As I was looking through my files in preparation for my presentation tomorrow, I chanced across a book review I wrote nearly eight years ago. As it remains timely, reflecting some of the ideas on gay marriage I have expressed on this blog while it summarizes what I believed needed be said then — and still needs to be said now — in the marriage debate, I share it with you (in slightly revised form).
In the debate on gay marriage, I often fault many of my friends and associates for spending too much time in pursuing the legal “right” to marry, that is, using the courts or legislatures to gain state recognition for gay and lesbian unions. I have countered that marriage is primarily a social institution and that we must first establish marriage as a gay social norm. After all, the traditional concept of marriage, one man to one woman, evolved as a social and religious institution long before it was recognized by the state.
As I struggled in my teens and twenties with my own longings for affection and intimacy, I read whatever I could discover in the mainstream press on homosexuality and, when I could muster the courage, bought gay books and periodicals. Whatever I read, I found few images which corresponded to the love I felt deep in my own heart: for a tender and intimate monogamous relationship with another man that, to paraphrase the great Oscar Hammerstein, would last everyday of my life for as long as I live.
Since coming out, I have discovered that the gay norm is far closer to my own expectations than what I had been reading. But, even today, there still seems to be a dichotomy between gay culture as it actually exists and gay culture as it is portrayed in the media, both in the articles written about us and in the articles, essays, stories and novels that we write about ourselves. If we really want gay marriage, then we must present our lives as they are lived: of men and women seeking same-gender intimate, long-term relationships.
With his book, Together Forever: Gay and Lesbian Marriage, Eric Marcus has taken a necessary step in the right direction. He interviewed forty “self-described happy couples who have been together for at least nine years,” twenty male and twenty female. Some couples have been together for as long as fifty years and they hail from fourteen states, ranging in age from thirty-one to eighty-six. He noted that when he began the project some of his gay and lesbian contemporaries cynically suggested that it would be a short book.
Even at 350 pages, it is still not long enough to fully consider the lives and relationships of the couples he interviewed.
Instead of giving each couple its own chapter, Marcus has edited selections from each conversation into twenty chapters, each on a different issue facing relationships. He addresses such topics as meeting, courtship, children, intimacy, sex, family and monogamy. One topic missing from the book is religion.
He provides a short introduction to each chapter, then lets the couples speak for themselves, providing appropriate selections from interviews he conducted in their homes, interspersing the dialogues with descriptions of the couple’s household and his own commentary. Sometimes, this commentary sounds like politically correct mumbo-jumbo and feel-good pop psychology. Other times, he offers incisive observations about the state of our cultural expectations and the reality of gay and lesbian lives.
This is particularly true in Chapter Four, “Monogamy/Nonmonogamy,” which, if the book’s purpose is to further the debate on gay marriage, is its most important. He was struck at the “seemingly one-sided numbers,” that most of the couples had chosen monogamous relationships. All twenty female couples were in monogamous relationships and only three (out of twenty) of the male couples were nonmonogamous. (Three of the other male couples had, at one point, been nonmonogamous.) Not only is that number significant in proving that gay men and lesbians are as capable of fidelity as our straight counterparts, but some of the comments the couples offer show also how natural that monogamy is.
For several couples, the monogamy agreement was “understood” or “unspoken,” with one man noting, “the assumption from early on was that our relationship was closed. We just never said anything.” While, for others, “their political/ideological beliefs had led them to think they wanted nonmonogamous arrangements==only to find that in practice, their emotions conflicted with their politics.” After his boyfriend had an affair, one man spelled out new rules for the relationship, observing, “I know the way my psyche works.”
In the chapter on sex, the book considers how sex changes during relationships. Marcus observes, “sex becomes less central to the relationship, less frequent though more intimate,” thus making the important point that our relationships are not just about sexual desire and fulfillment.
He also describes some powerful moments. One woman in a fifty-year relationship flushed and began sobbing when asked how she knew her partner loved her. Later, her partner observed, “If there’s real communication, you become part of each other. This goes for heterosexuals as well as homosexuals. And the loss of one means the loss of life for the other.”
As Marcus summarized in his concluding chapter, “What is a Happy Relationship?” “It’s the comfort of knowing that you’re not alone, that you have someone you love and who loves you, someone with whom you can share the joys and sorrows of life and celebrate the milestones.”
In short, gay relationships are quite similar to straight relationships. And it is in presenting this truth that the book becomes an important resource.
To be sure, there is some silly language in the book, but that does not obscure its overall strength.
By taking the time to interview forty couples, to ask intelligent questions, to listen and then to edit and arrange the couple’s remarks in an easily accessible manner, Marcus has let them speak for themselves and to our community. Not only that, they can speak to the straight world as well.
There is much to recommend in this book. WIth short chapters, the book is perfect summer reading, easy to set down and pick up again. It’s not only a good read, it’s also an important book. It shows that gay men and lesbians are capable of committed, intimate, monogamous relationships and thus becomes essential to the ongoing debate on gay marriage.
I think you are right, This perspective on the loving and deeply committed relationships that gays as well as straights can cherish is not one that is portrayed, not part of the societal image the way Will and Grace is.
I thought about that, and I wondered if maybe that is part of the problem that some conservatives have with the idea of gay marriage. I have wondered why so many people are convinced gay marriage will threaten marriage as an institution, because I haven’t found their arguments very convincing. But maybe in the absence of the touching sentiments you describe being a part of our popular culture, people fear that gay couples will marry mainly as a political statement or as a means to promote social acceptance, and thus cheapen marriage by making it a mere badge as opposed to being about the other person.
That argument probably isn’t new to you, but it was kind of a-ha moment for me, because I’ve never really gotten what the hell all the concern was about on the “threat to marriage” part of the debate. Does different have to mean bad? Actually, I don’t get most of the conservative/Christian arguments against gay marriage are coming from, which is somewhat disheartening to me as a member of both.
I hope that you are right, and that books like this will go a ways toward helping people see the human, rather than political side of the whole mess.
Personally, in this age with so many people just co-habiting instead of wedding, and certain celebrities role-modeling marriages that last as long as their latest fashion statement, I think we should be glad that some people are still taking marriage seriously. I’m glad some people still care very much about wanting to get married. And I think that conservatives are fighting the wrong battle by defending marriage from those who it means a lot to, rather than focusing on the attitude among some others of having given up on it and its ideals.
I wouldn’t doubt that homosexuals are just as capable of upholding and cherishing those ideals as my fiance and I are. But perhaps that isn’t as widespread opinion as it could be.
But, even today, there still seems to be a dichotomy between gay culture as it actually exists and gay culture as it is portrayed in the media…
Speaking to my own experience, I was very disillusioned when I explored the gay community and discovered the realitywas a lot closer to the “offensive stereotypes,” than it was to the AfterSchool Special/entertainment version of homosexuality I had grown up with; where gay guys were indistinguishable from straight guys except for their sexual orientation. The lack of commitment to commitment was just one of the aspects of gayness where the difference between what really was and what was supposed to be was disillusioning to me.
V the K, I wrote this piece before I moved to LA where I have seen what you call a “lack of commitment to commitment.” What has struck me is the advocates of gay marriage who see commitment as a choice and don’t seem to understand that marriage requires such a commitment. I still see a reality which corresponds to what I had witnessed in Washington, but not nearly as widespread as I once hoped it was.
I will have more to say on this anon.
What has struck me is the advocates of gay marriage who see commitment as a choice and don’t seem to understand that marriage requires such a commitment.
Gay marriage advocates tend to treat marriage like a pinata full of social benefits and privileges that they want convenient access to. Unfortunately, many heterosexuals treat it the same way, which is how I think we got to the place where we are now. I honestly wonder if gays would even be interested in marriage rights if there were still an expectation of life-long, monogamous commitment.
V, don’t have the time now, but will note that I have sketched out a post on the two conversations on marriage going on now in America, one begun by social conservatives (and a tiny handful of gay-marriage advocates, notably Jonathan Rauch) on the values of the institution and the other by most advocates of gay marriage on the necessity of granting the institution’s political benefits to same-sex couples. It’s too bad (especially given the general seriousness of their conversation) that many in the former camp can’t understand that same-sex couples are capable of assuming marriage’s responsibilities while all too many in the latter camp don’t all too readily exclude the points of those in the former camp.
More on this anon (I hope.)
#5 — I don’t think it’s even a question of whether gay couples are capable of commitment. Obviously, some are. It’s more a question of whether gay culture supports commitment. That’s a murkier issue. The PR line is that gay people want commitment the same as heterosexuals. The reality often seems to be that sexual gratification is more revered in gay culture than commitment and stability.
I agreee, V in #6 that gay culture does not, by and large, support commitment.
Why are you personifying gay culture and treating it as if it was some monolithic entity that dictates the way all gay people have to live? And, for that matter, why do all gay people need to behave in exactly the same way? The “gay community” is as diverse as this entire country.
This blog depresses me, having to witness so much self-hatred from gay people.
Um, Peter, where’s the self-hatred?
Unfortunately, many heterosexuals treat it the same way, which is how I think we got to the place where we are now.
This is true-while “no fault divorce” may have been a good idea on one level, it has in reality I think made marriage something less than a life long committment. I am still bothered by a comment from a heterosexual friend getting married about 15 years ago-she said “yeah, we are getting married, but if it doesn’t work out we can always just get a divorce” I remember thinking how solid a marriage could it be, if she is already thinking about divorce.
Marriage isn’t something you just try out, to see if things work out.
I sometimes wonder if the real solution to gay marriage isn’t some sort of civil marriage that is made easily, and gotten rid of easily for both homosexual and heterosexual couples, and some kind of super marriage for all couples where divorce isn’t easy and some level of fault has to be proved by one of the parties. Of course I doubt this would happen-but it just seems like too many people out there view marriage as something easily tossed aside, and not the life long committment it should be.
God knows that Peter is right in feeling that this blog is often depressing, but I still think some truth and good advice for all gay people occasionally seeps through here, as with the blogger’s comment that “marriage is primarily a social institution and that we must first establish marriage as a gay social norm”. Agree with that 100%. But also think that will take longer to accomplish than the roughly two decades of open self-examination by gay people that we’ve had so far. Patience sweeties.
The interesting thing, Peter, is that you answered your own question.
Why are you personifying gay culture and treating it as if it was some monolithic entity that dictates the way all gay people have to live?
Because these are the kind of statements we regularly hear.
This blog depresses me, having to witness so much self-hatred from gay people.
It’s interesting that you pay lip service to how diverse the gay community is, but then blast as “self-hating” those who criticize aspects of it.
Thus, you ARE dictating to us how we have to live — and verbally abusing those who don’t comply.
I sometimes wonder if the real solution to gay marriage isn’t some sort of civil marriage that is made easily, and gotten rid of easily for both homosexual and heterosexual couples, and some kind of super marriage for all couples where divorce isn’t easy and some level of fault has to be proved by one of the parties.
Funny you should mention that.
I’ve always liked the idea of covenant marriage. I wish Virginia was a covenant marriage state- it’s come close a couple times but not quite. Unfortunately, CM hasn’t exactly taken off. In the 3 states where it’s been tried, less than 3% of couples have signed on to it. Explanations range from uncooperative marriage license clerks to the skeptical reaction by the major churches.
#14 — True faith is a narrow and difficult path. As someone once said of Christianity, it’s not so much that it’s been tried and found wanting as it has been found difficult and left untried. It may also be true of CM.
Why are you personifying gay culture and treating it as if it was some monolithic entity that dictates the way all gay people have to live?
Actually, to an extent, it does do exactly that. Gay culture is very narrow-minded and oppressive. Try being an openly conservative Christian and see how well you’re accepted into gay culture. Actually, you don’t even have to go that far. I remember in college people being sneered at for wearing the wrong clothes, or even being too “straght-acting.”
I remember in college people being sneered at for wearing the wrong clothes, or even being too “straght-acting.”
This is an interesting comment, one that might make for an interesting post all its own.
But I have long thought that there were two groups that are expected to fully toe the DNC/liberal party line, or be considered traitors of some sort to their group. African Americans and gays. Just about any other group is permitted to fall anywhere on the political spectrum they want without censure for betraying their group identity. They may be attacked for their political positions, but not because those positions somehow “betray” the groups they identify with.
…and some kind of super marriage for all couples where divorce isn’t easy and some level of fault has to be proved by one of the parties….
This has been proposed in some of the red states (anti-gay, of course)–which are supposedly “fam’ly friendly,” but whose divorce rates far exceed some of the blue states. They call it “covenant marriage.” I haven’t read that it has been signed into law yet, though, in any of those red states, so I guess they will continue to have relatively high divorce rates.
Whereas in the blue states, couples never bother to get married in the first place. They just shack up until the one or the other loses interest. Hm, no wonder they’re more receptive to gay “marriage.”
True, you have to be careful about measuring divorce rates in a time when cohabitation is so common because more marriage = more divorce. To answer Raj’s non-question, though, it has been signed into law in three states: Louisiana first, then Arizona and Arkansas. Red, yes, but actually not among the reddest.
#20 — The other part of the equation is that divorce rates tend to be skewed by a relatively small number of people who engage in serial marriages. The percentage of couples who marry and stay together is actually much higher.
#19 V the K — April 13, 2006 @ 7:10 pm – April 13, 2006
Incorrect–no surprise. Several years ago, I did an analysis of marriage and divorce statistics that I found on the internet that showed that in Massachusetts, for example, the rate of marriage (that is, the percentage of people who are married) among marriage-eligible people was significantly higher than in the South, but the rate of divorces was significantly lower. In the latter, I am not referring to the phony 50% figure, but instead the percentage of people who had been married, but subsequently divorced.
Some have opined that the relatively high divorce rate in the South was in part due to the “abstinence before marriage” silliness, which encourages people to get married before they have finished education or become financially stable.
#20 Amber — April 13, 2006 @ 11:13 pm – April 13, 2006
Thank you for the information regarding “covenant marriage.” When I first read about it, it was in the context of Oklahoma, not any of the states that you mentioned. This was several years ago and the governor of OK was alarmed at that state’s high divorce rate. Apparently, the OK governor was not able to get “covenant marriage” instituted in OK.
Two questions. One, is there any statistic regarding the percentage of “covenant marriages” vs. regular marriages in the three states that you mentioned?
Two, what is does “covenant marriage” in those three states really mean? From what I have read, “covenant marriage” can mean anything from just premarital counselling, up to reinstituting a fault requirement for divorce.
Actually, a third question. Are there any statistics regarding (a) the ages at which the parties to a covenant marriage are married (the reason for this question is that there is some evidence that people who marry for the first time in their 20s and early 30s tend to stay married) and (b) divorce rates among parties to a covenant marriage?
#22 — So, basically, you did an analysis and got the result you wanted. How very objective.
And note that he didn’t specify what type of analysis he did — though I’m quite sure he wouldn’t be capable of doing anything beyond calculating simple means, which isn’t an analysis of any kind.
He’d better either make the data and analysis available, or shut up.
raj also has a history of disingenuousness and weaseling, so it’s wise to approach anything he asserts as ‘fact’ with an extreme degree of skepticism.
## 25 & 25.
Do your own research and prove me wrong. Nobody else around here cites to sources, and I’m not going to go through the bother of doing so, either.
Actually, raj, I’ve done an analysis of your comments on this forum and the statistical breakdown is approximately 45% bullshit and 55% attempts to weasel away from previous bullshit. Plus or minus 3%.
You claimed to have done research. Well, then put up or shut up. Let’s see the data and analysis.
I see that when challenged to put up or shut up, raj has once again scuttled back under the refrigerator.
The only way to do a meaningful statistical analysis on such data is to aggregate the data by county, not state, and look at the proportion of divorces to marriages and the proportion of married to unmarried households. Anything else will tell you nothing.
That’s stats 101.
The fact that 40 couples chosen for a book with that title claim mainly to be monogamous means nothing. The book is controversiaL, as is the earlier “Man to Man,” which came to just the opposite conclusion.
Marcus’ book proves that gay people who want to live in long-term monogamous relationships can do so. Big surprise. It does not prove that most long-term gay relationships are monogamous.
It ought to be pretty easy to figure that if sex becomes secondary in the average long=-term relationship, monogamy itself can also become less important. It also undergoes some pretty bizarre redefinitions as countless studies have shown.
Also, I find the assumption that long-term heterosexual marriages are always monogamous quite naive too. Many couples develop a don’t ask-don’t tell policy, as many gay men do, and stilll call themselves monogamous.
The whohle business of predicating the right to marry on the observance of particular standards of sexual behavior is silly. Let the churches do that. The state’s business should have nothing to do with that.
Ihope you will give the precious high school students some of Michael Warner’s cotnrary opinions in his book “The Trouble with Normal,” a fascinating reply to ASullivan’s agenda-setting “Virtually Normal.”
#30 V the K — April 15, 2006 @ 11:42 am – April 15, 2006
I see that when challenged to put up or shut up, raj has once again scuttled back under the refrigerator.
You do? That’s nice. Let’s see:
(Continued from #33)
See also Walking the walk on family values:
and Sullivan himself NORWEGIAN DEATH-MATCH
I don’t know where Sullivan got his figures comparing the percentage of persons who were unmarried in MA vs. Texas, but I do know where he got the divorce rate: the Statistical Abstract of the United States, published by the US government. A handy chart is available at Divorce Rates by State, 1990–2001 although the most recent official Statistical Abstract is available at Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2006. You would have to go to the last page.
Regarding the Sullivan’s percentage of persons unmarried in MA vs. TX, I would presume that they were accurate, in large part because Kurtz did not contest them. Kurtz was correct that Catholics are less likely to divorce than Protestants, as was attested to by the Barna Group’s study released in 2004: Born Again Christians Just As Likely to Divorce As Are Non-Christians.
Next question? And recognize that some of us have other things to do than to respond to little jibes on an obscure web site 24/7.
The link for the blockquote in #33 is Want to stay married?: Move to Massachusetts
#31 rightwingprof — April 15, 2006 @ 7:13 pm – April 15, 2006
The only way to do a meaningful statistical analysis on such data is to aggregate the data by county, not state…
This is a joke, right? To do a bit of reductio ad absurdum, one might just as well argue that the only meaningful way to do a statistical analysis is to do it on an individual basis, on a block basis (correcting, of course, for block size), on a street basis (correcting, of course, for street length), on a town or city basis (correcting, of course, for town or city size), or on whatever bases you wish to choose. Why limit it to a county basis?
Statistics 101? Not hardly.
Now, given the fact that numbers are accumulated on a state basis, it strikes me that your assertion that the only way to do a meaningful statistical analysis on such data is to aggregate the data by county is a bit silly.
… and what are the relative populations of Massachusetts and Texas?
Perhaps even more importantly: what is the population distribution by age group in each state?
It’s easy to lie with statistics.
It’s even easier to use any number of tangential points to move the conversation away from the most salient point:
The gay “community” is overwhelmingly not about committed long-term relationships.
– even though this is a basic survival strategy for most (embattled) minorities.
– even though the gay rights movement came of age as Western legal and social systems normalized non-marital committed relationships.
– even though many gays swear up and down that they want – and yearn for – just such a relationship.
For many of us looking on at the spectacle of gay “communities” whose public “institutions” consist of baths and bars – this contradiction between stated desire and actual behavior (and the immature, exploitative, and repulsive nature of the behavior itself) confirms our opinion that homosexuality is dysfunctional and not a normal, healthy variant of mature adult sexuality.
Maybe I am naive, but I am inclined to believe that gay couples are not against monogamy. It is my belief that certain couples stray from monogamy because the participants are too young to understand what it means to be in a committed relationship (no different than a non-gay couple) and two because these relationships were for so long not seen as being legitimate the participants never treated them as being real. Oddly enough, I think the former is seen more in females and the latter in males. Now, I just need some gps to test my hypothesis.
#37 Ben-David — April 16, 2006 @ 11:50 am – April 16, 2006
It’s easy to lie with statistics.
Yes, it is. Now, present evidence that the statistics that I have presented are a lie.
The gay “community” is overwhelmingly not about committed long-term relationships.
Your evidence for this being–what? Statistics? If so, present them.
The data on gay promiscuity are consistent across several decades of studies.
The most (in)famous is the McWhirther/Mattison study of “The Male Couple” in which all the couples that lasted beyond 5 years had a tacit or explicit provision for sexual activity outside the relationship.
McWhirter and Mattison – themselves gay – simply rewrote the definition of “committment”, arguing that fidelity should be defined emotionally for GLBT couples, rather than in terms of actual sexual fidelity.
Upon this spurious basis entire mountains of pro-gay propaganda have been built. Subsequent surveys of homosexual couples blithely refer to McWhirter and Mattison in discussing their data, which lets them paint an artificially rosy picture of gay relationships that only knowledgable researchers can debunk.
The McWhirter study – and a more recent one from Amsterdam that confirms the persistence of promiscuous behavior AFTER marriage is available to gays – is nicely summarized here.
Large-scale studies in the mid 1970s revealed that:
75 percent of gay men admitted they’d had sex with more than 100 different males in their lifetime
15 percent claimed 100-249 sex partners
17 percent claimed 250- 499
15 percent claimed 500-999
28 percent claimed more than 1,000 lifetime male sex partners.
“By 1984, after the AIDS epidemic had taken hold, homosexual men were reportedly curtailing promiscuity, but not by much. Instead of more than 6 partners per month in 1982, the average non-monogamous respondent in San Francisco reported having about 4 partners per month in 1984.”
These and other studies are summarized with citations to the journal articles in this page written by a doctor.
(Prediction: now that I’ve provided the requested link to actual research, people will try to wiggle out of the facts by segueing into ad-hominem attacks. Yes, that last link goes to a Catholic website – but the long list of citations point to referreed professional medical journals.)
Some of the larger studies were conducted by GMHC and other organizations, so their provenance is unassailable.
So there is a continuum of data from the mid-70s to present-day, swinging Europe that confirm the centrality of promiscuous sexual liasons to homosexual “lifestyle”.
This is obvious to anyone who lives near enough to a “flourishing gay community” to see what businesses and institutions it is structured around.