I just found this in my drafts on my Google Drive from August 2014. I probably meant it to be the bones of a piece with sentences and paragraphs and everything, but looks like I could never be bothered to actually write it. (I think the original question was on Q&A). Here it is in its unedited form.

Note the question used “gay people”, so I used the same in the response. I’d normally use “queer people”. See an earlier post for my thoughts on the term for marriage that includes queer people that I refer to here as “gay marriage”.

Why do so many gay people want to be assimilated into the heteronormative-archaic-patriarchal construct that is marriage?

 

• We don’t
  • Rich vocal minority with means and funding to campaign loudly on this issue make it seem like more gay people see this as a major issue than actually do.
  • Well-meaning straight people with influence see this as an easy cause to get behind.
  • Actual major issues affecting gay people are where the less-vocal majority of gay people actually want to see change:
    • Homelessness, particularly for young gay people
    • Employment
    • Education
    • Access to relevant health services – including sexual and mental health, and especially aged care.
    • Societal, rather than legal change
    • Protection of our culture/subcultures
    • Not being called a poofter on national television or being told by boss to move to New Zealand
  • Underground gay culture is still strong – most gay people really do reject heteronormativity.

• We do, but we shouldn’t
  • Marriage is a form of social control – government regulating our relationships
  • Gay marriage means more discrimination; not less
    • Immigration (ref UK Home Office guidelines)
    • Treatment of trans people
    • Treatment of poly people
    • Adoption rights
    • Increased stigma to unmarried people – including unmarried couples (of all orientations), single parents
    • Creation of a ‘gold standard’
  • Gay marriage is an attempt to stifle our liberation – by regulating our relationships, our oppressors make us less free; not more free.
  • Marriage is promoted as a right, but in reality it is a civic duty – our responsibility to ensure our relationships follow the approved format
  • Gay marriage creates a public register of gay people that can be used against us by those who would harm us.
  • The whole fucking system is bollocks

• We do, and we should
  • The law shouldn’t discriminate
    • BUT it still does, indirectly.
    • BUT just because it doesn’t discriminate against us doesn’t mean it doesn’t discriminate against anyone.
  • Family is universal – our desire to form family units that fit within our wider culture is not assimilation – it’s an expression of our relationships being a valid and important part of society
  • Our relationships are normal, not subcultural, and society should recognise that
  • We actually just want the legal rights afforded by marriage, and we reject the archaic patriarchal nature of traditional marriage
  • We can’t completely eliminate societal discrimination if we don’t eliminate legal discrimination
    • Gay marriage, while not perfect, is a definite step in the right direction.
  • We shouldn’t ignore the inequality of discriminatory marriage laws just because there are also worse issues affecting gay people
  • We like the idea of having a wedding and all the cultural tradition that comes with it
  • It’s also just, at it’s most basic element, a certificate and official recognition that two (or more) people  love each other.
  • Some of us want to get married, and that should be reason enough

Versions of gay marriage I have knowledge of and oppose

• • The UK version. Oh god so awful.
    • Spousal veto in particular
    • Really heavily gender-defining
  • The (thankfully overturned) Canberra version (even fucking worse than the UK)
    • Set us apart as different
    • Completely excluded trans and genderless people
• Versions of marriage including gay people I could support:
  • Any marriage that didn’t exclude any consenting adult. At all. Under any circumstance.
  • None, really. The whole system is fucked