Praise then darkness, and creation unfinished

Yay Vermont!

In the same week as Iowa. A week ago, there were two U.S. states that didn't limit marriage to mixed-sex couples. Today, four, and one of them by legislative action, after a few years of trying the "civil union" compromise.

Any bets on whether Malcolm Smith can get the New York state senate to follow Vermont's lead? (We have no need for a veto-proof two-thirds, just a majority of each house of the state legislature: Governor Patterson has said he’ll sign a marriage equality bill.)

Yay, Iowa! The Iowa Supreme Court has unanimously upheld a ruling that limiting marriage to mixed-sex couples violates the state constitution, and ordered that marriage licenses be issued to same-sex couples within the next three weeks.

I'd lost track of this case, as we were all watching California and I kept a cautious eye on the NY legislature*


*always the best kind, though in this case I was hopeful they'd do something good, not wary that they'd take something away.

Another collection of comments. ( resolutions, sexual orientation and relationships, clothing and perceived gender, names and use-names, awareness of race, sleep and waking )

Another set of saved comments from my journal, for later reference and, if you want, discussion here: ( defining people, avoiding overcommitment, what understanding people might mean, friendship and romantic relationships, being angry at lots of people, testing )

This was a comment to a discussion in bcholmes's journal, after BC linked to sparkymonster tallking about the racism involved in blaming black voters for Proposition 8. I was going to save it for my next "misc. comments" post, but I think it's worth getting out there now, not in a month or two:

I also note that this is a convenient way of ignoring the white people who organized and mostly led the anti-marriage forces. It wasn't black churches that wrote Proposition 8, and it wasn't black Obama supporters who put it on the ballot and wrote those dishonest ads. It was middle- and upper-class straight white people.

I suspect that most of the white gay and bisexual people who are blaming black voters right now are more likely to be sitting down at a family dinner with middle-class, straight white bigots than with black heterosexuals, and sitting down to dinner together will be easier if they can ignore the idea that their relatives are part of why this thing passed.

The California Supreme Court has ruled that same-sex couples have the right to marry under the state constitution. 4-3, but that's good enough (one of the dissenters basically said she's in favor of marriage equality but doesn't think the state constitution guarantees it).

Also points to the BBC, for the headline "California lifts gay marriage ban," with the pleasant suggestion that allowing same-sex marriage is not only the right thing to do, but the normal thing, with the rule against it having been the anomaly. (The UK offers same-sex civil partnerships, not called marriage, but I'm not sure precisely what the differences are.)

My mixed-sex marriage is in no danger from this ruling, of course: my beloved cattitude and I are staying together because we want to, not in order to distinguish our heterosexual relationship from homosexual ones.

[That makes two US states that will perform same-sex marriages, I think three that have "civil unions," and at least one (New York) that does not perform same-sex marriages but recognizes such marriages legally entered into elsewhere, including outside the U.S.]

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I thought about going to the Gay Pride March today, either as a participant or to stand on Fifth Avenue and watch. I concluded that I don't really have that much energy right now, and that I don't need to do this anymore. It needs doing, but I don't need to be doing it.

I don't need it for myself: I know I'm not alone, I know this is my city, and I don't feel the need to remind myself that yes, I'm queer that was one of my motivations for marching when I was involved only with cattitude. And the march doesn't need me: it's a big thing now, lots of people, lots of groups and floats, pretty rainbow-colored subway posters telling us what trains to take to get there. We're here, we're queer, and this city is definitely used to it. The State Assembly passed same-sex marriage earlier this month--and my being there, or not, isn't going to convince the Republican boss of the State Senate to let the bill get to the floor for a vote.

I was grumpy about this earlier--more about feeling I had to stay home than about missing the parade, really--and I talked to Cattitude and adrian_turtle and felt much better. But I am visible as bi, in a lot of contexts, and I was there marching in the early 1980s when it wasn't as easy for a lot of people, and when I needed to be there, and when it probably meant more not only to me, but to the people watching us march. And maybe next year I'll have the energy, and go.

And I should think about why I'm not out at work--though I think that's more about being nervous about being out as poly, and having already mentioned cattitude (he's the partner I live with, and spend the most time with), than about passing as straight.

[This post was prompted in part by one from athenais about similar topics.]

desayunoencama just posted that he'd noticed, and been unhappy with, a lack of an organized queer presence at Wiscon, something he had felt and appreciated in previous years. In response, I wrote a bit about one of my panels, and am expanding that a bit here to talk more about the panel itself.

Sunday afternoon, I was on a panel about Alison Bechdel's book Fun Home, which by design and in practice discussed the possible reasons for and effects of the book's unexpected acceptance in mainstream contexts as well as the book as book, in terms of structure, content, stylistic choices, and how we (panelists and audience members) had reacted to it. The discussion went into details like the book as artifact, and what that says about support by the publisher; Bechdel's choice to use limited color; the inclusion of quotes from the Western literary canon; the nonlinear, or maybe spiraling narration; and the ways that Bechdel grounds her personal story in what was going on in the world, and how that connects to what she's done over many years in Dykes to Watch Out For.

It was a very good panel. At the end, the moderator asked each of us what we would like to have happen as a consequence (either causal or sequential) of Fun Home success. I came up with something about more cross-fertilization, I don't remember what the next three people said, and then the last panelist, who came at things from a comics background, actually said that she expected to read more by and about lesbians, which she hadn't previously done because she isn't one. I interrupted and said "We read about straight people."

I shouldn't have to be having that interaction at Wiscon, at a panel about a book by Alison Bechdel.

[footnotes: I'm not naming the person who said that because there were two panelists I didn't know, and I'm not sure which it was. Janet Lafler might, but she's not reachable right now. And yes, I'm bisexual rather than exclusively lesbian.]

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