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Partisan Politics and Opposition to Gay Marriage in Mexico
 Patrick Corcoran - mexidata.info
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March 01, 2010
 |  | Opposition to same-sex marriage may seem like a winner for the PAN today, but times change. |  | | |
Despite a lengthy to-do list that represents Mexican President Felipe Calderón's last gasp for an enduring legislative legacy, the president and his party have diverted their recent efforts toward a push to ban same-sex marriage.
The change of focus stems from a December law passed by the left-leaning Mexico City government legalizing same-sex marriage and providing gay couples with an avenue to adoption. Gay rights in general and same-sex marriage in particular had not been particularly divisive issues in Mexico, but the new law, which was the first of its kind in Latin America (the northern state of Coahuila did, however, legalize same-sex unions in 2007, though without the adoption provision) provoked a storm of controversy.
Even before the new law was official, the Mexico City PAN (National Action Party) was promising a legal challenge. Church officials, predictably, were apoplectic (although interestingly the Vatican conspicuously kept its distance). Opponents of same-sex marriage found a sympathetic ear in Los Pinos; Calderón is said to be personally close to Mariana Gómez, the PAN's most visible opponent of same-sex marriage, and in late January, his attorney general Arturo Chávez Chávez filed a challenge of the law before the Supreme Court. Five more states, all run by PAN governors, joined the fray last week, challenging the law on the grounds that it unfairly obliges them to recognize the capital's marriages.
Since Mexico City is light years to the left of much of the rest of the country, the backlash could undermine gay rights more than the Mexico City law advanced them. The Supreme Court could strike down the Mexico City law, rendering same-sex marriage illegal across the nation. Even if the Court refrains from doing so (which seems likely, given the court’s recent leftward tilt, its endorsement of Mexico City’s abortion legalization, and the flimsiness of the legal arguments), a series of statewide bans of same-sex marriage seem quite likely. This pattern, a progressive law in Mexico City sparking a harsh conservative reaction virtually everywhere else, was established over the past couple of years in the realm of abortion.
But even if the PAN’s strategy does bear fruit, this is a bad policy and ultimately a bad political move for the PAN. Mexico is recovering from its worst economic decline in more than 70 years, which has vaulted several million Mexicans into the ranks of poverty. It is burdened by declining oil income, a dysfunctional political culture, limited access to credit, and a gigantic gap in the budget, among other ills.
Whatever satisfaction it may offer to a small sector of society, banning same-sex marriage will bring zero quality-of-life improvements to those Mexicans who most need them. (This is presumably a major factor behind the grumbling from within the PAN about the party's suddenly rabid stance.) Nor is the PAN’s position an authentic expression of grass-roots anger boiling over; there is no broad-based right-wing group in Mexico pushing politicians for action, analogous to the Christian right in the US. I have never seen a poll that ranked concern over homosexual rights among the Mexican electorate’s foremost concerns. This is, rather, an elite manipulation, the stoking of populist coals for electoral gain.
That’s not only shameful, but ultimately, politically stupid; opposition to same-sex marriage may seem like a winner for the PAN today, but times change. According to the pollster Mitofsky, 58 percent of Mexicans, a big number but hardly a runaway majority, say that homosexuals should not have the right to marry. But at the same time, 46 percent offered the slightly contradictory belief that homosexual couples should have the same rights as heterosexual couples. Furthermore, young people were significantly more likely to support gay rights in general and gay marriage in particular (by seven and eight points, respectively).
Another interesting data point lies in causes of opposition: according to a different poll of Mexico City residents in the newspaper El Universal, the principal reason that opponents gave for their hostility to same-sex marriage wasn’t faith or family values, but that homosexuality “wasn’t normal.” But a society's concept of what's normal is evolutionary. Two hundred years ago, executing a man for stealing a horse was standard practice in much of the US. Today, less so.
All of this indicates that the PAN is defending a position that sooner or later will inevitably turn against them. Their opposition, however stalwart, won't remove homosexuality from Mexico, nor will it succeed in denying legal rights to gays. Ultimately, all it will accomplish is lashing the PAN to an ethically questionable position lying on history’s tail end.
Patrick Corcoran (corcoran25(at)hotmail.com) is a writer who resides in Torreón, Coahuila. He blogs at Gancho (www.ganchoblog.blogspot.com). |
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