Publication
Constitutional Commentary
Volume
17
Page
603
Year
2001
Abstract
The world into which Gaylaw arrives is one whose poles are very far apart. At one pole, a man fatally fractures his dog's skull by beating him with a plastic vacuum cleaner accessory and then throwing the dog against a tree trunk. 3 Why? The man concluded the dog was homosexual after he saw the poodle-Yorkshire terrier mix repeatedly attempt sexual activity with another male terrier. 4 At the man's subsequent trial for animal cruelty, a veterinarian testified that such behavior in dogs is a common way for them to assert dominance, rather than necessarily a sexual act, much less evidence of a homosexual orientation. It's a measure of how deeply rooted shame and hostility about homosexuality are that, in the eyes of some, even a mutt's behavior is imbued with negative sexual significance in need of a corrective. 5
Recommended Citation
Dale Carpenter, The Limits of Gaylaw, 17 Const. Comment. 603 (2001), available at https://scholarship.law.umn.edu/faculty_articles/147.
Comments
Review Essay: reviewing William N. Eskridge, Gaylaw: Challenging the Apartheid of the Closet (Harvard University Press, 1999).