The US after DOMA and Prop 8
What a week! As you all well know by now, the Supreme Court made some big decisions regarding DOMA and Prop 8 on Wednesday. Neither were sweeping "gays deserve equal rights" rulings by any means. But two steps in the right direction? Absolutely.
DOMA was determined to be unconstitutional, not because it was taking away the rights of GLBT married couples, but because it was the federal government infringing on a state's right to define marriage. SCOTUS was careful to tiptoe around that in order to make sure they were not redefining marriage for the country.
They didn't actually even make a ruling on Prop 8, but simply decided that those who were appealing the original ruling in California that said it was unconstitutional had no standing to make the appeal (because they were not representatives of the CA government). Thus, the original ruling still stands. Again, they are being very careful here to not say "all California couples have the same rights".
The Supreme Court could have very well done some damage to the Marriage Equality cause, so I am relieved and happy with these decisions. The key isn't that they didn't say that gay couples don't have the right to marry, even if they also didn't say that they do.
Essentially, they stayed silent on the issue and broke down a few of the barriers we had standing in the way.
So, what's next? We have 37 more battles to fight. Gay marriage will now be legal in 13 states. There will likely never be a federal government sanction of same-sex marriage, it's going to be fought on a state by state basis.
I floated down from my cloud of happiness when I came home and had a discussion over dinner with my dad about gay marriage. He believes every argument on the other side: one man & one woman is thousands of years of tradition, all of the holy books of religions agree this is what it should be, allowing gay marriage will take away the rights of those who live in that state to not have gay marriage there.... etc.
Of course I got a little worked up, but did my best to calmly and rationally explain how religion should have no place in a civil institution, and how marriage has evolved over the centuries, and how ME having equal rights in my own state does not change anything for him--he's not going to have to divorce my mom and marry a man!
Indiana's Governor took the opportunity to emphasize that Indiana would be working to put a constitutional ban against same-sex marriage in place during the next legislative session (right now we just have a statute ban).
*sigh*
Slowly but surely, eh? At least our country, as a whole, is going to get there. Some states will drag their feet and throw a fit about it, but we'll get there.
Someone posted a joke on twitter about all of the "red" states should send their gays to CA, and CA can send all their Prop 8 supporters to the red states. But a friend of mine pointed out: NO, we need to do the opposite! We can't abandon the states that will have the greatest struggle, instead the marriage equality supporters from places like CA need to be helping red states fight these battles. Those are the places the LGBT community are the most silenced minority. The answer is not all of us having to flee our homes. Katrina and I don't want to have to run away somewhere else to be happy. We should have our rights in the place we call home. That is America to me. Or at least...that is what it should be.
United State of Indiana - a cool T-shirt company at Pride.
A day or two after me and my dad had that discussion, he asked, when I was saying goodnight, "can we talk more about that sometime? I'd like to understand better."
"Of course, I'd be happy to," I said, and my heart was filled with hope.
This is where real change takes place. In the hearts and minds of the individuals who make up this country.
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