When news broke that the U.S. Supreme Court declared a constitutional right to marriage equality in all 50 states last Friday, of course I was happy. But that excitement was slightly overshadowed by a pit-in-the-stomach feeling. A tidal wave of a question hit me instantly: What now?
Marriage has been at the forefront of the LGBT movement for an incredibly long time. Queer folks in the U.S. have been fighting against marriage bans since at least the 1970s, and those years of activism finally paid off this Pride Month.
Yet, because of the tight grip our community had on marriage, it’s difficult to have a clear plan in terms of what comes next.
“The last couple of years have felt very powerful for people specifically because of our progress on only one issue — and that is marriage,” Rea Carey, executive director of the National LGBTQ Task Force, tells Mashable. “I think what some of us fear is that people will see winning marriage equality as the end of our work. And it is nowhere close to being the end of our work.”
Let’s appreciate how big this is—and of course marriage equality does not mean FULL #LGBTQ equality. #SCOTUSMarriage pic.twitter.com/tXFX5xRZ9a
— The Task Force (@TheTaskForce) June 26, 2015
Questioning what’s next doesn’t stem from a lack of remaining issues — it’s due more to the fact that so many dire issues still need our attention.
Right before New York Governor Andrew Cuomo officiated the marriage of two men at New York City Pride on Sunday, a lawyer who boasted an impressive resume of marriage equality cases proclaimed to the crowd that full equality had been achieved with this Supreme Court case. Some cheered, but I didn’t. I couldn’t, even with the rainbows, glitter and spirit of Pride all around me.
There’s been a “state of emergency” when it comes to the murder rates of trans women of color for years. The stigma around bisexual and pansexual people not being able to “choose one side” is still very real. Forty percent of homeless youth in the U.S. identify as LGBT. I can’t hold a girl’s hand in my New York City neighborhood without fighting a twinge of fear.
