Gay Marriage – Obama Comes Out for Love. Do You?

“The word marriage has a connotation,” an Amendment One supporter insists (more on connotation later). “They can have the same right, but not the same name,” says another man. When Sampson suggests pronouncing same-sex unions as “marry-äzh,” both are immediately fine with that. Why? When gay marriage opponents argue that “that’s not what it means,” or insist that marriage is between a man and a woman, it is often dismissed as a thin cover for bigotry. But is there more to it than that? What’s in a name?

On April 11, David Blankenhorn and Elizabeth Marquardt (originally from NC) of the Institute for American Values in New York City and supporters of California’s “Proposition 8,” penned an op-ed for the Raleigh News and Observer opposing North Carolina’s Amendment One, writing:

In the California “Prop 8” case, David felt that he could testify on behalf of traditional man-woman marriage in good conscience, in part because California some time ago passed domestic partnership legislation to extend legal recognition to same-sex couples. He argued in favor of domestic partnerships, more commonly called civil unions, while also insisting that marriage, because of its unique role in uniting biological, social and legal parenthood – a great gift to our children – is its own institution, deserving of its own name, and should remain, as it has always been, the union of a man and a woman. [emphasis mine]

I submit — and the examples above suggest — that there is something more subtle going on than equal rights vs. bigotry in the argument about the definition of marriage. Blankenhorn says he supports equal rights for same-sex unions. But he opposes using marriage to describe them. Now, the horse is out of the barn on whether or not to use the term marriage in advocating equal rights for same-sex couples. The We Do campaign, for example, is built around having LGBT couples ask local Registers’ offices for marriage licenses. In part, because there are legal differences in how the federal government treats marriage nationwide as opposed to other legal, state-sanctioned arrangements. That’s an issue blogger Bob Hyatt of Portland, Oregon’s Evergreen Community addressed recently:

The State needs to get out of the “marriage” business. It should recognize that as long as it uses that term, and continues to privilege certain types of relationships over others this issue is going to divide us as a nation, and is only going to become more and more contentious. We need to move towards the system used in many European countries where the State issues nothing but civil unions to anyone who wants them, and then those who desire it may seek a marriage from the Church.

In past conversations, however, my suggestion (as a political strategy) about not using the word marriage in the fight for equality, or about inventing unique words for same-sex unions, was dismissed as relegating same-sex unions to second-class status. That puzzled me. Why worry about the verbiage as long as the legal rights and privileges are the same? Perhaps — and maybe few on either side consciously recognize it — this fight is over something more, something beyond the legal definition of marriage: sacredness.

Not that definitions don’t matter. Words mean something. Echoing the U.S. Supreme Court, Mitt Romney says, “Corporations are people, my friend,” and it sounds ludicrous. One hears people argue that marriage is only a union of one man and one woman. It is historically a male/female union, sure, but not necessarily involving only one of each sex. How many wives did Solomon have? 700? We have special words for multiple, opposite-sex unions: polyandry, polygyny, polygamy, etc. But not for describing woman-woman or man-man unions.

Bear with me here. Going back to Genesis 2, humans name things to distinguish this from that. It is basic cognitive processing, and marriage is an established mental construct. Those do not bend easily. Point to two men or two women and say marriage, and people like those in the examples above object, insisting that that is not what the word means. Is that bigotry? Maybe. For some, probably. But try this naming thought experiment (in your mind’s eye):

I hold up a cup and call it a box.
I hold up a plate and call it a bowl.
I hold up a spoon and call it a fork.
I hold up a kitten and call it a puppy.
I hold up a can and call it a jar.
I hold up a square and call it a circle, etc.

Trying that the other day induced a headache. Because the mind is a difference engine. It knows that even among similar things, this is not that.

When we see that opponents are unwilling to share the word marriage with LGBT couples, that is part of it. For them, two men or two women is not a marriage. First, because it conflicts with a mental construct fixed since childhood. It may be marriage-like, but it is different, requiring a separate name. But secondly, they oppose same-sex marriage because they refuse to accept that LGBT unions can be sacred.

Perhaps for a similar reason, LGBT friends balked at adopting alternate terms for their legal unions, terms that might decouple the fight for legal rights from social acceptance. They use gay marriage, same-sex marriage, or marriage equality instead of civil unions or domestic partnerships, and not just for the statutory differences. Because if same-sex unions are not marriage, they are not sacred and do not feel equal. It is a yearning buried in the sub rosa conversation. But in addition to legal equality, whether their relationships — their marriages — are sacred, whether neighbors in the community accept their unions as sacred is as meaningful for gay people as for everyone else. Civil union doesn’t quite cut it.

Still, if one’s goal is just to get to the other side of the mountain, going around or climbing the lowest pass will do. You don’t climb the steepest face without understanding that summiting makes getting to the other side harder. Recognition of LGBT relationships as sacred is a tougher climb, and not achievable through legislation anyway, any more than the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts settled the equality issue for African Americans. But by establishing their legal rights, passing those acts did lever open the door of acceptance a bit wider. On paper, at least. Recognition of sacredness for LGBT relationships will likely work the same way: over time.

(Cross-posted from Scrutiny Hooligans.)

Writing at The Huffington Post, Campolo recently wrapped a distinctly theocratic idea in the language of apparent moderation and called it a compromise.

Let’s unwrap it and see what’s inside.

Campolo first offers a series of false premises:

President Bush once said that marriage is a sacred institution and should be reserved for the union of one man and one woman. If this is the case — and most Americans would agree with him on this — then I have to ask: Why is the government at all involved in marrying people? If marriage really is a sacred institution, then why is the government controlling it, especially in a nation that affirms separation of church and state?

Campolo suggests that because George W. Bush once said something, we should therefore treat it as true. And if we accept Bush’s truth, we should feel right about it because a popular majority is said to agree with him. Of course, just because a politician expresses a view on the sacred, that does not mean the view is either sacred or true. And we are left to wonder what strange thinking has gotten a hold of Campolo who identifies himself as both a Democrat and a liberal. (We find out all too soon.)

Quite independently, liberal columnist Leonard Pitts recently wrote about the meaning of polls showing that a majority of Americans now support same sex marriage. (What are we to make of the views of Bush and Campolo now? Is their notion of traditional marriage no longer sacred because a majority favors same sex marriage?) While Pitts is pleased with the progress, he averred:

“In extolling the fact that the majority now approves same sex marriage, do we not also tacitly accept the notion that the majority has the right to judge?”

Here in Massachusetts where the right of same sex couples to marry was first recognized by the state Supreme Judicial Court in 2003, the overwhelming majority of citizens opposed same sex marriage at the time. Now, the overwhelming majority supports it. What’s more major religious communities such as Unitarian Universalism and Reform Judaism before the decision, and the United Church of Christ — the largest protestant denomination in the Bay State — since the decision, view same sex marriage as sacred as heterosexual marriage. Majority or minority view — shall Campolo and Bush’s sense of the sacred trump what is sacred to such historic religious communities as these? Or should each religious organization be able to decide this for itself?

Pitts continued:

One shudders to think what sort of nation this would be if Lyndon Johnson, before signing the Civil Rights Act of 1964 or the Voting Rights Act of 1965, had first taken a poll of the American people.

We tend to regard America, proudly, as a nation where human rights are given. But that stance is actually at odds with the formulation famously propounded by one of the first Americans. Thomas Jefferson, who, after all, wrote that human rights are “unalienable” and that we are endowed with them from birth.

If you believe that, then you cannot buy into this notion of a nation where rights are magnanimously doled out to the minority on a timetable of the majority’s choosing. You and I cannot “give” rights. We can only acknowledge, respect and defend the rights human beings are born with.

Campolo continues:

Personally, as a Baptist minister, I always feel a bit uneasy at the end of the weddings that I perform when I have to say, “And now, by the authority given unto me by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, I pronounce you husband and wife.” Having performed a variety of religious exercises, such as reading scripture, saying prayers, giving a biblically-based homily and pronouncing blessings on the marriage, why am I required to suddenly shift to being an agent of the state? Doesn’t it seem inconsistent that during such a highly religious ceremony, I should have to turn the church into a place where government business is conducted? Isn’t it a conflict for me to unify my pastoral role with that of an agent of the state?

This is a strawman argument in the form of a rhetorical question. Campolo is not required to serve as an agent of the state. Nor is he required to merge his religious ceremonial duties with legal officiating. That is his choice. But he nevertheless has a solution for the problem that does not exist.

I propose that the government should get out of the business of marrying people and, instead, only give legal status to civil unions. The government should do this for both gay couples and straight couples, and leave marriage in the hands of the church and other religious entities. That’s the way it works in Holland. If a couple wants to be united in the eyes of the law, whether gay or straight, the couple goes down to the city hall and legally registers, securing all the rights and privileges a couple has under Dutch law. Then, if the couple wants the relationship blessed — to be married — they goes to a church, synagogue or other house of worship. Marriage should be viewed as an institution ordained by God and should be out of the control of the state.

But of course, this is the way it is in America as well — except we call it marriage whether one gets married by a clergyperson or by the Justice of the Peace. There is no reason why people can’t have a religious service if they want one and legal process before a Justice of the Peace or other designated official. (Unless, as in most states, said people happen to be gay.)

Back at the beginning of his essay, Campolo asked a rhetorical question that now bears answering.

If marriage really is a sacred institution, then why is the government controlling it, especially in a nation that affirms separation of church and state?

Campolo’s demagogic, tea-partyesque appeal to the idea that “government” is somehow “controlling” a “sacred institution” is reckless and wrong. State governments, representing all of the people, and not merely sectarian interests, have always issued marriage licenses. Marriage is “sacred” only to the extent that people within the marriage and the community to which they belong consider it to be so. No religious institution or coalition of the theocratic gets to define the sacred for the rest of the citizens and make it part of the legal code.

The way we define the sacred in America is as a right of individual conscience that is protected by our constitutional doctrine of separation of church and state. We have the right to marry whom we choose in whatever ceremony we choose from any institution that will have us, or no institution at all. No institution is required to preside over weddings, gay or strait, and I have heard no one argue that they should be required to do so. Really. All that is required is for those who are marring each other, to get a marriage license. Extending this right to gay people is consistent with our national ethos and constitutional framework of the rights of conscience free from undue influence from the government or powerful religious institutions.

If Campolo is uncomfortable functioning as a legal officiator and signer marriage licenses — all he has to do is tell people that is not his department and send them to the Justice of the Peace.

Campolo continues:

Of course, homosexual couples could go to churches that welcome and affirm gay marriages and get their unions blessed there. Isn’t that the way it should be in a nation that guarantees people the right to promote religion according to their personal convictions?

If such a proposal became normative, those like myself who hold to traditional beliefs about marriage would go to traditional churches where conservative beliefs about marriage are upheld, and we would have our marriages blessed there.

Of course, people can already attend the church of their choice and Campolo’s proposal does nothing to change that. But all this a a prelude to the theocratic idea behind his supposed compromise which he expresses with a remarkable spirit of bigotry against non-religious people.

And secularists who are unlikely to do anything that smacks of religion would probably just throw a party to celebrate a new union. Marriage would be preserved as a religious institution for all of us who want to view it as such, and nobody’s personal convictions about this highly charged issue would have to be compromised.

Listen to Campolo as he sneers about what “secularists” would “probably” do. As if commitment ceremonies by non-religious people are inherently meaningless and lack any form of reverence or solemnity; or as if expressions of exuberance and joy cannot be part of a marriage or commitment event. And good grief — as if people who get married in religious ceremonies don’t also sometimes party — and sometimes mighty hard. Campolo’s bigotry and sanctimony may be less obnoxious than Falwell’s and his participation in the campaign to tear down the wall of separation between church and state less obvious, but we should not mistake any of this for moderation or compromise.

Another key phrase, in which he rephrases the theme of his proposal is this:

Marriage would be preserved as a religious institution for all of us who want to view it as such…

Here he suggests that something about marriage is being changed when it is not. Marriage has always been a civil institution in America. It has always been a religious institution as well, for those who are religious. But these aspects of the institution of marriage are as separate as church and state should be. The law does not require religious blessing to be legal, and marriage in a particular religious institution does not require legal sanction to take place — but at some point a marriage license needs to be obtained from the state. It ain’t rocket science. Those who want their marriage to have a religious dimension can do so. Those who don’t, don’t.

But what is important to underscore about The Campolo Compromise is that it is not really about gay marriage. It is a fundamental reframing of the entire argument into a theocratic stalking horse against the rights of non-religious citizens.

Campolo proposes a two-tiered system: For religious people, commitment ceremonies will be called marriage; for everyone else, something else. As insulting and politically tone deaf as this is, it is also unlikely to pass constitutional muster. Here is what happened when traditionalist pols proposed that the Massachusetts high court consider a compromise. The State Senate asked the state’s highest court whether civil unions would be an adequate way to address the matter of same sex marriage. The court said no.

“…the Supreme Judicial Court advised on February 4, 2004, that “civil unions” would not suffice to satisfy the Court’s finding in Goodridge. The 4 justices who formed the majority in the Goodridge decision wrote: “The dissimilitude between the terms ‘civil marriage’ and ‘civil union’ is not innocuous; it is a considered choice of language that reflects a demonstrable assigning of same-sex, largely homosexual, couples to second-class status.” They continued: “For no rational reason the marriage laws of the Commonwealth discriminate against a defined class; no amount of tinkering with language will eradicate that stain.”

Indeed.

[Crossposted from Talk to Action]