PRESERVE gay marriage rights in California

.

I guess I can’t reopen the goal.

Between 9:30 and 10:30pm someone tore down 3 of my 4 signs.

I’m thinking maybe a rainbow-painted sheet next? Would THAT be harder to tear down?

grrrr

<|X(

but I did not get a photo to prove it :P as I had taken the battery out of the camera to charge it & forgotten I did that.

There are 4 signs now instead of 2 and all were still up this evening when I drove by at 7pm, so I’m going to call this goal done because I have done what I could do.

Haven’t heard the returns on the props yet but feeling hopeful….

the ones near our local polling place…a church.

:P

:( grrrrrrrrrr

I’ll drive down in a bit and put up the two new signs along with the two waterlogged signs that had been torn down (at least they were still there, on the ground—and no, they hadn’t been rained down, definitely ripped)

:(((( grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

were accidentally left in A’s car trunk Saturday so they went to San Diego and back before finally being affixed to the fence at the bottom of the hill, near a large and very bright yellow sign for some local dignitary. Photo to follow. We have backups in case these disappear. If they’re still up by tomorrow night, the backups will go up somewhere else. Bonus: the signs are located just outside the legal radius of our neighborhood polling place.

We waved and gave thumbs-up to a very brave soul who was the sole, silent opponent to a small raucous gathering of ‘yes on 8’ nazis on a street corner today. I felt very guilty about not joining her but I had other things planned today & also really hated the 2 times I’ve spent doing street-corner protests, standing there like a zoo animal while the endless traffic goes by. It’s comforting to have seen a significantly larger “No on 8” protest a few evenings ago on a different street corner not far from this one. Still. Not one of my shining moments of activism. On the other hand, it was deeply inspiring to see this woman.

when they arrive

and outright fear of my neighbors and get a couple yard signs.

One for the street, from which it will probably be stolen, one for our yard. Is this asking for trouble? Our neighbors and their garrison-sized, now-absolutely shredded (shameful) floodlit American flag.

It’s horrible yet makes me laugh at the unintentionedness of the mallet-like symbolism.

I’m going to just quote Adar’s great words here:

Adar is defending her marriage!
Some good-hearted people think…
that a state that offers “domestic partnerships” is doing enough to uphold the rights of LGBT people.

At the federal level, civil marriage (that is, marriage sanctioned by the state, not by a religious body) is a gateway to over 1049 protections, benefits, and obligations. Some of those are indeed addressed by the concept of “domestic partnership.”

The California Domestic Partnership law was a great step forward in its time. It provided for the same adoption procedures available to step-parents, and rights identical to married couples for unemployment insurance. For state employees, domestic partners get the same sick leave, and certain survivors’ rights. (Notice the qualifiers beginning to creep in here.)

However, in order to gain these protections for the families of LGBT individuals, the law essentially created a new class of family. There are “regular” families, created when couples “marry” and there are other families, that are created when couples “file for domestic partnership.”

Imagine for a moment that a straight couple decide to file as domestic partners in the State of California. Imagine the reactions of the parents: “Why don’t you get REALLY married?” “If you aren’t SERIOUS about him, just don’t sign anything.” etc. It doesn’t take much of this visualization exercise to see that what the law created was a second-class family.

Which brings us to the nub of the issue: what is the purpose of marriage and domestic partnership? It’s purpose is to create a new family, whether that family consists of two people or ten of them. It isn’t just about children, although the protection of children is important. It’s also about obligations to take are of one another, to be responsible for debts, to be responsible for care. It’s about taking care of kids, disabled people, sick people, and old people.

The benefit to the state, and to the whole of society, is that instead of individuals rattling around on their own, they live in networks of shared care and obligation.

When we set some of those networks, those families, up as second-class, less “serious” arrangements, then we do not only those families, but all of our society a disservice. Society is better off, if Catattack and Adar take care of each other. (Trust me on this. We are gonna be cranky old birds.) We can do that best if our marriage is a MARRIAGE, not some funky not-quite-marriage arrangement that gives us some of the tools “regular” families have, but not all of them.

I won’t write any more long rants like this on this subject. I just wanted to start out by explaining that “separate but equal” didn’t work for African Americans and it doesn’t work for LGBT folks, either. It doesn’t work because “separate” is always a tip-off that someone or something is UN-equal.

I’ll be working to encourage all Temple Sinai members to vote NO on the anti-marriage amendment.