Critical Response - Research Paper Example

David Grindstaff’s Queering marriage: An Ideographic Interrogation of Heteronormative Subjectivity “maps the contemporary scene of heteronormative power and resistance through two rhetorical performances of gay male identity” using his and other theorists’ ideas. I totally agree with him when he said: “The recent controversy surrounding same-sex marriage marks the institution, practice, and concept of marriage as a significant site of power and resistance within American culture (p. 258)”. In my opinion, human rights apply to everybody regardless of gender, race, and preferences.

Grindaff said that “…the decision to sanction same-sex marriage would extend legal and economic advantages to same-sex couples, which appears to carry the promise of social equality on a broader scale” (p. 258). I totally agree with him. There are advantages that married couples enjoy and when same-sex marriage is approved, it will be unfair for the couple not to enjoy such advantages. As Pastor Allen has shared: Though my partner and I had a commitment ceremony in 2003, and obtained a marriage license this past July in Washington D.C., we learned that marriage is more than our religious convictions and our commitment, but also about laws that will protect us.

Marriage equality is not about religious rights, but the right to equal benefits. At the end of 2003, the U.S. Government Accountability Office identified 1,138 federal provisions where marital status is a factor in determining or receiving benefits, rights and privileges. These include next-of-kin hospital visits and medical decisions where one partner is too ill to be competent; automatic inheritance in the absence of a will and inheritance of jointly owned real and personal property through the right of survivorship.

These benefits allow all marriages access to the social and emotional supports that can produce healthy families and communities (Same-sex marriage is about equality, not religion. August 2010). Wilson’s “conservative” response to Andrew Sullivan rejects same-sex marriage for purely symbolic reasons. He first locates his grounds for equating “heterosexual marriage” (identity) with procreation (act) in scripture: the Torah links “sex to procreation the highest standard by which to judge sexual relations” (p 159).

In other words, heterosexual marriage, in its ideal or symbolic form, serves procreative purposes (p. 267). Although I must admit that this is true it does not mean I agree. There are couples who get married but do not have children on purpose and there are married couples who cannot have children for several reasons such as physical and financial. And there are people who opt to have children but never get married. Kristen Houghton said in her article, “The reality of the word "marriage" is a meeting of two minds and the joining of two lives.

Husband and wife need not always become Daddy and Mommy. Decide how you want to live and be realistic about your expectations, your needs, and your wants. To become or not become parents is a personal