Changing the Way We Change?

Talking this past week to queer friends in Canada and the U.S. I've heard a familiar refrain; elation that "at least we got the big decision right" but disappointment and disaffection for being once again denied equal marriage rights or, as Dan Savage puts it, being "forcibly divorced…thanks to the members of a church founded by a polygamist and a pedophile with more than a dozen wives.".

Like many of my fellow Canadians, I'm always on the lookout for ways to understand the differences between our country and the U.S. I think there's something about what happened Tuesday night that says a lot about the differences between Canadians and Americans. For example, consider what our then Prime Minister Jean Chrétien said in 2005 when it was suggested that the issue of same sex marriage be put to a referendum in Canada. He essentially said that it was inappropriate to allow the majority to decide the fate of minority rights. That, he said, is why we have constitutions. Implied in his comments was the idea that it's also the government's role to look out for the rights of minorities. I'm not sure any U.S. president could say that so explicitly, because I'm not sure enough Americans believe it. Not yet anyway.

I think this is one of the most hopeful aspects of an Obama administration. There are signs already. There's the inclusion of sexual orientation and gender identity in the list of non-discrimination notes for administration hiring practices. There's the prominently placed and beautifully simple statement about disability and access on the new Obama-Biden transition website. There's the fact that their first thought on getting a White House dog is that it would be great if they could get a shelter dog. And what's so hopeful to me about these things is that none of them feel like items checked off a list marked "things to make us look like we care" (back in Canada our current Prime Minister is a whiz kid with those kinds of lists, and you can feel his self-righteous smirk every time he checks another one off). They feel like a part of the organization. They feel like simple and elegant gestures to include more and more people.

What I'd like to think is that the change that's coming is not simply that a few more marginalized groups are going to be given a seat at the table. I'd like to think they're taking the table out of the room to make more space for the people. From the beginning, Obama's rhetoric around rights has reminded me of a public work model of citizenship; one that emphases the connections between all citizens and works towards pointing out those connections in our daily lives. This kind of change is more than just changing what we do, it's changing how we do it.

The ease and comfort with which sexual orientation and gender identity were added to a list of non-discrimination rules for hiring in the Obama-Biden administration; the deep understanding that the campaign team (and now transition team) seem to have about access and disability; these are powerful things not only because they're long overdue from a government meant to be of, by, and for the people, they're powerful in the way they are accomplished. One might glean from these moves that the administration intends to lead by example, to model the world the way they want it to be. And hopefully they intend to gently nudge everyone else along.

What sort of impact this is going to have on sexual rights or the rights to sexual expression remains to be seen. Marty Klein isn't hopeful, but is waiting to be proved wrong. I'm waiting to see what would happen after, say, four years of an administration that takes a public work model of citizenship seriously. In his press conference last week Obama said the path to better times will be long and hard. I have no doubt that's as true for a more complicated and progressive approach to sexual rights as it is for a light at the end of the economic tunnel. I can't quite imagine what will happen but, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, for the first time in a long time, I'm excited for the future.