What a thrill to hear “The following program is brought to
your in living color on NBC.” The
peacock would unfurl its feathers in magnificent shades of… gray. Hey! What’s
wrong with our teevee?! Being as it was
the dawning of the age of television, it wasn’t long before we got a color TV,
along with eventually every other American household. From Fred and Betty
(Flintstone) to George and Jane (Jetson), our white-skinned entertainers were
now displayed in living beige.
It was a while before “people of color” came to the screen—
not as caricatures, but as kids and parents to whom people of all colors could
relate --the Jeffersons, the Cosbys. It seemed strange at first, but the
novelty soon wore off, and you saw the humanity beyond skin-deep. In a way, it
was like that when I was watching TV in black and white. I didn’t miss the
color. My mind was on the story, the song, or the joke. Only by contrast could
I register the difference between gray TV and color reality.
My real life was like that, too. In my hometown, half of the
people were of Mexican ancestry. They were clearly different from me, yet they
were my friends and neighbors, so being around them was no big deal. But it was
different with blacks-- there were almost none in town. When I encountered
black people while visiting San Francisco, I was very color conscious (and
concerned about how they might think of me, as it was the height of the black
power movement.) But twenty-five years later, working in San Francisco, I had
added a full range of skin tones to my colorblindness. And consciousness of
sexual preference lost its edge, too, as I found “some of my best friends” were
gays and lesbians.
People of color and homosexual preference have lived under a
cloud of prejudice that we WASPs have never known. I shudder to imagine what it
would be like to be the target of white-hot hatred, not for what you’ve done
(or written) but for simply who you are… for simply seeking a seat on the bus,
a house in the suburbs, a place in the Boy Scout troop. Or wanting to get
married under the blessing of your God.
I attended a divinely beautiful and spiritual Christian
wedding this summer. It was a three-way bonding-- between a woman, a man, and
Jesus. Love filled the air along the riverside, inclusive of the bride and
groom, their Lord, family and friends. I believe there need be no less love in
a wedding party when Kathy marries Brenda rather than Brendan. When your God is
one of tolerance and compassion, when your God *is* love, love rules the
day.
But what becomes of love when your God is Judge, Jury, and
Afterlife Jailer, a God that lends power to the power-hungry. In the name of
this God, loving same-sex couples are relegated to second-class standing, or
castigated for undermining the sanctity of marriage. Does anyone seriously think
that a husband would more likely cheat/abuse/neglect his wife (or vice versa)
because he knew that men were married to men?
Part of the same-sex marriage problem is that gays are still
emerging from the closet and onto the television screen, still more oddity than
old friend. The reaction is partially fear of the unknown, driven by
superstition (e.g. legitimizing gay marriage will make more people “decide” to
become homosexual, reminding me of when the queer man asked Jerry Falwell when
he “decided” to become heterosexual.)
Religious leaders ought to concentrate on serious threats to
marriage, like obsessive selfishness and materialism. Marriage should be about
love, but Madison Avenue has been trying to use love, like it uses sex, to sell
product. In 1970, yippie Jerry Rubin lamented, “How can I say ‘I love you’
after hearing ‘CARS LOVE SHELL.’” A third of a century later, we endure
Chrysler’s “Drive & Love” campaign. Pullease!
Love is not something you buy. Love doesn’t care who you
are, what kind of television you watch, or whose hand you’re holding when you
watch it.