Punching A Hole In an Anti-Marriage-Equality Argument

I think Elton John or David Geffen or Calvin Klein or Tim Gill or some rich homo should offer a ten million dollar reward to any heterosexual married couple who can prove that their marriage has been harmed by a gay couple's marriage.  I think they should hold a huge press conference and do it in as loud and splashy a way as they can.  I think they should take out full-page ads in newspapers all over the country announcing the reward.

And maybe then we can put to rest, once and for all, the beyond-ridiculous argument that allowing gays and lesbians equality under civil law has anything to do with anyone else's marriage.  What do you think?

Catholic Leaders vs. Catholic Laity -- A Major Disconnect

Even if the homophobic and misogynistic Catholic clergy doesn't get it, it appears that their parishioners do.  According to this recent study from the Public Religion Research Institute,

Catholics are more supportive of legal recognitions of same-sex relationships than members of any other Christian tradition and Americans overall. Nearly three-quarters of Catholics favor either allowing gay and lesbian people to marry (43%) or allowing them to form civil unions (31%). Only 22% of Catholics say there should be no legal recognition of a gay couple’s relationship.

When same-sex marriage is defined explicitly as a civil marriage, support is dramatically higher among Catholics. If marriage for gay couples is defined as a civil marriage “like you get at city hall,” Catholic support for allowing gay couples to marry increases by 28 points, from 43% to 71%. A similar pattern exists in the general population, but the Catholic increase is more pronounced.

  Beyond the issue of same-sex marriage, Catholic support for rights for gays and lesbian people is strong and slightly higher than the general public. Nearly three-quarters (73%) of Catholics favor laws that would protect gay and lesbian people against discrimination in the workplace; 63% of Catholics favor allowing gay and lesbian people to serve openly in the military; and 6-in-10 (60%) Catholics favor allowing gay and lesbian couples to adopt children.

Hit the link to read more.

Thanks to LezGetReal.com for the image, and Meghan Stabler for the link.

Blast from the Past for Marriage Equality

I was on a conference call tonight with lots of activists from all over the country who are organzing marriage equality protests at marriage license counters on Valentine's Day.  The moderator, Molly -- who was fantastic, by the way! -- said a few times how thrilled she was that there were people on the call who had been working on this for an entire decade.

I've actually been working on this for more than 22 years.  :-)

The call stirred up some memories, so I dug up the video from CBS News in New York City that documented our protest at the Marriage License Bureau in Manhattan back in 1989. 

[As a side note, and not to take away from their efforts, but I was amused in February 2010 when Queer Rising (including activists I respect and appreciate) put out a press release touting their "unprecedented protest" at the Marriage License Bureau.  Sorry, folks, I appreciate your activism, but not even close!!  You may not have known that you were following in our footsteps almost exactly, but you were.  It's true that we didn't chain ourselves to the entrance 21 years earlier, but then I don't think locking people inside of a building is pretty much ever a good idea for our cause.  And it's also true that you didn't follow up your protest with a law suit against the City of New York, as we did.]

What the video doesn't show (although it was covered by other media at the time) is that after that demonstration, me, the man I was attempting to marry, and 3 or 4 other couples were not satisfied with the result, so we made a sudden decision on the spot.  We went from that demonstration directly to meet with lawyers, where we filed one of the very first law suits for marriage equality ever filed in this country (that I know of, anyways).  I was a named plaintiff in that suit.  We sued the City of New York and the County Clerk under NYC's anti-discrimation laws for refusing to give us marriage license applications. 

Unfortunately, many months later, our law suit was dismissed by a judge who told us that NYC was merely administering New York STATE's marriage laws, so they were off the hook.  Which was bogus, of course, but anyway, that's how our particular suit ended 22 years ago.  We tried (and have been trying ever since) -- and I don't think many people know that history.

Hopefully the fight won't have to go on for another 22 years.  It has been a long struggle.  And the ability to marry the one you love is a basic human right.  Enjoy the video!  (I'm the one holding the "Exclusion of Lesbians and Gays is IMMORAL" sign in a few of the scenes.)