Because I’m a Fucken Queer…till 2010!

I sit here watching the news, sad news for all us gays. I speak for us all even though I know some of us gays out there don’t give two shits about marriage but the truth is that the repealing of Prop H8 is more than about granting the queers the right to marry it’s about standing up to being relegated to the status of second class citizens. So I sit here and shed a tear cause I’m a fucken, a fucked over queer. I went to a conference a few months back where I heard a prominent Chicana Lesbian author speak on the subject of gay marriage and she was not necessarily in favor of us being granted the right to partake of civil marriage (and gain from the numerous economic benefits that come with it) cause she said it made us to normative too domesticated. Also many Queers see marriage as one of the key pillars of heteronormativity, a major factor in the preservation of heterosexual culture. So gay marriage is not radical enough to change the moral sexual compass of our society? Just listen to the religious rights reason for opposing gay marriage:

• Gay relationships are immoral
• A gay household is not a stable enough environment to raise kids
• Same sex marriage will lead to polygamy, bestiality, necrophilia…etc, etc
• Gay marriage STILL = sodomy in the minds of many. It wasn’t until June 26, 2003 that the US Supreme Court ruled said laws unconstitutional. 
• Gay marriage is a slap in the face to masculinity.

 So given all the phobias and stigma that surrounds homosexuality why do some queers see still the gain of this civil right as not radical enough? I guess somehow getting married or having the right to marriage somehow absolves us from being seen and treated as queers.

 I live with my partner and her son we have a quite household. I pick him up from the sitters, we play together we eat dinner together as a family but believe me when I tell you that we are anything but normal. Some of my neighbors won’t even look me in the face and many of them were not too proud to flaunt their ‘Yes on 8’ signs during last November’s elections. And when I take my boy to the bus stop I get stared at and then have to hear and see him dodge the many questions flung at him by his peers, some of them older than him; “yo is that a woman or is that a dude?”  “hey, hey, is that a girl,”  “she looks like a boy huh?”. My boy doesn’t answer he just makes his way to the back of the bus.  So tell me how would being married to my partner change any of this, how would our bond sanctioned by the state of California protect me, us, him an eight-year-old boy from his peers’ ignorance?  It wouldn’t necessarily but it would assure some peace of mind if I (or she) were ever happen to be hospitalized, arrested or worse deceased that she, my partner can rest assured she won’t be deemed powerless by the laws of our land. 

So the California Supreme Court spoke out on Tuesday (May 26, 2009) upholding Proposition 8- many of us were devastated but not defeated and like I told my sister, who is also a big gay, the fight isn’t over; this is so much more than civil unions it’s about human rights.  The fact that five states - Massachusetts, Iowa, Vermont, Connecticut and Maine - have approved same-sex marriage during the time that California judges were deliberating over Prop 8 and recently it has been reported that at least three other states New York, New Jersey and New Hampshire, are seriously considering the matter show that this is now a national issues. So I expect to meet again in 2010…and not be fucked over.