[News] The Mad Activist Ponders Marrying for Money

[Anti-Imperialist News]

The Mad Activist Ponders Marrying for Money
by Susie Day

http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2011/day180711.html

Dear Queer Diary --

Should I get married?

I mean, now that the state of New York has passed the gay marriage 
bill, should my girlfriend and I get really and miraculously and 
legally married?

Or.  Should I, as a queer, reclaim my right to legal ostracism, grab 
my lesbo luv-muffin, and take her underground with me to fight the 
state that gave us this soul-sucking, boilerplate "privilege" in the 
first place?

Oh Queer Diary, my inner being has split into two warring 
factions.  Here they are now:

ME 1: For joy!  How amazed and happy I am -- I, a newly sanctified 
lesbian, can become, with tears of joy streaming down my 
cherub-cheeks, the lawfully wedded wife of a woman who shares my 
gender!  Together, my fellow-wife and I can grow old, enjoying the 
<http://www.religioustolerance.org/mar_bene.htm>1,400 legal rights 
and fiscal benefits that this country has long afforded wedded 
heterosexuals, until one of us keels over and dies suddenly during a 
routine argument about whether to watch the Food Channel or ESPN.  Oh 
what shall I wear to plight our troth?  Does anyone know a good gay 
wedding planner?

ME 2: You fucking idiot.

ME 1: Pardon?  Have we met?

ME 2: Governor Cuomo spent the year 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/02/opinion/02sat1.html>cutting funds 
for Medicaid, public schools, and legal services.  He forced 
<http://www.statebudgetsolutions.org/publications/detail/cuomo-secures-big-givebacks-in-union-deal>wage 
and benefit concessions from the state's largest public employee 
union, and next year he plans to 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/14/nyregion/cuomo-says-he-wants-to-tackle-pension-changes-in-2012.html>curb 
public pensions.  Can't you see Cuomo shepherded this gay marriage 
bill through the legislature because he needed something to make him 
look like a liberal?

ME 1: So what?  We're legal -- us, whose love now dares speak its 
name!  The name being, of course, Gay Marriage!

ME 2: That's not a name; that's a brand.

ME 1: A brand I can trust!  Like Kleenex and . . . and . . . Electrolux!

ME 2: Which proves that this thing blows and sucks.  Read 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/nyregion/the-road-to-gay-marriage-in-new-york.html>the 
story in the June 25 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/nyregion/the-road-to-gay-marriage-in-new-york.html>New 
York Times: Governor Cuomo, sick of "rampant infighting and 
disorganization" in the groups that had been pushing gay marriage for 
years, called gay activists together last March, merged them into a 
single coalition, hired an outside consultant, and demanded 
"meticulous, top-down coordination."

ME 1: Oh no.  All that beautiful infighting, destroyed.  But don't 
you think it was worth it?

ME 2: Cuomo also met with a "group of super-rich Republican donors" 
-- one of whom, a billionaire, has a gay son.  These donors wrote 
six-figure checks to the gay marriage lobby, amounting to over $1,000,000.

ME 1: So the gay movement married for money -- big deal.  So the bill 
passed because of Cuomo's "relentlessly strategic mind."  I read that 
story, too, you know.  I also read the Times on July 16: 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/16/nyregion/gay-rights-group-donated-60000-to-cuomo-campaign.html>"Gay-Rights 
Group Gave Cuomo $60,000 as He Pushed Marriage Bill."

ME 2: I hate you.  Why did you let me go on like that?

ME 1: We're the same person, remember?  I just wanted to savor one 
joyous moment of feeling society's validation and acceptance without 
you bringing me down.

ME 2: Now I know where I get my extremely low self-esteem.

ME 1: Well cheer up, because I'm back to my usual feelings of despair 
and alienation.

ME 2: Good.  Now we can start to bond with the people we're alienated 
from.  Like 
<http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/freedom-rider-gay-not-new-black>Black 
people, Brown people, sick people, union workers, schoolchildren: 
basically, low-income people.  This year, none of them got lucky like 
gay people.

ME 1: That's not true.  It was very nice of Governor Cuomo to give 
major tax breaks to rich people.

ME 2: Fine.  You go right ahead picking out your silver pattern, 
nimrod, so you won't notice that Cuomo's about to 
<http://www.wnyc.org/articles/wnyc-news/2011/jun/30/cuomo-administration-outlines-plan-regulate-fracking/>lift 
the ban on hydraulic fracturing that pollutes drinking water by 
blasting carcinogenic chemicals into --

ME 1: Hydraulic whaah?  You mean fracking?  Hey, I feel abused by 
your shame-based barrage of politically correct factoids.  Why can't 
you think of positive ways to resolve our differences?  Like holding 
consciousness-raising gay wedding ceremonies at scenic upstate fracking sites!

ME 2: I love how you smash our pain into a sarcastic ball of 
self-involved retort.

ME 1: Whimsy helps me shoulder the burden of white middle-class privilege.

ME 2: Was that sarcastic, too?

ME 1: I don't know.  I only know I want world peace.

ME 2: I also love it when you don't know.  I guess, beneath our 
torment and confusion, I feel an undying self-love for you.  I 
forgive you.  Marry me.

ME 1: I can't.  We have a girlfriend.

ME 2: OK, let's marry her.  Think of the loot -- we'll get toasters 
-- microwaves -- contour sheets!  Life is good!

ME 1: But you can get those at a commitment ceremony.

ME 2: OK, then let's just have a big party --

ME 1: Yeah!  And invite the low-income people!  We can all marry each 
other!  Toasters -- microwaves -- contour sheets for everyone!  YAY!

ME 2: Where are we going to get the money for all that?

ME 1: We'll also invite our friend Andrew Cuomo.  We'll remind him 
we're gay, see?  He should be able to figure something out . . .

----------
Susie Day is a writer.




Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110

415 863-9977

www.Freedomarchives.org  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/news_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20110719/901a581b/attachment.htm>