"In order for a movement to maintain its viability as a collective enterprise, it must not only secure potential adherents, but also transform some of these participants into committed members or devotees" (McAdam and Snow).  This statement that the authors pose in the introduction to our unit on conversion and commitment lays the groundwork for the chapters that follow.  Each chapter describes various methods of getting people involved in and encouraging their subsequent active commitment for different religious and social movements.  In understanding the importance of keeping members active in specific movements, it is first necessary to have a clear understanding of what is meant by the term "conversion."  As pointed out in the unit's introduction, "conversion can be thought of as a radical transformation of consciousness in which a new or formerly peripheral universe of discourse comes to function as a person's primary frame of reference" (Machalek and Snow).  The chapter on commitment in a student social movement provides the most helpful model for our group's movement based on the four group processes of consciousness-raising, collective empowerment, polarization, and group decision-making.  This paper will show how these four processes can be implemented in the queer movement's fight for the legalization of same-sex marriage.

    Our group's model for creating commitment and conversion in the ranks of the adherents of the movement begins with a focus on consciousness raising.  It has been found that political change is slow moving and often difficult to achieve, but once movement recruits are convinced that their cause is just, they find a rise in consciousness by seeing that "institutional means of influence have been unsuccessful and that morally committed individuals must fight for the cause" (McAdam and Snow, 303).  Our group's ideas on encouraging conversion include the borrowing of ideology from other movements such as the civil rights and women's movements.  Connections can be drawn that link oppression to other groups, as in the belief that, as long as women and people of color are oppressed, so are lesbians and gay men. These oppressions can become compounded when an individual fits into several of the categories, ie. a woman who is black and a lesbian.  For the legalization of same-sex marriage, small steps towards success can be especially encouraging for activists.  Activists find the destigmatization of sexuality, and homosexuality in particular, to be an important step.  This is an ongoing process that requires members to stay active even though their efforts may feel fruitless.  Any attack on heteronormativity, which means challenging  the systemic exclusion of queer people from public life and help people recognize those that are not being treated with respect and equality, is a productive step.  Efforts to gain media attention help publicize the concerns of the movement to non-urban parts of America where people are harder to reach and also may face greater danger in coming out and actively participating.  Media exposure can help bring about the inclusion of more positive lesbian and gay roll models in television and the movies.  Activists in the movement also find it important to encourage queer people in high power positions, ie. government, religious leaders, media personalities, journalists, and others in visible positions and positions of authority to come out and take a stand.  All of these efforts help build community and encourage members of the movement to live out the idea that "the personal is political."  Though queer people may not win equal rights over night, it is important for activists to say mobilized and know that their small steps are important along the way for bringing about change.

    Collective empowerment puts to action the "risks associated with challenging authority" and "convinces people to participate in a particular protest because of its presumed ability to accomplish the movement goal" (McAdam and Snow, 304).  Public protest has been a tactic of the queer rights movement for decades and continues to be implemented by same-sex marriage supporters.  At visibility marches across the country, political protests, and queer rallies, activists work to spotlight the issue of same-sex marriage.  Many believe in the grass-roots strategy of first changing things culturally rather than going directly to the law books.  Some activists take on tactics of inside action, with goals of promoting anger among movement recruits.  Their goal is to make people upset in order to get them active, using such things as scare tactics about the power of the religious right and other opposition, as necessary ways to strengthen mobilization in our movement.  Outside action includes more "in your face" political tactics: carnival, parody, displays, such as mall kiss-ins where the point is to disrupt a space coded as family-oriented to make a point, or planning a "queer night out" in which queer couples patronize straight bars in great numbers, paralleling the lunch counter sit-ins of 1960s South.  These methods of gaining visibility for the movement require citizens to actually take part in politics through direct action, and to expect their action to have some effect rather than to depend on a legislator to act for us on behalf of the cause.

    The processes of polarization and collective decision-making provide the final keys to creating commitment among members of the queer movement.  Consciousness raising and collective empowerment lay the groundwork for group identification and the strengthening of movement bonds in a way that polarization can influence protestors to "respond to threats as a powerful, angry group rather than as isolated, frightened individuals," which can have a strong impact on participation. (McAdam and Snow, 304).  Dedicated members of the movement will stay committed even when faced with opposition from conservative social forces and right-winged extremists.  Protestors often feel committed to a cause when they have had a say in whether to "initiate, continue, or end a given protest."  Participation in the queer movement, as in other protest movements, is often "the result of a complex group decision-making process, and not the consequence of many isolated, rational individual decisions" (McAdam and Snow, 304).  Members can be involved in grass-roots organizing efforts, organizing and taking part in group actions, voicing their opinions at meetings, and voting on whether or not to pursue certain issues.

    One of the most recent victories for same-sex marriage supporters and activists has been the 1999 ruling by the Vermont Supreme Court in the case Baker v. Vermont.  As of 1 July 2000, same-sex couples in Vermont were granted the state benefits of legal marriage.  Their "civil unions" mean property can be merged and break-ups will require a divorce, however, federal marriage benefits and responsibilities do not apply- couples are not recognized for issues of immigration rights, federal taxes, and countless other elements provided by heterosexual wedlock.  This small step forward for supporters of our movement has been counteracted by the passage of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) providing states a loophole to bypass the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which says all states must recognize the "public acts, records, and judicial proceedings" of every other state.  DOMA reads "no state shall be required to give effect to any public act, record or judicial proceeding...respecting a relationship between persons of the same sex that is treated as a marriage under the laws of any other state..."  Because of legislation such as this, it is crucial for the lesbian and gay community around the country to take a stand on issues that will directly impact their lives and their choices.  It is equally important for non-gays who believe in the equality of all people to take a stand and contribute positively to the movement because real people with real families are affected every day and deserve the legal security automatically granted to heterosexual Americans.  The poet Audre Lorde once wrote, "You do not have to be me in order for us to fight alongside each other.  I do not have to be you to recognize that our wars are the same.  What we must do is commit ourselves to some future that can include each other and to work toward that future with the particular strengths of our individual identities.  And in order to do this, we must allow each other our differences at the same time as we recognize our sameness"  (Lorde, 142).
 
 
 
 

Works Cited

Lorde, Audre.  1984.  "Learning from the 60s." Pp.134-144 in Sister Outsider.  Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press.

Machalek, Richard and David A. Snow. 1993. "Conversion to New Religious Movements." Pp. 53-74 in Religion and The Social Order:  The Handbook on Cults and Sects in America, v. 3B. Greenwich, CT: JAI Press.

McAdam, Doug and David A. Snow. 1997. Social Movements: Readings on Their Emergence, Mobilization, and Dynamics. P. 281. Los Angeles, CA: Roxbury Publishing Company.