More Queer Questions

What does marriage mean to you?

It's a state-sponsored institution with a misogynist history and a lot of gendered ritual. It's a partnership between two people who care about each other. It can be a symbol of love, a sign of miserable commitment, or a partnership of convenience. It's a socially-sanctioned relationship between a monogamous heterosexual, cisgendered couple which is expected to produce children. It's a reason for lower car insurance rates. It's internationally recognized, but not universally defined. It's an institution queer people have historically been denied. It happens in Boston between lesbians. It's a gateway to health insurance in America.

I have extremely mixed emotions on marriage, but I definitely think it can mean different things at different times. It can take many forms. There is considerable beauty and power in partnerships and relationships, in the emotional and sexual bonds we have with others. Do I personally think all commitments should be for life? Probably not. Would I deny anyone else the right to commit to someone for life? Hell no. I don't really care what the fuck we call it, as long as everyone has equal access to it. I don't think the government should define who gets to take part in social rituals and social contracts. But if that's the only way everyone can have equal access, then government control may be the only way. I don't think my tax rates should be linked to my relationship status, though.

Your favorite LGBT book?

I got into LGBTQ non-fiction heavily a few years ago. I'd have to stay "Stonewall" by Martin M. Duberman (which is about the fascinating history of queer bars in New York, the mob, the three pieces of clothing law, the Stonewall riots, and much more) or "And the Band Played On" by Randy Shilts. There are others, and I own a lot of fiction, too. But those two books changed my life.

Your favorite LGBT quote?


The Bible contains six admonishments to homosexuals and 362 admonishments to heterosexuals.  That doesn't mean that God doesn't love heterosexuals.  It's just that they need more supervision.  ~Lynn Lavner


If homosexuality is a disease, let's all call in queer to work:  "Hello.  Can't work today, still queer."  ~Robin Tyler


Why can't they have gay people in the army?  Personally, I think they are just afraid of a thousand guys with M16s going, "Who'd you call a faggot?"  ~John Stewart


The world is not divided into sheeps and goats.  Not all things are black nor all things white.  It is a fundamental of taxonomy that nature rarely deals with discrete categories.  Only the human mind invents categories and tries to force facts into separated pigeon-holes.  The living world is a continuum in each and every one of its aspects.  The sooner we learn this concerning sexual behavior the sooner we shall reach a sound understanding of the realities of sex.  ~Alfred Kinsey, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, 1948

Your first experience with an LGBT organization or event?

My first year of college someone at school told me about the local PFLAG group that met once a month on Saturday mornings at 10am. I started going, taking my then-girlfriend with me whenever she was in town. The woman who ran the group, Sherry, became like a surrogate mother to many of us. It was a varied group and an ever-changing cast, some queer, some families of queer kids or adults. We had children as young as four up to transwomen in their seventies. I don't remember my first meeting. But I do remember that PFLAG opened a lot of doors for me. It was the first time I belonged to a group where I felt welcome, safe, and supported. It was very, very powerful for me. It was the gateway to a lot of what I became involved with. They became the supportive family I needed to help me come at school and in town, when my biological family wasn't supportive.

Butch or femme?

Neither. This is a complex question for me, one I'm still learning to navigate. I respect those who find power in these terms, who identify with them. That's great, and I don't want my rejection of these terms to be taken as why everyone shouldn't use them -- I don't feel like that, at all. But I just don't identify with them. It's like sticking a round peg in a square hole for me. I struggle with how we all love to identify and label each other, and how often "femme" gets attached to me in ways I'm not comfortable with. It's just simply not how I describe my body, my identity, or my experience. As for my attractions -- I find I'm most attracted to certain personality traits, to individual quirks, and not to someone's gender expression or looks. Those are just bonus :)

Political LGBT issue that is closest to you or affects you the most?

I have a hard time narrowing out "issues" because social problems are deeply interconnected. I find connections easily. If I had to pick one political issue that's most important to me, it would probably be employment discrimination. It's incredibly pervasive. I think everyone needs food and shelter and safety from violence first, so those basic needs will always be my priority. When those needs are met, then I'm happy to put money and energy toward other issues. But without a job, those very basic needs cannot be met.

At the root of most queer "issues" is the widespread belief that homosexuality and transgenderism is wrong and queer people are less deserving, less important, than heterosexual cis-people. Why would we need to protect against bullying and against discrimination if everyone believed that queer people were truly equal to heterosexual, cis-people? We wouldn't. So anything and everything I do is not just about creating laws or political equality, but full social equality. The civil rights movement didn't end racism. The gay rights movement isn't going to end homophobia and transphobia. It's a step in the right direction, but we need to change widely held beliefs and ideas, not just the laws.

Even within queer culture, within subgroups and power structures, I often see the same play out -- men who don't see women as capable and equal, gays and lesbians who don't see trans people as equal, etc. I want a nation, a culture, and a society that values difference and uniqueness instead of discriminating against those that don't assimilate, those who aren't the majority. I don't think that's too much to ask for.

An LGBT image that makes you smile and an LGBT image that makes you cry or makes you angry?

These are images of imprisoned gay men at Buchenwald, one of the Nazi concentration camps, who are marked by the pink triangle to symbolize their group status. This image breaks my heart. 

The first two images are from the Stonewall Riots in 1969. The second two are from the first gay liberation march, on the first anniversary of the Stonewall riots. There is nothing like the power of individuals taking to the streets, to public spaces where they can be condemned, beaten, murdered, and instead, they are proclaiming the power of their love. These photos are also testimony that the Gay Lib movement was made up of a diverse group. It wasn't men or women. It wasn't black or white. It wasn't old or young. It wasn't gay or trans. It was everyone. 

I'm grateful that there are photos of history to remind us what a difference three and a half decades makes. 

High Gender Theater: On Marriage, Kids, and Being a Big Fat Queer

I saw a comment on a blog the other day calling marriage “high gender theater.” It was like someone had put the words right into my mouth. It was the best three-word explanation of how I’ve felt attending a mess of weddings over the last few months. Six couples that I am close to have gotten married between November 2009 to July 2010. One wedding was for a gay couple, and in another wedding, I was a bridesmaid (see: commitments I will never make again). And those are just the weddings I was invited to… that’s not taking into account the mess of high school and college acquaintances who have become engaged or hitched in the last few years of my life, whose relationships Facebook has now made me privy to.

I used to really like weddings. Ok, I still do. I love getting dressed up. I like watching two people who care about each other celebrate their love. I like cake and dancing, I like free food and open bars. I like the spectacle of flowers. I like meeting up with people I haven’t seen in awhile. I like the joy of celebrating love.

But there is a lot about weddings that has made me increasingly uncomfortable. Where to start? Well, there are a lot of fucking dichotomies in weddings. Do you catch the bouquet or the garter? Do you sit on the side of the bride or groom? Are you there to pick up a bridesmaid or go home with a groomsman? Are you bringing a date – and if so, is your date going to be acceptable to the Catholic brides’ parents?

I realize that there’s no fun in dancing if your partner can’t come and dance with you – because who wants to watches queer dance at a wedding? (Besides me.) I realize that, especially as a bridesmaid, I have no interest in catching the bouquet. I don’t want to find a hubby. I would rather be caught pulling a girl’s panties down in the closet than chasing after a potential new husband.

I’ve begun to see that most weddings I attend are a series of rituals, shoved back-to-back, and put on fast-forward. Cue music. Cue attendants. Cue bride. Parents give her away. Vows. Possibly some churchy blessing stuff. Walk out. Photos of everyone. Cue eating. Cut cake. Smash it in someone’s face. Toast. First dance. Father-daughter dance. Groom-mother dance. Everyone dances for a minute, or stands around awkwardly staring at each other. Garter toss. Bouquet toss. Then… either everyone gets drunk and has a great time, or everyone gets bored. Inevitably, someone asks when the bride will get pregnant, if she isn’t already… just in case the couple forgot that the next step is to reproduce. Then there are bubbles or rice or whatever. Someone has decorated the car so that it looks like a mess. Then goodbyes. Cue honeymoon.

And when they get back, cue a whole lot of when-we-have-kids or we-plan-to-have-kids-soon conversations.

There are some variations on this, of course. And what I described is pretty reminiscent of my own white, middle-to-upper-middle-class upbringing in the deep South. But though there are variations, this is the “ideal” – the ritual most begin with, and many mimic to the detail.

I am an outsider at these events. As I see when I look at photos of many of my queer friends – there we are, posing as bridesmaids or groomsmen, friends or family. We are stuffed into a dress or a suit befitting our sex, but often not our gender identity or expression. We are expected to keep our partners in the closet (metaphorically and/or physically), or at least not “flaunt it” too much. We are expected to talk politely about the couple’s history, their love, their deep spiritual/emotional/metaphysical/legal bond through marriage (and often, a church), and their future reproducing more little breeder brats. (Just kidding)

Often I find myself getting drunk, pulling out my camera, and documenting these events to keep myself from having to actually participate in them. My camera is a safe shield which protects me from explaining my lack of a male date, why I don’t plan to get married soon, or why I don’t really want a marriage and 2.2 kids. I might have on a dress, but I don’t fit into the smattering of women chasing their own brood, fingering their diamond engagement rings, silently coveting the bride’s dress/shoes/man, or dreaming about their chance to be the life of the party. I fit into the camp of radical feminist queers who probably aren’t present at this wedding, but spread across hundreds of weddings, all thinking the same. I think parties don’t need rituals – just a whole lot of really great people coming together from my life, drinking, eating, dancing, and celebrating for no good reason at all. I don’t think love needs social legitimacy, or that marriage is “the logical next step” in every relationship lasting over 2 years and taking place between my 19th year and my 30th year on this planet. I don’t think commitments are between men and women only. I don’t want my parents giving me to anyone, and the thought of my deserted father walking me anywhere or trying to dance with me is horrifying.

But that’s gender theater, folks. It’s the compelling notion that a) gender is a biological phenomenon we can’t change, and b) gender is the reason we are compelled to be attracted to the opposite sex/gender, and c) straight folks meet each other, get hitched, and have kids. There are roles we are expected to play, and these roles are defined by the genitalia we were born with (or should have been born with, according to doctors who try to "fix" intersex children). And weddings are ALL ABOUT gender, gender rituals and roles, and legitimizing a straight relationship so that your kids don’t end up as bastards and your property can pass onto them without being taxed. Yep.

Don’t get me wrong. I think love can be an important part of a marriage. Love doesn’t factor into every marriage license, but love factors into many of the marriages I’ve witnessed. I think many people do now get married because they love each other… and I think many feel that BECAUSE they love each other, the only way to show that love is to get married. In other words, I think we conflate love with marriage, even though we’ve all see love-less marriages and loving relationships without a piece of paper.

We’ve all seen kids whose parents weren’t married, but did a great job raising them. Or marriages for convenience, for money, for green cards, for Pell grants, for Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Marriages for pregnancies. But we still idealize marriage as a ceremony ultimately about Love.

I’m sure when countries and states began letting queers marry, the same things happened – some queers got married for love, others because they felt it was the logical next step in their journey of life. Some got married because they didn’t know what else to do. Some got married for privilege or money or kids. Queers are no different, after all. We grew up in the same society – a society which prioritizes couples, state-sanctioned marriage, and procreation as important life steps. We grew up exchanging wedding “bands” with our neighbors in private, childish play in the backyard. We grew up knowing that Barbie and Ken are together (even though, secretly, we might have thought differently about Ken). We saw Princess Di’s dress and galloped our way down an aisle as a junior bridesmaid (I thought I was a horse at the point in my life that my aunt and uncle married). We grew up with heterosexual ideals and gender theater.

But now, in my 20’s, with my gender identity firmly entrenched in confusion and my sexuality bordering on messy and radical, I wear my grandmother’s (first) wedding ring as a reminder of my family’s history. My history, though I remember carefully that she and my grandfather had a miserable, Catholics-don’t-divorce-but-just-drink-and-yell, kind of marriage. I watch my friends walk down the aisle, and I wonder what their lives will be like in twenty years. I see my best friends becoming pregnant, popping out squirmy toddlers who grab onto my heart as I rock them in circles, and creating new families. They reconnect with their blood relatives, while mine push me further away. They fit their names neatly into wedding albums and baby books, under “husband” and “wife,” “mother” and “father.” They go to weddings and don’t explain why their date isn’t the same sex. They walk down the aisle as a bridesmaid without feeling like an imposter stuffed into a bright orange dress, blessing a couple who will have a house and a dog and a marital bed and a kid as I’m going out on Tuesday nights and taking girls home from the club. I realize these couples will have social legitimacy in a way that I will probably never have in my relationships.

I don’t want to trade. Not for a minute.

But I do remember, most acutely at weddings, what it means to be queer. What it means to realize my dreams and my reality will always (legal gay marriage or not) be different, because I grew up in a society that says I’m an outsider. Real women get married. Real women have children. Real women have dinner on the table at 6pm. Real women juggle their career and familial responsibilities. Even gothic women, women with tattoos, women with Ph.D.’s, women who have shattered glass ceilings, women who adopt, women who marry late in life… they’re still women in a way I can’t be, because at the end of the day, I live in a society that conflates “female” and “male” with heterosexual roles… not a society which respects that gender, sex, and sexuality are fundamentally different.