Gay Marriage or Bust: The Gayer the Better, the Tighter the Sweater, the Bois Depend on Us!
Gay men in America are kind of messed up. We grow up in a society that denies us (or would like to deny us) the natural milestones of young love and courtship. We are fed years of misinformation about our identities, and we lack positive gay role models to combat this misinformation. Our relationships are ignored, ridiculed or vilified, and most of us have no or limited marriage rights (except if we want to ruin the life of some nice woman and, potentially, our innocent children). There are even fewer role models for gay marriages, and so far the majority of gay nuptials have involved those thirty and over.
So it is wonderful, wonderful, I say, to read an article like Benoit Dezinet-Lewis’s NY Times piece on marriage among 20-something gay men in Massachusetts. As one of the subjects of the article says, “I sort of feel like we’re on this island out here by ourselves. . . . That’s probably the biggest difference between us and straight married couples. They see other married people like them everywhere. We don’t.” The young couples in the article are perhaps not the best role models for gay marriage (two of the interviewees are already divorced), but they put a welcome face on committed gay relationships.
The Dezinet-Lewis article is already being blogged about, including a post from my friend Craig. What do you think about the article?
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April 29th, 2008 at 1:20 am
I had mixed feelings about the article. As a semi-anonymous lurker-cum-commenter, I should clarify that I’m a 28 year old coupled gay man, living in LA in a relationship that will hit the 5 year mark in a few weeks, so I should have really liked the article, since I’m a coupled (if unmarried) young gay man and all.
My main criticism of the article is also a general beef I have with the NYT: if you’re not a wealthy, northeastern, Ivy league educated, white professional, you really don’t exist to any of the “lifestyle” sections of the Times. See, e.g., Weddings section, Travel section (where the token “budget travel” feature has a budget of $500 / weekend), Dining Out section, etc. Now I recognize that the northeastern bias here is unavoidable, since MA is the only state with gay marriage, but otherwise the couples profiled were pretty much über WASPy Stepford gays. In particular, the photos accompanying the article were kind of creepy. I recognize there was a kitsch, ironic aspect to the photos, but in an otherwise serious article, they seemed oddly out of place.
Perhaps those profiled were deeper and more interesting people than the article let on. But the focus on superficial aspects of the couples like their clothing choices, food and beverage choices, and home decor choices left me not caring very much about what happens to these couples, aside from perhaps wanting to swoop in an buy their lovely antique furniture should any of them divorce. Finally, I doubt that all young, married gays in MA fit such a narrow profile, and I fault the author for not delving further beyond his own social milieu.
I’m glad an article on this topic was written, but my takeaway message from it was that someday if I get married, I too can do housework while wearing a tie and smoking jacket…
April 29th, 2008 at 1:18 pm
A tie, smoking jacket AND HIGH HEELS. That’s what totally sold me.
You’re right. You are completely right. (Except I’m not certain how WASP-y a guy named Vassili is–sounds like an Orthodox name to me. But there I go, stereotyping people again.) The NY Times does not in general, and certainly does not here, represent a true cross-section of America. I didn’t feel very connected to the couples interviewed; I’m only a couple years older than most of them, but they all seemed impossibly young (and idealistic and rich).
On the other hand, I think marriage is a good goal for young gay men. Maybe what we need (or one of the things we need) to make our relationships less ephemeral is to take hold of and own the goal of marriage. I went to Brigham Young University, where marriage at 21 for guys and 18 for girls is seen as the ideal (people who wait to finish their education are selfish), and I don’t want to see gay men falling into that trap, but I think society benefits when relationships are stable, and I think laws and attitudes should be such that relationships—all kinds of relationships, not just romantic ones—are supported and allowed to flourish.
April 30th, 2008 at 6:38 am
“On the other hand, I think marriage is a good goal for young gay men. Maybe what we need (or one of the things we need) to make our relationships less ephemeral is to take hold of and own the goal of marriage.”
Agreed, but I would, personally, state that as “I think marriage is a good goal for young people in love.”
When I was in San Fran this January visiting my long-time friend Mark (and meeting John for the first time), the BART station at Castro St. was lined with ads advocating a shift in thinking of relationships as ephemeral to more of a “you can make this last” philosophy. They were from partnerforlife.com, and were comforting to me to see, since I too feel that if you can find someone that makes you happy and you don’t have to put on a façade in order to receive love, then THAT is a relationship worth keeping and worth fighting for.
April 30th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Unless gays en masse decide to not engage in premarital sex–tricky given the current legal situation and unlikely in any case–I don’t think we’re going to see BYU style rapid marriage. But overall it would be a good thing for gays to have more stable, partnered relationships. Personally, I just find it much more satisfying, and I think as social acceptance continues to increase, we’ll collectively calm down a little sexually.
Here in West Hollywood, most of our gay themed advertising is dedicated to encouraging the gays to avoid meth, with some lovely photos. I always suspected San Francisco was a bit more civilized…
April 30th, 2008 at 4:02 pm
I don’t think marriage or even monogamy is for everyone, but I think having the option to marry will have an effect on how gay men relate to each other, and how they think about relationships. Or at least I hope it will. Or do I hope it will? I guess I don’t even know what I want.
The Utah anti-meth campaign is aimed at mothers, with lovely pictures of diaper bags.