This Salon interview with Richard Rodriguez (who, I’m ashamed to say, I’ve never read) on the “real issues” behind Proposition 8 is, to say the least, awesome. RELEASE THE MONEY QUOTE:
Monotheistic religions feel threatened by the rise of feminism and the insistence, in many communities, that women take a bigger role in the church. At the same time that women are claiming more responsibility for their religious life, they are also moving out of traditional roles as wife and mother. This is why abortion is so threatening to many religious people—it represents some rejection of the traditional role of mother.
In such a world, we need to identify the relationship between feminism and homosexuality. These movements began, in some sense, to achieve visibility alongside one another. I know a lot of black churches take offense when gay activists say that the gay movement is somehow analogous to the black civil rights movement. And while there is some relationship between the persecution of gays and the anti-miscegenation laws in the United States, I think the true analogy is to the women’s movement. What we represent as gays in America is an alternative to the traditional male-structured society. The possibility that we can form ourselves sexually—even form our sense of what a sex is—sets us apart from the traditional roles we were given by our fathers.
If you’ll excuse me, I’m now off to buy a Rodriguez book or seven.
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