Global Learning
  • Home
  • Defenders of Cuban Socialism
    • UN Charter
    • Declaration of Human Rights
    • Bandung
    • New International Economic Order
    • Non-Aligned Movement
  • Substack editorial column
  • New Cold War articles
  • Friends of Socialist China articles
  • Global Research articles
  • Counterpunch articles
  • Cuba and the world-system
    • Table of Contents and chapter summaries
    • About the author
    • Endorsements
    • Obtaining your copy
  • Blog ¨The View from the South¨
    • Blog Index
    • Posts in reverse chronological order
  • The Voice of Third World Leaders
    • Asia >
      • Ho Chi Minh
      • Xi Jinping, President of China
    • Africa >
      • Kwame Nkrumah
      • Julius Nyerere
    • Latin America >
      • Fidel Castro
      • Hugo Chávez
      • Raúl Castro >
        • 55th anniversary speech, January 1, 1914
        • Opening Speech, CELAC
        • Address at G-77, June 15, 2014
        • Address to National Assembly, July 5, 2014
        • Address to National Assembly, December 20, 2014
        • Speech on Venezuela at ALBA, 3-17-2015
        • Declaration of December 18, 2015 on USA-Cuba relations
        • Speech at ALBA, March 5, 2018
      • Miguel Díaz-Canel >
        • UN address, September 26, 2018
        • 100th annivesary, CP of China
      • Evo Morales >
        • About Evo Morales
        • Address to G-77 plus China, January 8, 2014
        • Address to UN General Assembly, September 24, 2014
      • Rafael Correa >
        • About Rafael Correa
        • Speech at CELAC 1/29/2015
        • Speech at Summit of the Americas 2015
      • Nicolás Maduro
      • Cristina Fernández
      • Cuban Ministry of Foreign Relations >
        • Statement at re-opening of Cuban Embassy in USA, June 20, 2015
        • The visit of Barack Obama to Cuba
        • Declaration on parliamentary coup in Brazil, August 31, 2016
        • Declaration of the Revolutionary Government of Cuba on Venezuela, April 13, 2019
      • ALBA >
        • Declaration of ALBA Political Council, May 21, 2019
        • Declaration on Venezuela, March 17, 2015
        • Declaration on Venezuela, April 10, 2017
      • Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) >
        • Havana Declaration 2014
        • Declaration on Venezuela, March 26
    • Martin Luther King, Jr.
    • International >
      • Peoples’ Summit 2015
      • The Group of 77 >
        • Declaration on a New World Order 2014
        • Declaration on Venezuela 3/26/2015
      • BRICS
      • Non-Aligned Movement
  • Readings
    • Charles McKelvey, Cuba in Global Context
    • Piero Gleijeses, Cuba and Africa
    • Charles McKelvey, Chávez and the Revolution in Venezuela
    • Charles McKelvey, The unfinished agenda of race in USA
    • Charles McKelvey, Marxist-Leninist-Fidelist-Chavist Revolutionary
  • Recommended Books
  • Contact

Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Recommended books on Amazon.com; click on image of book to connect

Gay rights and revolution

1/22/2016

0 Comments

 
     I have been reflecting in various posts on the renewed popular and socialist revolutions that have emerged since 1995 in the Third World, particularly advanced in Latin America, and on the lessons that they provide for the possibility of a popular socialist coalition in the United States.  These reflections have included explorations of the limitations of the discourse of the US Left, including its management of the issues of race and gender, contrasting its approach with that of the Latin American popular movements (“A just, democratic & sustainable world-system” 1/12/2016; “The twelve practices of socialism” 1/14/2016; “Popular democratic socialist revolution” 1/15/2016; “Lessons of socialism for the USA” 1/18/2016; “Race and Revolution” 1/19/2016; “Gender and revolution” 1/21/2016).  In today’s post, I would like to reflect on the issue of gay rights.

     Lesbianism is one of the issues in which Latin American feminists have been cautious.  They have not wanted to get too far ahead of the people or to provoke a negative popular reaction.  In 1998 interviews that I had with founders of women’s organizations in Honduras, the women leaders maintained that lesbianism was an issue that they could not possibly embrace without significant negative political repercussions, and they considered it Eurocentric for European feminists to take them to task for not engaging the issue (see “The rights of women” 11/11/13).

      I have not found a great difference between Latin America and the North with respect to attitudes toward homosexuality.  In both cultural contexts, there are many people who consider it unnatural and/or sinful.  But public discourse toward the issue has unfolded in different ways.  In Latin America, there is a much greater cultural tendency to accept people as they are, which leads to a cultural tendency toward tolerance, and much less of a tendency toward hate crimes, violence, and aggression.  Nonetheless, taking into account popular definitions of homosexuality as sinful or unnatural, women’s organizations have not embraced the issue of gay rights.  As a result, leaders of the popular movements in Latin America have tended to avoid the issue, without speaking for or against gay rights.  In contrast, progressive movements in the North have embraced the issue of gay rights with little concern for the values of significant sectors among the people or for the negative political consequences of such a position for the progressive movements. 

     In Cuba, organizations have been formed recently with an agenda of gay rights, and the daughter of Raúl Castro is playing a leading role. Listening to the public discussion that has emerged, I have observed that gay rights advocates speak in a tone that is sensitive to the values of the people, hoping not to provoke a negative reaction.  In discussion, for example, of the unfairness of laws of property ownership with respect to homosexual couples, gay rights advocates make explicit that they are not advocating “gay marriage.” Rather, their goal is to establish laws that are fair to all.  

      In contrast, in the progressive movements of the North, there is advocacy of “gay marriage.”  We should reflect on the meaning of such a proposal.  Marriage is a religious ceremony, and it is a ceremony that gives the union a sacred character.  To propose gay marriage is to ask for popular blessing of gay unions, and not merely acceptance of it as a legally-sanctioned option for those who desire it.  To advocate gay marriage is overly provocative, and it is asking of the people more than is necessary.

     The progressive movements in the United States cannot afford to have the people divided over gay marriage, and they must search for a centrist position that could be the basis for common ground.  Perhaps the key would be to propose that the state get out of the marriage business altogether, inasmuch as marriage is a religious ceremony, and it should not be an affair of the state.  Rather than regulating marriage, the state should regulate domestic partnerships, in which two adults living together freely enter into an economic contract that designates common property.  As with existing marriage laws, a domestic partnership law can regulate what ought to occur with the common property when the union is dissolved by the death of one of the partners, or by the desire to dissolve the partnership of one of the two.  A new domestic partnership law would not only protect the property rights of both partners with respect to gay unions, it also would open up possibilities for a wide range of unions involving two adults living together, facilitating a diversity of legally sanctioned life styles, in which the state would never inquire concerning the personal or sexual relation between the two.  The state would not sanctify any of the unions; it would legally recognize them.  With a new domestic partnership law, the state would not be blessing gay marriage, but would be recognizing the diversity of life styles among the people.

      We should appreciate that the issue of gay rights is not like other issues.  The right of all persons to adequate nutrition and housing or the right of all nations to sovereignty are rights that no person can reasonably deny, and for this reason, popular revolutionary movements affirm consistently and clearly, without compromise or equivocation, that these rights must be protected.  But the morality of homosexuality is a matter concerning which reasonable people can disagree.  All human societies have norms and values with respect to sexuality, defining some forms of sexual behavior as unacceptable; as a consequence, we are all expected to control and channel sexual desires.  In many societies at present, reflecting an uneven transition from traditional to modern to post-modern thought, there is no consensus among the people concerning what forms of sexual behavior are appropriate.  And for this reason, a proposal for the blessing of homosexual unions divides the people.

      Revolutionary processes should not enter this kind of cultural conflict among the people, and the triumphant revolutions of the world have not done so.  Revolutions seek the protection of those rights that have been affirmed by humanity in a wide variety of official declarations of an international character, in representation of the diverse nations, cultures, and peoples of the world (see “Universal human values” 4/16/2014).  But the quest by popular revolutionary movements for the protection of universally recognized rights provokes powerful enemies whose agenda is the maximization of corporate profits and the protection of the political and economic interests of elites.  All of the people must be united and mobilized against these formidable forces, and the worst thing the movement can do is put forth a proposal that is inconsistent with the cultural values of many of the people and thus considerably reduces popular support for the revolutionary project.

      Ideally, revolutionary processes should not take a position with respect to cultural debates among the people, other than to make clear that the revolutionary project will establish structures of popular democracy, thus facilitating a process of sustained popular discussion free of the distortion of particular interests, enabling the people to arrive at consensus.  If such a position of deferral to the future is not politically possible, the revolution should seek a middle ground: affirming the dignity of all persons, regardless of sexual orientation, and affirming that all persons should be treated with respect and civility; and proposing a new law of domestic partnerships that would seek to legally protect the rights of all persons with respect to the distribution of common property that emerges during unions.  It is a question of affirming the diversity of the people while seeking to forge the unity of the people.
0 Comments

    Author: Charles McKelvey

    Retired professor, writer,  and Marxist-Leninist-Fidelist-Chavist revolutionary

    Categories

    All
    American Revolution
    Blog Index
    Bolivia
    Charismatic Leaders
    China
    Critique Of The Left
    Cuban History
    Cuba Today
    Ecuador
    Environment
    French Revolution
    Gay Rights
    Haitian Revolution
    Knowledge
    Latin American History
    Latin American Right
    Latin American Unity
    Marx
    Marxism-Leninism
    Mexican Revolution
    Miscellaneous
    Neocolonialism
    Neoliberalism
    Nicaragua
    North-South Cooperation
    Presidential Elections 2016
    Press
    Public Debate In USA
    Race
    Religion And Revolution
    Revolution
    Russian Revolution
    South-South Cooperation
    Third World
    Trump
    US Ascent
    US Imperialism
    Vanguard
    Venezuela
    Vietnam
    Wallerstein
    Women And Revolution
    World History
    World-System
    World-System Crisis

    Archives

    August 2019
    July 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    December 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    January 2013

    RSS Feed

    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture

More Ads


website by Sierra Creation