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Citing traditional right-wing “family values,” the New York court majority ruling stated that biological parents of children were better qualified to be parents than any others. In a 4-2 ruling, the court denied an appeal by more than 40 same-sex couples challenging a New York state law banning same-sex marriage.
Less than two hours later, the Georgia Supreme Court upheld a state constitutional amendment banning same-sex couples the right to marry.
State bigotry against LGBT people
The New York ruling is shocking for its bigoted language and long-outdated view of marriage and the family.
In the majority opinion, Judge Robert S. Smith audaciously declared that the issue was about the welfare of children in society, and that children raised by same-sex couples are significantly worse off than those raised by biological parents. Then, after making such a wholly irrational statement, the judge continued to say that, “Plaintiffs have not persuaded us that this long-accepted restriction is a wholly irrational one, based solely on ignorance and prejudice against homosexuals.”
Blasting the majority opinion, Chief Judge Judith S. Kaye wrote that banning same-sex marriage rights was tantamount to barring interracial marriage, as laws formerly did. She stated, “The long duration of a constitutional wrong cannot justify its perpetuation, no matter how strongly tradition or public sentiment might support it.”
The court rulings reflect the current political atmosphere, in which the Bush administration has promoted a campaign against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality in order to strengthen its right-wing base. Even in a state like New York, which has a long history of progressive support for equality, and where a majority of the population supports the right of same-gender couples to marry, a massive national campaign has led to setbacks in the LGBT struggle.
These two rulings demonstrate clearly that in class society, including the current period of capitalist rule, the institution of marriage is designed to protect the status quo regarding property relations under capitalism.
In addition to the blatant bigotry being fomented against LGBT people, there are underlying economic factors driving the current right-wing homophobic campaign.
By stipulating that “biological” parents are best suited to provide an optimal environment for children, the judges are reinforcing the notion of the family as a unit devised to ensure the subjugation of women and provide efficient workers to the production pool, thus ensuring ongoing exploitation and oppression of all workers—men, women, gay or straight.
The legal recognition of the validity of loving and committed same-sex partners implies expanding the benefits of civil marriage granted to men and women to same-gender couples who wish wed. This would be costly to the capitalist bosses in both political and economic spheres.
A militant, independent movement
While the current setbacks are disappointing to all those who abhor discrimination, the struggle is far from over. The large, well-funded national gay rights organizations have relied too much on seeking changes through the courts and counting on forces in the Democratic Party to effect real change. They have failed to use their resources to mobilize the millions of people who support equality for LGBT people.
The broad militant mobilizations of the LGBT movement in past decades brought the movement into the streets, mobilizing hundreds of thousands to Washington and in cities around the world. The many gains that have been won—overturning of the sodomy laws by the U.S. Supreme Court, trade union recognition of same-sex partners, growing support for transgender rights, a dramatic increase in support for same-sex marriage rights, and so on—these gains were won by a strong vocal and independent movement with ties to other movements against racism, women’s oppression, and U.S. wars from Vietnam to Iraq.
A resurgence of that movement can force the agencies of the government, the courts, and Congress, who are the managers of the capitalist economy, to concede democratic rights to all the oppressed sectors of the working class.
