The Atlantic - Latest Comments in I think this comment explains a lot...

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

JonF — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 21:32:41 -0000

Re: Here in MA, gay men in couples tend to earn a significantly lower income than their married heterosexual counterparts.

Interesting. Is this due to the fact that there are a lot of gay male couples where the partners earn very different amounts of money from each other? So I've observed at least (and my own relationship is somewhat along those lines; my income is about twice my partner's). Along heterosexual people the trend is increasingly toward same-class couplings where both husband and wife have similar educations and similar earnings (though the wife of course will usually be the one who takes the income hit for child-bearing and rearing). Among gays this trend is far less in evidence, perhaps because we form a fairly small fraction of the population and we can't afford to be picky about where someone works or went to school when we are husband-hunting.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

cocolamala — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 10:58:33 -0000

On Purity...

" a new way for people to "identify" when they aren't "pure" -- when their family wasn't the whitest of white protestants coming over on the mayflower, or isn't Southside of Chicago black" --Dan

African Americans (even on the South Side of Chicago) aren't *PURE*. Hardly any African Americans have exclusively African ancestors. African Americans are already a mixed race.

The one drop rule was implemented to prevent mixed race African Americans from being White, and claiming the benefits and privileges as such.

The one drop rule is not absurd just as it applies to Obama, but as it applies to most African Americans. Don't let my brown skin and kinky dreads fool you, if the One Drop rule worked to define who is white the way it defines who is black, I would have to add up my white ancestors and say that I am only passing for black. Very many of us would be.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

RhondaCoca — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 01:22:50 -0000

I agree more with Greg Rodriquez's take as to why the GLBT community and many on the left felt the need to single and put a beat down on blacks voters in Cali.

The ugly side of beyond race

Anyway, I have no problem with the GLBT community admiring civil rights leaders and the civil rights movement but I do have a problem when I see people frame the movement as one-dimensional and flattening out the desires, words and actions of the leaders and people involved. I am not saying that this is what the GLBT community is doing, I am referring to something that has unfortunately happened across the board in all sectors of American society from education to politics. Its not about "self-righteousness" its about the fact that the black liberation movements have lost almost all of its substance and the civil rights movement and Dr. King in particular have been used by every possible group for their own self-interest while the bulk of what he said, stood for and fought for is ignored. This is the sensitivity. This is what gets me and some others annoyed.

Also, the last aspect of what you said gets sticky. I agreed with you then I read it and disagreed and agreed and did not know what to make out of it. Here is why:

1. Moses, Promised Land etc... are biblical. Most of that rhetoric is preached in churches because they are really using biblical scripture as a source of liberation, hope and uplift. A central pillar of the black church before being hijacked by prosperity pimps and opportunists was and in some churches still is liberation. Its more about Christianity and the use of biblical scripture and not the appropriation of any one group's movement.

2. There are black Jews and also there are many scholars who say that many of the people spoken about in the Bible may have been black. I have a friend who speaks about this a lot so there is a lot more nuance.

3. This is where I agreed and this is where I believe you made your strongest point, talk of a "Black Holocaust", yea and also, the extended talk of none biblical related transgressions towards Jews that some black ministers and leaders discuss and correlate to black American suffering can be seen as hypocrisy when they are against the equal rights of another group and are offended by another group who may just find inspiration in black movements. I think that you should take what you wrote to the closest traditional black church.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

Daughter — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 00:06:39 -0000

Serwer is wrong when he argues that "The black community in America has always accepted people of varying shades, cultures and backgrounds." In fact, this is demonstrably false, and there are a host of people who have a question mark over their heads because black people have not fully embraced them as black (OJ, Condi, Tiger, maybe Lenny Kravitz).

Dan, I disagree with you here. I say this as an Ivy-League educated black woman with light skin, blond hair and green eyes (two black parents and a host of recessive genes made me! lol). I've had my share of folks who've questioned my African-American bona fides because of the reasons I've just named. However, more than 95% of the black folks I've ever met in my life have accepted me immediately as black. (They always know, too. It's only non-blacks who ask me, "What are you?"). And I would guess that Serwer, as a biracial man, is speaking from experience, also, of being and feeling accepted in the black community.

The folks you mention with the question mark? In my experience, the question mark appears when the person seems to be distancing themselves from the black community, not the other way around. For example, to my knowledge, Condi Rice has never done that, so while folks may disagree with her politics, I've personally never heard anyone question her blackness. And OJ? What you see (IMO) is mostly disgust at what he's become--a desire to disown him if we could. But even that desire means we know he started out as family. Tiger? I've heard mostly older generation folks criticize him for "thinking he's too good to be black." That's a desire to keep him in the family, not to push him away. But there is still a lot of pride in his accomplishments across the board, and among the younger generation, an acceptance of him the way he defines himself.

This, however, I do agree with: He wasn't distancing himself from black people, he was saying I'm other things too, and -- even though someone like Serwer wants him to be one or the other -- he wasn't going allow himself to be drafted. I do think we need to make room for people to identify themselves as they wish and be fully who they are.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

evans — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 23:02:39 -0000

thanks dan

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

dan — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 16:32:06 -0000

Evans:

Very interesting. I think the Racial Draft is a great way to illustrate the group forces at work here (when I said "agenda" above that's what I was getting at). I went back to the two articles you cited -- "He's Not Black" by Marie Arana, a Latina and "He's Black, Get Over It" by a multiracial man self-identified as black, by Adam Serwer.

The question is, why is the Racial Draft skit funny? Its funny because Serwer is wrong when he argues that "The black community in America has always accepted people of varying shades, cultures and backgrounds." In fact, this is demonstrably false, and there are a host of people who have a question mark over their heads because black people have not fully embraced them as black (OJ, Condi, Tiger, maybe Lenny Kravitz). The Draft works because we all know this, and want to see how it turns out.

What is interesting about the Draft is that it is really about allocating blackness, which, to bring it back to this thread, has a special cultural and political credibility that lots of people would like to have access to (which is why gays were outraged at their apparent abandonment by blacks on Prop 8).

So the Jews get Lenny, and the Asians get Wu Tang. The whites wouldn't want someone "really" black, so they get Colin Powell. (Note: I'm not question his identity, but the skit, and many others, are).

The Latino case is the interesting one: it was totally unfunny, and it was because the Elian Gonzalez thing just didn't work within the framework of the skit. It was kinda dumb, and I think that's because Chappelle couldn't come up with a good case of someone on the line between latin and black, over whose idenitity there is some amount of controversy. Notice also how the other "teams" in the draft fit in the white black divide, so we know what to laugh about. Asians and Jews are white, its funny who is now on their team. Whites are white, and its funny/controversial that Powell is on theirs. Latinos don't fit into this.

Which brings us back to Arana and your article. I'm not sure sure was trying to draft Obama into the "multiracial" category, or that she viewed that category as superior to black. I think she's saying that "black" doesn't capture all of Obama's identity, and that we need a new language. (It is instructive that the source of this viewpoint is Latino, though of course also a source of controversy).

Now, Obama identifies as black, and on the one hand that should be enough. But I think your article illustrates the forces that force him to make that choice -- he cannot be multiracial, he has to be black or white.

Why? Well, here's Serwer: "Tiger Woods' insistence on identifying himself as "cablinasian" was met with such hostility because of the extra distance he seemed to be drawing between himself and other black folks." I just don't think so, and I don't think Woods would have a problem being listed in the company of indisputably black people like Michael Jordan or Donovan McNabb. He wasn't distancing himself from black people, he was saying I'm other things too, and -- even though someone like Serwer wants him to be one or the other -- he wasn't going allow himself to be drafted.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

Hugo Pottisch — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 14:12:47 -0000

Solon gave men the right to vote.. women refer to men in order to get to vote.. men are upset. blacks refer to whites and jews.. gays refer to blacks... bis refer to gays...

those who are not oppressed anymore, especially the 2nd generation, should (be able to) stay cool when those who still feel oppressed refer to past struggles? for sure, those who claim to want the same as has gone before are not belittling those events. quite the contrary - they are the only ones who keep reminding young generations of past struggles and their relevance today?

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

zacksback — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 13:19:27 -0000

Have you ever noticed that marginalized groups can talk for hours about their own societal issues but couldn't care less about the (very similar) problems of other marginalized groups?

Yes. And it's exactly what keeps the political and economic power structure in this country overwhelmingly white, male and straight. Keep on arguing, guys....

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

DougEMI — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 10:16:19 -0000

As defined by many above, I come from the ultimate in privilege, white, male, straight, upper middle class, conservative, college educated etc, so of course I don't fully understand all the issues. I do have to say I find this thread fascinating and I think that the confines of a blog like this is the perfect place to hash things like this out. I love hearing all points of view and love to over think things.

However, as an outsider to much of this, I really wonder if bringing a lot of the talk about privilege and whose trumps someone else's takes the eyes off the prize. I have always been fond of the "walk and chew gum" concept Ta has been bringing up, but in the aftermath of this vote, there is way too much finger pointing. Having Dan Savage lecture black people about homophobia is about as effective as having Al Sharpton lecture certain people in my neighborhood about race relations. It just isn't going to work and is only going to harden people.

Most people in my family are conservative, but they are not very religious. They are small government types so many are persuadible on an issue like gay marriage. However lecture them about how privileged they are, bitch about how the Catholic Church is full of bigots, and then vandalize churches, then they will probably shut down the whole conversation.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

Thomas R — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 01:46:33 -0000

"Tiger is white." dan

TR: I know very few people who consider Tiger Woods, if that's who you mean, as white.

In the token reactionary McCainiac so don't take my opinion too serious, but I've always figured Tiger Woods is essentially what he says he is. That being a mixture of Asian, Black, and White with maybe some American Indian somewhere.

I see the concern, but I'm not sure Obama has to mean that biracial people must choose to be black. That decathlete at the Olympics, Bryan Clay, is half-black and half-Japanese. So far as I know he is considered Afro-Asian or Afro-Japanese and I don't recall there being any problem with that. Lenny Kravitz is black and Jewish and I believe claims both.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

evans — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 00:13:22 -0000

dan,

check out the article: Identity, Race, Racism, Labels and Shortcuts: Hopefully Not a Remake of the Same Song, But a Somewhat Familiar, Yet Still Engaging, New Tune

on www.thetalentedmasses.com.

I'm interested in your thoughts.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

dan — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 23:18:15 -0000

TNC, I appreciate your comment above (yeah, I'm late answering your question). You say, "I can't figure out, for the life of me, why this keeps coming up" -- that is, whether Obama is black.

I think the reason it does is the next comment. BabylonSista says, "Hang the hell on, Dan. Obama is black," and then says I'm being unfair because I'm "trying to negate the identity of a biracial person."

You see what the problem is? It looks to me like the fact that Obama is "biracial" is negated by being called black (and not by me). We are accustomed to this because in America you have two choices, you are white or you are black. (Latino? Okay, you're kinda black. Asian? Shit, I don't even need to say).

If he identifies as black, fine, I am not trying to take that from him. But there is a problem here. Obama's first book is all about it -- contending with what and who he is. Obama may have resolved these issues, but for the many, many people who are multiracial and/or multiethnic, I think there is an agenda at work and I think that agenda is forcing most of them to choose sides (and excluding entirely Latinos and Asians). It's the racial draft all over again. Tiger is white. Obama is black, and for at least two reasons, first, because he says so, and second, because we really, really want a black president. (It's not enough, by the way, that he says so, because the rest of us have to believe it. I'm sure Condi has said she's black, and so what?)

I want a black president too. I have read your comments on Michelle, the White House, the photo spread in that French magazine; I saw Colin Powell crying about the election on CNN; I watched Rev. Lowery on youtube a bunch of times. I'm moved, and we have a really opportunity here.

But this is also a time to ask the question, why do we still apply the one-drop rule? We have an opportunity here to come up with a new language, a new way for people to "identify" when they aren't "pure" -- when their family wasn't the whitest of white protestants coming over on the mayflower, or isn't Southside of Chicago black.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

PhoenixRising — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 21:11:49 -0000

black people get assumed by white people to be the arbiters of whether something's authentically part of the King legacy

There is a powerful leverage to be gained, by anyone who wants to fight for freedom and equality, from simply acknowledging this habit and growing past it.

It's not the mission of every, or any, brown skinned person in this country to validate my struggle.

I know I'm right. I don't need my real or virtual Official Black Friends to affirm me in order to claim my role in the ongoing American drama of expanding freedom to enclose everybody.

And that's one of the ways I'm a strange white skinned person. I do my best to preach to my people about developing ourselves past the reflexive desire for positive reinforcement from people of color, but I can't do it alone.

It's not that I don't want the support of Oakland's church ladies for marriage equality. It's just that I don't need them there to make my goal a just one. (They should be there for the 55,000 black children in CA with same-sex parents. Those kids have a claim on their grandmas' support and my job as the experienced organizer is to help them press that claim. Not to get permission to assert that mine is a movement for civil rights.)

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

NoahB — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 20:50:51 -0000

"Nate's point was mired in useless stereotype, but I understand what he was saying. While there are definitely parallels, the struggle is not the same because white queers have the advantage of privilege on their side."

But some black people have had, and continue to have, privilege on their side too, no? Barack Obama; he's got a lot more money and power than a lot of queer people. Roland Burris; he's got more privilege than some working-class closeted lesbian, doesn't he? And...there are a lot of black queer people, too.

The discrimination and oppression suffered by black people (as blacks( and gay people (as gay) are very different. But as several commenters have pointed out, discussing them in terms of who is less or more oppressed isn't necessarily all that helpful or insightful.

And, more importantly than my natterings: every time this discussion comes up, somebody should quote Mildred Loving. So I'm going to:

"My generation was bitterly divided over something that should have been so clear and right. The majority believed that what the judge said, that it was God’s plan to keep people apart, and that government should discriminate against people in love. But I have lived long enough now to see big changes. The older generation’s fears and prejudices have given way, and today’s young people realize that if someone loves someone they have a right to marry.

Surrounded as I am now by wonderful children and grandchildren, not a day goes by that I don’t think of Richard and our love, our right to marry, and how much it meant to me to have that freedom to marry the person precious to me, even if others thought he was the “wrong kind of person” for me to marry. I believe all Americans, no matter their race, no matter their sex, no matter their sexual orientation, should have that same freedom to marry. Government has no business imposing some people’s religious beliefs over others. Especially if it denies people’s civil rights.

I am still not a political person, but I am proud that Richard’s and my name is on a court case that can help reinforce the love, the commitment, the fairness, and the family that so many people, black or white, young or old, gay or straight seek in life. I support the freedom to marry for all. That’s what Loving, and loving, are all about."

Amen.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

CitizenE — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 19:46:16 -0000

From a white, or I don't know, non-black perspective, and I think it's always important to recognize either-or fallacies, like all fallacies, break down the discussion, I see Martin Luther King, Jr. as someone who was not only specific to African Americans, but someone who comes out of a world tradition, like Ghandi before him and Ceasar Chavez after, just as I see the Filipino writer Carlos Bulosan's generation representational autobiography, America is in the Heart, part of a thread in American literature that the Autobiography of Malcolm X is most famous for (though of course King knew about Ghandi, while it's questionable whether Malcolm X ever read Bulosan, whose blistering critique of racism in America with its special exclusion of Filipinos in mixed race fraternization, let alone marriage, was part of the critique). The civil rights movement lead by King is one of America's great contributions to the world, right in the tradition of the American Revolution itself. People worldwide seeking justice and freedom have been inspired and moved by it, so it should not surprise blacks that others appropriate its glories and virtues. That said, there is something presumptuous, not to mention foolish, about thinking that just because another group has suffered prejudice and injustice that they are necessarily in synch with your experience or that any group of people all thinks the same way about anything, let alone a world wide controversy--see news from Senegal today, for example.

It would probably be salutary to consider Richard Wright and James Baldwin in thinking these issues out.

However, insofar as marriage is concerned, as a confirmed heterosexual who has lived through a failed marriage and seen as many if not more failed heterosexual marriages as successes and witnessing my children's generation that distrusts marriage to the nth degree, I really wish those who are so concerned about the sanctity of male-female marriage would begin to consider why the institution is in such sorry shape these days, rather than sticking their nose in other people's sacred relations.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

anon — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 17:54:50 -0000

MaJeff, I like your commentary, and if you think employment nondiscrimination is more important than marriage, that's a-ok by me. But I take issue with the "rich white Armani brides for marriage" vs. "normal suffering LGBT people for jobs" framing. Marriage and civil union rights affect poor people, too -- unless you think there are no poor LGBT families, or that legal protections don't matter to them. The legal protections of marriage are probably more important for lower-income people who can't afford second-parent adoption and all the costs of creating contractual substitutes for marriage--costs that wealthier Armani-wearing gays can far more easily absorb.

As you yourself note, of course, those lower-income families aren't who shows up on tv. Of course many lower-income LGBT's are going to care about ENDA, too -- maybe more than marriage, maybe not.

Personally I am 100% in favor of ENDA, but I also think it's naive to think that legal job protections are going to work as a magic bullet without a social change where LGBT's are not viewed as second class. It's not like many employers can't think of a decent excuse to not hire the gay guy, if they want to, anyway, and our employment nondiscrimination laws generally don't do a great job of rooting out pretextual firings.

In short, I think your Armani bride diss is more than a little shortsighted. I just don't get the need for so many gay people to pooh pooh the marriage equality fight. Personally, I don't see any need to choose between working on these two things, anyway, and work on one issue helps clear the way on the others, generally. It all goes back to the same damn thing, discrimination.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

Huntington — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 17:06:39 -0000

God, I'm an idiot. I'm gay, almost forty, and I like to think I've considered these issues. I've never understood biphobia. But this is the first time I've realized that, for some people, sexual orientation is just as much about who you don't sleep with as who you do.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

msl — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 16:54:08 -0000

Hating on bisexuals has thankfully leached out of lesbian culture, or at least lesbian culture as I know it. Most of my gay female friends have also dated guys, so bisexuality is unremarkable to me and most other mid-20-something lesbians I know. It's one of the benefits of gay culture becoming more mainstream, i.e. we don't feel like an embattled minority that needs to police its borders in order to maintain group identity.

ECL is spot-on with her point about why gays were cheesed off at black people after Prop 8, and offers the best analysis of gay use of civil rights analogies that I've read. So the civil rights movement isn't a good analogy for gay marriage rights. Now we know! In this light it's been frustrating to watch the discussion about what went wrong with No on 8 devolve into an idiotic and ineffectual blacks vs. gays fray. The important lesson Prop 8 gave to the gay rights community is that it needs to get better at reaching out to the black community.

A la MAJeff's point, it's probably good for fundraising for the gay rights industrial complex to use wealthy white couples as shining examples of gay married virtue - this causes rich white gays to open their wallets and makes mainstream white people more comfortable with the idea. But if Prop 8 is any indication this small-tent approach is no longer useful.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

Juba — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 15:51:50 -0000

"Now, black folks need to be humble here, instead of proprietary, and here is why--we do the same damn thing. Think about the ancient tradition of the black clergy identifying themselves as the America's Hebrews, of thinking of MLK as a sort of Moses, and his allusions to the Promised Land. Think about the Black Israelites. More disturbing, I can't tell you how many rallies I went to at Howard designed to memorialize the "Black Holocaust." Which was fine up to this point--unlike folks in the gay community, I saw several speakers at those rallies claim that the "Black Holocaust" was ten times worse, and thus deserved more attention.

Now, there are reasons why that happened, but the fact of the matter is that it was ugly. We need to guard against our sense of virtue, against our own self-righteousness."

OOOooweee! Thats good stuff right there.

Unfortunately, humans collectively are not by nature rigorously self-reflective. If we were, Socrates would not have been poisoned, and Sufis would not have been executed in the medieval Islamic world, and Malcolm would not have been gunned down--all for pushing for unyielding truth over dogma.

But still we rise, and still we rise.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

John — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 15:48:57 -0000

Have you ever noticed that marginalized groups can talk for hours about their own societal issues but couldn't care less about the (very similar) problems of other marginalized groups?

I think we'd all be better off if we shut up about our own problems and worked towards alleviating someone else's issues. Isn't that how relationships work? The reciprocity comes when both partners are solely focused on lifting the other up.

Not to discount education, advocacy etc. for your own group. But just something to think about...

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

Steven — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 15:28:56 -0000

Well, yes, white queers do have privilege. Just as black hets have privilege: heterosexual privilege. While I agree that comparing oppressions and privileges for competitive purposes yields little, I think it's important to acknowledge that there are a variety of ways to be both privileged and oppressed. Analyzing the similarities and differences among forms of privilege and oppression can be illustrative not only of the nature of privilege and oppression generally, but also of the specific experiences of various groups living some kind of "minority" experience. And the complicating fact is that many people are both privileged and oppressed over the course of their lives, and sometimes in the same moment.

It's probably also helpful to really understand what the oppression of gay people is. It's true that, in the main, it has not taken the forms that the oppression of black people in this country has taken. If you look for images of gay people being sprayed with fire hoses or "straight only" water fountains, they will be hard to find, no doubt about it.

To me, it seems that there is the black civil rights movement as it actually was, and The Black Civil Rights Movement as an iconic historic event. The latter gets in the way in every way in this dicussion: (white) gay people tend to want to lay claim to the iconic movement, often with little (or only superficial) regard for the lived experience of the actual historic events as they happened to real people.

But I also think that black (straight) people tend to view oppression only through the lens of the iconic movement, discounting other forms of oppression to the extent that they don't look like the iconic civil rights movement.

So, for example, I think it's in poor taste -- to say the least -- for fellow white gay men to speak of being "free at last," as I have heard them do. I know where they're coming from, and there is a very real sense in which gay people (even gay white men) have not been free in this country, even today. But we haven't yet reached the moment (and maybe never will or even should) where that rhetoric can be lifted from its historical context. In context, it is not responsive to the experience gay white men as white men.

But I'm similarly tired of being told that the closet is somehow a "perk" of being gay -- that the invisibility that gay people endure, which is enforced by the omnipresent threat of all forms of violence, is somehow a blessing. It isn't.

Anyway, I had a conclusion, but I can't quite remember it and I think I've gone on long enough. You get the point, I think.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

Lynn Gazis-Sax — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 15:24:58 -0000

Just to join in piling on Nathan: I'm bi, have never once slept with someone I picked up in a bar, and have been faithfully married for nearly 21 years.

On the other hand, unlike the commenter quoted in the post, I never did go for the independent bisexual social/political identity thing. It's not a bad idea in principle, but back when I was single, the only bi group I knew about was a) bus rides away, and b) rumored to be very poly oriented, while I was only interested in monogamy. So I figured I could fit in the straight world or fit in the gay and lesbian world, but didn't have a practically viable third alternative.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

AMT — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 14:42:30 -0000

@ MAC:

Of course it'd be better if people were free to express themselves. What I was really try to get at with the hypothetical co-eds was not the idea that the girl might mislead the boy by throwing out a label that clearly didn't fit (for whatever reason). I meant that when we use labels that are in common usage with an agreed upon meaning such as "straight" or "gay", we should only employ them using their agreed upon meaning or add a qualifier or else the shorthand becomes useless. For me this whole thing is more an issue of clear communication.

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

sv — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 14:17:16 -0000

"The president's black, my Lambo's blue, and I'll be God-damned if my rims ain't too.."

I think that's the final word on the subject.

kidding... I mean he's black as it's usually meant in America, and is a part of that community, but he's also somewhat unique as a black man - and not just because he's president (!!) or has more white blood than most of the other black Americans, and not really because of his success and certainly not fot his intelligence, but because of a whole host of things, such as his upbringing in disparate locations and the fact that he's related to every single United Color of Benetton. Hell he's probably related to me in some distant way. Anyway Obama's black, whatever.

(I know this comment was way up there but I just wanted to respond to it)

Re: I think this comment explains a lot...

MAJeff — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 13:57:30 -0000

"It was an interesting time to be poor, gay, and too smart for your own damn good."

Still is.

I'm doing my dissertation on news media and same-sex marriage, particularly representations of the couples*. You know why so many people think that this is an issue primarily affecting better off white people? Because those are pretty much the only people who show up in the media.

Here in MA, gay men in couples tend to earn a significantly lower income than their married heterosexual counterparts. Lesbians earn a bit more than their married heterosexual counterparts. (I attribute this to structures of gender--the ways that married women are more likely to work part-time and/or take time out of wage labor markets for childbearing/rearing. Lesbians don't have those higher male incomes to draw upon.) In same-sex household raising children, Massachusetts is a bit different than the rest of the country in that those couples have household incomes that are about the same as those of heterosexual married households (nationally, same-sex couples with children tend to make less than different-sex couples). Generally, taking households with and without children same-sex couples tend to have slightly higher incomes than different-sex households (again, I'm placing this one in gender/wage-labor markets/and the mommy track type stuff).

However, when we look at the couples who show up in the media, they're better off than the population at large, and than the rest of lesbian and gay population (no transgender folks show up, or at least they aren't noted as such, and neither are any bisexuals). The couples we see are more likely to own homes (while same-sex couples are actually less likely to own homes), and the homes we see tend to be more extravagant. There's a complex thing going on here, between movement activity and news reporting, but the public face of the movement is almost exclusively white. And wealthy.

As someone who can't even afford to go to the dentist, I don't give two shits about a couple of brides' matching Armani pant suits. As someone engaged in a national job hunt, non-discrimination protection is far more important to me than marriage.

But incorporating same-sex couples into the wedding-industrial complex is apparently more important than issues affecting poorer LGBT people, who don't matter, to media or movement.

*(my work is dealing specifically with Boston's Globe and Herald--the income data and such come from the Census and the Williams Institute at UCLA).