May 09, 2004

Legitimizing the Struggle

by PG

In some other blogplace, at some other blogtime, someone commented that comparing the struggle for equality for homosexuals to the struggle for equality for African Americans implies that everyone who is not in favor of the former must be a racist, despite their support for the latter.

I don't think the implication is of racism, but rather of inconsistency; the thinking is that people who are in favor of equality for one group ought to be in favor of it for another unless there is a relevant difference. In the view that neither one's race nor one's gender/ sexual orientation ought to be regarded as a relevant difference for being treated equally, to want equality for people of the minority race but not of the minority orientation or historically-oppressed gender is an inconsistent support for the principle of equality.

Alas a Blog looks at it differently:

Why is it that we can't seem to get away from viewing the black civil rights struggle as the Platonic civil rights struggle, the struggle that all other struggles must resemble or else be illegitimate?

Think of the debate, in recent months, over if same-sex marriage is a civil rights issue. It's almost always presented in the same way: as a question of if the gay rights movement is similar to or different from the black civil rights movement (those who are pro-SSM say "similar," those who aren't say "different"). It's rarely presented as a question of if justice and equality are being denied to same-sex couples, taken on their own terms.

It's like a perverse variation of the "model minority myth," which is so often used to attack blacks (e.g., "if Jews and Asians made it despite discrimination, why can't blacks?"). This time, it's the "model civil rights movement" myth. We need to get over it.


The black civil rights struggle is such a tempting comparison because of the near-universal acceptance of its legitimacy. One of the tenets of our contemporary civic religion is that keeping African Americans as an underclass was wrong. Indeed, opponents of race-based affirmative action frequently argue that they are the true inheritors of the civil rights struggle because they want to eliminate race completely as a recognized categorization.

Legal thinking relies strongly on precedent, which makes comparison even more inviting. If sexual orientation becomes regarded as a 14th Amendment-protected suspect classification, discrimination against homosexuals will become illegal. If even gender becomes fully regarded as such (with strict rather than merely heightened scrutiny), prohibiting same-sex marriage will become unconstitutional.

I understand ampersand's point. We should be able to look at homosexuality, at same-sex couples, and evaluate their claims to justice and equality on their own terms and without reference to a different civil rights movement. If Americans were somehow able to make the mental, emotional or spiritual leap required to look at people of different races as their equals, why wouldn't we be able to look at people of other sexual orientations as our equals? What is the hurdle?

I don't know. But until that leap seems to be happening, advocates for equality are unlikely to abandon the comparison to an earlier and successful struggle.

May 9, 2004 11:49 PM | TrackBack
Comments

The hurdle is the Bible, or Christianity, or people taking both out of context. Putting the struggle in the context of the African-American Civil Rights movement puts a secular face on it, which is what proponents of SSM need in order to counter the "bible thumpers", if you will. It gives people the incentive and the safety net to make that leap.

Posted by: mls at May 10, 2004 12:36 AM

>In some other blogplace, at some other blogtime, someone commented that comparing the struggle for equality for homosexuals to the struggle for equality for African Americans implies that everyone who is not in favor of the former must be a racist, despite their support for the latter.

Um, I would be interested in knowing where this came from, because in my experience it isn't necessarily accurate. From my experience, in dealing with more than a few homophobes on more than a few message boards, after a bit of discussion it became clear that most of the homophobes were also racists. That is a bit different than suggesting that a homophobe is ipso fact necessarily a racist. But there seems to be more than a bit of a correlation between the two.

Posted by: raj at May 10, 2004 08:32 AM

Quite frankly, I don't think the "struggles" are similar in any way at all... it's just a phenomena of having some people and academics label it this way.

There are actually few areas where homosexuals don't have equality: marriage and in some cases adoption; whereas blacks were discriminated against on a much wider scale.

Posted by: Brian at May 10, 2004 03:56 PM

Brian, you forget to take into account the ability to hide sexuality but not race. If homosexuals had to wear a giant rainbow on their back I bet we'd see an increase in discrimination in all areas of life.

Posted by: Quain at May 10, 2004 07:44 PM
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