Mermaid Musings

“Marriage is a coercive state structure that perpetuates racism and sexism through forced gender and family norms. Right wing pro-marriage rhetoric has targeted families of color and poor families, supported a violent welfare and child protection system, vilified single parents and women, and marginalized queer families of all kinds. Expanding marriage to include a narrow band of same-sex couples only strengthens that system of marginalization and supports the idea that the state should pick which types of families to reward and recognize and which to punish and endanger.” (link)

Someday I want to live in a society that honors people for who they are, that supports people who need a little extra help and that makes as its primary objective supporting its members to realizing their full human potential.

It’s really nice having a president that isn’t a war-mongering, woman-hating, vengeful-god-worshipping monkey who’s primary motivation is fear. But let’s face it, Obama is not going to make this country or this planet a better place until we create a shift in cultural values, and that can’t be legislated or dictated by policy.  Marriage rights are nice, but really not going to create a culture and a society that values queer people. It’s going to bestow a handful of special rights onto a select group of same-sex couples, most of whom already have much of the privilege that our society bestows upon those who fit into the narrow confines of what someone, somewhere once decreed was ‘normal’.

Wouldn’t a better path be to expand the notion of normal? Is that not what liberation politics is really about? I don’t really want to stop those same-sex couples who desire a life-long committment to each other to be publically acknowledged. More power to them, really. But why should married people have special rights that the rest of us don’t have? Why the extra privileges? Why should the state be so invested in people’s love and sex lives?

It’s high time this society started recognizing the rights of LBGTQ folks in all aspects of their lives. Period. No exceptions for the genderqueer folk, everyone has an absolute right to their sexuality and their sexual identity. All is fair among consenting adults.

What I would like to see is a new sexual revolution - one that supports healthy sexuality for everyone regardless of who they have sex with. One that is based in liberation and the belief that humanity is beautiful because of its diversity. One that is grounded in love, for ourselves, for each other, for this great planet we live on and the belief that loving someone can never be wrong.