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August 24, 2006
Beyond Marriage
by Jesus Politics
The Beyond Marriage movement is an interesting development in the context of the struggle for the legitimization of same-sex marriage. Many progressive Christians, Christian groups and at least one denomination (United Church of Christ) have given full support for marriage equality. The Beyond Marriage statement, however, questions this support and raises some important issues.
Although this movement doesn't appear to have originated with explicit religious endorsement, it should be noted that a good number of people of faith have already signed on to the statement. Some excerpts from the full statement:
We, the undersigned – lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) and allied activists, scholars, educators, writers, artists, lawyers, journalists, and community organizers – seek to offer friends and colleagues everywhere a new vision for securing governmental and private institutional recognition of diverse kinds of partnerships, households, kinship relationships and families. In so doing, we hope to move beyond the narrow confines of marriage politics as they exist in the United States today.[ ]
To have our government define as “legitimate families” only those households with couples in conjugal relationships does a tremendous disservice to the many other ways in which people actually construct their families, kinship networks, households, and relationships. For example, who among us seriously will argue that the following kinds of households are less socially, economically, and spiritually worthy? [ ]
LGBT movement strategies must be sufficiently prophetic, visionary, creative, and practical to counter the right’s powerful and effective use of “wedge” politics – the strategic marketing of fear and resentment that pits one group against another.
Right-wing strategists do not merely oppose same-sex marriage as a stand-alone issue. The entire legal framework of civil rights for all people is under assault by the Right, coded not only in terms of sexuality, but also in terms of race, gender, class, and citizenship status. The Right’s anti-LGBT position is only a small part of a much broader conservative agenda of coercive, patriarchal marriage promotion that plays out in any number of civic arenas in a variety of ways – all of which disproportionately impact poor, immigrant, and people-of-color communities. The purpose is not only to enforce narrow, heterosexist definitions of marriage and coerce conformity, but also to slash to the bone governmental funding for a wide array of family programs, including childcare, healthcare and reproductive services, and nutrition, and transfer responsibility for financial survival to families themselves.
Moreover, as we all know, the Right has successfully embedded “stealth” language into many anti-LGBT marriage amendments and initiatives, creating a framework for dismantling domestic partner benefit plans and other forms of household recognition (for queers and heterosexual people alike). Movement resources are drained by defensive struggles to address the Right’s issue-by-issue assaults. Our strategies must engage these issues head-on, for the long term, from a position of vision and strength. [ ]
So many of us long for communities in which there is systemic affirmation, valuing, and nurturing of difference, and in which conformity to a narrow and restricting vision is never demanded as the price of admission to caring civil society. Our vision is the creation of communities in which we are encouraged to explore the widest range of non-exploitive, non-abusive possibilities in love, gender, desire and sex – and in the creation of new forms of constructed families without fear that this searching will potentially forfeit for us our right to be honored and valued within our communities and in the wider world. Many of us, too, across all identities, yearn for an end to repressive attempts to control our personal lives. For LGBT and queer communities, this longing has special significance.
We who have signed this statement believe it is essential to work for the creation of public arenas and spaces in which we are free to embrace all of who we are, repudiate the right-wing demonizing of LGBT sexuality and assaults upon queer culture, openly engage issues of desire and longing, and affirm, in the context of caring community, the complexities and richness of gender and sexual diversity. However we choose to live, there must be a legitimate place for us.
Posted by Jesus Politics at August 24, 2006 05:34 AM
Comments
There is just about nothing that a Christian could support in this treatise of promoting chaos over intelligence.
Letting "whomever" decide "whatever" is the unraveling of society on a a massive scale.
The family is always going to be "woman-man and their children," as the basis of a healthy society . . ., or mankind breaks down to a massive party of selfish nutballs, trying to always justify every action through indvidual eogtism promoted by slick neologisms.
Posted by: Al at August 24, 2006 02:29 PM
"...or mankind breaks down to a massive party of selfish nutballs, trying to always justify every action through individual egotism promoted by slick neologisms."
Best description of the NeoCon Republicans I've heard in a long time.
Posted by: Frank Frey at August 24, 2006 07:33 PM
Redefining marriage, opposing patriarchal families, promoting sexual perversion(homosexuality) and "queer culture" are all attempts to rebel against what God has ordained. Those who join this moral rebellion against the Creator, including those who falsely claim to be Christians, ensure for themselves the same judgement and damnation that God has reserved for all moral rebels. Think about it.
Posted by: Gary at August 24, 2006 10:44 PM
Last time I checked, there was supposed to be something call seperation of church and state in this country. We talk so much about freedom, yet gay people are being robbed of such a basic freedom that the rest of us have. Yes, the Bible says it's wrong, but there are so many common practices in today's culture that the Bible forbids, so many that often get overlooked or disregarded. So why is it that so many so-called "Christians" like to constantly focus on this issue?
Posted by: Bobby at August 25, 2006 02:08 AM
Last time I checked, there was supposed to be something call seperation of church and state in this country. We talk so much about freedom, yet gay people are being robbed of such a basic freedom that the rest of us have. Yes, the Bible says it's wrong, but there are so many common practices in today's culture that the Bible forbids, so many that often get overlooked or disregarded. So why is it that so many so-called "Christians" like to constantly focus on this issue? Is gay marriage really that threatening? If you're really so worried about the "sanctity" marriage, then how about outlawing divorce too?
Posted by: Bobby at August 25, 2006 02:11 AM
Gary, Al, et. all,
Whats so un-Christian about allowing my two elderly, unmarried aunts who have lived together for almost 80 years to have access to the same legal rights as conjugal co-habitants?
Posted by: john g at August 25, 2006 11:31 PM
Baby,
you will never make any money taking that position.
Posted by: Torin at August 27, 2006 10:59 AM
john,
Do you mean hospital visitation and such things? Can't they accomplish what they want with a living will, or some other legal document?
Posted by: Gary at August 27, 2006 01:19 PM
Gary,
Some rights can be obtained through numerous legal documents. Others can't. Thanks to gay-rights activists, non-married people living together can finally use their partner's retirement fund to help cover emergency medical expenses.
Its hardly just to force people who have lived together for decades to go through a huge legal run around, when people who just met in Vegas can get even more rights just by signing a marriage lisence. This injustice stems from a patriarchal society that tries to tell people that they can only reach their greatest potential in a heterosexual marriage, and creates legal and financial stumbling blocks for those who don't marry.
In Acts we see the early apostles living in complete community. Setting up the financial and legal arrangements for a group living situation today takes a lot of legal work. However, some gay-rights activists are working to establish a legal framework for households with more than 2 partners.
Posted by: john g at August 27, 2006 06:58 PM
john g.
Read my other post on this thread.
Posted by: Gary at August 28, 2006 12:37 PM
SIGH.
There is SO much ignorance in this country about marriage systems and the reality in this world!!!!
Until Eurocentric protestantism started forcing it's cultural biases on people around the world, serial monogamy (the standard for the US) was truly in the minority. There are marriage systems of all types, and guess what- they all work. Even today, serial monogamy is not that dominant, the norm is still polygyny. Even during the early years of the church, polygyny was common. That is why there is the prohibition against a Bishop having more than one wife.
I must add, however, that in those cultures I know of where homosexuality is the norm, marriage occurs only between men and women (only) and for one thing only- procreation. The heterosexual act is considered dangerous and attractive to snakes by at least two of these cultures. Another thing which I find distressing is the norm in these same cultures: extreme hostility between the sexes. I do not want to live in any culture like that!
One other thing that has been observed over the years- the more patriarchial a culture is, the more likely that that culture will also be abusive, oppressive, and violent.
Ethnocentrism is a severe problem for most of the people from the US (and other similar countries). The mindset is that everyone is alike- and people from other cultures just dress funny. The truth is that people from other cultures think differently, and their dress and behavior mirrors that difference. This extends to marriage customs.
Something I find ironic and rather sad-but-funny: the prevalence of the use of the "marriage march" used for the more fundamentalist weddings that I have attended. As I understand it, this music was written for a parody of a marriage.
Posted by: Bob Bowers at August 29, 2006 02:43 AM
To get through life people form family units in one way or another. With the divorce rate above 50% we now know that people form serial family units - and you can't divorce children. We all have an interest in providing support for legitimate attempts at forming these family units no matter what they look like.
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Posted by: jishglus at April 27, 2007 01:42 AM
Marriage is a "right" we all have. This is a God given right that "government" has no authority to grant. Government has hijacked the entire process and has brainwashed people into thinking that without a government's marriage lisence (Permission Slip) that you can not get married. Hogwash!! It has nothing to do with them. Go to another country. Don't ask the Imperial Federal Government to give you their permission. You don't need it unless you care that "they" have a record of it. Who cares if they have a record. You'll have the record of it. The pictures, the video, the marriage certificate, the witnesses, your new family Bible with the newly recorded marriage and dates inscribed, etc. Take back this whole process from the government. You have that right. The government can only grant you a privilage. They are supposed to enforce your rights, but they fail to do this regularly.
My girlfriend/fiance and I are planning to marry next year. She (obviously female) and I, a male, are refusing to marry with a marriage lisence. This is out of principle and has nothing to do with same sex marriages, but are stance would be about the same.
Yes, we MAY lose a benefit here or there IF the government refuses to recognize our marriage, but we are willing to accept those consequences to hold true to our belief and what is right. Our God granted rights mean more to us than the failed IRS' 60,000 page tax code. (which by the way is on its way OUT when the FAIR TAX passes) We will have a living will, power of attorney, insurance with one another as beneficiary, etc. We've got it covered.
Screw their Permission Slip (marriage lisence)
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