Gay Marriage VIII

VIII

I am approaching the idea of Gay Marriage from more than the position of civil rights, which is how it wound up in the Supreme Court, which is a very good thing to have had happen. We must understand, though, that it is not the Court that gives Gay Couples the right to marry. It is not even the law that can do that. Human Rights precede the law, and Gay Marriage is a Human Right, the Human Right to choose. Yes, again, we are talking here about Human Rights (as in other essays, Human Rights must be capitalized to signify its capital place in our hearts and minds). When talking about Gay Marriage, I take this to be self-evident and not a point for debate. If it is understood that we are addressing basic Human Rights when we discuss the issue of Gay Marriage, perhaps the opposition could not be as vehement.

Moreover, where human rights are concerned, the law can uphold a right, the law can protect rights from abuse, the law can even get behind them and ensure that they are maintained in a manner that impedes future violation—and this is where the Court comes in—; but a basic Human Right is an unalienable right, and the denial of legitimacy by standing laws does not eliminate the right. The Human Rights of a slave exist and persist irrespective of the slavery. Slavery certainly disrespects and, more so, violates the Human Rights of the slave; but the slave has Human Rights in spite of the violation. The Human Rights of Gay couples exist irrespective of what the law says.

The law, again, in a slave society legally enforces the perpetuation of the slavery; but the slave’s human rights are absolute and universal, most especially at moment of their violation. This is where Gay Marriage resides–universal, absolute and transcendent Human Rights. Yes, let us proclaim liberty throughout the land for gay couples, that gay couples have unalienable human rights irrespective of the laws that support or impede social progress toward accepting Gay Marriage as a variegation of marriage.

Addressing Gay Marriage as a civil rights issue is a necessary adjunct to addressing Gay Marriage as a feminist issue, which it is, and not because lesbians are women. Gay Marriage is a feminist issue in as much as Gay Marriage will forever change how partners in the marriage contract are looked at, talked about, referred to; all of these apart from and forever distinct from how tradition has engaged these roles and used the terms to name them. Addressing the civil rights of homosexual couples is correlative to addressing Gay Marriage as a Human Right’s issue, so the Supreme Court was correct in addressing this case now as it has. I cannot stress this enough, though, about the Human Rights of gay couples being bound up in the legal sanctioning of Gay Marriage. Let all repetition become motif; the motif here is universal Human Rights; all in the cause of universal Human Freedom.

The interesting thing about the Supreme Court decision, though, is that it declared that any State’s attempt to block civil marriage of gay couples is unConstitutional. This shifts the focus of Gay Marriage from a Human Rights issue, universal, absolute and transcendent, to a legal matter, one where civil rights are specifically if not solely addressed, and not necessarily in conjunction with a discussion of Human Rights. This shift in focus does not eliminate–or should not be allowed to eliminate–from our view, just how much we need to keep our eye on Gay Marriage as an issue fully lodged in the fight for universal Human Rights. To say I agree with any legal decision that ends with the Constitutionality of Gay Marriage sounds silly to rational and intelligent ears, but it might not seem superfluous in the debate when we understand that sometimes in a democracy, power is numerical. I add my voice to the sum of voice, an extension of adding light to the sum of light.

Let me then say that Gay Marriage is Marriage. In this way, the truth is tautological.