America's dominant media culture can lay claim on a universe of influential media, but The New York Times Magazine is one of the most strategic venues in elite publishing. A cover story in The New York Times Magazine sends a powerful cultural signal.

Thus, Russell Shorto's June 19, 2005 cover story in the magazine, "What's the Movement to Outlaw Gay Marriage Really About?," deserves significant attention. Interest in the article is likely to be sparked by a line printed on the cover just under the article's title. That line suggests that the battle to outlaw gay marriage is "not just about marriage." Of course, that statement is profoundly true--and that's what makes Shorto's article interesting.

Shorto's specific focus is on the state of Maryland, and he profiles advocates and opponents of gay marriage operating within that state. Nevertheless, Shorto's first stop on his journey to understand the controversy over gay marriage is a "small but grandiose building at the corner of Eighth and G Streets Northwest in Washington," the headquarters of the Family Research Council [FRC]. Shorto begins his article there, describing the majestic traditionalism of the FRC headquarters in terms of "architectural signals of tradition and power." He takes his readers immediately to a large window case in the FRC headquarters focused on the meaning of marriage. The case features a statement reciting verses from Genesis 2, where God creates woman and the institution of marriage. Accompanying the biblical text is a collection of wedding artifacts collected from FRC staff members. Old photographs, a wedding dress, and other wedding paraphernalia communicate a vision of heterosexual marriage as an institution of enduring strength. Of course, the background to Shorto's article is a sense of more recent vulnerability.

As Shorto explains, "This shrine to marriage as a heterosexual, Judeo-Christian institution is a totem of conservative Christianity's mighty political wing and a flag marking its territorial gains in what its leaders see as a decisive battle in the culture war." He goes on to explain the development of the "Arlington Group," a coalition of over 20 conservative organizations, committed to the protection of marriage as a heterosexual institution and the defeat of all efforts to normalize same-sex "marriage."

Shorto argues that, even as the Arlington Group was formed in May 2003, a "one-two punch" of historical developments was in the making. First came the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in the case, Lawrence v. Texas, striking down all laws against homosexual behavior. Within months the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court would mandate same-sex marriage in that state, and San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsome would begin handing out same-sex marriage licenses from City Hall. Shorto sees this as the defining moment in America's culture war: "The nebulous culture war instantly focused into a single issue." From there, Shorto's article is, in turns, interesting and infuriating. For one thing, Shorto doesn't seem to be able to convince himself that Americans are decisively opposed to homosexual marriage. In one statement, he will concede that "the country is fairly decisively opposed to it." Yet, looking back to the wedding display at the FRC headquarters, Shorto described the exhibit as "a cultural litmus test." As he explained, "Perhaps half the population would see the disembodied wedding outfits preserved in glass cases and guarded by a wooden eagle as bizarre, even lurid, while for the other half the display would trip different signifiers: sanctity, defiance, determination. On so many fronts that is where we are as a nation these days: divided, clearly and seemingly unbridgeably, in sensibility, value, foundations, even a sense of humor."