Items: A few more same-sex marriage-related notes

A few links of possible interest:

  • Asian-Americans have been remarkably supportive of gay rights. "We think of anti-miscegenation laws that specifically banned intermarriage with Asians. For us, this is a civil rights issue, not a moral one."
  • Some California same-sex couples actually got married today. It's unclear when exactly Prop 8 goes into effect, assuming it passes. Any same-sex couples who get married in CA from now until Prop 8 is resolved are likely to have even muddier legal standing than those who've gotten married in the past few months. Best bit from that article is the final line, a quote from a woman who got married on Sunday: "I hope the marriage holds, but we are already married in our hearts, so nobody can take that away."
  • There was a last minute No On 8 robocall on Monday night, featuring a recording of Obama saying he didn't support Prop 8. I think it was too little too late, in light of the Yes side's ads over the weekend saying that Obama was opposed to same-sex marriage. The latter is not a lie--but in the context of Prop 8, it was extremely misleading. And I read on a mailing list a note from one No On 8 volunteer who recently spoke with a black man who was voting Yes explicitly because he believed that's what Obama wanted. Anecdotal evidence; who knows how widespread that was. But pretty distressing.
  • (Which reminds me that I got two robocalls from Bill Clinton as well as that Obama one in the past few days, but I only just now found the messages on my answering machine. The Obama one was garbled, but I suspect that's 'cause my machine was almost out of recording space.)
  • Kos at Daily Kos writes about not being complacent.
  • Kos suggests, as have many others, that the next step is to get an anti-8 measure on the ballot for 2010. One problem with that approach is that California voters often default to voting No on ballot measures, which means that a Yes campaign is harder to win than a No campaign. Interesting side note on that topic: "[Political science prof] David McCuan [noted that the Yes campaign,] pushing for passage of an initiative[,] began to behave like a classic 'No' campaign--by injecting doubt about the effect of a proposed 'change' into the minds of voters. [...] Because gay marriage was so new in California, it allowed Yes on 8 campaign manager Frank Schubert to operate as if what was technically the status quo was actually a proposed change, and trying to inject doubt into the minds of voters about that 'change.'" (From a Mercury News article.)
  • Dale Carpenter at the Volokh Conspiracy writes about the long view and homophobia, a sobering piece; among other things, I was struck by the remark that "gays were invisible in the No on 8 campaign. The literature I handed out talked in generalities about 'discrimination' and about how it was 'wrong' and 'unfair' to take away marriage from some unnamed group of people." But the main reason I'm linking to this is the line "Mostly, my heart breaks for the gay couples and their children who had a five-month window in which their families could celebrate the ultimate expression of commitment and love our culture knows."
  • Andrew Sullivan writes about whether courts and legislatures are the wrong path.
  • Ta-Nehisi Coates writes about the work left to be done regarding African-American homophobia. (I should note that the CA chapter of the NAACP has been a strong supporter of the No On 8 campaign. Although there are people who were pretty unhappy with that stance. And yes, I'm vastly oversimplifying a pretty messy issue.)
  • An oldie but goodie from a year ago: San Diego Republican Mayor Jerry Sanders gives an emotional press conference supporting same-sex marriage. (Video + transcript.) For those who don't know, San Diego is a relatively conservative part of the state.
  • Finally, Andrew Sullivan's personal response to Prop 8 apparently passing. Sad and hopeful and compelling. "The hope for equality can never be extinguished, however hard our opponents try."

6 Responses to “Items: A few more same-sex marriage-related notes”

  1. David Moles

    I never thought I’d find myself in such agreement with something Andrew Sullivan said, but I guess that just goes to show the extent to which Megan McArdle is a twit.

    reply
  2. Haddayr

    Thanks for all of these links. My joy at our first Black president has transmuted to sadness, today, at the homophobia.

    reply
  3. Dan P

    N.B: If, like me, you have an automatic habit of reading a whole page once you’ve loaded it, and if, like me, you’re not quite at a place of dispassionately anthropological observation of the degree to which this issue inspires people to sling around wild words, you probably want to skip reading any of these links that allow comments.

    reply
  4. Jed

    David: Yeah, I’m not normally a Sullivan fan, but I’ve been liking a fair bit of what he’s been writing about Prop 8.

    Haddayr: Thanks for the note. And likewise about the sadness, although it is of course okay to have both joy and sadness at the same time.

    Dan P: Oh, yeah, good point. I pretty much ignore the comments sections of this kind of thing these days as a matter of course; reading them makes me too angry and upset.

    reply
  5. Jay Hartman

    Live blogging the protest:

    Right now there is a large number of folks protesting the Prop 8 outcome with signs and chants outside my building at the corner of Wilshire and Westwood Blvd in Los Angeles.

    It is literally one of the busiest intersections in LA…they have it mostly shut down and there is also a huge police presence on the ground, plus news and police helicopters, etc. I think the police are about to start making arrests.

    reply
  6. Jay Hartman

    Live Blogging Part II:

    Looks like they didn’t make mass arrests and the protestors marched off out of the intersection, down Wilshire. Turns out the biggest part of the protest originated at the Mormon Temple, a few blocks from here. According to this LA Times Article (link below), the LAPD called a tactical alert but there have been few arrests and protestors have largely been peaceful.

    http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-protest7-2008nov07,0,3827549.story

    reply

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