Friday Assignment #3: Hot Topics: Gay Marriage

Hello everyone,

In this blog, the focus will be on the emotions regarding the gay movement and how that relates to the “face/ figurehead” of the gay rights movements. Later, I will talk about the emotions relate to the opposition people particularly the religious front.

There are a variety of emotions that comes along the gay rights/ marriage movement. There are 2 main kinds of fronts within the same sex rights supporters. There is the fight involved with getting equality, which includes providing awareness, educating the public, dealing with politicians and the public, campaigns, etc. and the next set of emotions comes from the passing of laws for marriage and/or rights that allows gays to be equal to straight couples. Yes these are the categories that the emotions for this movements fall into. The primary emotions when it comes to the fight for equality are neutral emotions. They include concern, the desire to help others understand the cause, wanting to have others to see a better picture of the issue of homosexuality. When it comes to this aspect of emotions of this movement, it comes from the emotions of helping others. The next set of emotions is tethered to the idea of laws passed that legalizes gay marriage and rights. When these major events happen, the community are all happy, excited, and overwhelmingly optimistic that this will spread to other states. This shows that their fight for equality is finally paying off and that this should continue until the community is complete equal rights as heterosexuals. But on the other hand, the exact opposite happens when such laws/ amendments disallows equal rights and marriage to homosexuals. When the gay community see what they feel as discrimination of which people of the state are enforcing (through state laws or amendments), they are outraged, angry, in shock and awe. While legislating equality brings the group unspeakable joy, the banning of equality brings the group unspeakable disappointment and disgruntled. When the prevention of equalities for this group is put into law, it definitely feels like a miscarriage of justice and that the law, the government, etc. has failed them.

Now, it’s time to apply these emotions to the tactics at hand. They gay rights/ marriage supporters use these emotions in few different ways. One tactic is using the dead, victims of hatred from the opposition. The gay community tells tragic stories of people getting murder just because their gay such as the Lawrence King story (link in previous blog). They want you to feel sad and want you to prevent such atrocities. The community wants you to look at your gay friends and/or family member and asks you through your emotions to support them being gay. The community uses your emotions as a tactic to support their cause.

As mentioned in the previous blog, I feel there are 2 sets of unsung faces, the living and the deceased victims from hate. With the living, I feel that the image that it puts forth to the public is what you get as it presents to its members or potential recruits. The gay community and their supporters want is equality and to end discrimination. They want the law to recognize them as first class and not second class citizens. They do not want to be told by anyone else that they’re any less just because of a different sexual orientation. They use this logic that to appeal to the public to find potential recruits.

Here is another note that I would like to explore, there are emotions and tactics that engage in their opposition, particularly when it comes to the religious fundamental/evangelical type. PLEASE NOTE: NOT EVERYONE WHO OPPOSES GAY MARRIAGES IS EITHER RELIGIOUS OR A BIGOT. JUST BECAUSE YOU DISAGREE ON THE SUBJECT DOES NOT MAKE YOU A HATEFUL PERSON OR THAT YOU DISLIKE THE GAY COMMUNITY OR INDIVIDUAL GAY PEOPLE. I want to make my position clear on that. But the concern in this paragraph is on the religious right forcing its way into the law. It is recent that religion in general got involved with the gay marriage/ right movement. Their arguments include it’s not natural, encouraging other people to be gay, not good for kids, etc. It just comes from the idea that just because homosexuality does not correspond with their bible and their g-d’s word. So how does the gay community react to this creed? Obviously, they would feel disrespected and understandably angry that people exhibits much hate towards them. Despite the rise in negative emotions on the side of the gay rights movement and their supporters, this community tries to understand why they can have so much hate towards them as in what truly good and genuine reason why they are so hateful. In my experience with seeing their hatred on ASU’s Tempe campus periodically over the past 3 years, there is no good reason. As much as I do not want to say it, they use our 1st amendment to shield their bigotry. As long as they are shouting, engage in a cross-cultural dialogue or whatever provided that nothing illegal is going on. When it comes to this kind of idea, it saddens me that there is still so much hate and sorrow that is still affecting so many people.

Sincerely,

Steven Weingarten Time 4:54PM Friday