" ooops, I did it again....."

Oh, baby baby........

Just in time for the Yankees to take the World Series tonight, we turn to good ole Yogi Berra : " It's like deja-vu, all over again." I wonder how many people are sadly using that quote today.

One year ago, tonight, the voters in California took away a fundamental right from its citizens, last night the voters in Maine did the exact same thing. Christianist 2 , gay Americans 0. This one hurt , kiddies. A big ole gut punch to the stomach. It is New England after all, live and let live, " live free or die" all that sort of tommy rot. And on the surface the NO ON ONE folks in Maine did all the right things. Raised all sorts of money, kept very on top of the ads , answering the lies that the Catholic Church and NOM and the Mormons put out there. They did the best they could, but it fell about thirty thousand votes short.

I was all in a knot last night , and just went totally media free once it turned out that our issue in Maine was going down, woke up this morning all full of piss and vinegar. Angry that the exact same tactics that did not work in California , did not work in Maine. Trotting out the exact same Talbots clad lesbians with their 2.6 apple cheeked cherubs to decry how " just like everyone else we are" and " love makes a family" and " do the right thing, Mainers!" When I want to see big hulking full out leather daddies and big letters saying " GET YOUR FUCKING HANDS OFF MY CONSTITUTION, BITCH". Which part of " all men are created equal " does your pea size brain not get?

" No more Mr. Nice Gay", but I was wrong. No on one, was the way to go, a more slow and steady, Andrew Sullivan changed my mind:

"I also don't believe that the campaign [ no on one ] has anything to be ashamed of. I was worried about the early ads, but they improved. The campaign organization, by all accounts, was superb. The money was there. The enthusiasm was there. The turnout was spectacular in an off-year.
The hard truth is: people are still afraid of this, and our opponents knew how to target their fears very precisely. They have honed it to an art - their prime argument now is that although adults can handle gay equality, children cannot. And so they play straight to heterosexuals whose personal comfort with gay people is fine but who sure don't want their kids to turn out that way. One way to prevent kids turning out that way, the equality opponents argue, is to ensure that they never hear of gay people, except in a marginalized, scary, alien fashion. And this referendum was clearly a vote in which the desire to keep gay people invisible trumped the urge to treat them equally.
The truth about civil marriage - why it is the essential criterion for gay equality - is that it alone explodes this core marginalization and invisibility of gay people. It alone can reach those gay kids who need to know they have a future as a dignified human being with a family. It alone tells society that gay people are equal in their loves and in their hearts and in their families - not just useful in a society with a need for talented or able individuals whose private lives remain perforce sequestered from view."

( read more...)

I am FAR from child-centric, for the most part I find the little darlings all but unbearable until at least their late 20's, so this argument would be lost on me. The fear of older folks that their darling child or for the most part I am betting GRAND CHILDREN will turn out THAT WAY, is horrifying to some people. If your only idea of gay life is some bad 50's movie of sad predatory gay men out cruising the bathrooms then yes, that would be a big scare for your children. So, putting real families on tv , saying LOOK AT US, I guess is the way to go. Didn't work this time, but......

Gay America has an enemy. Let's try that again : " Gay America" has an enemy, in quotes because no matter what the the other side says, there is no GAY AMERICA. We are as diverse as the country is. Young, old, rich, poor, white, black, yellow , brown and green, every job, every big city, every small town, close to every family. We truly are everywhere. Our enemy is of one mind, and they have weekly meetings where they do things like take up money to defeat me, condemn souls to eternal damnation for stepping one foot out of lock step. All we can do , really, is ask to be let in. " Please , may we be equal citizens ?" " May we please get to not live in your bible based theocracy ? "

More on last night in a bit, today really was a day to find that warm spot beside the stove to lick our wounds. Last night was not a total failure at all, there were some bright spots, its just that deja-vu or not, this one still hurts, a great deal.