Loving v. Virginia 40 years later
Tomorrow marks the 40th Anniversary of the Loving v. Virginia decision in which SCOTUS struck down all laws in the United States banning interracial marriage. On the one hand I find it amazing that it’s only been such a short time, just 2 years before I was born, since it used to be against the law in many states for interracial couples to marry. On the other hand, while Loving isn’t the best argument for same-sex marriage it is an example of discrimination against a group of people once upheld by the law and in a very short period of time such bigotry is now strongly condemned. This is why I said that it amazes me to think that this ruling is only 40 years old: I grew up in the post-Loving era when the very idea of anti-miscenegation laws was unthinkable and believed to be immoral.
The irony here is that today we see opponents of same-sex marriage from the extreme Right, like La Shawn Barber, use similiar arguments once made against interracial marriages. The most often-used one is that of a slippery slope, i.e. that if same-sex marriage is allowed “polygamy, polyandry, combinations thereof, legal incest, etc.” will soon follow. Many honestly believe this though I myself find this to be a fallacious device to prop up bigotry. I rather like how The Interocitor responded to all this back in 2003:
Gay people are wired differently than straights. Some very large percentage of gays (possibly all) cannot pursue happiness under a heterosexual mandate. They must seek their relationships among their own gender. To deny gay people the right to seek this happiness, by barring them from the most basic of human institutions (one that predates agriculture) constitutes a discrimination that approaches that of Dred Scott. Even the laws against interracial marriage (voided 35 years ago in Loving vs Virginia) did not present this fundamental issue. One *could* find happiness with another, unjust as the laws were. But a gay person denied the legal right to marry the whole class of persons to whom they are attracted is utterly denied this basic human bond.
Andrew Sullivan likens interracial marriage to the present issue. He’s wrong. No one needs, biologically, to marry a person of a different race — there are alternatives. That restriction is wrong on other grounds, notably no-good-reason. Polygamy, incest, etc are also devoid of this biological need — these are simply wants, and there are very good reasons to bar these unions. While a truly bisexual person may want to marry “one of each”, they can marry one or the other, or remain single, as they choose. All married people struggle at times with monogamy — this is simply a difference in degree, not in kind. Pedophilia and bestiality do not apply to marriage, for reasons of consent and permanence. If your “bright line” is biological need without alternative, there is no slippery slope with respect to gay marriage.
Yet still this argument is pursued with a vengeance by the extreme Right, with the related “defense of traditional marriage”. The reasoning behind this is very much based on religious beliefs more than anything else in that homosexuality is considered to be sinful and that people freely choose to be gay. One sees that in such posts as this from Dean Esmay‘s blog:
I’m not going to feel sorry for someone that chose to live as they do.
And if they didn’t choose, if it’s a genetic condition, well, we’ll just fix that with gene therapy.
Sexual prefrence is not the same as race. No matter how tightly you close your eyes, click your heels, and hope otherwise.
The condescending attitude couldn’t be clearer. The problem for this blogger and all those on the extreme Right is that whether they realize it or not, in the long run they are fighting a losing battle. The laws and state amendments banning same-sex marriage they’ve managed to get into place over the past couple of years are Phyrric victories that will do nothing to end the fight for equal rights. Posterity will judge them very harshly for these comments and their general attitude against gays. The abuse of religion to cloak bigotry and asinine slippery slope arguments may delay matters for a generation, but it will not last. Such bigotry rarely does. When the day comes that being gay or straight is not given a second thought, people like Barber and this blogger will be remembered with the Bull Connors of infamy.
(Hat tip: Gay Orbit)
– John (Average Gay Joe)
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John, agree and disagree.
I agree the “slippery slope” argument against gay marriage is a bad one. In law and custom, the institution of marriage is structured as a way for 2 adults, who are unrelated and unattached and freely consenting, to attach themselves to each other. Just as the requirements for marriage have changed over the centuries in terms of allowing different races and different social classes to marry, so they could change in terms of allowing same-gender adults to marry, without rocking the foundations. Whereas polygamy, polyandry, and the rest would be much bigger changes, rocking the foundations. Hence, let’s do one (gay marriage) and NOT the other.
Thus far, I’m preaching to the choir. But the thing is – Gay people contribute to the “slippery slope” argument, by making bad arguments in favor of gay marriage. GPW has posted on this. The constant harping on economic “benefits” of marriage by some advocates (Not you) shows that their understanding of marriage is shallow and unserious.
Even harping on fairness / justice doesn’t really help the gay cause. If the best argument we can make is that we (gays) deserve “benefits” in the name of “fairness” – why wouldn’t polyandrous bisexuals and other groups, as well? The “slippery slope” charge sticks in a lot of people’s minds, partly because of the weakness – the shallowness – of gays’ arguments for gay marriage.
One of marriage’s unspoken purposes is to civilize men and women; to create a situation where they aren’t just living as animals, looking to hook up all the time. Instead, they commit themselves to caring for each other, caring for kids, NOT wrecking other people’s marriages / homes (also known as being monogamous), and so forth. (Men probably need the civilizing influence more than women, but still, women need a little too.)
A strong argument for gay marriage – strong because it shows an understanding of marriage’s fundamental purpose and benefit to society over the centuries, and tends to exclude the slippery slope argument – would be that the time has come to civilize gay men. That is, to expect gay men to settle down and really be monogamous. But many gay men – including not a few prominent marriage advocates – will react to that with, “Perish the thought!”
OK, so we (gays and lesbians) weaken the case by focusing on “benefits” of marriage, rather than responsibilities and taking the yoke seriously. There are a couple other points I disagreed with, in your post.
It’s incorrect, in a purely formal or literal way, to say that gay men cannot pursue happiness under a heterosexual mandate. First, some gay men could marry lesbians. I know this because I’ve met such a pair in my community, who have been together 3 decades and love it (and each other). Second, legal arrangements have always been available (but today more than ever) other than marriage. Show me a gay man or gay couple that cannot be happy unless the rest of society changes and grants gay marriage, and I’ll show you a couple of professional victims.
Well, I’ll change my mind and stop here. That’s enough for now. Long story short, I do support gay marriage… but I think society is right to be skeptical, until and unless we (especially gay men) present much better arguments for it, including our own willingness to give up sex-sex-sex and be civilized. (Which interracial couples did implicitly – along the way to miscegenation laws being struck down.)
Let the flames commence!
(Not you John. Or maybe you. Whatever)
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — June 11, 2007 @ 8:40 pm - June 11, 2007
[...] Original post by Average Gay Joe [...]
Pingback by Politics: 2008 HQ » Blog Archive » Loving v. Virginia 40 years later — June 11, 2007 @ 8:49 pm - June 11, 2007
I’d suggest the owners of this site refrain from posting this author’s posts in the future.
He can get his own blog to spew his anti-Christian bigotry.
Julie the Jarhead
Comment by Julie the Jarhead — June 11, 2007 @ 9:22 pm - June 11, 2007
ILC: I agree with you up until the part about gay men marrying lesbians (or women in general I suppose). Yes one can find happiness and even a measure of contentment, but such is not the same as being with the one you are IN love with. This of course doesn’t necessarily mean marriage for same-sex couples, but some kind of arrangement. I for one would be satisfied with DPs or CUs for now and let the rest come later. I personally found the argument from The Interocitor to be more compelling than much of what I hear today arguing in favor of same-sex marriage. There is a place for such arguments, but they are not as weighty as some may believe.
Julie: Such is the right of Bruce and Dan at any time. Yet I find it remarkable that you’d make such a claim about a post that nowhere even mentions Christianity.
Comment by John — June 11, 2007 @ 10:25 pm - June 11, 2007
I’d suggest the owners of this site refrain from posting this author’s posts in the future.
He can get his own blog to spew his anti-Christian bigotry.
Well, ironically, Julie, he does have his own blog — and it is a great read. I’d ask that you look through it first and then make your decision.
Do I think he’s an anti-Christian bigot? No.
Do I think he’s making a mistake and trying to appeal to them? Yes.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — June 11, 2007 @ 10:58 pm - June 11, 2007
I wish I had more time to respond to this great post–and that is was not so late. There is so much I agree with. And if I do not say something here now, I will not say anything at all as tomorrow’s business day takes my focus.
I have been married and divorced. I also consider myself fully capable of pansexual polyamory. While I agree that intra-gender does not map across perfectly to interracial, I also agree that in the future [even if it does, in fact, take a generation] we will look back on this and wonder how we, as a culture at large, kept this “right” from orientations other than hetero. There will come a time when it will all seem like such a silly debate.
Simultaneously, though, I go in the opposite direction from wanting to legalize gay marriage. As one of those radical libertarians, I wonder how we ever got into the habit of thinking the State should approve and sanctify any intimate union. There are other vehicles for the property issues and the significant other/medical emergency issues. Beneficiaries of benefits are already allowed to be same-gender in many companies, etc.
Rather than looking to how the State should approve of all unions, we should take that power away from them and rely on vehicles already in place. LLCs even. Hell, the tax benefits alone are worth it. Heh.
The rest is emotional and conventional. Thousands of years of cult-ural training.
**sigh**
Time for bed.
Comment by Liberator — June 12, 2007 @ 3:46 am - June 12, 2007
Thanks, NDT. Yet my appeal is not to “anti-Christian bigots”, for whom quotes from the Gospel means nothing, but to bigots who are Christian.
Comment by John — June 12, 2007 @ 11:35 am - June 12, 2007
Rather, it is replete with the code words:
AHEM…
Comment by ThatGayConservative — June 13, 2007 @ 6:30 am - June 13, 2007
Now if you had worked in the phrases “Bible code” or “Da Vinci Code” at least this might have been amusing. As it stands though, you’ve lost touch with reality unless you honestly believe that Christianity is synonymous with a particular faction of the Republican Party. Of course if you do believe that then you’ve still lost touch with reality, but I’ll let it pass.
Comment by John — June 13, 2007 @ 7:13 am - June 13, 2007
#9
I DARE you to make less sense.
Comment by ThatGayConservatives — June 14, 2007 @ 3:14 am - June 14, 2007
Not my problem if you cannot keep up, TGC. Do a better job paying attention next time.
Comment by John — June 14, 2007 @ 2:07 pm - June 14, 2007