The debate on same-sex marriages has suddenly taken the country
about 40 to 50 years back in time. Terms like “separate but
equal,” states’ rights and the Civil Rights Movement
have gone from the pages of U.S. history textbooks into the mouths
of prominent leaders and on to airways across the nation in recent
weeks and months. The link drawn between the two movements have
prompted many black leaders to voice their support for same-sex
marriages despite the fundamental difference of the group of people
who believe they are being discriminated. Many campus civil rights
experts and student leaders think this surge of support from the
black community has resulted less from the similarities between the
movements and more from the responsibility that some feel to oppose
discrimination of any kind. Most opponents of gay rights do not
believe they are violating civil rights and wish to maintain the
sanctity of marriage.
Black leaders speak out While images of
President Bush pushing for a constitutional amendment to define
marriage as a union between a man and woman contrast images of
thousands of gay and lesbian couples lined up outside San Francisco
City Hall to obtain marriage certificates, many black leaders have
linked the movement to the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.
Congressman John Lewis, D-Georgia, who was one of the speakers at
the 1963 March on Washington, has written about the strong
connection between the two movements. “Some say let’s
choose another route and give gay folks some legal rights but call
it something other than civil rights,” Lewis wrote in an
op-ed piece in The Boston Globe in October 2003. “We have
been down that road before in this country. Separate is not
equal.” UCLA law Professor Brad Sears, administrative
director of the Charles R. Williams Project on Sexual Orientation
and the Law, strongly agrees that the “separate but
equal” argument is analogous to the issue of gay marriage.
“Brown v. Board should be legal support that civil unions are
not constitutional,” Sears said, referring to the 1954
Supreme Court case that called for the racial integration of public
schools and prohibited a “separate but equal” policy
that had been implemented by many states. Other leaders from
Democratic presidential candidate Al Sharpton and former Democratic
presidential candidate Carol Moseley Braun to members of Martin
Luther King Jr.’s family have given their support for gay
marriage.
Religious conflict At the same time, several
religious leaders in the black community are voicing their views
about holding on to traditional religious doctrines and their views
opposing gay marriage. Some of these leaders also emphasize the
lack of connection between the two forms of civil rights movements.
The Rev. Talbert Swan II, a Massachusetts religious leader and
author, has asserted his view that the movements are not linked.
“Homosexuality is a chosen lifestyle. … I could not choose
the color of my skin,” Swan told Fox News in a November 2003
report. In an address given at Harvard Law School, the Rev. Jesse
Jackson said making a connection between gays wanting to be married
compared to the black community’s fight for civil rights is a
“stretch.” Though Jackson said he did support some
rights for gay and lesbian couples, he believes marriage should be
a union between a man and a woman. But other religious leaders
across the country and student leaders on campus are pushing the
scriptural arguments aside and say they’re simply pushing for
human rights. Sexual orientation is a touchy subject for many
religious people in the black community, said Na’Shaun Neal,
chairperson of the African Student Union. There are many in the
black community who believe marriage is a gift given by God, but
that does not mean they have the right to dictate the lives of gay
people, Neal said. Neal said fighting for civil rights is a part of
the “African American experience” and that he will
continue to fight oppression of people’s identities.
“There are divisions in all communities … but I see a lot
of parallels,” Neal said, referring to the civil and gay
rights movements.
Drawing parallels Many campus experts believe
the parallels can be laid out on several levels. Sears, a lecturer
who specializes in gay and lesbian issues, sees the movements
intersecting at a few key points. They are comparable because they
are both forms of discrimination, they both reignited the debate of
the state and federal government’s role in regulating civil
rights, and both stem from philosophical principles, Sears said. He
argued that the philosophy behind prohibiting slaves rights and
rights of the black community stemmed from economic reasons that
began with white masters not wanting to have their authority
undermined. Meanwhile, the opposition to gay marriage comes mainly
from religious philosophy, Sears said. For some, the fights further
overlap because equality based on sexual orientation is still a
fight for equality. “The gay rights movement is a Civil
Rights Movement. I couldn’t even think of what else to call
it,” said Ronni Sanlo, director of the Lesbian, Gay,
Bisexual, Transgender Center on campus. Sanlo said the LGBT
community’s quest for equality constitutes a civil rights
movement. They want to have the same rights other people in this
country have, a goal that has yet to be fully reached. The
Massachusetts Supreme Court also drew parallels between the
movements when it ruled a ban on same-sex marriages was
unconstitutional earlier this month. In its ruling, the court cited
laws that struck down bans on interracial marriage in the late
1960s. For all of these reasons, the gay rights movement is
intricately linked to the civil rights movement, and has been since
the late 1960s, said Susan Cochran, a professor of epidemiology in
the School of Public Health and chairwoman of the LGBT Studies
Faculty Advisory Committee. The gay rights movement took force in
the 1950s, becoming more formally organized. Heavily influenced by
the civil rights movement of the time, various groups fought the
persecution faced by homosexuals. The movement finally escalated in
1969 as a result of the Stonewall Riots ““ a police raid on a
gay bar in New York City. The parallels aside, black student
leaders on campus say it is important for black leaders to fight
all forms of oppression. “If the gay community isn’t
successful in obtaining the right of marriage … it sets back
other communities,” said Anica McKesey, president of the
Undergraduate Students Association Council and former ASU
chairperson, adding that she feels connected to several communities
as a bisexual, female black leader on campus.