Link Banana

Well not really. Khalid Sheik Mohammed, widely called “the mastermind of 9/11,” is refusing to take a lawyer because the United States allows same-sex marriage. He explained:

I will not accept anybody, even if he is Muslim, if he swears to the American Constitution,” he said, vowing to follow Islamic shariya and scorning the U.S. Constitution “because it allows for same sexual marriage.”

(via Passport)

Kenji Yoshino offers an interesting idea — straights getting only as close to “marriage” as gays are allowed — though I wonder what good it would actually do. (Anyone who would think to do this probably already favors gay marriage.)

The Temporary Domestic Partnership Strategy asks straights to cross over, in a limited way, from sympathy (pity for the plight of others) to empathy (direct experience of that plight). It seems plausible that if a straight couple experienced a temporary domestic partnership even briefly, they would have a more visceral sense of why gays need the right to marry. For instance, straight couples will find that no contractual arrangement can give them rights against the federal government (which would refuse to issue either partner a green card). Moreover, these couples would experience the importance of the word “marriage” when confronted with the question of their marital status in the myriad places that question is posed.

Even for homosexuals eager for the right to get married, there could be one drawback to California’s making it legal: doting parents and the persistant question of “When are you gonna get married?”

Two things I’ve been meaning to share from Political Animal:

• A historical analysis of poll shows acceptance grows about about a point a year, with some violent perterbations around all the hubub of 2004. (via)
• And a recent California poll suggest voters actually support it, and oppose a ban. (via)

Benoit Denizet-Lewis’s piece in yesterday’s New York Times Magazine isn’t earth-shattering and it isn’t a sociological examination of gay marriage, but it’s certainly interesting enough recommend. A sample:

“The expectation for many years was that if you did any dating in your 20s, they were essentially ‘practice relationships’ where you did what heterosexual kids get to do in junior high, high school and college,” says Jeffrey Chernin, a Los Angeles psychotherapist and the author of “Get Closer: A Gay Men’s Guide to Intimacy and Relationships.” “But for many gay men, your 20s were about meeting a lot of different people, going out to bars with your friends and having a lot of sex. That has long been considered a rite of passage in the gay community.”

But young gay men today are coming of age in a different time from the baby-boom generation of gays and lesbians who fashioned modern gay culture in this country — or even from me, a gay man in his early 30s. While being a gay teenager today can still be difficult and potentially dangerous (particularly for those who live in noncosmopolitan areas or are considered effeminate), gay teenagers are coming out earlier and are increasingly able to experience their gay adolescence. That, in turn, has made them more likely to feel normal. Many young gay men don’t see themselves as all that different from their heterosexual peers, and many profess to want what they’ve long seen espoused by mainstream American culture: a long-term relationship and the chance to start a family.