What you did
First, read this sharply sarcastic yet no less poignant list of questions, written by my friend Pete Nicely.
Then read my two posts before this one, just so you can get a sense of how I'm feeling right now.
Are you really aware of the impact of having voted Yes on Prop 8?
This was not just the simple question:
"Shall we now allow same-sex marriages in California?"
"No. We do not wish to change our current laws to allow same-sex marriage."
... and that would have been it. We would see that the California public is not yet ready for that kind of cultural shift. We'll try again when you're a little more enlightened, a little less ick-factored by your western Judeo-Christian cultural upbringing.
No. This was the stomping-down of a civil right already granted to a part of the population, a right which was really not hurting you at all. You could have looked at this Proposition, realized its heavy-handed extremism, and voted it down, waiting for a better, more civilized opportunity to deny same-sex marriage. You did not. You wrote it into the State Constitution.
You wrote religious-based belief into our Constitution.
People. Don't you know that there are federal benefits that are applicable only to "married" couples, without substitutions? The concept of "civil union" is toothless and not equal to marriage. Do you know how entrenched this now is, how far back culturally we've pushed ourselves, how similar this is to the anti-miscegenation laws that didn't end until Bianca and I were born?
What reasons do you have for this that does not look like hatred and fear? Whether you felt that your own marriage was being demeaned, whether you feared that your children were at risk of confusion, that your churches would now be forced to marry gay people, that same-sex marriage must somehow be mandatory teaching in public schools, that the Hebrew God of War in the first half of the Bible doesn't like it, that your religious freedom was being infringed upon. Your reasons are weak, and all of them I can deconstruct into the dirt.
Bianca and I have friends and parents who must now figure out how to rearrange their lives, since they are married--were married--and now have that taken away from them. I just wish you had more gay friends, more couples who had experienced a wedding ceremony, who have children who they are raising together. I wish you knew some, so you'd have to tell them, "sorry I gotta do this to you, this is how I feel."
If you are proud of your solidly-grounded stance on this, then so be it. You cannot budge from what you call God's Plan, or your fear that children will somehow be tainted with new knowledge, or an outspoken hatred of homosexuals. I accept that, and we'll just concentrate on how else we can interact with each other without brawling.
However, If you were just kind of shrugging with a "hey, look, I just feel that marriage is between a man and a woman, that's all," then I gravely suggest you read things before you affect other people's lives, and seriously consider whether you should ever attempt to discuss anything of a philosophical, political, sociological, cultural, historical, or otherwise intelligent nature with me.
California now == Deep South.
Then read my two posts before this one, just so you can get a sense of how I'm feeling right now.
Are you really aware of the impact of having voted Yes on Prop 8?
This was not just the simple question:
"Shall we now allow same-sex marriages in California?"
"No. We do not wish to change our current laws to allow same-sex marriage."
... and that would have been it. We would see that the California public is not yet ready for that kind of cultural shift. We'll try again when you're a little more enlightened, a little less ick-factored by your western Judeo-Christian cultural upbringing.
No. This was the stomping-down of a civil right already granted to a part of the population, a right which was really not hurting you at all. You could have looked at this Proposition, realized its heavy-handed extremism, and voted it down, waiting for a better, more civilized opportunity to deny same-sex marriage. You did not. You wrote it into the State Constitution.
You wrote religious-based belief into our Constitution.
People. Don't you know that there are federal benefits that are applicable only to "married" couples, without substitutions? The concept of "civil union" is toothless and not equal to marriage. Do you know how entrenched this now is, how far back culturally we've pushed ourselves, how similar this is to the anti-miscegenation laws that didn't end until Bianca and I were born?
What reasons do you have for this that does not look like hatred and fear? Whether you felt that your own marriage was being demeaned, whether you feared that your children were at risk of confusion, that your churches would now be forced to marry gay people, that same-sex marriage must somehow be mandatory teaching in public schools, that the Hebrew God of War in the first half of the Bible doesn't like it, that your religious freedom was being infringed upon. Your reasons are weak, and all of them I can deconstruct into the dirt.
Bianca and I have friends and parents who must now figure out how to rearrange their lives, since they are married--were married--and now have that taken away from them. I just wish you had more gay friends, more couples who had experienced a wedding ceremony, who have children who they are raising together. I wish you knew some, so you'd have to tell them, "sorry I gotta do this to you, this is how I feel."
If you are proud of your solidly-grounded stance on this, then so be it. You cannot budge from what you call God's Plan, or your fear that children will somehow be tainted with new knowledge, or an outspoken hatred of homosexuals. I accept that, and we'll just concentrate on how else we can interact with each other without brawling.
However, If you were just kind of shrugging with a "hey, look, I just feel that marriage is between a man and a woman, that's all," then I gravely suggest you read things before you affect other people's lives, and seriously consider whether you should ever attempt to discuss anything of a philosophical, political, sociological, cultural, historical, or otherwise intelligent nature with me.
California now == Deep South.