by Kevin Sparrow

Good weather on a wedding day has long been held as a sign portending a healthy marriage. Beginning on a gorgeous Tuesday morning in mid-June, gay citizens of California were able to head out to their courthouses and legally marry their partners. The state Supreme Court overturned a ruling from 2000 defining marriage as solely between a man and a woman. Fears of resistance were assuaged as county clerks offices opened their doors early to begin handing out licenses the evening before the official date. Many counties added additional staff to help perform all the marriages requested, which doubled the typical daily amount.

For many Americans who support the right of gay couples to marry, this is a bright spot in a long battle. But this battle has also come to dominate the gay movement as one of its most prominent issues since the mainstream recognition of AIDS. Nationwide acceptance of marriage does not guarantee a shift of public opinion on all issues important to the queer community. Making gay marriage legal is going to require manpower and resources from numerous queer organizations locally and nationwide, from the Gay Liberation Network to the Human Rights Campaign. The fight could leave other important LGBT issues—employment and housing discrimination, gender expression in schools, adoption and an even wider assortment of rights—in dire straits. Before committing to this battle, it’s important to make sure the end result is both possible and worthwhile.

A major hurdle in passing pro-gay marriage legislation comes from religious opponents. Their objections derive from faith-based ideology, which claims homosexuality is an abomination. Legalizing such behavior through the act of marriage—a sanctity in most religions—is intolerable. However, American law is derived from the Constitution, which grants the right to a separation of church and state through its first amendment. Religious arguments against gay marriage are not valid when it comes to legislation, but they are not the sole arguments holding gay marriage on the horizon.

Secular arguments have been launched as well, although they are typically derived from religious rhetoric. In an article titled “The Monogamous Male Marriage” posted on May 20, 2008 to The Evangelical Outpost, writer Joe Carter states, “Gay men–like men in general–tend to be more promiscuous than women. Yet unlike married heterosexual men, gay men don’t assume that taking wedding vows means accepting sexual exclusivity.” Not only is that claim an egregious assumption on the psychological process of gay men, but it is also astonishing when taken into consideration the number difference this and similar reports purport between the sexual behavior of gay and straight men.

An examination of other publications arguing on similar bases, including Touchstone Magazine’s “Top Ten Reasons for Sanity” by Dr. Anthony Esolen, revealed claims that gay men are unable to commit to a monogamous partnership, citing a source as claiming heterosexual men having between five and nine sex partners in a lifetime, while homosexual men have over 1,000 partners. The source is a 1978 study, titled Homosexualities, published by medical doctors Bell and Weinberg. Basing an entire article on one study completed 30 years ago is disingenuous reporting at best and a dangerous manipulation at worst. On the other hand, some sites, like The Evangelical Outpost, list a wide-range of sources for their argument–such as the following:

According to the American Psychological Association, after the AIDS epidemic the average number of male homosexual partners only dropped from 70 to 50 per year. Source: Sally Ann Stewart, ” AIDS Aftermath: Fewer Sex Partners among Gay Men,” USA Today, 21 November 1984.

A Los Angeles study conducted in the late 1980s found that male homosexuals averaged over 20 partners per year. Source: L. Linn et al., ” Recent Sexual Behaviors Among Homosexual Men Seeking Primary Medical Care,” Archives of Internal Medicine 149 (December 1989): pp. 2685-90.

These accounts are only two examples of over 30 from the same article. The accounts differ so greatly and contain so much conflicting information that nothing is conclusive, except for one interesting pattern: a decline in the number of partners over time from the various eras examined.

Independent studies can be influenced by myriad factors and should be put under greater scrutiny. However, the most influential source for comprehensive studying ignores promiscuity in homosexual relations altogether. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, released the results of a National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) last year that included a complete look at the sexual behaviors of the American public—as long as they were straight. The CDC study—administered between 1999 and 2002—asked participants about the age they first had sex, their risk of sexual activity, and most importantly to arguments against gay marriage, the number of sex partners for various age groups, the main statistic validating arguments about commitment in gay relationships. The results were relegated to the amount of female sex partners for males and male sex partners for females. Since sexual preference in regard to promiscuity was not referenced in the advance data of the study, any homosexuals who may have participated in the study would have been part of the portion of the population reflecting as those who had never had sex at all. This calls into question the veracity of a comprehensive health study by a respectable institution and leaves any arguments as to the level of promiscuity in the American gay male a question of the past. There are currently no comprehensive studies comparing the level of promiscuity in heterosexual and homosexual behavior.

The aberrance of gay male sexuality is the focal point for many arguments, but what about the full range of LGBT individuals? Arguments based in general on the community are economic in nature and speculative at best. The popular claim that the meaning of marriage will be undermined because of an increase in divorce tie back into the promiscuity argument as it assumes that gay couples are psychologically unable to commit. However, the August 6, 2008 edition of the Chicago Free Press references a recent UCLA study showing “Gay and lesbian couples dissolve their marriage, union or partnership at the rate of 1-3 percent per year, pretty much the same as straight married couples.” Other arguments as to tax rights, death benefits, and other provisions that are secured through legal marriage have been unstructured when it comes to providing protection to gay couples living in a similar arrangement. Of the 1,138 marriage benefits listed by the U.S. Government Accountability Office, none are protected nationally for those in civil unions and domestic partnerships who face fluctuating definitions of their status as a couple from state to state and job to job.
One final argument that is used to quash gay marriage is whether gay couples are suitable for raising a family. As Republican presidential nominee John McCain stated to The New York Times of July 13, 2008, “I think that we’ve proven that both parents are important in the success of a family so, no, I don’t believe in gay adoption.” Influential members of American society such as McCain are backed by conservative family rights groups, including Focus on the Family and the Family Research Council, in the insistence that a committed mother and father are held as the normative base for all society. However, The Washington Post of March 4, 2007 counters, “…married couples with children now occupy fewer than one in every four households.” Married couples are the exception to the child-rearing rule, which includes single-parent families, couples raising children out of wedlock, and even gay couples who are allowed to adopt. Marriage is no longer considered the only institution in which to raise children. Now, marriage is one agreement people make between each other, while how to raise children is a separate and multifaceted arrangement.

If all these arguments fail to satisfy legislation preventing gay couples to marry, then it is possible for marriage to become an inclusive institution. However, does that mean gay marriage should be a major issue for the GLBT community? Many see marriage as a synonym for legitimacy; gay relationships will have the same standing as straight relationships because the last obstacle has been tackled. However, those who identify as queer have many different needs, so it is difficult to pinpoint one issue as the majority cause. Marriage rights do not hold legitimacy for those of the GLBT community struggling with gender identity issues, overwhelming prejudice based on environment, and those who do not want a traditional monogamous relationship.

Marriage is one step in aiding the cause of GLBT citizens throughout the world. In many countries, identifying as gay is still criminal and can be punishable by death. To say marriage would allay these tensions would be naïve. Marriage equality is an important right to secure, but it is not a panacea to discrimination and reproach. It does not guard against hate speech to those who choose to dress as the opposite sex in school. It does not aid queer people in rural cities without access to a broader community. And it does not save anyone who has been assaulted and left for dead simply for being queer. To secure rights for all in the queer community, marriage is only one battle in a greater fight.