I am a supporter of marriage equality. Love is
love. You should be able to spend forever with the person you love, and
they should get the same benefits that my husband and I get from our
marriage. I can accept the idea that
each church interprets things in their own way, so if they don’t want to
perform your ceremony, I can’t really fault them that but I do
expect civility from everyone. But I think
the state should not interfere with two adult people being married. I
can’t even begin to see how it matters what’s inside their pants, or how
they use it in private, as to if they get to provide dental insurance
for each other. (The state should also not
care what I do, as a straight person, in private. Same rules for
everyone, same legal rights all the way around, thank you.)
So, with that in mind, I requested American Savage: Insights, Slights and Fights on Faith, Sex, Love and Politics
by Dan Savage from NetGalley. The subtitle alone should clue you in
that this is not a quiet read, and I did not expect it to be so. I have
not been a follower of Dan Savage’s sex advice column, Savage Love,
and only knew his name in a vague way. It turns out, Savage is blunt,
funny, and I agree with pretty much everything he says in the book. I
appreciate that he’s honest about who he is- gay, married, a parent,
outspoken, monogamish (his word). You are probably familiar with the It Gets Better Project, which was founded by Savage to help combat anti-gay bullying.
In American Savage, he discusses everything from
marriage, to sex, to parenting, to politics. He talks about when it’s
ok to cheat and when it’s not. (Oh, I know, it’s never ok. Once a
cheater always a cheater! Blah blah. It’s still good
food for thought, and is convincingly argued.) It’s both crude and
respectful (seems impossible, but is true.) He is not anti-religion,
and admits to longing to be part of the Catholic Church, as in his
youth, but realizes that his lack of faith and his complete
disagreement with church politics make this impossible. There is a lot
of discussion of marriage, and what makes a good marriage, for both
same-sex marriages and straight marriages. There are a lot of personal
attacks on anti-equality people, and a lot of
crude talk about them, but I didn’t feel like he ever stoops to the
Facebook level of ridiculous insult (if you are on Facebook, you know
what I mean by this.) He does insult the Catholic Church, and the Pope,
but in my opinion never full scale bashing
for the sake of bashing. (Hello, Facebook. Again.)
To be clear, this book is not polite. It is largely
about things that were I to blog the actual words would bring the wrong
people to my blog. If you are offended by language or sex you should
not even bother picking it up. But if you
would like to have someone else articulate why you believe in marriage
equality, this is a great choice. With the exception of one chapter on
death, I enjoyed the entire thing. It was funny, honest,
brutal, and graphic. It would definitely get
banned at any high school I know (Except maybe mine.) But it was also
human, and written by someone with the experience to know what he’s
talking about. It clarified a lot of the things I believe, but hadn’t
taken the time to properly think through. I won’t
be recommending it to everyone I know, or even everyone who reads my
blog, but I am glad I read it.
American Savage will be published on May 28, 2013.
Great review, Lisa! I hadn't heard about this book but it sounds fantastic and thought-provoking.
ReplyDeleteThis does sound thought provoking! I recently read that young people are leaving churches, but not religion, because they can't abide by the churces' stands on gay and mixed race marriages.
ReplyDelete