Breaking the Spell: Rethinking queer community

[SecretAgentMa'am]

Originally Posted by Corkey

I don't need to convince any one of my right to be, my right to marry my right to fight for my country, I just do it.

This doesn't actually make any sense, though. Regardless of how you choose to live your life, you don't currently have the right to legally marry in the US. Even if you live in a state with marriage rights, your marriage still isn't federally recognized. You don't just magically have that right because you say so. If it worked that way, there would be no reason to have this conversation. You can have a relationship that you feel is a marriage, you can have a ceremony, but that doesn't get you all the benefits of a legal marriage. That's what this conversation is about.

[Corkey]

Actually we were married legally in Canada. I don't care one way or the other, if it doesn't make any since to you, that isn't my goal. I'm not going to live my life in fear or in what ifs', that is a total waste of energy. Go convince the Idiot party that you want your rights, they don't care about you, they don't care about me, the only thing they care about is their racist, sexist, classist small minded grasp of their own small patch of Americana.

Trust me I've been fighting this war longer than you've been alive.

[SecretAgentMa'am]

Originally Posted by Corkey

Actually we were married legally in Canada. I don't care one way or the other, if it doesn't make any since to you, that isn't my goal. I'm not going to live my life in fear or in what ifs', that is a total waste of energy. Go convince the Idiot party that you want your rights, they don't care about you, they don't care about me, the only thing they care about is their racist, sexist, classist small minded grasp of their own small patch of Americana.

Trust me I've been fighting this war longer than you've been alive.

Congratulations. I'm talking about in the US. If you don't live in the US, then what are we arguing about? The conversation is about getting marriage rights IN THE US.

That last bit is utterly fascinating since you have no idea how old I am.

[atomiczombie]

Originally Posted by Corkey

Actually we were married legally in Canada. I don't care one way or the other, if it doesn't make any since to you, that isn't my goal. I'm not going to live my life in fear or in what ifs', that is a total waste of energy. Go convince the Idiot party that you want your rights, they don't care about you, they don't care about me, the only thing they care about is their racist, sexist, classist small minded grasp of their own small patch of Americana.

Trust me I've been fighting this war longer than you've been alive.

So, is your answer just to stop the fight? Do you feel it's a fight that will never be won? I'm just asking for clarity here.

[Corkey]

I live in the US, and Drew, fighting idiots doesn't get us anywhere, there are no sane republicans left to argue with.

[dreadgeek]

Corkey:

Okay, if you don't care what they think then how do you get them to actually fold us into the circle of people called 'citizen'. I'm not a Canadian citizen and neither is my wife so we can't get married in Canada. The US government isn't obliged to acknowledge a marriage done in Canada.

I'm not talking about begging, Corkey. I'm talking about being pragmatic because, at the end of the day, we have to live in the same country as the people who hate us. They are not going away. We can't make them go away and they overwhelm us in sheer numbers. So we have to convince the vast middle, those people who are not actively anti-gay, that we have the better case. That is NOT begging.

We do not have the numbers to simply win by decree. We cannot *make* the majority do *anything* they don't want to do. Yes, in an ideal world, we would just say this WILL BE and it would become so. We don't live there. We can't even maneuver an absolute dictator into power on our behalf. So we have to win through process. We have to get enough people who are not gay on our side that the social pressure to change the law will be too much to ignore. We are not going to do that by grabbing them by the collar and screaming "I don't give a damn about you or what you think, now you WILL make marriage legal between same-sex couples!" Straight people do not HAVE to change the law. The law, as stands, works well-enough for their needs. It benefits straight people very little to expand the definition of marriage. If it were important enough to straight people for same-sex couples to get married the law would already be that way. So we have to convince a majority, that feels no widespread pain over our lack of rights, to somehow see our cause as a matter of justice. We have to win them over.

That is not begging, Corkey, that is the political process. What other choice do we have other than the political process? We can't break away. We can't all just leave. We shouldn't *have* to leave. We can't get our way by sheer number of our votes alone. We do not have the numbers to take over the government by either democratic or non-democratic means. I also do not think we should succumb to the temptation to use non-democratic means--meaning, we can't just outlaw homophobia. We must not do that. We must never outlaw *ideas*. So given all of that, what other choice do we have but to go to the majority, present our case, show how the opposition is the same crowd it has *always* been, and that just as the cause of my parent's generation was righteous so is our cause righteous?

Living in an open, democratic society means learning to get one's way by convincing 50% + 1 of your fellow citizens to side with you to change the laws. It means convincing the media that your cause is worthy of covering you. It is convincing lawmakers to champion your cause, even if they are not one of you. It is convincing the clergy to side with you and to use their pulpit's as a place to rally people to your cause. Politics is the art of compromise in order to achieve the possible. Despite what the Republicans in Congress *believe* about negotiation, it does not involve the other side capitulating abjectly. That means we have to understand what the costs of change are. None of that is negotiating anything away or begging for anything. It is trying to figure out how to achieve a just goal through the processes of our country.

Cheers
Aj

Originally Posted by Corkey

Actually we were married legally in Canada. I don't care one way or the other, if it doesn't make any since to you, that isn't my goal. I'm not going to live my life in fear or in what ifs', that is a total waste of energy. Go convince the Idiot party that you want your rights, they don't care about you, they don't care about me, the only thing they care about is their racist, sexist, classist small minded grasp of their own small patch of Americana.

Trust me I've been fighting this war longer than you've been alive.

[Toughy]

Tolerance implies and reinforces 'love the sinner, hate the sin'......makes me want to bitch slap the person saying that.........

Acceptance is turning on the tv, flipping channels and NEVER EVER seeing Bennie Hinn praying over letters and mailing out prayer clothes he prayed over on tv to those who send $19.95 so they can be saved. Acceptance is not having a murder count on the local news every night. Acceptance means Liberty University, Oral Roberts University, Bob Jones University are closed due to no enrollment. Acceptance means equality and value for each and every human being.

Acceptance is the government getting out of the business of regulating how adults order our families. Marriage has always been a contract to pass property, money and establish paternity for the transfer to the next generation of males. How about civil marriage does not exist? How about signing legal documents to cover inheritance and benefits? Spiritual marriage is not the business of any government .

What am I willing to do for what I believe in? I have risked my life more times than I can count for what I believe in. Stepping into rush hour traffic on the Golden Gate Bridge, playing cat and mouse with the cops so I can make it on the Bay Bridge to stop traffic, walking out of the gay bar, down the dark alley to the street looking for the cowboys with baseball bats cuz you know they are there...somewhere....waiting....and the police are way more scarey than the cowboys.

Apathy is our enemy. Settling is our enemy. Morality linked to dogma is our enemy. We once walked in light and that was lost. Until we find light again as Dylan Thomas wrote:

DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rage at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

[SecretAgentMa'am]

Originally Posted by Corkey

I live in the US, and Drew, fighting idiots doesn't get us anywhere, there are no sane republicans left to argue with.

Okay, then my point stands. You're married in Canada, but you live in the US. That means you don't get the benefits that come with marriage. In the place where you live, you marriage is not recognized as valid, and wishing doesn't make it so. So where does that leave us?

[atomiczombie]

Originally Posted by Corkey

I live in the US, and Drew, fighting idiots doesn't get us anywhere, there are no sane republicans left to argue with.

I agree that the republican tea-party idiots won't ever be swayed. But they are a small minority of the voting public. They get lots of press because of their crazy antics, and republican politicians have to cowtow to them if they want to be elected or stay in office. But the vast majority of people can be swayed if we work hard to educate them. We have to counter the voices of the extreme right. They scream the loudest so they get all the press. We need to bring another voice to the discussion. Do you feel that that is a fight worth fighting?

[Toughy]

I forgot.............

The greatest enemy of all enemies..........the one that must be overcome at all costs......

violence

What a vast difference there is between the barbarism that precedes culture and the barbarism that follows it.
-- Friedrich Hebbel

the violence in my own mind is my greatest enemy

[citybutch]

I agree with you that they are cow-towed to.... but the question is why? Take a look at the Koch brothers (and Karl Rove for that matter) who fund the Tea Party. With the amount of money they have, the commitment to eliminate taxes for the super wealthy (and I am not talking about the rich because $250,000 income for a small business owner is an WHOLE other topic), and time time time on their hands to dig their heels in deeper to accomplish what they want to. I am hoping we can combat this... With corporations as "persons" now, we are going to have a tough road.

Take the recall in Wisconsin for example.. and the variance in funding between the dems and the repubs:

http://www.thedailypage.com/daily/ar...?article=34206

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-0...e-recalls.html

Originally Posted by atomiczombie

I agree that the republican tea-party idiots won't ever be swayed. But they are a small minority of the voting public. They get lots of press because of their crazy antics, and republican politicians have to cowtow to them if they want to be elected or stay in office. But the vast majority of people can be swayed if we work hard to educate them. We have to counter the voices of the extreme right. They scream the loudest so they get all the press. We need to bring another voice to the discussion. Do you feel that that is a fight worth fighting?

[Corkey]

Originally Posted by dreadgeek

Corkey:

Okay, if you don't care what they think then how do you get them to actually fold us into the circle of people called 'citizen'. I'm not a Canadian citizen and neither is my wife so we can't get married in Canada. The US government isn't obliged to acknowledge a marriage done in Canada.

I'm not talking about begging, Corkey. I'm talking about being pragmatic because, at the end of the day, we have to live in the same country as the people who hate us. They are not going away. We can't make them go away and they overwhelm us in sheer numbers. So we have to convince the vast middle, those people who are not actively anti-gay, that we have the better case. That is NOT begging.

We do not have the numbers to simply win by decree. We cannot *make* the majority do *anything* they don't want to do. Yes, in an ideal world, we would just say this WILL BE and it would become so. We don't live there. We can't even maneuver an absolute dictator into power on our behalf. So we have to win through process. We have to get enough people who are not gay on our side that the social pressure to change the law will be too much to ignore. We are not going to do that by grabbing them by the collar and screaming "I don't give a damn about you or what you think, now you WILL make marriage legal between same-sex couples!" Straight people do not HAVE to change the law. The law, as stands, works well-enough for their needs. It benefits straight people very little to expand the definition of marriage. If it were important enough to straight people for same-sex couples to get married the law would already be that way. So we have to convince a majority, that feels no widespread pain over our lack of rights, to somehow see our cause as a matter of justice. We have to win them over.

That is not begging, Corkey, that is the political process. What other choice do we have other than the political process? We can't break away. We can't all just leave. We shouldn't *have* to leave. We can't get our way by sheer number of our votes alone. We do not have the numbers to take over the government by either democratic or non-democratic means. I also do not think we should succumb to the temptation to use non-democratic means--meaning, we can't just outlaw homophobia. We must not do that. We must never outlaw *ideas*. So given all of that, what other choice do we have but to go to the majority, present our case, show how the opposition is the same crowd it has *always* been, and that just as the cause of my parent's generation was righteous so is our cause righteous?

Living in an open, democratic society means learning to get one's way by convincing 50% + 1 of your fellow citizens to side with you to change the laws. It means convincing the media that your cause is worthy of covering you. It is convincing lawmakers to champion your cause, even if they are not one of you. It is convincing the clergy to side with you and to use their pulpit's as a place to rally people to your cause. Politics is the art of compromise in order to achieve the possible. Despite what the Republicans in Congress *believe* about negotiation, it does not involve the other side capitulating abjectly. That means we have to understand what the costs of change are. None of that is negotiating anything away or begging for anything. It is trying to figure out how to achieve a just goal through the processes of our country.

Cheers
Aj

You don't have to be a citizen of Canada to get married in Canada. You would have to live there for 6 month however to get a divorce. It isn't up to me to brow beat people who because of their false beliefs cannot understand reason when it hits them squarely in the face. There is NO reasoning with these people. The best I can do is to live my life as a citizen and show people who I am by the good things I do around the place I live. That more than marching, fighting or getting in their face will open more doors than any violence ever could. I do what I can with voting, petition signing, calling and generally getting in my Rep's face, who BTW is a tea parter and an ass. More and more North Americans are coming around and opening their eyes and ears, problem isn't with the population, it's with the dumbf&%*s in Washington. Get rid of Cantor, Bohnnner and Mitchell, and we may just get our country back. I can't do that alone.

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by Toughy

Tolerance implies and reinforces 'love the sinner, hate the sin'......makes me want to bitch slap the person saying that.........

Acceptance is turning on the tv, flipping channels and NEVER EVER seeing Bennie Hinn praying over letters and mailing out prayer clothes he prayed over on tv to those who send $19.95 so they can be saved. Acceptance is not having a murder count on the local news every night. Acceptance means Liberty University, Oral Roberts University, Bob Jones University are closed due to no enrollment. Acceptance means equality and value for each and every human being.

This I found really discouraging, Toughy. So, assuming that you mean what you appear to mean above, you are saying that in order for queer people to be accepted there must be NO place for a Benny Hinn. You are saying that queer people will truly be considered legal and social equals ONLY when there are no murders. You are saying that queers will only be accepted ni society when there are no Christian universities. I find that discouraging, Toughy, because it seems like what you have said above is that queer people will be considered legal and social equals--acceptance from the larger society--sometime after the twelfth of never. And how would we get to this world? I'm not sure I'm willing to pay those costs, as I calculate them to be, Toughy. NOT because I have any love for Benny Hinn or I think that the Christian universities you mention turn out good scholarship. Benny Hinn is just a carnival barker in a better suit and Bob Jones, Regent's, Liberty and Oral Roberts *combined* couldn't turn out a real top-shelf scholar if they tried. It is because I don't want to win our battle on eliminating the opposition, I want to win by convincing the middle.

The world you are describing, Toughy, isn't achievable by OUR species in a manner that is not oppressive in a broad way. In order to get a world where one will never see another Benny Hinn or where Christian fundamentalist universities have no enrollment, one would have to *outlaw* religion. Are you prepared to do that, Toughy? Are you willing to pay that cost because I'm not sure that I am. That might surprise you. I am no friend of religion but I also recognize that our brains bend *toward* religion and, as such, I view religious belief as an built-in part of human nature. Whether that is a feature or a bug, I don't know. I do know that unless I can come up with something to *replace* one's religious belief I have no business robbing someone of that which brings them meaning.

Then there's the stuff that really says "this will happen when the Winter Olympics are held on the Sun". When there's no murder count? Acceptance means equality and value for every person? What 'value' are you talking about and what kind of equality? Equality of opportunity or equality of outcome. A relatively free and open society can just about manage the first one but it takes a totalitarian dictatorship to pull off the second one. I'm not sure I'm ready to have the kind of state necessary in order to enforce equality of outcome JUST so my 'tribe', if you will, is accepted as you have defined that term. In order to have NO murder count, you would have to fundamentally change human nature or you would have to make a society where surveillance and control was so complete and total that no one would ever have the opportunity to commit a crime because they are *always* observed and *always* monitored. That is a world of cameras on every lamppost and in every corner. I don't want that world, Toughy. I love Jaime like she were the very breath of life itself, and as much as I want to be able to legally marry her, I would rather not be able to than to have to live in the kind of society that would make your vision above possible.

That kind of society would rebound to our sorrow, Toughy. This is the thing I don't understand--we all talk 'as if' we admired Dr. King but, quite honestly, I think that mostly that is very superficial. We, as queer people, face a similar numerical and social challenge as my parent's faced in their time. Their generation could have demanded that the Klan be made illegal--and it would have failed. They could have tried to make America a nation where racist thoughts or speech were made illegal. They could have demanded these things at the point of a gun. You know what would have happened? We wouldn't be having this conversation and no one under the age of about 45 would have any memory of meeting a black person because we would have been wiped out.

This is similar. Sure, Toughy, we could try to create a society where Christianity is made illegal and, quite honestly, it would be far easier for Christians to simply wipe us out to the last than have their religion made illegal. Or we could keep spinning our wheels, generation after generation, telling ourselves 'one day' while making NO discernible headway because instead of rather simple and pedestrian goals--marriage equality, equal employment opportunity, military service, etc.--we set impossible goals for ourselves (e.g. the utter destruction of Christianity, the complete elimination of poverty, everyone being equal and valued).

What you call acceptance, your vision of what it means for queer people to be in a decent enough social and legal position that the queer rights organizations can turn out the lights and go home is nothing I recognize as acceptance. Quite honestly, I don't see what half your list even has to do with queer people becoming full and equal citizens.

Unless we're not meant to take your words to mean what they appear to mean or we are not meant to take your words and try to apply them to the real world, I don't see that you have set achievable or, for that matter, desirable goals.

Cheers
Aj

[dreadgeek]

Betenoire:

My grandmother used to say "be a better person than you have any right to be". I was an adult before I understood what she meant. What you describe below, though, is a near Platonic example of my understanding of it. It means recognizing you have a legitimate gripe, something that could put one in the mind of "damn you, society, I'm gonna get mine if I have to walk all over you to get it!" and then NOT walking all over society but flying high above it. Being not just a candle in the dark but a burning star.

My grandmother would say it and she lived it. If ever someone had a legitimate gripe, it was my grandmother. Her husband was lynched by the Klan, her eldest son was run down and had his leg shattered by some boys from town. She worked as a domestic and then at an orphanage. She was oppressed in that special way that a black woman, born at the beginning of the 20th century and living until the 1980s could be oppressed. Yet, she was kind and gracious to everyone I ever saw her interact with. She rarely had a harsh word and I never saw her take a spiteful action or speak a nasty word about *anyone*. Even people she didn't really like.

Your method of payment is much like mine.

Cheers
Adrienne

Originally Posted by betenoire

How I pay:

1 - By not acting like a horses ass.

2 - By not screaming that somebody must be a homophobe every time they don't like me (maybe I'm just not likeable, that's possible. or maybe I did something to that person unintentionally.) There will be people who don't like me because I'm Queer. Ditto there will be people who don't like me for some other reason. Since I'm not psychic I have no way of knowing which it is unless they come right out and say it - so I'm not doing me or any other Queer any favours by screaming about homophobia every time something goes wrong.

True story: I live in kind of a shitty neighborhood, for Canada. What I mean by that is while there isn't a lot of violent crime going on where I'm living, there is a TONNE of property crime. Lots of theft. When my mail or my bike gets stolen (the mail happens all the time, the bike happened once and I never got another one because why bother?) Nick immediately jumps to "They are harassing you because they hate gay people!" which is just super crazy, since we have no way of knowing who the "they" in the situation are, let alone what their motivation is.

3 - By going out of my way to be the kind of person that people tend to like, even when I don't feel like it. I smile at people strangers when I pass them on the street and I say hello and stop for small-talk with acquaintances. I run errands for the guy on the 1st floor who is ill. When other people from my building are sitting around in lawnchairs out front I pull up a chair and hang out for a bit. I give up my seat on the bus for elderly people, women with small children, people with a disability, and anybody who looks like they are tired and would rather not stand up. I help people with heaps of groceries get their groceries on and off the bus. I try to keep the noise in my apartment to a minimum. If it's late at night I turn the teevee down real low and turn on closed captioning. I pay my rent on time. And I never go into the express line at the grocery store unless I really DO have 10 items or less.

4 - By being who I am but not making a huge deal out of it. I'm not confrontational around the Queer stuff. If I'm in line at the coffee shop and someone is shit talking gay people I approach them with a SMILE and ask them to please rethink who might be listening - I never yell or call names or act like a jackass about it. You'll never catch me in a teeshirt that says "Pussy is rad!" or "I am going to fuck all of your girlfriends!" or anything like that.



There is no Promised Land. People are what they are and we just are not evolved enough as a species to love and respect everybody - we never will be. Some individuals are pretty good at it...but as a species? It just isn't going to happen.

I'm Canadian, as most people know. So I'm pretty freaking lucky. It's illegal to discriminate against me for my "sexual orientation" (or whatever you want to call it.) I can marry whoever I want. I can work wherever I want. I can live wherever I want. I can shop wherever I want. If we can ever get that bill to add language around not discriminating against people who are transsexual added to our Charter of Rights and Freedoms passed I will be happy as a freaking clam.

Equal rights and protections is good enough for me. But as far as how individual people feel about the Queer "community" goes - the people who love us are just gravy. The people who hate us aren't especially shocking and are not going to ruin my buzz.

[Toughy]

Aj.........I need to digest what you said. It is never my intention to discourage anyone. When I asked my grandmother how she and my grandfather stayed married for 60+ years.........her reply was....'you have to be decent with each other always'. I think those are words to live by.

My world of acceptance is truly but a pipe dream, where the world is not a melting pot but a salad bowl. Differences are as celebrated as commonalities.

Lately I have been failing at articulating what my intellect tells me....as someone said in another thread........'I used to be so smart'. Maybe it's because more and more I operate from an open loving heart which does not always translate to words.

[little man]

i've long been interested in the concept of social contracts. i've done some reading here and there and i can't say that my retention is much, but i have to wonder if this can't be used to advantage by not just queers in the larger community of the world, but all marginalized/oppressed groups.

seems to me there should be some lawyer clever enough to work this angle.

as i understand it, a simplified version of social contract is that in order to be a part of a community/civilization, the "citizens" agree to abide by rules, pay taxes, do what generally is best for the group as a whole. in return, the "state" agrees to treat the citizens equally and fairly, to protect all and to generally work to the benefit of all citizens. anyone...please correct me if i've got this wrong.

it seems to me the "state" is not holding up its end of the bargain here. i know they tax me on my wages, write me tickets for speeding or no seat belts, generally hold me to the laws of the land. in what seems like the same breath, i have been denied the right to marry whomever i choose, my taxes go to pay the salaries of those who would turn a blind eye to crimes committed against me and generally don't think i should exist in the universe, let alone in this particular society. is there not some point where the "state" can be called on not ensuring the safety of any portion of its population against the rest of the population?

when i was younger, i had a notion that all the queers should just take over a single state, secede from the union and take all the grand gloriousness with us. let the rest of the country live in leisure suits and poorly decorated homes, with bad haircuts. but, that's me.

tangent aside, i wonder if a class action suit was brought against not only state, but federal government for not holding up their end of the bargain...sue for return of taxes, punitive damages, whatever...if that would not serve as a way to bring the issues of second class citizenship to the forefront. it would be *just* about sexual deviants wanting to wreck marriage then...it would be about the dignity that all humans have a right to. it would be about all the groups who don't have a place at the table, not just the ones who didn't get silverware or a clean plate.

ok, i'm rambling off into hyperbole. that's what i've been wondering.

bueller? bueller? anyone???

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by Toughy

Aj.........I need to digest what you said. It is never my intention to discourage anyone. When I asked my grandmother how she and my grandfather stayed married for 60+ years.........her reply was....'you have to be decent with each other always'. I think those are words to live by.

My world of acceptance is truly but a pipe dream, where the world is not a melting pot but a salad bowl. Differences are as celebrated as commonalities.

Lately I have been failing at articulating what my intellect tells me....as someone said in another thread........'I used to be so smart'. Maybe it's because more and more I operate from an open loving heart which does not always translate to words.

Take your time, Toughy. I do want to say two things. While we might have dreams of how the world would be if we had a better people to do social change with, we only have us. If we lived in world of *infinite* resources, there would be no need for competition. If we lived in a world where everyone thought alike, then, ironically, we could have the world you're talking about where differences are as celebrated as commonalities.

But look at who we are. Is there a *single* culture that anyone can name where one couldn't tell a story about two sisters jealous of one another and people will understand what that story is about? Can anyone think of a culture where a story about a couple kept apart by their parents, or one where a good woman stays by her drunkard husband, or families quarreling about this or that would not resonate? There's a reason for that. People are jealous. They get angry. They quarrel. They are selfish. They prefer their family over strangers. They prefer their countryman or their neighbor over the stranger in their midst.

This is what we have to work with and we have to do it in the most democratic fashion because all the other alternatives are pretty unsavory.

One thing about your operating from an open, loving heart. I don't often talk about this and, quite honestly, I have done an insufficient job letting my love for humanity come through. That is my own failing as a writer. I am operating from an open and loving heart too, Toughy, even if I'm less obviously public about it. I hoped (and still hope) that my loving heart will come through without my having to tell people 'see, I'm a loving and open-hearted person'.

When my son was just a toddler and I would get frustrated with him, I would say "act my age!" It was my way of reminding myself that I was the adult and he was the child and my desiring for him to behave like an adult was patently ludicrous. That, to me, was being both open-hearted and loving. Instead of trying to make him be what I thought I needed or wanted him to be, I had to meet him where he was, warts and all. When I met Jaime, the mistake I told myself I would avoid was expecting her to be anyone other than she is. I try not to see my wife through rose-colored glasses although I'm sure that I do. You've met her, it's easy to do. But if we are going to last, I need to meet her right where she is and never expect her to be anyone other than herself. That, to me, is being open-minded and loving.

That is how I try to approach my love of the other 6 billion of you lot. I don't expect us to be anything other than what we are. So any social change we're going to have has to be done with that in mind. That's not to say we shouldn't dream big, but expecting humanity to one day live in a state of perpetual kumbaya is to expect a 2 year old to act like a 22 year old.


Cheers
Aj

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by little man

tangent aside, i wonder if a class action suit was brought against not only state, but federal government for not holding up their end of the bargain...sue for return of taxes, punitive damages, whatever...if that would not serve as a way to bring the issues of second class citizenship to the forefront. it would be *just* about sexual deviants wanting to wreck marriage then...it would be about the dignity that all humans have a right to. it would be about all the groups who don't have a place at the table, not just the ones who didn't get silverware or a clean plate.

ok, i'm rambling off into hyperbole. that's what i've been wondering.

bueller? bueller? anyone???

There's a number of problems. The first is that the government has sovereign immunity. What that means is that for most things you can't sue the government, particularly not the Federal government. The second is that if you are going to sue the Federal government, that very same government has to tell you that you *can* sue them. Third, we'd have to determine on what possible grounds we are suing them. The social contract is an unspoken contract and so would not stand up in court. Fourth, in order to have standing we would have to show that the government was in breach either of law or of a signed contract.

What we *can* do is sue our states for violation of our 14th Amendment rights. But even that should probably be done only on a limited basis. What we're going to have to have is that enough states will pass laws guaranteeing marriage equality. Then when a couple in one state, moves to another state where their marriage is not recognized, sue that state for violating the Full Faith and Credit clause of the Constitution. The short version of that clause is that a contract executed in California is legally binding in Oregon. This is going down the same path as interracial marriage took. By 1967, 33 states had legalized interracial marriage. All of the states of the South, however, still had anti-miscegenation laws on the books and in force. Mildred and Richard Loving were an interracial couple (she black, he white) who were originally from Virginia but had moved to DC and gotten married. They then went to Virginia and had to rent a hotel room. Their being married violated Virginia law and so they were arrested, tried and convicted. The judge suspended the sentence on the proviso that they leave Virginia never to return. They appealed the decision and the Virginia Supreme Court upheld it in one of the uglier court decisions one is like to read in American law. They then appealed it to the Federal courts and it thus wound up in the Supreme Court.

We *can* use the law in that way but a class action lawsuit simply won't work because the legal system has to recognize that you have rights under the law and, at present, it doesn't in a consistent fashion which, after all, is what the whole argument is about.

cheers
Aj

[little man]

Originally Posted by dreadgeek

There's a number of problems. The first is that the government has sovereign immunity. What that means is that for most things you can't sue the government, particularly not the Federal government. The second is that if you are going to sue the Federal government, that very same government has to tell you that you *can* sue them. Third, we'd have to determine on what possible grounds we are suing them. The social contract is an unspoken contract and so would not stand up in court. Fourth, in order to have standing we would have to show that the government was in breach either of law or of a signed contract.

What we *can* do is sue our states for violation of our 14th Amendment rights. But even that should probably be done only on a limited basis. What we're going to have to have is that enough states will pass laws guaranteeing marriage equality. Then when a couple in one state, moves to another state where their marriage is not recognized, sue that state for violating the Full Faith and Credit clause of the Constitution. The short version of that clause is that a contract executed in California is legally binding in Oregon. This is going down the same path as interracial marriage took. By 1967, 33 states had legalized interracial marriage. All of the states of the South, however, still had anti-miscegenation laws on the books and in force. Mildred and Richard Loving were an interracial couple (she black, he white) who were originally from Virginia but had moved to DC and gotten married. They then went to Virginia and had to rent a hotel room. Their being married violated Virginia law and so they were arrested, tried and convicted. The judge suspended the sentence on the proviso that they leave Virginia never to return. They appealed the decision and the Virginia Supreme Court upheld it in one of the uglier court decisions one is like to read in American law. They then appealed it to the Federal courts and it thus wound up in the Supreme Court.

We *can* use the law in that way but a class action lawsuit simply won't work because the legal system has to recognize that you have rights under the law and, at present, it doesn't in a consistent fashion which, after all, is what the whole argument is about.

cheers
Aj

i kind of figured that wouldn't work, or someone would have grandstanded that play already. i wonder, though, if just the effort would garner enough press to make people just stop and think for a minute.

i do find some irony in a system that outlawed interracial marriage because the people were "different" from one another. now? they want to keep people who are alike from marrying.

[atomiczombie]

Originally Posted by little man

i kind of figured that wouldn't work, or someone would have grandstanded that play already. i wonder, though, if just the effort would garner enough press to make people just stop and think for a minute.

i do find some irony in a system that outlawed interracial marriage because the people were "different" from one another. now? they want to keep people who are alike from marrying.

Let me throw another iron in the fire here: Marriage rights are important and I support them, but are we allowing that particular issue to over-shadow other (and in my estimation more important) issues? Issues such as equality in housing, the workplace, hiring, healthcare, etc., and the worst one: violence against LGBTs. I think these are at least as pressing, however the whole marriage thing seems to be such a focus that I don't really hear people talking about these other things. Gays and lesbians and trans people are getting beaten and killed all the time. We need more law enforcement crackdowns on bashers, current laws to be enforced more, more hate-crime legislation, campaigns to raise awareness and educate people, etc. I think the "It gets better" campaign has been a great step, but we need something like that to address these other issues too. Think about all the AIDS activism in the 80s and 90s and how much things changed for the better because of it. In the press, marriage rights seems to be the only thing reported on, as if all we need is that right, then we will have equality. But we won't.

I know we can't have a utopian society where all these issues are permanently and completely fixed, but that doesn't mean we have nothing more to gain.