Proposition 8

[TotallyOz]

Hard to believe. But, with 90 percent of the votes counted, it looks like this may pass. WTF

[Guest Conway]

It doesn't surprise me at all. While Obama stated that he opposed proposition 8, he also spent the entirety of his campaign stating that he believed that marriage should be between a man and a woman and that he was opposed to gay marriage. These two positions simply conflicted one another and made his opposition to 8 kind of lukewarm at best.

The fact that about 67% of Californians voted for Obama and that this failed, shows that gay marriage was not a trigger issue with many California voters.

The road to equal rights is often filled with small gains as well as glaring losses.

In the end, we will gain this right, the question is: when will it matter enough to the rest of the world to give it to us.

[TownsendPLocke]

Quite simple.

The yes on 8 folks ran a stronger(not better) campaign.

While we played nice they played dirty.They ads played to the strong fears and prejudice held by even some of the "I have some gay friends"and the"not that there is anything wrong with that"crowd.

And If any of you saw the ads running on foreign language stations you would understand just how dirty these folks played.

We are a long way towards this goal IMO.And to be honest I think we should be aiming our gay dollars at our friends,rejecting the status quo instead of aspiring to it,celebrating our difference instead of looking to be a "me too"minority.

More Fabulousness is what is needed.Visability is key.Those closet cases that are terrified of their big secret being discovered-well your Mom has known since you were 12 and your Dad always kinda suspected-so get over your self.

This defeat now sets up tons of court cases.Let minds better than those of Joe and Marge sixpack decide on this.

__________________

[TotallyOz]

I didn't get to see the ads. I did give to the cause but I guess that didn't help too much. I really didn't think a ton of new democrats showing up and voting would hurt the cause. I was honestly a great deal shocked. I am not in USA and have relied on the news overseas. But, I thought that California would certainly do better. I guess there still is a great deal to overcome.

[Guest JamesWilson]

Quite simple.

The yes on 8 folks ran a stronger(not better) campaign.

...

This defeat now sets up tons of court cases. Let minds better than those of Joe and Marge sixpack decide on this.

While sad, not unexpected. Our experience in Canada with the whole SSM debate suggests that the courts need to lead on this, not the electorate. When the courts here struck down the ban as against the rights of gay people to marry, a majority of Canadians were still against allowing gay marriage. That majority has now shifted towards support (I believe), but it has taken a while. Hopefully, the US courts will eventually support SSM too.

In the meantime, we can still celebrate the many different kinds of relationships that we already have, and continue to work towards the day where alternate sexual orientations are no longer looked upon with such fear and hatred.

And if SS couples want to get married in the meantime, they can still come up here to Canada! ;-)

[TotallyOz]

SAN FRANCISCO—The San Francisco City Attorney's office says he plans to challenge the validity of a ballot measure that would change the state constitution to ban gay marriage.

Spokesman Matt Dorsey says City Attorney Dennis Herrera will file the legal challenge in the California Supreme Court if the measure passes.

With 95 percent of precincts reporting, Proposition 8 is leading with 52 percent of the vote. But there are still as many as 3 million ballots left to be counted.

The first lesbian couple to be married in Los Angeles County after the Supreme Court threw out the gay marriage ban also plans to announce a lawsuit against Proposition 8. Attorney Gloria Allred says that lawsuit will argue that the measure is unconstitutional.

http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci...?nclick_check=1

[Guest EXPAT]

Nov 05, 2008

Statement by No on Prop 8 Campaign on Election Status

Roughly 400,000 votes separate yes from no on Prop 8 – out of 10 million votes tallied.

Based on turnout estimates reported yesterday, we expect that there are more than 3 million and possibly as many as 4 million absentee and provisional ballots yet to be counted.

Given that fundamental rights are at stake, we must wait to hear from the Secretary of State tomorrow how many votes are yet to be counted as well as where they are from.

It is clearly a very close election and we monitored the results all evening and this morning.

As of this point, the election is too close to call.

Because Prop 8 involves the sensitive matter of individual rights, we believe it is important to wait until we receive further information about the outcome.

Geoff Kors

Executive Committee NO on Prop 8

Kate KendellExecutive Committee

NO on Prop 8

[Guest Viki]

All this makes me absoultely sick. Proposition 8, the proposition for banning gay marrage has been passed. This says that despite California's typically liberal political views, this state is still against gays, lesbians, and transexuals. If you don't believe me about this, listen to this: The man who is the head of the "god hates fags" group, was an attorney supporting the civil rights movement. America would rather see people of color get rights and have who aren't straight to just have their rights be stopmed on.

Proposition K in San Francisco, the proposition to DECRIMINALIZE prostitution has been defeated. What this says is that society is still unwilling to admit their moral decay. If you're a sex worker, you see everyone in a very different light. You see how many people who would seem normal, hard-working, and god-fearing, are actualy sick, perverted nymphomaniacs. And the number of these people in our society is quite significant. This shows that people want to banish all the dark and ugly sides of themselves by hiding behind the law.

[KYTOP]

Hard to believe. But, with 90 percent of the votes counted, it looks like this may pass. WTF

ABC News this morning reported that 73% of Blacks voted in favor of the proposition. But it is not politically correct to blame Blacks for being the big reason the proposition passed. Gay protesters are targeting the Mormon Church, who helped finance the Proposition, but really is a small minority of California voters. Will we see picketing of Black Churches, of course not , not politically correct. The opposition to Proposition 8 are completely ignoring the fact that the large Black turnout for Obama cost them their right to marriage. Maybe it is time to place the blame were it belongs??

[TotallyOz]

Keith Oberman speaks out.

Finally tonight as promised, a Special Comment on the passage, last week, of Proposition Eight in California, which rescinded the right of same-sex couples to marry, and tilted the balance on this issue, from coast to coast.

Some parameters, as preface. This isn't about yelling, and this isn't about politics, and this isn't really just about Prop-8. And I don't have a personal investment in this: I'm not gay, I had to strain to think of one member of even my very extended family who is, I have no personal stories of close friends or colleagues fighting the prejudice that still pervades their lives.

And yet to me this vote is horrible. Horrible. Because this isn't about yelling, and this isn't about politics.

This is about the... human heart, and if that sounds corny, so be it.

If you voted for this Proposition or support those who did or the sentiment they expressed, I have some questions, because, truly, I do not... understand. Why does this matter to you? What is it to you? In a time of impermanence and fly-by-night relationships, these people over here want the same chance at permanence and happiness that is your option. They don't want to deny you yours. They don't want to take anything away from you. They want what you want -- a chance to be a little less alone in the world.

Only now you are saying to them -- no. You can't have it on these terms. Maybe something similar. If they behave. If they don't cause too much trouble. You'll even give them all the same legal rights -- even as you're taking away the legal right, which they already had. A world around them, still anchored in love and marriage, and you are saying, no, you can't marry. What if somebody passed a law that said you couldn't marry?

I keep hearing this term "re-defining" marriage.

If this country hadn't re-defined marriage, black people still couldn't marry white people. Sixteen states had laws on the books which made that illegal... in 1967. 1967.

The parents of the President-Elect of the United States couldn't have married in nearly one third of the states of the country their son grew up to lead. But it's worse than that. If this country had not "re-defined" marriage, some black people still couldn't marry...black people. It is one of the most overlooked and cruelest parts of our sad story of slavery. Marriages were not legally recognized, if the people were slaves. Since slaves were property, they could not legally be husband and wife, or mother and child. Their marriage vows were different: not "Until Death, Do You Part," but "Until Death or Distance, Do You Part." Marriages among slaves were not legally recognized.

You know, just like marriages today in California are not legally recognized, if the people are... gay.

And uncountable in our history are the number of men and women, forced by society into marrying the opposite sex, in sham marriages, or marriages of convenience, or just marriages of not knowing -- centuries of men and women who have lived their lives in shame and unhappiness, and who have, through a lie to themselves or others, broken countless other lives, of spouses and children... All because we said a man couldn't marry another man, or a woman couldn't marry another woman. The sanctity of marriage. How many marriages like that have there been and how on earth do they increase the "sanctity" of marriage rather than render the term, meaningless?

What is this, to you? Nobody is asking you to embrace their expression of love. But don't you, as human beings, have to embrace... that love? The world is barren enough.

It is stacked against love, and against hope, and against those very few and precious emotions that enable us to go forward. Your marriage only stands a 50-50 chance of lasting, no matter how much you feel and how hard you work.

And here are people overjoyed at the prospect of just that chance, and that work, just for the hope of having that feeling. With so much hate in the world, with so much meaningless division, and people pitted against people for no good reason, this is what your religion tells you to do? With your experience of life and this world and all its sadnesses, this is what your conscience tells you to do?

With your knowledge that life, with endless vigor, seems to tilt the playing field on which we all live, in favor of unhappiness and hate... this is what your heart tells you to do? You want to sanctify marriage? You want to honor your God and the universal love you believe he represents? Then Spread happiness -- this tiny, symbolic, semantical grain of happiness -- share it with all those who seek it. Quote me anything from your religious leader or book of choice telling you to stand against this. And then tell me how you can believe both that statement and another statement, another one which reads only "do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

---

You are asked now, by your country, and perhaps by your creator, to stand on one side or another. You are asked now to stand, not on a question of politics, not on a question of religion, not on a question of gay or straight. You are asked now to stand, on a question of...love. All you need do is stand, and let the tiny ember of love meet its own fate. You don't have to help it, you don't have it applaud it, you don't have to fight for it. Just don't put it out. Just don't extinguish it. Because while it may at first look like that love is between two people you don't know and you don't understand and maybe you don't even want to know...It is, in fact, the ember of your love, for your fellow **person...

Just because this is the only world we have. And the other guy counts, too.

This is the second time in ten days I find myself concluding by turning to, of all things, the closing plea for mercy by Clarence Darrow in a murder trial.

But what he said, fits what is really at the heart of this:

"I was reading last night of the aspiration of the old Persian poet, Omar-Khayyam," he told the judge.

"It appealed to me as the highest that I can vision. I wish it was in my heart, and I wish it was in the hearts of all:

"So I be written in the Book of Love;

"I do not care about that Book above.

"Erase my name, or write it as you will,

"So I be written in the Book of Love."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVUecPhQPqY

[Guest StuCotts]

ABC News this morning reported that 73% of Blacks voted in favor of the proposition. But it is not politically correct to blame Blacks for being the big reason the proposition passed. Gay protesters are targeting the Mormon Church, who helped finance the Proposition, but really is a small minority of California voters. Will we see picketing of Black Churches, of course not , not politically correct. The opposition to Proposition 8 are completely ignoring the fact that the large Black turnout for Obama cost them their right to marriage. Maybe it is time to place the blame were it belongs??

It has emerged that 60+% of the over-60's also voted for the proposition. That reveals new horizons for anybody who get jollies from demonstrating and who feels frustrated by politically correct strictures. You can now demonstrate against your grandmother, or the whole assisted living facility she's in, and feel you've done your bit for gay rights.

In case it's not obvious, the objective of this post is to suggest that where the gay groups do their demonstrating is irrelevant because the exercise does little more than make the demonstrators feel good. It doesn't get to the seat of the problem, which in this case was complacency on the part of gays. The effort now going into wailing should have gone into getting the vote out. Maybe next time.

[Guest Conway]

It has emerged that 60+% of the over-60's also voted for the proposition. That reveals new horizons for anybody who get jollies from demonstrating and who feels frustrated by politically correct strictures. You can now demonstrate against your grandmother, or the whole assisted living facility she's in, and feel you've done your bit for gay rights.

In case it's not obvious, the objective of this post is to suggest that where the gay groups do their demonstrating is irrelevant because the exercise does little more than make the demonstrators feel good. It doesn't get to the seat of the problem, which in this case was complacency on the part of gays. The effort now going into wailing should have gone into getting the vote out. Maybe next time.

those statistics, in and of themselves, show the progress that we're making as our society progresses toward a greater acceptance of our gay citizens. It is clear that younger generations support the rights of gay people to quantify their relationships with marriage if they so choose to a greater degree than older folks do. For those in their sixties, even in their younger years, anything gay was taboo and as a result few young gays in their generation were ever able to express themselves as proud gay men and women the we way that younger generations have. Their own experiences, or lack thereof, clearly define their present opinions on gay rights issues. At the same time, I absolutely believe that the experiences that younger generations have had with gay men and women on a microcosmic basis, clearly define their greater acceptance of us and our desires for equal representation.

To a certain degree, I'm envious of young gay men and women who are coming of age today. Had society been as accepting of me then as we are of them today, wouldn't have stayed in the closet as long as I did.

On the other hand, it both frustrates me and makes me angry that, historically, it took the AIDs epidemic and the ensuing deaths of millions, to put a human face on gay people for the rest of our society.

To me, as disappointing as the passage of 8 is and should be to anyone, gay or straight who supports a right to free expression, can clearly see the progress that we are making toward greater acceptance in American society in general. The vote was quite close. And, in coming years, it will get closer as other referendums come up for votes.

We have been able to achieve this growing acceptance as a result of the herculean efforts of those who led the early effort for rights recognition for us.