Queer To The Right, Prude To The Left
Posted on November 3, 2009 at 7:38 amThomas F. O’Connell pens a very personal tract about his reaction to a push to ban gay couples from adopting which would have prevented any unmarried couple from adopting:
Nashville is my hometown, and Tennessee is my home state. As a man who has only so much as kissed one woman in his entire life, who has been with her for 10 years, and who expects to be with her for the rest of his life, I challenge anyone who questions my moral values or my choices to actually live according to them. The only thing wrong with them to practitioners of various organized religions is that I belong to no organized religions. Other than that, though, my personal life is about as conservative as it gets in contemporary America.
So imagine my surprise when a great moralizer appeared from the western part of Tennessee to assert that I should be considered unqualified for adoption. Exacerbating the offense of a previous incarnation of a bill targeting same-sex couples, state senator Paul Stanley (R-Germantown, Tenn.), in our most recent legislative session, perhaps seeking to blunt criticisms that he was merely anti-gay embarrassingly included unmarried couples in his list of people unqualified to adopt on moral grounds. More embarrassingly still, he specifically mentioned unmarried “sexually cohabiting” couples in his bill. I suppose this means that there would have been a state test of some variety to determine what constitutes sexual cohabitation.
I highly encourage you to click through and read the whole thing.
Comments
7 Responses to “Queer To The Right, Prude To The Left”
Correction: any “sexually co-habiting unmarried couple.”
I have great respect for Mr. O’Connell and applaud his commitment to his partner. Further I appreciate his sharing all that. Can I ask though, why not get married? Not being a member of an organized religion has nothing to do with that. It impresses me as a rather low threshold to cross. It signals to the broader community what you already know to be the case and are practicing, your commitment to one another.
PS: The part of not keeping any alcohol in the house… kids might drive you to change that policy.
Go Freddie, truth to power!
Martin, why should I need to signal the broader community when the commitment is to one another? Further, why should I need to signal the state about any of my commitments in any of my personal relationships?
Well if you are not interested in adopting children then you are right, there is no public interest. But, the state has an interest in placing children in stable homes. By marrying you send a signal. It is legitimate for policymakers to read such signals.
You can still answer my question… why not get married? Is getting married an undue burden?
If by marrying we send a signal and it’s legitimate for policymakers, i.e. the state, to read such signals then I think we have a new case for marriage equality.
Or, we could base adoption on the character and the home environment of the person/persons adopting rather than on an institution such as marriage that supposedly automatically signals good character and a stable environment.
Marriage does not automatically signal good character and a stable environment. It is a signal. It reveals something about intention. People who don’t get married signal something else, that they don’t see the relationship as a long-term/life long situation.