The Trouble With Normal By Michael Warner

There comes a point in everyone’s life that this question or subject is brought up - “Are you dating anyone?” “When are you guys getting married?” When these questions are asked from family and friends, it pressures people into finding that special one. Even though, people do experience those desires and questions for themselves; does it make it right to feel that need? What is marriage? Is marriage a contract or love? What if marriage is not what people perceive it to be? What if marriage is not the happily ever after often seen in the movies? Laurie Essig and Lynn Owens are two scholars that wrote a piece entitled, What If Marriage Is Bad for Us? that contended the institution purpose of marriage is obsolete and in reality bad for society, and how marriage can lead to changed, unhealthy, and distressed.

In Andrew J. Cherlin’s essay “American Marriage In Transition”, he discusses how marriage in America is evolving from the universal marriage. Cherlin’s definition of the universal marriage in his essay is the man is the breadwinner of the household and the woman is the homemaker. In the 20th century according to Cherlin, the meaning of marriage has been altered such as the changing division of labor, childbearing outside of marriage, cohabitation, gay marriage and the result of long- term cultural and material trends (1154). During the first transition of marriage, Cherlin discusses how in America, Europe, and Canada the only socially accepted way to have sexual relations with a person and to have children is to be married (1154). The second change in marriage occurred in 2000, where the median age of marriage in the United States for men is 27 and women is 25 (1155). Many young adults stayed single during this time and focused on their education and starting their careers. During the second change, the role of law increasingly changed, especially in the role of law in divorce (1155). It is proven in today’s research marriage has a different definition than what it did back in the 1950’s. Today marriage can be defined as getting married to the same gender or getting remarried to someone who already has kids. The roles in a marriage are evolving to be a little more flexible and negotiable. However, women still do a lot of the basic household chores and taking care of the

The author, Leslie Fiedler writes about the differences in what it means to be normal. She discusses this in a professional manner that opens eyes to what we have disguised and even been ashamed of. “The Tyranny of the Normal,” we learn much about what we perceive as abnormal and what society seems to portray normal as. We discover what we believe is normal and also what has changed through-out the history of this subject. Our minds are opened and exposed to the world of abnormalities and how we see them.

Thus, any premises involved in Warren’s essay should intend to support this conclusion. The necessity of a trial marriage is irrelevant and does not intend to support the conclusion of this essay. Warren commits a red herring by the deliberate raising of an irrelevant issue during an argument. After discussing the fallacies Warren used in his essay, I want to use four strategies to have a closed and detailed assessment of the “So Why Bother with Marriage?” part of his essay to espouse my conclusion that Warren’s essay is unbelievable.

Assimilating completely to society’s norms is not an option either, especially to those whose very existence defies these norms. Many aspects of queer theory scorn those who do make decisions deemed regressive by popular queer theory, for example, the accusation that LGBT individuals who advocate for marriage equality are upholding heteronormativity. “Critics of the same-sex-marriage movement have argued that advocating for marriage rights is assimilationist and simply affirms that some families are better than others.” (Brandzel) This critique fails to take into account the importance that marriage can have to some people, and the legal and economic benefit to being married. Additionally it implies that establishing a longterm relationship is somehow not a part of being gay. Assuming that every action by an LGBT person must be subversive not only tokenizes LGBT individuals, but also places an unjust amount of pressure on the shoulders of people who did not ask to be put on a pedestal.

The lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community in the United States exhibit great heterogeneity in its members’ racial and ethnic, class, religious, and other sociodemographic backgrounds and characteristics. However, the LGBT community is often represented as a monolithic group with unified social, economic, and political agendas, especially since the large sociopolitical mobilization for the legalization of same-sex marriage that lasted more than a decade and came to fruition just last year in 2015. Scholars and activists have criticized this monolithic representation of the LGBT community as white, affluent, and highly educated movers and shakers of the larger society (Duggan 2012), and this voice was especially strong among

I chose to analyze the book Queering Marriage: Challenging Family Formation in the United States by Katrina Kimport for this book analysis. The book is written in a way that specifically focuses upon Kimport’s findings on how the act of same-sex marriage is capable of altering or affirming heterosexual assumptions that are contained in the institution of marriage, which has been heavily based upon the concept of heteronormativity. Because the American culture never acknowledged same sex marriage and was heavily focused upon heteronormativity, the gay and lesbian Americans, who had put so much effort into constructing and establishing their set of relations and the culture, had to endure so many years of exclusion. Even with the recent breakthrough

Rather, contemporary civil rights activists must progress as society becomes cognizant of the social construction of sexuality, and as new understandings of sexuality emerge. Indeed, the essentialist myth of gayness propagated by litigators and th¬¬e queer community led to the rapid acceptance of same-sex marriage. This successfully helped same-sex couples develop a plethora of legal rights not previously available to them. On the other hand, gay civil rights activists must not be entrapped by the idea that legal same-sex marriage reflects societal acceptance—or that same-sex marriage was even the initial goal for gay liberationists. Same-sex marriage, though an important political goal, merely assimilated gay Americans into the conservative system that enshrines the private family as the nucleus of love and warmth. Assimilation into a system inherently stacked against gay Americans, however, is not liberation. This raises the paradoxical relationship between gayness and capitalism brought up by D’Emilio. Ironically, capitalism facilitated sexual liberation and the emergence of a gay identity. Yet capitalism economically and personally incentivizes heterosexual relationships, which leads young people to internalize a “heterosexist model of intimacy and personal relationships”. This generational internalization, combined with the capitalistic

In the essay “I Wish They’d Do It Right”, Jane Doe discusses about her conflict with her son because he does not believe in the idea of marriage. After her son and his girlfriend have lived together for seven years and had a child, Doe finally decides to consult with her son about the concept of marriage. She argues with him that “living together out of wedlock can be economically impractical as well as socially awkward” (222). Doe believes it is awkward because she does not know how to present her son’s “girlfriend” to her friends and family. Also, she argues that there are economic disadvantages for people who are cohabiting. For instance, the two of them would have to find much more expensive housings without their marriage documents. His

While it was barely a kernel of activism against the immense backdrop of advocacy during the 1960’s and 70’s, the gay liberation movement was one of the most important challenges to the hierarchal structures of accepted moral and scientific thought. Functioning as a minor footnote within the context of a substantial political arena comprised of the issues of war, race and a raging women’s liberation movement, gay liberation in the late twentieth century still sought to impress upon the marginalizing and sectarian constructions that subjugated gays to an imposed peripheral existence of personal and public abhorrence. The Stonewall Riot of 1969 signaled the start of a substantial social movement, the dissemination of which would permeate the gay community and call into action an assault on the mechanisms of social order, public legislation and cultural dispositions that sustained a framework of persecution against homosexual men and women. The efforts of gay liberation activists during the sexual revolution of the late twentieth century made possible the near expulsion of constraints on sexual expression and gave way to a new rhetoric of pride and affirmation.

Chapter 11, of the textbook “Understanding Social Problems,” by Linda M. Mooney, David Knox, and Caroline Schacht jockeys issues related to sexual orientation. This chapter openly deliberates the struggle for equality for non-heterosexuals and their fight for equal rights and recognition. This paper will briefly summarize this chapter.

In today’s media, it is no longer unusual to see queers in the spotlight - whether that is in TV shows, in celebrity news, or even in advertisements. This definitely seems like a big win for the LGBTQ movement on the surface but is society actually accepting of queer culture? A prominent “big win” for activists was the legalization of gay marriage in 2015. However, many queer studies scholars are skeptical of the mainstream LGBTQ movement’s focus on marriage rights because it is based on homonormative politics that continues to uphold oppressive institutions and because it does not tackle the actual underlying social issues. Instead of focusing on marriage, activists should prioritize building coalitions based on community values and intersectionality and strive for radical change rather than settle

Homosexuality is the state of being attracted to people of the same gender. The gay community is often referred to by an acronym- LGBTQ. This represents the different identities within homosexuality. The “L” stands for lesbian, the “G” stands for gay, the “B” stands for bisexual, the “T” stands for transgender, and the “Q” stands for queer. There has been much debate about many different issues surrounding homosexuality. The issue that has garnered the most attention from the media and the general public is same-sex marriage. The debate around same-sex marriage is on an international scale. In many places, it is illegal to marry someone of the same gender, or even have a same-sex relationship. In this paper, I will be taking the position that

The article discusses the potential creation of a Restatement of the Law treatise which is devoted to various legal issues affecting LGBT people in America as of 2014, focusing on the American Law Institute (ALI), efforts to decriminalize sodomy, and the promotion of LGBT rights. Same-sex domestic partnerships and the legal rights of same-sex couples are mentioned, along with state marriage laws and remedies in the U.S. Social marginalization is examined in relation to women and minorities.

Per contra, proponents of same-sex marriage include gay activists, majority of homosexuals themselves, and others who show strong public support. They contend that same-sex couples ought to have the same matrimonial values and public acceptance that is assumed with heterosexual couples. The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, and Queer (LGBTQ) community- and adherents- is one that feels suppressed by the traditionalist ideas in that they do not get a chance to express their civil liberties as married people and that barring gay marriage is unconstitutional and discriminatory. This substantial dispute and division of our society is due to dissimilar social and historical values and morals that have been with us since the beginning of time.