Dave Singleton

Call me Joe the Gay Guy™.

I came out during the gale force of 1980’s wartime AIDS, breathed easier in the 1990’s when awareness led to more acceptance and Will and Grace lightened the mood, and opened my eyes in the 2000’s to the possibility of true equality in the form of gay marriage.

I write this soon after a major setback: three states recently voted to ban gay marriage by writing discrimination into their state constitutions. For average gay people like me who hope to commit to a partner, create families with full legal protections most take for granted, and protect their assets, as easily and seamlessly as the average Joe, that this news comes after a period of naïve jubilance makes it worse.

We chose to initiate our marriage battle on judicial frontlines, thinking that legislation and lawsuits would save us, which occasionally they do, but only temporarily. Our bigger, more lasting battle is for hearts and minds. That’s tricky business, requiring gays and gay allies to coax equality by appealing to voters’ fairness and better angels. But here’s a new twist from Joe the Gay Guy™. A little bit of progress can dampen the fire of your righteous anger just enough to keep you quiet.

Since the election, I am not feeling quiet. Something’s bubbling up. Steam is rising. Instead of righteous anger, I am feeling ironic anger.

No one group is to blame, but it’s hard to hear that African American voters in California voted overwhelmingly for Prop 8, writing anti-gay discrimination into California’s constitution and banning same-sex marriage in that state.

I am sobered into non-complacency by the stunning irony of voters in California, Florida, and Arizona approving gay-marriage state constitution bans at this moment in history when the spotlight is on hope, equality and transcendence. Sadly, the record voter turnout, which assured our first African-American president, may not have been such a boon to Joe the Gay Guy’s™’ quest for marriage equality.

There’s blame to share. There’s irony to spare.

At a Human Rights Campaign Fund election night party just yards from the Capitol, Joe the Gay Guy™ cheered each Obama state win with whoops and whistles, unaware that my personal version of Rome was burning. Gays were being defeated as millions of us celebrated the transcendence of racial inequality at election night parties. From church pews to city skyscrapers, many of the same Obamaniacs who, understandably, feel healed, thrilled, justified, and transformed by this once-unthinkable ascendance of a black man to the highest office in the land, didn’t connect the dots of equality to the gay folk.

I can’t help thinking about Martin Luther King Jr.'s quote, "Injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere."

I know, I know. It might be everywhere, but it’s not everyone. We have allies across the political and racial spectrum. One ray of hope this past week was Republican Gov. Schwarzenegger expressing disappointment at California’s Proposition 8's passage, saying it's not over, and comparing it to the interracial marriage ban decades earlier. And before him, Coretta Scott King, denounced a proposed constitutional amendment that would’ve banned gay marriage back in 2004. “Constitutional amendments should be used to expand freedom, not restrict it,” she said. "A constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages is a form of gay bashing and it would do nothing at all to protect traditional marriages."

I just wish someone could give a reasonable, civil argument to counter the fear and faith-based opposition to gay marriage. What bad thing will happen, aside from that tired, old right-wing chestnut, the, “If same sex couples marry, then what’s to stop someone from marrying a goat” argument?

Why not consider marriage as a sacred union between two consenting adults who are able to communicate their acceptance of the over 1,100 legal protections afforded by marriage that are issued from the government, not from God?

Want to hear a secret?

Let Joe the Gay Guy™ share a secret to help you transcend your fear of the unknown. Gay couples commit. We snore. We bicker. We bore. We understand sanctity. Once your social circle includes even one couple in a longstanding same-sex union, and you find out that we love just like any other “old married couple,” your resistance to the notion may dissolve. We want so to be special. But… nah.

We know the meaning of the word sanctity and our vows possess a hell of a lot more relationship gravitas than, say, Britney in Vegas. I am no threat to your marriage. Infidelity, money issues, stepchildren, and the mere fact that you can divorce…research shows that these are the real-world circumstances that pose true threats to the sanctity of your unions. The wedding I pay for out of my post-tax, disposable income, after giving Uncle Sam an equal or greater share of my taxes than you? Not so much.

C’mon, average Joe six-pack. Become a civil rights maverick and get a handle on your silly fear and resistance.

Here’s another secret. Joe the Gay Guy™ wonders if marriage could be the wrong fight simply because it’s the wrong word. It’s a loaded word, co-opted by religion. Here’s my $.02: give marriage back to the church. Find a new term, something better than “civil union,” and brand the hell out of it. Make that the de facto term for all the legal protections afforded through traditional marriage, fulfilling the true separation of church and state our forefathers assured. Require it of all: straight, gay, young, old, white, black, and Britney Spears. Let the churches run marriages according to whatever traditions their religious dogma requires.

Take one step forward, and one step back.

As the gay rights movement marks the fortieth anniversary of Stonewall in June 2009, Joe the Gay Guy™ is definitely out, a little bit loud, and as proud as you’d expect him to be. After all, many live more openly and some have domestic partnership benefits. There’s a national awareness of hate crimes, despite national legislation to deter them. And if a drag queen hits you with her shoe, you can pretty much be assured that it’s not to avoid arrest at some brawl akin to the Stonewall Riots. You probably just pissed her off.

But the game for all civil rights movements is called “one step forward, one step back,” isn’t it? We make strides, we face setbacks, we fight harder, and we find a mantra and unite. Rising up from Selma to Watts, we shall overcome. Fighting back from Los Angeles to Miami, we are what we are.

If one milestone of a civil rights movement is the moment when decent people decry inequality in public and private, then gay advocates need to step up the fight over the recent, ironic blow against marriage equality. We need a critical, decent mass to get outraged and connect the dots from movement to movement. To borrow from John McCain’s now infamous call out to the crowd on one of his last campaign stops before the election: “You’re all Joe the Gay Guy™, so all of you stand up!”

### Dave Singleton writes on topics including pop culture, dating and relationships. He’s the author of two books and a regular columnist for MSN.com and Match.com since 2003. www.davesingleton.com.