Science Framing and Not: Disengaging the Countermovement in the Contest Over LGBT Families

• In Event: 308 - Regular Session. Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies

Abstract

This paper is based on a situational analysis of two social movements involved in contests about LGBT families today and charts how one movement engages in a competitive process of disengagement (Clarke, 2005). To illustrate, I discuss one key aspect of the framing situation revealed in my analysis -- the doing and claiming of science. I first discuss the science framing of a key anti-LGBT organization (Family Research Institute) and other key anti-LGBT organizations. Next, I contrast that to the work of a central LGBT organization (Williams Institute), outlining how their science work ignores the science claims of the Family Research Institute and other organizations in the anti-LGBT movement. Similarly I chart how very few LGBT organizations reference science in their framing. In an arena that has long been defined by opposing movement competition, I argue that the LGBT movement’s strategy of ignoring the science framing of the anti-LGBT countermovement is a process of disengagement that serves to redefine the situation of each movement in relation to each other and the larger culture. I identify this as an extension of McCaffrey and Key’s (2000) work on the competitive processes of opposing movements and argue that it allows us to better understand how such movements do interpretive work to situate themselves.

Author

• Kendal L. Broad, University of Florida