'Did I ever really know him?': the women who married gay men | LGBTQ+ rights | The Guardian

Contents:

• GAY MARRIAGE
• A GUI FOR GAY MEN ON BOTH OPEN AND MONOGAMO MARRIAGE
• 'DID I EVER REALLY KNOW HIM?': THE WOMEN WHO MARRIED GAY MEN
• I’M A STRAIGHT WOMAN WHO MARRIED A GAY MAN
• WHAT IS THE STATE OF GAY MARRIAGE THE US?
• WHY AS A GAY MAN I STAND FOR TRADNAL MARRIAGE
• STRAIGHT WOMEN AND THEIR GAY HBANDS
• SHOULD GAY MARRIAGE BE LEGAL?
• HOW TO COPE WHEN YOUR SPOE COM OUT AS GAY
• WHAT TO KNOW ABOUT A SEEMGLY FAKE DOCUMENT A GAY RIGHTS CASE
• CALIFORNIA VOTERS WILL BE ASKED TO REAFFIRM GAY MARRIAGE PROTECTNS ON 2024 BALLOT

GAY MARRIAGE

For stance, 45% of adults the Silent Generatn (those born between 1928 and 1945) favor allowg gays and lbians to wed, pared wh 74% of Millennials (born between 1981 and 1996). 4As wh the general public, Amerins who intify as lbian, gay, bisexual or transgenr (LGBT) are most likely to ce love as a very important reason for gettg married.

A GUI FOR GAY MEN ON BOTH OPEN AND MONOGAMO MARRIAGE

Sce then, several other European untri – cludg England and Wal, France, Ireland, all of Sndavia, Spa and, most recently, Atria, Germany and Malta – have legalized gay marriage.

Early Years: Same-Sex Marriage Bans In 1970, jt one year after the historic Stonewall Rts that galvanized the gay rights movement, law stunt Richard Baker and librarian Jam McConnell applied for a marriage license Gerald Nelson rejected their applitn bee they were a same-sex uple, and a trial urt upheld his cisn. ” This lg effectively blocked feral urts om lg on same-sex marriage for s, leavg the cisn solely the hands of stat, which alt blow after blow to those hopg to see gay marriage beg 1973, for stance, Maryland beme the first state to create a law that explicly f marriage as a unn between a man and woman, a belief held by many nservative relig groups. Though the gay rights movement saw some advancements the 1970s and 1980s—such as Harvey Milk beg the first openly gay man elected to public office the untry 1977—the fight for gay marriage ma ltle headway for many years.

In 1989, the San Francis Board of Supervisors passed an ordance that allowed homosexual upl and unmarried heterosexual upl to register for domtic partnerships, which granted hospal visatn rights and other years later, the District of Columbia siarly passed a new law that allowed same-sex upl to register as domtic partners.

'DID I EVER REALLY KNOW HIM?': THE WOMEN WHO MARRIED GAY MEN

C., 1993, the hight urt Hawaii led that a ban on same-sex marriage may vlate that state nstutn’s Equal Protectn Clse—the first time a state urt has ever ched toward makg gay marriage Hawaii Supreme Court sent the se—brought by a gay male uple and two lbian upl who were nied marriage licens 1990—back for further review to the lower First Circu Court, which 1991 origally dismissed the the state tried to prove that there was “pellg state tert” jtifyg the ban, the se would be tied up ligatn for the next three Defense of Marriage Act Opponents of gay marriage, however, did not s on their hnch. Congrs 1996 passed the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which Print Bill Clton signed to didn’t ban gay marriage outright but specified that only heterosexual upl uld be granted feral marriage benefs.

I’M A STRAIGHT WOMAN WHO MARRIED A GAY MAN

That is, even if a state ma gay marriage legal, same-sex upl still wouldn’t be able to file e tax jotly, sponsor spo for immigratn benefs or receive spoal Social Secury payments, among many other act was a huge setback for the marriage equaly movement, but transient good news arose three months later: Hawaii Judge Kev S. Phg for Change: Civil Unns The next saw a whirlwd of activy on the gay marriage ont, begng wh the year 2000 when Vermont beme the first state to legalize civil unns, a legal stat that provis most of the state-level benefs of years later, Massachetts beme the first state to legalize gay marriage when the Massachetts Supreme Court led that same-sex upl had the right to marry Goodridge v.

The state fally troduced the untry to gay marriage (m the feral benefs) when began issug same-sex marriage licens on May 17, that year, the U.

2004 was notable for upl many other stat as well, though for the oppose reason: Ten typilly nservative stat, along wh Oregon, enacted state-level bans on gay marriage.

WHAT IS THE STATE OF GAY MARRIAGE THE US?

Kansas and Texas were next 2005, and 2006 saw seven more stat passg Constutnal amendments agast gay towards the end of the , gay marriage beme legal var stat, cludg Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont (the first state to approve by legislative means) and New Hampshire. Domtic Partnerships Throughout the and the begng of the next, California equently ma headl for seawg on the gay marriage state was the first to pass a domtic partnership statute 1999, and legislators tried to pass a same-sex marriage bill 2005 and 2007.

WHY AS A GAY MAN I STAND FOR TRADNAL MARRIAGE

Perry legalized same-sex marriage early 2010s ntued the state-level battl over gay marriage that fed the precedg , wh at least one notable event.

For the first time the untry’s history, voters (rather than judg or legislators) Mae, Maryland, and Washgton approved Constutnal amendments permtg same-sex marriage marriage also beme a feral issue 2010, Massachetts, the first state to legalize gay marriage, found Sectn 3 of DOMA—the part of the 1996 law that fed marriage as a unn between one man and one woman—to be unnstutnal.

STRAIGHT WOMEN AND THEIR GAY HBANDS

Wdsor, nservative Jtice Anthony Kennedy sid wh Jtic Ruth Bar Gsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan favor of same-sex marriage rights, ultimately makg gay marriage legal across the natn June this time, was still outlawed only 13 stat, and more than 20 other untri had already legalized gay marriage, startg wh the Netherlands December 2000. I had the opportuny to talk wh psychotherapist and thor Michael Dale Kimmel about his new book, The Gay Man's Gui to Open and Monogamo Marriage.

SHOULD GAY MARRIAGE BE LEGAL?

MDK: I began offerg workshops for gay, bisexual, and transgenr men about eighteen years’ ago, and after a uple of years there were always a few guys who me up to me and said ( whispered ton), “You’ve got to put this stuff a book. While there are lots of books about how to plan your gay weddg, there were virtually none that addrs what to do after the honeymoon is over (lerally and figuratively). The Gay Man’s Gui to Open and Monogamo Marriage dar to ask the qutn: is monogamy or an open relatnship (or a batn of both) the bt way to stcture your marriage?

HOW TO COPE WHEN YOUR SPOE COM OUT AS GAY

Same-sex marriage has been a long time g – a few thoand years or so - and now that ’s fally here, many gay, bisexual and transgenr men may thk that ’s a bad ia to “rock the boat” by discsg the kds of ias that this book prents.

WHAT TO KNOW ABOUT A SEEMGLY FAKE DOCUMENT A GAY RIGHTS CASE

While marriage wasn’t a possibily then, the qutns those workshops were basilly the same as those this book: as gay men, do we choose the monogamy of heterosexual marriage as our mol, or do we prefer an open marriage?

As a psychotherapist for gay upl for many years’ now, ’s been que clear to me that “handbooks” for heterosexual marriage don’t really apply to our marriag several signifint ways: our marriag are more “signed” than “assumed.

I wrote the chapter about “refg genr rol, " bee we have an amazg opportuny as married gay men to terme who we are as two men, married to each other.

CALIFORNIA VOTERS WILL BE ASKED TO REAFFIRM GAY MARRIAGE PROTECTNS ON 2024 BALLOT

In fact, rearchers have found that the majory of lbian, and gay, adults are mted relatnships and many upl have been together 10 or more years. The fai and iends of lbian and gay upl who are nied marriage rights may also experience negative physil and mental health nsequenc siar to those experienced by their loved on. The vast majory of scientific studi that have directly pared lbian and gay parents wh heterosexual parents have nsistently shown that the same-sex upl are as f and pable parents as heterosexual upl, and that their children are jt as psychologilly healthy and well adjted.

They clud Judh Kasen-Wdsor, widow of gay rights activist Edie Wdsor; Matthew Hayn, -owner of Club Q, the LGBTQ club Colorado Sprgs where a gunman last month killed five people a mass shootg; Club Q shootg survivors Jam Slgh and Michael Anrson; and a number of platiffs om s that culmated the landmark civil rights se Obergefell vs.

Philanthropist and Democratic donor David Boht, who has been an outspoken gay- and transgenr-rights activist and longtime supporter of Bin, told CNN that Tuday’s bill signg uld not e at a more ccial moment. “[Bin] has monstrated his support for s for lbian and gay civil rights, and Tuday’s signg to law is a reaffirmatn of that durg this time when rights are unr asslt, ” Boht said. Megan Holgate uldn’t que believe where she was the height of the Aids crisis and she was the wag room of an ner-cy STI clic, equented by those most at risk of HIV: gay men, jectg dg ers, sex, as she had been, a monogamo married had felt “too ashamed” to ask her doctor for the HIV tt.