I feel very confused. Half of me is ecstatic, jubilant, elated, over the moon. The other half of me feels like someone just spat in my face.
I want to share in the Obama victory. I really do. I wish I could have been out in the streets, dancing, laughing, enjoying the moment in which we took our country back. Just the sheer amount of collective joy is inspiring. To see people spontaneously partying in the streets in cities all over America and the globe feels like sweet vindication. I heard from a friend who rallied at the White House and got to shout mean chants at George W. Bush. How cathartic! I feel I have my share in those moments of joy. I have never, ever, been prouder of my country than I am right now. Last night, I cried tears of joy for the first time in my life.
Right now, though, I am sobbing uncontrollably, and not with joy, but with anger, and disappointment, and sorrow and confusion at the passage of Prop 8 in California. I don't really know what to say, although WTF comes to mind.
For the most part, I am an obnoxiously proud Californian (although, I have, at various moments, argued for the secession of Northern California from Southern California). I've pissed a lot of people off because of my pride, but I mean, come on, California's awesome! Not so much, today. Today, I feel betrayed. I thought we knew better. I thought we were braver than we really are. I thought we were more loving. I guess I thought wrong.
I don't want to get into the arguments for or against gay marriage. I've already talked about that, and the last thing anyone wants to read is a piece that reads like that of a would-be pundit. I just want to say this, California: You made me cry today, so you'd better freaking apologize.
Since, as a straight woman, I still have the right to marry whatever man I choose, I feel a bit like a poseur for being so angry and upset. No one took away my rights. Yet I also know that when the rights of some are threatened, the rights of everyone are in jeopardy. But, to be honest, I'm not actually worried about my rights. I am more worried about what it means for our character--what it means that we could do this to an entire population of Californians. We're supposed to be leaders. We're supposed to be on the frontier of history. We're supposed to be a repository for America's dreams. And what a bleak dream this is.
***
None of this is written to belittle the utter exulatation I feel because of Obama's victory. This is just to say: the other half of me feels devastated, and at this particular moment in time, that half is winning the battle for my greater emotional state.
I can't imagine how much worse I would feel if I were one of the millions of Californians who actually did have their right to marry stripped away.
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So yes, it's bittersweet today with the Obama victory but this defeat. I feel like I have been served the most sumptuous banquet imaginable only to find a big ole hair in my food.
Maybe the fight will go better, with Obama in office. Maybe the example of unity that he is, will have a trickle down effect and we can defeat people's notions that it is somehow OK to deny some rights to some of us, and replace it with the notion that all rights for all of us makes all of us more free, good, right and true.
If a law was passed tomorrow saying everyone had to have brown hair, it would be just as oppressive to those with brown hair as to those without.
I say we campaign for another proposition: All non-First marriages immediately dissolved, and everyone must return to their original husband/wife--and no further divorces are allowed--to protect the sanctity of marriage. Think that would fly in CA?
Till death do we part.
When I picked up my 16 year daughter from school today she said we may have lost but my generation will change it.
very proud of that moment.
Please don't feel that way. We need more straights like you in our lives. Thank you for your support.
It would serve CA right if there were a mass exodus - leaving nothing but fundamentalist bookstores, fried dough stands and creation museums.
B. My brilliant SoCal daughter prefaced Election Day with this (on her Facebook page): "If you don't vote No on Prop. 8, you can't come to my birthday party." Love her. Share your anguish.
Signed, Straight Guy from Indiana, torn between elation and despair.
It will happen eventually, but the fight will be long. Like civil rights for blacks, it may take decades more. But look what has happened in that cause! Take heart, keep the faith and keep working toward the goals. You are a person of great heart.
Older white women, Latinos, 70% of African Americans,
among others
BTW, I've always felt that Northern CA should become
its own country, as in ECOTOPIA
(On a side note, I had written a much longer response but hit something wrong on my mouse and it disappeared. One of the things that I noted in the other post was that it may have been as much a rejection of Justices bending the law a bit too much to advance a cause they personally believe in as it was a direct rejection of the gay rights movement. I fleshed the idea out more in the missing post, but I am too tired to write it all out again. The bottom line is that some races and some ballot initiatives may not have gone the way some people wanted, but overall, November 4, 2008 was a great day to be an American.)
1) If marriage is sanctified then shouldn't the 1st priority be to make sure that those who already have the right treat it as such?
Why is noone suggesting that we outlaw divorce? Is it because noone wants marriage to be SO sacred that you cant get out of it?
2) If, as many say, this is not the government endorsement of a religious viewpoint then where are the arguements against gay marriage always thinly veiled religious ideas (if there is even an attempt to veil them).
3) How would my marrying my boyfriend in any way threaten the stabiliity of anyone else's relationship?
4) dont i have a right to make sure that my boyfriend can make decisions for me that my family has far less right to make than the man I spend my life with?
This is a very sad day for californians, but in a Representative Democracy every nation gets the government it deserves. The failure is not with the government it is with ALL OF US. society as a whole. WE allow this state of affairs and only we can change it.
Incidentally the obama admin may be a'sumptuous banquet' but remember he has already stated that he beleives that marriage is and should be between a man and a woman. He disaproves of a constitutionaly ban but that doesnt mean that he is going to push the issue.
(strangely enough one of the polititians who has quietly done alot for gay rights was dick cheney .............especially when he was in the bush 1 cabinet)
Look for Obama to try as much as possible to keep his hands clean on this issue. Dont get me wrong I think he will be the president that america really needs now, but I dont expect much on this issue............maybe if there is a second term.
this is a social issue.............we need to change hearts and minds before we can change laws.
"I personally believe that marriage is between a man and a woman. But I also agree with most Americans, including Vice President Cheney and over 2,000 religious leaders of all different beliefs, that decisions about marriage should be left to the states as they always have been."
Marriage from the government's perspective needs to be completely separated from the religious viewpoint IMO. Make them all civil unions and let churches marry people as they see fit.
Of course, then I have a harder time figuring out why I wouldn't be a hypocrite for being against polygamy (when it involves adults who all know about each other). Why does that bother me? Seems it should not.
I don't want to get into the arguments for or against gay marriage. I've already talked about that, and the last thing anyone wants to read is a piece that reads like that of a would-be pundit..."
Today, you have been subjected to the whims of competing rationalizations. I htink I heard that african-american voters and hispanic/latino voters, turning out in large numbers because that's what the Obama campaign wanted them to do, actually defeated Proposition 8. It's a cultural and religious thing. One person's religious ideology is another person's trampled rights. And if you expect Barack Obama to intervene, as I read on another post, you will be crying in your beers again. It won't happen. He doesn't have that kind of clout or political leverage - not one day after his election. Remember this: It was only an electoral college defined landslide. The popular vote tells a different story.
I've been feeing intense mixed feelings, too.
Mostly, I'm ecstatic about Obama, but also pissed off.
And I'm discouraged that if we can't win in California, where the hell can we win. But that's not really true: there are more liberal states. And this is not our last stand, just one more.
I take solace knowing that it's a long struggle, and the gay one is running a few decades behind the ones for blacks and women. We got there, finally, on a crucial hurdle in the black struggle, and we got within striking distance for the women. (And the one will reinforce the other. Ending white-male rule of the white house breaks the door open more for everyone.)
Today I feel unincluded. It's kind a stick in the eye that on the very day we leap forward, gays get the message that we're not part of that.
I feel that way, though I know it's not really true. We're just much farther from the finish line. We're slogging our way forward, and this was a shitty day and an ugly setback, but we're moving forward.
We have to get up again tomorrow and fight again.
In CA, specifically, I don't know what the strategy is, but I'd put it on the ballot again--reversing the language, making a Yes for us. Keep putting it on there, wear people down, but most of all, get them comfortable with the idea.
I propose right here, right now that we begin a petition to get the following proposition passed in California:
"The term 'marriage' shall be banned for all ceremonies performed in the State of California. Henceforth, only 'civil unions' shall now be performed by any authorized state and local authorities, and the term 'marriage certificate' shall be replaced in all public documents by 'civil union contract' which will be limited to a seven year renewable term. If either party wishes to void this contract before the seven-year period has expired, they must file a petition with the appropriate authorities, and wait until all property and custody disputes have been resolved, or a minimum period of ninety (90) days, for the contract to be voided. All rights, privileges and duties due to any citizen of the U.S. (including, but not limited to) inheritance, parentage, community property, etc. shall be granted and duly enforced. "
The wording is negotiable, but that is the gist of the proposition.
If religious types want to get married in their church, let 'em. If ANYONE wants to get married in a church only, all they have to do is find a preacher and have their church, synagogue or atheist group issue their own legally non-binding certificate of marriage. But they must also have the 'civil union contract' authorized by a city or state official if they want to have any legal rights granted.
If we start working now, we can get this on the 2010 ballot and end this bickering forever. If anyone has the will, legal knowledge and interest, I would be happy to talk to you!
I'm a fellow, straight, married former Californian that can't understand why Prop 8 passed.
I wrote a while back about two friends on mine: one a black homophobe who didnt want gays teaching her children; the other a white gay racist who didn't want her mom dating a black man . Go figure.
They stopped befriending me after I wrote my piece.
The last thing I want to is attack their institution. I want to join it. Or at least to have the right to join it.
If you want to opt out, that's fine. But a proposal to attack it, that undermines so much work that we've done.
I beg you to reconsider that stance--here or elsewhere in your daily travels.
http://open.salon.com/user_blog.php?uid=1097
Google is a lovely place to start, or perhaps a phone call to lawyer friends?
Informed opinions are much, much more convincing than the other kind.
I have been married to the same man for almost forty-three years and trust me, I have never felt my marriage could be weakened by anyone outside of my husband and myself. Our union in 1966 was not legal in a whole lot of states because of so-called miscegenation laws. Often, we still receive stares from elderly white women in public and I still find myself wondering why they should care.
The truly tragic thing about the passage of Prop 8 is that many people who voted for the proposition didn't even read it and voted for it because their minister or a "trusted" friend told them about the evils of gay marriage.
One day we'll finally get the government out of our bedrooms and personal lives. But that won't happen until the hysteria of the religious zealots cool and someone decides that there really is supposed to be a separation between church and state.
Yes, we bled blue for Barack. But other than that...not so much.
The wave of energy and change passed us by. Our energy (and our money) delivered some swing states, I'm sure - most notably Nevada - but the homefront is lacking.
Same incompetent state legislature. Same congressional delegation. We sent Duncan Hunter's son to Congress for pete's sake.
No one was really dancing in the streets or, well, anything. It was like it all happened in France. You know, except for the good part where I get to say "President Obama!"
I feel blah. National dems and progressives can't take California for granted forever. Megachurches throughout the state are planning and mobilizing to take their place.
It's pretty sad that we feel more strongly about treating farm animals well than we do about gay people.
I feel that moves like this that threaten individual rights pave the way for more encroachment of rights.
I live in Nothern CA (north of Sac) and as far as Prop 8, well, the voters spoke. Also, CA wasn't the ONLY state to have similar props on the ballot.
I live in Nothern CA (north of Sac) and as far as Prop 8, well, the voters spoke. Also, CA wasn't the ONLY state to have similar props on the ballot.
I live in Nothern CA (north of Sac) and as far as Prop 8, well, the voters spoke. Also, CA wasn't the ONLY state to have similar props on the ballot.
for my part my family will be demonstrating outside the Mormon Temple in San Diego on Sunday 11 am. The Mormons gave a "call" to their members who "donated" 20 million dollars to overturn others rights. I believe the Mormon church should lose their tax exempt status if they seek to overturn legislation we Californians enacted. Separation of church and state. Just say NO to cults. Dangerous!
geeegee
As for those who say that civil unions should suffice...well, we tried "separate but equal" a couple generations ago. It wasn't equal and it didn't work.
I've found when it comes to voter initiatives it's usually best to completely ditch (vote NO) to any initiative with a religious basis. The best way to do this is to consider, for example, gay marriage, without any kind of a religious backdrop to it.
In other words, what happens to the argument of those supporting a ban on gay marriage when the religion is taken out of it?
Take the religion out and you have an interestingly empty argument for declaring marriage to be between a man and a woman only.
I'm probably not going to post here again for awhile but I think it would be interesting if anyone else from California can think of why an initiative should be defeated because it is backed by religious conservatives due to bad policy; not just because it's backed by religious conservatives of whatever stripe.
Many conservative religious organizations base themselves in California and try hard to preempt our Constitution by claiming their particular beliefs should trump those that are sensible and determined on a secular basis that would benefit everyone.
They simply did a better job at popularizing and stealing this vote. We'll do a better job next time.
We got out-Obama'd on this one.