It’s been 11 years since same-sex marriage was legalized nationwide, and for most of that time, its place in American life has seemed settled. That sense of security is starting to erode. Support for same-sex marriage has dropped by 18 percentage points among Republicans since 2022, and conservative activists and lawmakers are mounting an increasingly aggressive campaign to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges, the Supreme Court case that established marriage equality as a right.

I do not take these efforts lightly. The right that some conservative Christian activists are seeking to undo is the reason I was able to marry my husband four years ago at a Baptist church in Texas — albeit one that had broken away from the traditionalist Southern Baptist Convention. Since then, the broad support that made marriage equality possible has grown more vulnerable. This is in part because a key message behind it — that being gay is not a choice — is being undermined by those who argue that same-sex orientation is better thought of as a part of a wider rebellion against social norms.

This worldview is best expressed in one word: “queer,” which is often used interchangeably with “gay” these days. The two words don’t mean the same thing. And in that difference lies a danger for our hard-fought equality.

I came out as gay in 2010 after being raised in an evangelical church in Wichita, Kan., where homosexuality was considered a sinful choice. Two things helped me change my mind. First was a painstaking study of Scripture. All six of the Bible’s references to same-sex relations are negative, but the lustful and exploitative same-sex practices those passages describe differ fundamentally from same-sex marriages today that are based on lifelong love and commitment.

The other thing that shaped my view was the public argument for gay rights at the time. The message from leading marriage equality advocates was simple and clear: Being gay is neither chosen nor changeable, and gay people deserve the same legal protections and chance at happiness as everyone else.

The faithful relationships highlighted by the campaign for marriage equality helped me see that same-sex love could be just as profound and enduring as heterosexual love. They were in keeping with a core biblical idea about marriage: that it is a covenant designed to reflect God’s self-giving love for humanity through the sacrificial love of spouses for each other.

This is, I admit, a far from radical vision of gay relationships. Which brings me to “queer.”

The shift toward “queer” has been remarkable and has coincided with a broader shift toward polarization in our society over the past 15 years. In 2009 a majority of gay men and lesbians reported negative feelings about “queer,” with only about one in five gay men viewing it positively. As a result, gay rights leaders and allies largely avoided it. But in 2025, 48 percent of L.G.B.T.Q. people said they thought of themselves as queer, including nearly 60 percent of those under 30. Progressive activists, organizations and major media outlets now routinely use “queer people” as an umbrella label for everyone who isn’t heterosexual, often paired with “trans” to encompass the broader L.G.B.T.Q. population.

What’s in a word? It’s more than just a shift in linguistic fashion. “Queer” carries an adversarial charge that “gay” does not, and that charge has a specific intellectual lineage. In 1990 an activist group called Queer Nation published a manifesto exhorting gay people to call themselves “queer.” Its rationale was that “gay” was “a much brighter word” and that “queer” better conveyed the anger and disgust they felt at how society treated gay people: as marginal others whose deaths barely mattered. That sentiment had an understandable resonance at the height of the AIDS epidemic, but the us-versus-them posture it represented has outlived that crisis.

This oppositional framing of “queer” achieved its most enduring influence through the rise of queer theory. In that academic context, “queer” did not simply mean “gay or bisexual.” It meant “anti-normative” in a sweeping sense. As the queer theorist David Halperin wrote, “Queer is by definition whatever is at odds with the normal, the legitimate, the dominant.” By that standard, same-sex relationships could be queer, but so could open marriages, prostitution and public sex, even when heterosexual.

To be fair, “queer” has certain advantages. It is more economical than “L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+,” and its openness can feel freeing to those ill at ease with the binary nature of “gay” and “lesbian.” I have friends who are transgender, or are married to someone who is, who find “queer” a more comfortable fit for that reason.

But the capaciousness that makes “queer” appealing to some also makes the term remarkably easy for anybody — regardless of orientation — to adopt as a kind of radical chic identity label. Because the word “queer” can describe any departure from social norms, it becomes an open door through which almost anyone can walk. Polyamorous? Queer. Vaguely uncomfortable with gender expectations? Possibly queer, too.

That elasticity has helped fuel a sharp rise in young people identifying as something other than straight, even if they are unlikely to ever pursue a same-sex relationship. Some of this increase represents people who were previously closeted but are now free to be honest about their sexual orientation, which is a welcome development. But the broader trend of casting the queer net ever wider has muddled a once-clear public message about who gay people are. Being gay begins to look less like an inborn trait and more like a chosen ideology or aesthetic.

Subsuming the fixed reality of gayness under the much more malleable banner of queerness undermines a core premise behind gay rights: that sexual orientation isn’t chosen. And polling suggests that premise is, indeed, being weakened; the share of Americans who believe people are born gay has declined over the past decade.

In a time of backlash, this is not a confusion that gay people can afford, especially those of us who live in red states and religious communities. In my work with the Reformation Project, which advocates the acceptance of same-sex relationships in the church, I have watched conservative Christians grow noticeably more guarded in recent years. Even those who had, however reluctantly, made their peace with same-sex marriage being legal have become increasingly alarmed by their sense that the L.G.B.T.Q. movement lacks clear limiting principles. And while the sharp recent drop among Republicans in support for marriage equality is only part of a larger ramping up of culture-war populism, losing the clarity and moderation of the message that once appealed to a majority of them cannot have helped.

As a 19-year-old, I found freedom by coming to understand that there is nothing inherently radical or subversive about being gay. Watching committed same-sex couples be welcomed into the institution of marriage transformed my sense of self-worth, allowing me to envision for the first time a dignified future as an openly gay person. It showed me that something never before possible for gay people now was for me: I could fall in love and build a life with someone without being confined to the closet or shunted to the margins of society.

The gay rights movement changed the world — and changed my life — by showing that being gay is not a rebellion against ordinary life. It is simply one way of living it, every bit as dignified and human as being straight. As support for gay rights begins to wane, we urgently need to regain the clarity of that simple, transformational message.

Matthew Vines is the executive director of the Reformation Project and the author of “God and the Gay Christian: The Biblical Case in Support of Same-Sex Relationships.”

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