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Partners Task Force for Gay and Lesbian Couples Online from 1995-2022 Demian and Steve Bryant originally founded Partners as a monthly newsletter in 1986. By late 1990 it was reformatted into a bi-monthly magazine. Print publication was halted by 1995 when Demian published Partners as a Web site, which greatly expanded readership. In 1988, the Partners National Survey of Lesbian & Gay Couples report was published; the first major U.S. survey on same-sex couples in a decade. In 1996, Demian produced The Right to Marry, a video documentary based on the dire need for equality that was made clear by the data from the survey mentioned above. The video featured interviews with Rev. Mel White, Evan Wolfson, Phyllis Burke, Richard Mohr, Kevin Cathcart, Faygele benMiriam, Benjamin Cable-McCarthy, Susan Reardon, Frances Fuchs, Tina Podlodowski, and Chelle Mileur. Demian has been the sole operator during the last two decades of Partners. Demian stopped work on Partners Task Force in order to realize his other time-consuming projects, which include publishing the book “Operating Manual for Same-Sex Couples: Navigating the rules, rites & rights” - which is now available on Amazon. The book is based on the Partners Survey mentioned above, his interviews of scores of couples, and 36 years of writing hundreds of articles about same-sex couples. It’s also been informed by his personal experience in a 20-year, same-sex relationship. Demian’s other project is to publish his “Photo Stories by Demian” books based on his more than six decades as a photographer and writer. |
Marriage Quiz What kinds of marriage do these quotes describe: interracial or same-sex couples? © 2003, Demian
How many can you guess correctly?
For the authors of the above statements, it would seem that legal recognition of such marriages would offend tradition, God, the sensibilities of the majority, and the natural order. All the while threatening conventional marriage, children, and the future of our civilization. Plus, they indicate a profound sense of rage, fear, and righteous indignation.
All of these quotes refer to interracial marriage, views of race, and the “proper” interaction between the races. They date from 1823-1964 and were culled by reporter Eric Zorn from a Boston University Law Review article and a brief filed with the U.S. Supreme Court. Zorn’s article was published in the Chicago Tribune, May 19, 1996.
The original quote about not being able to produce progeny articulated the old, white-supremacist belief that the offspring of whites and blacks were sterile, just like mules that result when horses and donkeys mate. It is chilling to know that 15 states still criminalized interracial marriage as recently as 1967, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned those laws in Loving v. Virginia. In the present day, some right-wing extremists claim that marriage should be denied because same-sex couples cannot produce children. However, many same-sex couples have children from previous relationship, as well as through insemination, surrogacy, or adoption, etc.
Still these same extremists wouldn’t think of denying a license to opposite-sex couples who cannot, or don’t want to, reproduce.
Like interracial marriage law, the closeness of kin one could legally marry has changed through the centuries. In 1076, Pope Alexander II issued a decree prohibiting marriages between couples who were more closely related than 6th cousins. First cousin marriage is allowed in Vermont. The Alaska and Arizona marriage codes specifically prohibit marriage to a first cousin. Because legal marriage has taken a wide variety of forms over the centuries, the only constant has been change. As these laws evolve to suit the times and public sentiments, it is clear that some people are loath to allow the changes to take place, whether the changes are regarding kinship, interracial marriage, or same-sex marriage.
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