Beyond Gay Marriage

This hourlong documentary is fiery and provocative, and frankly, it’s surprising that it was heard on national airwaves.  Lisa Dettmer asks a simple question: should same-sex marriage be the focus of the gay community?  Dettmer asks this question in 2010, and fourteen years later it remains highly relevant.  Indeed, at the time this piece  was made, the majority of LGBT folks identified economic discrimination as the most pressing issue facing the community.  Now, after a decade of gay marriage, we see a wealth and access gap in the Queer community, increased and formalized discrimination against transgender people, an an greater risk of homelessness or housing instability for LGBT youth.  The strategy to pursue marriage above all else has benefitted many LGBTQ folks, but has it divided the community instead of uniting it? This documentary offers a nuanced and pointed analysis of something you rarely see put forward for public consumption: internal debate among participants to a civil rights movement.  We can sometimes hear local radio debate topics of strategy (see the show You Don’t Have to Be Gay to Listen for some examples) but it’s rare to hear this kind of  ‘dirty laundry’ aired out so thoroughly over an hour.  Audio documentaries rarely immerse us so deeply in the complicated and emotional debates over something that is actively unfolding.  This documentary does exactly that, and in doing so offers a window into underrepresented issues in the LGBTQ civil rights movement and a mirror for those who rarely see themselves or their viewpoints given space on the radio.Beyond Gay Marriage was hosted and produced by Lisa Dettmer and co-produced bt Elena Botkin-Levy. Financial support was provided by Astraea Foundation and Making Contact at the National Radio Project. Lisa Dettmer is a radio producer with the feminist radio show "Women’s Magazine" at KPFA Radio in Berkeley, California, which can be heard at kpfa.org/program/womens-magazine.  You can contact Lisa Dettmer at [email protected].  If you want to read an article based on this radio documentary go to: www.academia.edu/11699431/Beyond_Gay_Marriage_Assimilation_within_the_Queer_community?sm=b