When I first started thinking about writing this post, I realized that it was going to sound like a "i have a black friend" type post. Yup, it did, and if there is one thing I have learned from reading on the internet is to write and offer my own opinion, of my own experience, as a white woman
I can't speak for anyone else's experience, and I certainly do have to rely on my empathy at times to understand, and embrace points of view and experiences that are alternative from mine.
Now I have read that as a white woman, I can only have empathy for, but not experience as a PoC or GLBT person. And I get that part.
My own experience is peripheral. I know I feel things, but I also realize that IMPACT is different for me, than the person who is the target of direct hatred, or who does not enjoy the same privileges as I do.
Let me use an anecdotal example. A little girl walking home from school, jumping over the sidewalk cracks, is suddenly taken by surprise by the large group of angry kids chasing her brother down the street, trying to hurt him, calling him hurtful and horrible names. The little girl is not the target, but she most certainly feels fear for her brother's life, fear for her brother's emotional well being, and fear of seeing the look of pain on their mother's face, and the closed look of shame on their father's face.
And as life goes on, and these little kids grow up, their life and circumstances will change, but the fear, shame, pain, and anguish will manifest at each turn in their journey as brother and sister.
I don't think for one moment that gay/lesbian marriage has anything to do with challenging notions of heterosexual marriage. To me, it has to do with parity, that people who love each other should be afforded the same rights as all others. Simple as that. From health insurance and other dependant benefits, to the right to see your loved one in the hospital, to making sure that it isn't acceptable to tease or torment the children of the GLBT community on school grounds.
And as a het. white woman, I have been able to make some comparisons about my experience and sexism, to other forms of oppression. I would really like to see coalitions join together, but at the same time, make sure that the oppression olympics do not forge wedges, rather, I still see far too many white people, heterosexual or glbt, who have not really done the necessary work of unraveling their own private racisms, or made any appreciable efforts to understand what it means to be Black, Asian, Latino, Native American. I know that for me, it's been some hard work, and I try, all the time, to learn, to listen, to think.
To put on the cloak of that pain,of our history in the United States, own it, wear it, embrace it, but make sure not to appropriate that experience, of slavery, of lynching, of the right to vote, of being treated as less than human, or compared to savage animals, white people really need to take a look at that, no matter what the status of their own personal oppression is, so we can all work together for the same things, justice, fairness, love, now that would be a powerful coalition.