Bittersweet.
I am not good at wearing my emotions on my sleeve. I have always, sometimes by pure necessity, kept my cards close to the vest.
America is a great nation, and last night, in my opinion, made us a greater one. MSNBC interviewed Rep. John Lewis very quickly after 11:00 when everyone called the election for Obama. Lewis, a black man, who was severely beaten in 1965 because he dared to cross a bridge in Alabama, lived to see another black man elected President of the United States. Forty Three years is a blink in history. Americans do things quickly. America is a great nation.
On May 16th of this year , the California Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution of this great nation says that " All men are created equal". The same principle that John Lewis was beaten for. All men and women in this country have the same rights , " Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness......" Last night a little over Five Million Californians disagreed with that . All men are not equal, some have more rights that others, some don't have rights at all.
For five months happy gay and lesbian couples in California got married! Love was in the air, bird seed was thrown, cake was eaten. The sky did not fall, the often shaky California did not fall, as much bally-who-ed, into the sea. Nothing happened except that all men were treated as equals. And this drove some people wild. How dare gay America think itself as equal. The Mormon Church pumped in something like 25 Million dollars to back horrible tv ads, that were just bold faced lies. The evil gay boogie man was coming to take your children. And it worked. The right to marry in California will be taken away. The couples that have been married in the last few months will stay married, but if you want to have it done, today, sorry, you are less than, not equal, your time is up.
I do not know how much of this the Gay community brought onto itself, did we , as our new First Lady has said about African Americans have a " natural fear of possibility" ? Did we as gay Americans NOT think that this would pass, because it was just so " wrong", that right would win? and not work hard enough out there? I don't know, the numbers are very confusing, exit polls are not helping me much. I am still digging through all the math. I had said from the start that it would come down to how many African Americans voted FOR Barack Obama, and Against gay Americans. It is looking like I was right, but its complex. I will write more about this after some more study.
This is hard. I do not understand why those that voted against .. well, me, do not see the nation as great enough, as big enough to accept us all. President-elect Obama opened his speech with: "If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer."
Well , Mr. President-Elect, I have some doubts. Last night was fantastic, my side won. The judges that President Obama will appoint will be more on the side of equality than McCain judges, the Federal marriage amendment is dead as a door nail. But, would you Mr. President-Elect, be in your position if Brown v Board had been put to a popular vote in 1954 ? I am happy for small advances. We are a great Nation.... we just need to keep working.
3 comments:
Yep. You should look at the piss poor grades the Congressional Black Caucus scores with gay rights. It's pretty dismal.
I hate to say this, because I know it will sound racist, even though it's fact-based - but it really looks like the reason Prop 8 passed yesterday was because of very high African-American turnout at the polls. Again, this is going to sound racist, but it's based on my personal experience working in public-interest lobbying and organizing with community organizations...the black community is the most homophobic group in the country, excepting perhaps white fundamentalist evangelicals. And that's only perhaps.
So we're left with the distressing fact that one group who headed to the polls to finally realize the dream of equality that they had been waiting for for so many years used the opportunity to at the same time rescind the equality and rights of others. Heartbreaking. And deserving of a scolding from the big O himself, I think, which of course won't change the way it now stands, but someone needs to point out to these folks in the strongest terms possible how unclear on the concept they are.
As for my state, having been denied the opportunity to flat out deny gays and lesbians, singles and couples, the right to foster or adopt parentless children several years ago, our great unwashed yesterday passed by a two-to-one margin a law that prohibits all unmarried couples who cohabitate the right to foster or adopt children. Unable to punish only gays, our electorate chose to paint with a broader brush. I'm sure they'll have the thanks of hundreds of children who will now spend their childhoods in group homes rather than in the toxic environment of a home with two adults who love each other but don't have a scrap of paper making it "legal".
I have to say, as elated as I was momentarily last night, I've been on balance depressed today. Yes, it was encouraging to see that the country has progressed to the point that a more qualified man will not be automatically rejected due to the color of his skin. But looking at the map, and the popular vote breakdown, you can't help but come to the conclusion that half or somewhat north of that number of the people in this country still have a very medieval mindset. Last night we dragged them kicking and screaming into the last century. It's going to take some doing to drag them into the current one - given that the kicking and screaming we seen thus far is far from over.
Oh, Jaffner, only you would be depressed today.
Although these two words are depressing: Bernice King.
I'm not going to pretend to understand this. I just know it's flat-out wrong.
During the boring CNN coverage last night, we were all citing our top voting issues. Mine has been gay rights for almost 20 years. Which falls under the larger category, perhaps, of separation of church and state.
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