California voters prove rights aren’t always equal
In the weeks leading up to election day, pollsters found that opponents to Proposition 8 in California were losing ground. I took note, but didn’t worry much at all. Eighteen thousand gay couples had been married since June 16, when my native state legalized the unions.
The effort to turn around and spit in the face of the California Supreme Court decision and ban same-sex marriages wouldn’t pass. So many happy, not to mention high profile, stories came out over these past four and a half months.
In what I see now as an obvious miscalculation, I steeled myself instead for the presidential candidate of my choice to lose. Memories of four years ago filled with confusion and disappointment when George W. Bush won a second term haunted me into preparing for the worst.
The polls said otherwise, but I wouldn’t let myself fully believe Barack Obama would win the presidency. Along came Nov. 4 and glued to the television, election night had never been so fun.
Then came mid-day Nov. 5. News spread that Prop. 8 passed and someone might as well have punched me in the gut. The sensation, no, physical pain, hasn’t left since.
Californians shutting down marriage equality hurts I know because I lived among those people for 31 years. It hurts because as a country we voted for change in the White House. We showed our desire to think more openly and inclusively by choosing Barack Obama, who espouses diplomacy in the face of conflict and fair-mindedness toward all people.
Exit polls revealed overwhelming support for the marriage ban from black and Hispanic voters, who turned out in larger than usual numbers to vote for Obama. That is what hurts the most.
Here are two minority groups essentially saying, don’t you dare discriminate against me, but I can treat you gay people like second-class citizens.
Frank Schubert, co-manager of the Yes on 8 campaign said, “People believe in the institution of marriage. It’s one institution that crosses ethnic divides, that crosses partisan divides.”
So, according to Schubert, when it comes to individual rights of fellow citizens, we’re all one big race-less, party-less happy family. That is, unless we’re gay. Not part of the family anymore. The black sheep we are.
Yep, something hurts more than nameless California residents voting to deny the rights of marriage to all people. Maybe this, in truth, is what makes the physical pain in my gut linger.
It’s entirely possible my mother voted to ban gay marriage.