Straightforward: How to Mobilize Heterosexual Support for Gay Rights

by Ian Ayres, Jennifer Gerarda Brown

What can straight people do to support gay rights? How much work or sacrifice must allies take on to do their share? Ian Ayres and Jennifer Brown--law professors, activists, husband and wife--propose practical strategies for helping straight men and women advocate for and with the gay community.



Straightforward advances a thesis that is at once simple and to make real progress at the central flashpoints of controversy--marriage rights, employment discrimination, gays in the military, exclusion from the Boy Scouts, and religious controversies over homosexuality--straight as well as gay people need to speak up and act for equality. Ayres and Brown take aim at both the hearts and minds of the general public, focusing on strategies that can change the incentives and therefore the behavior of the recalcitrant.


The book is peppered with stories about real people and the decisions they have faced at home, in church, at work, in school, and in politics. It is also filled with creative legal and economic strategies for influencing public and corporate decision-making. For example, Ayres and Brown propose the development of a "fair employment mark" to help companies advertise inclusive employment policies. They also show how a simple pledge to vacation in states that legalize gay marriage can create powerful incentives for legislatures to amend their marriage laws.


Engagingly written and sure to spark debate, Straightforward promises to change the way America thinks about--and participates in--the gay rights movement.

Genres: Queer, Politics, LGBT

264 pages, Hardcover

First published April 18, 2005

About the author

Ian Ayres is the William K. Townsend Professor at Yale Law School and the Yale School of Management, and is editor of the Journal of Law, Economics and Organization. In addition to his best-selling SuperCrunchers, Ayres has written for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, International Herald Tribune, and The New Republic. He lives in New Haven, Connecticut.Barry Nalebuff is Professor of Economics and Management at the Yale School of Management. His books include The Art of Strategy (an update of the best-selling Thinking Strategically) and Co-opetition. He is the author of fifty scholarly articles and has been an associate editor of five academic journals. He lives in New Haven, Connecticut.

Reviews

[Hannah]

I already love Ian Ayres because he wrote a book about why being a data miner is the new way to be smart. And then, as if that weren't enough, he and his wife teamed up on this book. Ian Ayres, what can I do for *you*?

[Raelene · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had some issues with their ideas, mainly because it's hard for me to determine if small steps are good or not, but it's a great book! Check it out.

[Jack · Rating 4 out of 5]

A bracingly clear understanding of how heterosexual America needs to embrace its gay & lesbian citizens far more fully than is now the case.

[Lauren Klinger · Rating 2 out of 5]

I just don't think I was exactly the right audience for this book. It would be great for a young straight couple who is pro-equality.