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End Marriage
assimilation is still not liberation.
Marriage is Murder:
on the discursive limits of matrimony
So, what is wrong with gay marriage?
In order to answer that question we must first understand what this thing called marriage is. Marriage is essentially a financial and legal contract that allocates the movement of property, power and privilege from one person to another. Historically it has been a way of consolidating family power amongst and between men, through women. In more recent times marriage in the United States has functioned to solidify the American middle class. Marriage does this through concentrating wealth and power through family lines and inheritance (both in terms of money and power). Because of marriage's ability to discipline class structures it is now, and always has been a primary structure of a capitalist economy. In reality most people marry within their own socioeconomic class. Marriage, earlier through miscegenation laws, and currently through racist "values" also contains wealth through racist ideologies of matrimony. Because of these realities there has been a long history of critique of the institution of marriage launched by feminists of color, white feminists, and queer people among others.
What about gay marriage? Isn't gay marriage going to change all of this?
NO. The current push towards gay marriage is, in fact, not going to subvert the systems of domination we all live through. Ironically, the gay marriage movement is standing on these same legacies of brutality for their slice of the wedding cake. Take for example the "Freedom to Marry" stickers created by the freedom to marry organization. Not only are these stickers falsely equating the intervention of the State into ones life (marriage) with "freedom" (when was the last time the State helped you to become more "free"?) they are trying to work this idea through horrifying star-spangled stickers. Instead of critiquing the ways US imperialism has rendered most transgender people, queer people, people or color etc. as expendable through its countless wars here and abroad, the Freedom To Marry stickers simply disguise these histories and reproduce this red-white-and-blue national theme for every married gay and guilt filled liberal to wear with PRIDE.
If straight people can marry, why should gay people not have the same privilege?
What we are calling for is an abolishment of State sanctioned coupling in either the hetero or homo incarnation. We are against any institution that perpetuates the further exploitation of some people for the benefit of others. Why do the fundamental necessities marriage may provide for some (like healthcare) have to be wedded to the State sanctioned ritual of terror known as marriage?
Won`t gay marriage help couples stay together where one person is not a US citizen?
The way immigration is being used by the gay marriage movement is not only un-thought-out but also relies on racist notions of the "white man saving his brown lover". Although it is true that because of the US policies on immigration some lesbian and gay couples may be split, gay marriage does not at all question these systems that allow some people into the country( white) while excluding others (people of color). Where are the gay marriage "activists" when the INS is actively raiding and deporting whole families ?(such as it is currently doing just blocks away from the Castro in San Francisco's Mission District). Also missing from the picture of immigration that gay marriage advocates are painting is the reality that there are queer couples in the US where neither person is a US citizen. How will gay marriage help them stay in the US if that is what they want to do? Gay marriage will not challenge "citizenship" but simply place some bodies within its grasp while holding others out.
I agree with your argument, but isn't gay marriage a step in the right direction?
This liberal model of "progression" is one of the primary ways many of us are ideologically trapped into a reformist way of thinking. To understand how gay marriage, like voting, will never lead to liberation we can look to the histories of many "social justice movements" that only address oppressions on a level of the symptomatic. Gay marriage and voting are symbolic gestures that reinforce structures while claiming to reconfigure them. This scheme will undoubtedly become apparent with "marriage equality" advocates. As they have positioned gay marriage as the last great civil rights battle, will they continue to fight after the Honeymoon?
Won't gay marriage help get health care to more people?
It may help some people get healthcare but for the vast majority of Americans with NO healthcare it will do nothing. And within the rhetoric of the gay marriage movement working towards healthcare for all (people and animals) is nowhere to be found. This argument also relies on the false assumption that one person would already have healthcare.
So if you are against gay marriage then you are allying with the Christian Right and the GOP!
NO. This is amongst the most troubling aspect of this current epidemic of gay marriage. The way the marriage movement is framing any critique of their precious institution is either you are one of us (gay married) or you are one of them (homophobe). This helps to silence the much needed debate and public discourse around such issues. It seems as if everyone has been shamed into submission and subsequent silence by the marriage movement. Even in allegedly "progressive" circles any mention of the implicit links between marriage, misogyny, and racism in the U.S. gets shutdown by a "gay married". Ironically, if you look at the rhetoric of the freedom to marry movement and the Republican Party their similarities are frighteningly apparent. In their ideal world we would all be monogamously coupled, instead of rethinking the practice of "coupling". They want us working our jobs not working towards collective and self-determination, remembering anniversaries not the murder of trans-people, buying wedding rings not smashing capitalism. The vision of the future the republicans and the gay marriage movement has offered will render most of us already in the margins of the picture (trans-people, sex workers, queers of color, HIV positive people, non-monogamous people etc) as the new enemy of the régime of married normalcy they hope to usher in.
on the discursive limits of matrimony
So, what is wrong with gay marriage?
In order to answer that question we must first understand what this thing called marriage is. Marriage is essentially a financial and legal contract that allocates the movement of property, power and privilege from one person to another. Historically it has been a way of consolidating family power amongst and between men, through women. In more recent times marriage in the United States has functioned to solidify the American middle class. Marriage does this through concentrating wealth and power through family lines and inheritance (both in terms of money and power). Because of marriage's ability to discipline class structures it is now, and always has been a primary structure of a capitalist economy. In reality most people marry within their own socioeconomic class. Marriage, earlier through miscegenation laws, and currently through racist "values" also contains wealth through racist ideologies of matrimony. Because of these realities there has been a long history of critique of the institution of marriage launched by feminists of color, white feminists, and queer people among others.
What about gay marriage? Isn't gay marriage going to change all of this?
NO. The current push towards gay marriage is, in fact, not going to subvert the systems of domination we all live through. Ironically, the gay marriage movement is standing on these same legacies of brutality for their slice of the wedding cake. Take for example the "Freedom to Marry" stickers created by the freedom to marry organization. Not only are these stickers falsely equating the intervention of the State into ones life (marriage) with "freedom" (when was the last time the State helped you to become more "free"?) they are trying to work this idea through horrifying star-spangled stickers. Instead of critiquing the ways US imperialism has rendered most transgender people, queer people, people or color etc. as expendable through its countless wars here and abroad, the Freedom To Marry stickers simply disguise these histories and reproduce this red-white-and-blue national theme for every married gay and guilt filled liberal to wear with PRIDE.
If straight people can marry, why should gay people not have the same privilege?
What we are calling for is an abolishment of State sanctioned coupling in either the hetero or homo incarnation. We are against any institution that perpetuates the further exploitation of some people for the benefit of others. Why do the fundamental necessities marriage may provide for some (like healthcare) have to be wedded to the State sanctioned ritual of terror known as marriage?
Won`t gay marriage help couples stay together where one person is not a US citizen?
The way immigration is being used by the gay marriage movement is not only un-thought-out but also relies on racist notions of the "white man saving his brown lover". Although it is true that because of the US policies on immigration some lesbian and gay couples may be split, gay marriage does not at all question these systems that allow some people into the country( white) while excluding others (people of color). Where are the gay marriage "activists" when the INS is actively raiding and deporting whole families ?(such as it is currently doing just blocks away from the Castro in San Francisco's Mission District). Also missing from the picture of immigration that gay marriage advocates are painting is the reality that there are queer couples in the US where neither person is a US citizen. How will gay marriage help them stay in the US if that is what they want to do? Gay marriage will not challenge "citizenship" but simply place some bodies within its grasp while holding others out.
I agree with your argument, but isn't gay marriage a step in the right direction?
This liberal model of "progression" is one of the primary ways many of us are ideologically trapped into a reformist way of thinking. To understand how gay marriage, like voting, will never lead to liberation we can look to the histories of many "social justice movements" that only address oppressions on a level of the symptomatic. Gay marriage and voting are symbolic gestures that reinforce structures while claiming to reconfigure them. This scheme will undoubtedly become apparent with "marriage equality" advocates. As they have positioned gay marriage as the last great civil rights battle, will they continue to fight after the Honeymoon?
Won't gay marriage help get health care to more people?
It may help some people get healthcare but for the vast majority of Americans with NO healthcare it will do nothing. And within the rhetoric of the gay marriage movement working towards healthcare for all (people and animals) is nowhere to be found. This argument also relies on the false assumption that one person would already have healthcare.
So if you are against gay marriage then you are allying with the Christian Right and the GOP!
NO. This is amongst the most troubling aspect of this current epidemic of gay marriage. The way the marriage movement is framing any critique of their precious institution is either you are one of us (gay married) or you are one of them (homophobe). This helps to silence the much needed debate and public discourse around such issues. It seems as if everyone has been shamed into submission and subsequent silence by the marriage movement. Even in allegedly "progressive" circles any mention of the implicit links between marriage, misogyny, and racism in the U.S. gets shutdown by a "gay married". Ironically, if you look at the rhetoric of the freedom to marry movement and the Republican Party their similarities are frighteningly apparent. In their ideal world we would all be monogamously coupled, instead of rethinking the practice of "coupling". They want us working our jobs not working towards collective and self-determination, remembering anniversaries not the murder of trans-people, buying wedding rings not smashing capitalism. The vision of the future the republicans and the gay marriage movement has offered will render most of us already in the margins of the picture (trans-people, sex workers, queers of color, HIV positive people, non-monogamous people etc) as the new enemy of the régime of married normalcy they hope to usher in.
For more information:
http://www.gayshamesf.org
Add Your Comments
Comments
(Hide Comments)
will be to get govt out of marriage business altogether .
i don't agree w/ a lot of this manifesto (particularly the blanket "white lover saves brown lover from deportation" bullshit), but i like more of it than the tenor over at "join the impact". i'm stoked that loads of mainstream queers are riled up, but not sure that i can get in on that action.
when it comes down to it, i'd rather see marriage disappear than assimilate into that paradigm. but i also see this moment as important for taking advantage of queer agitation. all these people are getting out into the street to yell about gay rights, and not just about marriage, though prop8 was obviously the catalyst. there's no denying that lots of people want to enter into marriage contracts. i'm not one to tell them that they cannot, which to me is an infringement on the liberty of those peops (yes, the liberty to give your liberty up to a tired system like marriage).
still i don't think i can "join the impact", even to yell about queer rights beyond marriage. missives telling me that "cops are there to protect" me kinda make me ill. and the emphasis on permits and taking the "moral high ground" is wack. i thought we were contesting the application of the majority's morality on the minority. people talking about needing bathrooms ... yes, let's not protest until we have some infrastructure in place!
marriage isn't really my fight (they don't really want me there saying that all marriage rights should be taken out of the state's control) and yet, i'm interested in how it turns out.
when it comes down to it, i'd rather see marriage disappear than assimilate into that paradigm. but i also see this moment as important for taking advantage of queer agitation. all these people are getting out into the street to yell about gay rights, and not just about marriage, though prop8 was obviously the catalyst. there's no denying that lots of people want to enter into marriage contracts. i'm not one to tell them that they cannot, which to me is an infringement on the liberty of those peops (yes, the liberty to give your liberty up to a tired system like marriage).
still i don't think i can "join the impact", even to yell about queer rights beyond marriage. missives telling me that "cops are there to protect" me kinda make me ill. and the emphasis on permits and taking the "moral high ground" is wack. i thought we were contesting the application of the majority's morality on the minority. people talking about needing bathrooms ... yes, let's not protest until we have some infrastructure in place!
marriage isn't really my fight (they don't really want me there saying that all marriage rights should be taken out of the state's control) and yet, i'm interested in how it turns out.
Last time i checked human beings were considered warm blooded mammals, unless some of us have sprouted feathers..
Birds (eagles, owls, jays, etc..) are usually monogamous and mate for life, while mammals (deer, elk, lions, etc..) are not monogamous and frequently switch off to different partners every year or so. Of course there are exceptions to both of these statements, though generally speaking that is the case..
Since humans have evolved as mammals, we should try to follow the natural behavior patterns of our fellow mammals, instead of trying to mimic birds by getting married and mating for life. Not that most people stay married for life anyway, though birds haven't the resources to hire attorneys when they want a divorce..
From a social perspective, asking the government permission or getting rewards from the government for being married doesn't sound like such a good idea either, neither does requiring a religious authority (licensed by the government) to grant a couple of any sexual orientation permission to be married..
If i personally wanted to, i could bring any gay or straight couple out into the forest, desert or other wilderness area and perform a marriage ceremony as an unspecified Pagan practitioner, and it would be a union recognized by only those of us present and the animals watching, though the government and society in general would not officially recognize this union as binding or legal..
So what is the point? Why bother trying to gain membership to the marriage club when it isn't in anyone's best interest anyway? This is another example of the dog-chasing-tail scenario where the gay community tries to play along with the dominant system of capitalism and now religion (NOT spirituality, which accepts universal love and cannot define "god" or mix the government/legal system with personal spiritual belief systems)..
Another libertarian perspective is that the government should stay out of people's personal lives, and this includes marriage, sexual orientation and religion..
Ron Paul spoke about this, and the corporate media painted him as a "homophobe" be cause he said, "No, i do not support gay marriage, though i do not support straight marriage either." or something to that effect. They cut the last part of what he said off and made him into an opponent of gay marriage, when all that he meant was that people should not be obligated to get permission from the government about whom they want to be with..
If it is just about getting benefits from marriage, than this inequality would best be eliminated by getting rid of benefits for married couples alltogether, thus keeping married and non-married people on an equal playing field..
There are other folks out there who cannot get married because of disability, economics or other personal reasons, and the benefits for married people creates an imbalance against these people also..
Marriage should be like buying a fancy cake, it is nice and fun and sweet, though nobody would ask the government for additional benefits because they bought a fancy cake. Just eat your fancy cake inside of your nice house, and leave the government (and everyone else) out of it!!
Birds (eagles, owls, jays, etc..) are usually monogamous and mate for life, while mammals (deer, elk, lions, etc..) are not monogamous and frequently switch off to different partners every year or so. Of course there are exceptions to both of these statements, though generally speaking that is the case..
Since humans have evolved as mammals, we should try to follow the natural behavior patterns of our fellow mammals, instead of trying to mimic birds by getting married and mating for life. Not that most people stay married for life anyway, though birds haven't the resources to hire attorneys when they want a divorce..
From a social perspective, asking the government permission or getting rewards from the government for being married doesn't sound like such a good idea either, neither does requiring a religious authority (licensed by the government) to grant a couple of any sexual orientation permission to be married..
If i personally wanted to, i could bring any gay or straight couple out into the forest, desert or other wilderness area and perform a marriage ceremony as an unspecified Pagan practitioner, and it would be a union recognized by only those of us present and the animals watching, though the government and society in general would not officially recognize this union as binding or legal..
So what is the point? Why bother trying to gain membership to the marriage club when it isn't in anyone's best interest anyway? This is another example of the dog-chasing-tail scenario where the gay community tries to play along with the dominant system of capitalism and now religion (NOT spirituality, which accepts universal love and cannot define "god" or mix the government/legal system with personal spiritual belief systems)..
Another libertarian perspective is that the government should stay out of people's personal lives, and this includes marriage, sexual orientation and religion..
Ron Paul spoke about this, and the corporate media painted him as a "homophobe" be cause he said, "No, i do not support gay marriage, though i do not support straight marriage either." or something to that effect. They cut the last part of what he said off and made him into an opponent of gay marriage, when all that he meant was that people should not be obligated to get permission from the government about whom they want to be with..
If it is just about getting benefits from marriage, than this inequality would best be eliminated by getting rid of benefits for married couples alltogether, thus keeping married and non-married people on an equal playing field..
There are other folks out there who cannot get married because of disability, economics or other personal reasons, and the benefits for married people creates an imbalance against these people also..
Marriage should be like buying a fancy cake, it is nice and fun and sweet, though nobody would ask the government for additional benefits because they bought a fancy cake. Just eat your fancy cake inside of your nice house, and leave the government (and everyone else) out of it!!
The relative sizes of male testes often reflect mating systems. [11] [12] [13] [14] In species with promiscuous mating systems, where many males mate with many females, the testes tend to be relatively large. This appears to be the result of sperm competition. Males with large testes produce more sperm and thereby gain an advantage impregnating females. In polygynous species, where one male controls sexual access to females, the testes tend to be small. One male defends exclusive sexual access to a group of females and thereby eliminates sperm competition.
Studies of primates, including humans, support the relationship between testis size and mating system. [13] [14] [15] Chimpanzees, which have a promiscuous mating system, have large testes compared to other primates. Gorillas, which have a polygynous mating system, have smaller testes than other primates. Humans, which have a socially monogamous mating system, accompanied by moderate amounts of sexual non-monogamy (see incidence of monogamy), have moderately sized testes. The moderate amounts of sexual non-monogamy in humans may result in a low to moderate amount of sperm competition. Also, notably, in the case of an avowedly sexually monogamous society, the occurrence of sexual nonmonogamy is typically culturally stigmatized, and therefore detecting its prevalence is inherently difficult, if indeed it is at all possible. At best, such statistics can be viewed as general approximations with a wide margin of error.
Although testis size in humans is consistent with the modern pattern of social monogamy accompanied by moderate sexual non-monogamy, this fact reveals little about when the modern pattern evolved. Did Homo Erectus have testes similar in size to modern humans? What about Australopithecus? It is not possible to measure the size of testes in the fossil remains of human ancestors. This limits the usefulness of testis size in understanding the evolution of monogamy in humans.
Studies of primates, including humans, support the relationship between testis size and mating system. [13] [14] [15] Chimpanzees, which have a promiscuous mating system, have large testes compared to other primates. Gorillas, which have a polygynous mating system, have smaller testes than other primates. Humans, which have a socially monogamous mating system, accompanied by moderate amounts of sexual non-monogamy (see incidence of monogamy), have moderately sized testes. The moderate amounts of sexual non-monogamy in humans may result in a low to moderate amount of sperm competition. Also, notably, in the case of an avowedly sexually monogamous society, the occurrence of sexual nonmonogamy is typically culturally stigmatized, and therefore detecting its prevalence is inherently difficult, if indeed it is at all possible. At best, such statistics can be viewed as general approximations with a wide margin of error.
Although testis size in humans is consistent with the modern pattern of social monogamy accompanied by moderate sexual non-monogamy, this fact reveals little about when the modern pattern evolved. Did Homo Erectus have testes similar in size to modern humans? What about Australopithecus? It is not possible to measure the size of testes in the fossil remains of human ancestors. This limits the usefulness of testis size in understanding the evolution of monogamy in humans.
For more information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_...
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