legislation. During the 50s and 60s (and earlier), there were quite a few Jewish organizations and individuals pushing for racial equality. And they have quite a few gay people to thank as well. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/25 "2009-05-25T20:19:27Z")
> [@Sir\_T-Cups](#): > > Ditto. If the gays in this world are tiring of being oppressed and hated, then why are they saying they don’t want marriage because it will make them normal? Isn’t that what they want? > > Doesn’t “we’re here, we’re queer, get used to it” mean just that, we hare here now get used to it. Allowing them to marry I would assume would be us getting used to it, so then why are they all up in arms over the fact that they are finally getting what they want? Because we don’t all speak with one voice. There’s a tremendous amount of diversity within the GLBT community, and just because most of us want to be considered “mainstream,” it doesn’t invalidate the minority who have a more radical position. It wasn’t that long ago when it was the radical minority who were pushing for marriage rights, and the majority just weren’t there yet. ---
**Author:** ![Swallowed\_My\_Cellphone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@Swallowed\_My\_Cellphone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Swallowed_My_Cellphone)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/26 "2009-05-25T20:41:43Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > I’m just wondering what’s wrong with “the normalization of queer life”? That should be the goal of the gay rights movement, it seems to me. That is exactly the author’s (Warner) point: the goal should be to get the rest of the world to agree that gay relationships _are_ normal, rather than for gays to try to assimilate into a narrowly prescribed interpretation of “normal”. Warner is saying normalization is bad if you restrict “normal” to only _one_ model (in this case, the hetero marriage model). So to be fair, it is a valid theory with implications for everyone. Humans are a diverse lot, so there are all sorts of healthy relationship combinations out there. So if “normal” is too narrowly defined it’s not really great for anybody. I’m not familiar with Sullivan or Warner, but it looks like it was part of some kind of “assimilationist debates”. ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/27 "2009-05-25T20:44:14Z")
This is fascinating, seriously. When I go out next week wearing my “Marriage is So Gay” t-shirt, I expected to only get flack from narrow-minded straights! ---
**Author:** ![Swallowed\_My\_Cellphone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@Swallowed\_My\_Cellphone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Swallowed_My_Cellphone)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/28 "2009-05-25T21:06:47Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > This is fascinating, seriously. When I go out next week wearing my “Marriage is So Gay” t-shirt, I expected to only get flack from narrow-minded straights! :eek: Where can I get one of those??? :: off to Google :: ---
**Author:** ![alexandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e68b1a/32.png) [@alexandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alexandra)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/29 "2009-05-25T21:21:14Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > Because we don’t all speak with one voice. This is ironic, following up your thoughts on what The Black Community thinks of Jews. ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2009, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/30 "2009-05-25T22:03:50Z")
I thought that convential wisdom was blacks don’t like gays and Jews don’t like blacks\*? Never heard of blacks not liking Jews. (\*Anecdotal support: the dad in Maus, “schvoogie buttons” in jewelry stores, etc.) ---
**Author:** ![Erdosain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/erdosain/32/7284_2.png) [@Erdosain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Erdosain)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/31 "2009-05-26T01:09:40Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > I thought that convential wisdom was blacks don’t like gays and Jews don’t like blacks\*? Never heard of blacks not liking Jews. You’ve never seen the SNL skit “Hymietown”? That was like 1984. ---
**Author:** ![DMark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@DMark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMark)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/32 "2009-05-26T01:40:44Z")
Well, you tell me where I fit in: I am 100% for equality. My partner and I have been together for over 28 years and, despite lots of documentation, in the grand scheme of things we are nothing more than roommates with some legal docs. I am not so wild about the institution of marriage. My older brother has been married and divorced 3 times and my younger brother has been married and divorced EIGHT times. Add to that my complete disdain for churches and organized religion, you can well imagine I am in no hurry to rent a tux and play that game. So - I want the legal rights to go to a court house, profess my love, and leave as an official couple - with every iota of the same legal benefits of hetero couples. However, not only do I not care if you call it “marriage”, I would prefer a different name for it anyway. Give me the absolute same legal rights and you can call it any damn thing you want. ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/33 "2009-05-26T01:56:47Z")
> [@Erdosain](#): > > You’ve never seen the SNL skit “Hymietown”? That was like 1984. No, but now that you mention it I remember reading about Jesse Jackson’s “hymietown” comment. I was 3 in 1984 :). ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_T-Cups](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ed655f/32.png) [@Sir\_T-Cups](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_T-Cups)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/34 "2009-05-26T03:03:18Z")
> [@DMark](#): > > Add to that my complete disdain for churches and organized religion When you and others say something to this effect I almost want to say it doesn’t count. Only because your opinion has nothing to do with gay marriage, it has to do with marriage. Therefore your opinion wouldn’t be valid because it’s being against a topic larger than the one at hand. That make sense? ---
**Author:** ![Rodgers01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/35 "2009-05-26T03:51:42Z")
> [@Sir\_T-Cups](#): > > Doesn’t “we’re here, we’re queer, get used to it” mean just that, we hare here now get used to it. Allowing them to marry I would assume would be us getting used to it, so then why are they all up in arms over the fact that they are finally getting what they want? In fairness, I don’t think (?) you can say that the majority of gay people today _are_ “all up in arms about getting what they want”…the article I quoted specifically said that the gay argument against marriage is hard to even reconstruct because the topic has been so radically transformed in the past two decades. Not that I’m at all in touch with gay rights groups’ platforms, but anecdotally, every single gay person I’ve ever discussed the subject with is very much pro-marriage rights. ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/36 "2009-05-26T06:19:29Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > There will always be a Judas in every group, and there will always be people confused by growing up in an environment that is hostile to who they are. So it would surprise me more if there _weren’t_ gays against gay marriage, but I’m sure they are a very very small minority. > > Think about it . . . there are immigrants against immigration, there were blacks against the civil rights movement, there are atheists for Jesus. On my honor, I knew a Jew who legitimately admired Adolf Hitler. How long ago was it Andrew Sullivan called for gay marriage and was denounced as proposing “assimilation?” There was some rather nasty name calling too if I recall. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 11:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/37 "2009-05-26T11:33:45Z")
> [@Eats\_Crayons](#): > > This has been my experience as well. I personally don’t know anyone in my queer social circle who is against gay marriage, but I have heard/read the view that the hetero model isn’t great to begin with (usually due to “women as chattel”), so why would gays want that to begin with. IIRC, kd lang said something along those lines in an interview. She wasn’t anti-gay marriage, but rather was baffled that gays wanted to adopt the hetero system. Is this a parallel to the anti-Cochlear implant crowd in the deaf community? I’m not sure I get it. I don’t agree that government should be in the marriage business either, but if they do it for some, they should do it for all. It should be up to the individual to buy into it or not. ---
**Author:** ![Telcontar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3bc359/32.png) [@Telcontar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telcontar)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/38 "2009-05-26T13:17:49Z")
> [@Rodgers01](#): > > I honestly can’t even wrap my mind around this. I mean…I guess there are always extremists with nutty ideas out there, but even “mainstream” gay-rights groups were against Sullivan on this issue?! Can’t understand it. At all. Any gay dopers who are old enough to remember this period who can confirm or deny that mainstream gay groups were against marriage rights? The gay rights movement of the 70s and 80s was far different from what we know today, much more about challenging sexual boundaries than “we’re just like you.” Randy Shilts’s book on the beginning of the AIDS crisis really drives this home. > **[And the Band Played On](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_the_Band_Played_On)** > > And the Band Played On: Politics, People, and the AIDS Epidemic is a 1987 book by San Francisco Chronicle journalist Randy Shilts. The book chronicles the discovery and spread of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) with a special emphasis on government indifference and political infighting—specifically in the United States—to what was then perceived as a specifically gay disease. Shilts's premise is that AIDS was allowed to happen: while the d... I think most people my age (mid 20s) have forgotten the bathhouse movement. ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/39 "2009-05-26T13:41:48Z")
> [@Swallowed\_My\_Cellphone](#): > > :eek: Where can I get one of those??? > > :: off to Google :: [Happy to help](http://www.marriageissogay.com/)! 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2009, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481/40 "2009-05-26T13:58:46Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > I thought that convential wisdom was blacks don’t like gays and Jews don’t like blacks\*? But during National Brotherhood Week… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-dopers-any-of-you-against-gay-marriage/497481.md?page=3)