personal plea regarding proposition 8
On Friday, October 10, My five year old daughter Natasha’s first grade class left school during the lunch hour and took a bus to City Hall, where the class surprised their teacher Erin as she left city hall after marrying her partner. You can read about it and se photos and a short film at http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/10/10/MNFG13F1VG.DTL
This outing was conceived and organized by a couple parents. As I understand it, the motivation behind the outing was to do something sweet for Erin, who is not only the kids’ beloved first grade teacher, she was also their kindergarten teacher, so the kids have quite an attachment, and it’s probably fair to say a lot of us parents do, too. To be able to go and shower Erin and her spouse Kerry with rose petals was fun and a sweet way to show how much we and our kids appreciate her.
I also liked the idea because it is an historic moment. Right now, the right of same sex couples to get legally married is the law of the land. That may change, but right now, it is a historic time as thousands of couples all over California are enjoying a basic civil right that those of us in heterosexual relationships take for granted. I loved the idea of Natasha being able to commemorate this in a small way. I look forward to being able to tell her, when she’s older, that it wasn’t just that she was alive during this historic time, but that she participated, in a small way.
Well, as you can see by the above link, the media was there. I am not entirely clear how that came together, but we did get a heads up a couple days before the field trip that someone from the Chronicle might be there. And they were, and they took some lovely pictures and wrote a decent story which was on the front page of the Chronicle the very next day. (Natasha was excited, but a bit disappointed that her interview didn’t get into the paper). And then, all kinds of hell broke loose.
You could see for yourself what some people have to say if you read the comments in the linked article, but I don’t recommend doing that, it’s depressing. The Associated Press picked up the story. Apparently some of the video was aired on Fox’s Bill O’Reilly show, and then, on Tuesday (school was closed on Monday) reporters, who wouldn’t say what media outlets they were from, staked out the school. The Yes on 8 Campaign has picked up on it to prove that “if Prop 8 doesn’t pass, gay marriage will be taught in the schools,” and the story has made the rounds of the hater blogs and right wing news sites. And of course the school is getting tons of hate emails. There are safety concerns.
It’s hard for me to write what I want to say to all of you here, because I have such a difficult time wrapping my head around all of the controversy. I’m not a good person to sway anyone who is opposed to gay marriage, because I simply don’t get it, I can’t understand why someone would care if two people who love each other get married. I can understand if people have religious objections, but that’s a matter to take up at their place of worship; religion must not dictate law. It’s hard for me to engage civilly with someone who thinks that my child’s friends families shouldn’t exist, or that our LGBT friends and families shouldn’t have the same access to basic civil rights that our heterosexual friends and families do. It’s hard to be calm in the face of irrational hate and outright oppression.
It’s also hard for me to see what the problem is if kids learn about same sex marriage. The homophobes use scare tactics about children learning about gay marriage that betray their own weird depravities, but say nothing about reality. There is nothing wrong with children learning about same sex marriage. There are so many ways to make a family, but what’s at the heart of a family is usually the same thing. In Natasha’s class, there are several kids who have same sex parents, as well as single parents, and blended families, and I feel lucky that she goes to a school and lives in a community with so many different kinds of families. The more kinds of diversity our children encounter, the more equipped they will be to thrive in a complex, constantly changing, and very diverse world.
But to the rest of you, I just want to say, Please. Please make sure you get out there and vote against Proposition 8. Talk to your friends and family who may or may not have already decided their vote on Prop 8. Help safeguard the civil rights of my child’s teacher, who is a pretty awesome teacher and a good person, whose marriage deserves the same amount of respect and protection as any other marriage. Help make sure that my child’s classmates and friends whose families have same sex parents are safe and can rely on all of the same legal and societal protections and benefits that every other family can. You may even be helping to protect the California economy, which greatly benefits from the same sex marriage industry!
Most of all, though, don’t let hatred, bigotry, and intolerance carry the day. I will be talking to Natasha about this event, this field trip to City Hall, when she is older, and I do NOT want to be telling her that this was right before rights were taken away. I want to be able to tell her, this was the beginning, this was the beginning of when it no longer was legal to discriminate against people because of who they love. If Proposition 8 is defeated, we will be much closer to the day when a group of kids tossing rose petals at their teacher’s wedding will be nothing more than a cute story, regardless who their teacher is marrying.
VOTE NO ON PROPOSITION 8!!!
Love,
Rahula
This outing was conceived and organized by a couple parents. As I understand it, the motivation behind the outing was to do something sweet for Erin, who is not only the kids’ beloved first grade teacher, she was also their kindergarten teacher, so the kids have quite an attachment, and it’s probably fair to say a lot of us parents do, too. To be able to go and shower Erin and her spouse Kerry with rose petals was fun and a sweet way to show how much we and our kids appreciate her.
I also liked the idea because it is an historic moment. Right now, the right of same sex couples to get legally married is the law of the land. That may change, but right now, it is a historic time as thousands of couples all over California are enjoying a basic civil right that those of us in heterosexual relationships take for granted. I loved the idea of Natasha being able to commemorate this in a small way. I look forward to being able to tell her, when she’s older, that it wasn’t just that she was alive during this historic time, but that she participated, in a small way.
Well, as you can see by the above link, the media was there. I am not entirely clear how that came together, but we did get a heads up a couple days before the field trip that someone from the Chronicle might be there. And they were, and they took some lovely pictures and wrote a decent story which was on the front page of the Chronicle the very next day. (Natasha was excited, but a bit disappointed that her interview didn’t get into the paper). And then, all kinds of hell broke loose.
You could see for yourself what some people have to say if you read the comments in the linked article, but I don’t recommend doing that, it’s depressing. The Associated Press picked up the story. Apparently some of the video was aired on Fox’s Bill O’Reilly show, and then, on Tuesday (school was closed on Monday) reporters, who wouldn’t say what media outlets they were from, staked out the school. The Yes on 8 Campaign has picked up on it to prove that “if Prop 8 doesn’t pass, gay marriage will be taught in the schools,” and the story has made the rounds of the hater blogs and right wing news sites. And of course the school is getting tons of hate emails. There are safety concerns.
It’s hard for me to write what I want to say to all of you here, because I have such a difficult time wrapping my head around all of the controversy. I’m not a good person to sway anyone who is opposed to gay marriage, because I simply don’t get it, I can’t understand why someone would care if two people who love each other get married. I can understand if people have religious objections, but that’s a matter to take up at their place of worship; religion must not dictate law. It’s hard for me to engage civilly with someone who thinks that my child’s friends families shouldn’t exist, or that our LGBT friends and families shouldn’t have the same access to basic civil rights that our heterosexual friends and families do. It’s hard to be calm in the face of irrational hate and outright oppression.
It’s also hard for me to see what the problem is if kids learn about same sex marriage. The homophobes use scare tactics about children learning about gay marriage that betray their own weird depravities, but say nothing about reality. There is nothing wrong with children learning about same sex marriage. There are so many ways to make a family, but what’s at the heart of a family is usually the same thing. In Natasha’s class, there are several kids who have same sex parents, as well as single parents, and blended families, and I feel lucky that she goes to a school and lives in a community with so many different kinds of families. The more kinds of diversity our children encounter, the more equipped they will be to thrive in a complex, constantly changing, and very diverse world.
But to the rest of you, I just want to say, Please. Please make sure you get out there and vote against Proposition 8. Talk to your friends and family who may or may not have already decided their vote on Prop 8. Help safeguard the civil rights of my child’s teacher, who is a pretty awesome teacher and a good person, whose marriage deserves the same amount of respect and protection as any other marriage. Help make sure that my child’s classmates and friends whose families have same sex parents are safe and can rely on all of the same legal and societal protections and benefits that every other family can. You may even be helping to protect the California economy, which greatly benefits from the same sex marriage industry!
Most of all, though, don’t let hatred, bigotry, and intolerance carry the day. I will be talking to Natasha about this event, this field trip to City Hall, when she is older, and I do NOT want to be telling her that this was right before rights were taken away. I want to be able to tell her, this was the beginning, this was the beginning of when it no longer was legal to discriminate against people because of who they love. If Proposition 8 is defeated, we will be much closer to the day when a group of kids tossing rose petals at their teacher’s wedding will be nothing more than a cute story, regardless who their teacher is marrying.
VOTE NO ON PROPOSITION 8!!!
Love,
Rahula