Tag: Proposition 8

Crossposted at Daily Kos and The Stars Hollow Gazette

Note: Due to a deluge of editorial cartoons over the past week or so, I’m going to, time permitting, post Part II of this weekly diary in the next few days.  In addition to some of the issues covered in this edition, I’ll include more cartoons on the floods in Pakistan, the withdrawal of combat U.S. forces in Iraq, and Rupert Murdoch’s $1 million contribution to the GOP.

I’ve been watching the Prop 8 trial…except not really, since SCOTUS disallowed us folks who couldn’t be in the courtroom to watch what may be the most important court case ever for GLBT people.  So I watched the transcripts instead, as they were posted by the people at the Courage Campaign Institute and FiredogLake.  

One of the assertions made time and again by the defense was that Proposition 8 was not based in animus.

What?  No strong dislike of GLBT people?  No enmity?  Are we seriously expected to believe that there was no hostile attitude?

I’d like to think that one could discount those assertions as being false on there face.  But this was a court of law.  I am no lawyer, but as a writer and a mathematician, I know words and logic.

Having followed the trial closely, I have to ask the following.

When you deliberately choose not to learn about people who you wish to discriminate against, what is that if not animus?

The second day of testimony challenging Proposition 8 will begin at around Noon EST. The first day seemed to go well for the plaintiffs who are saying that Prop 8 violates their rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.

There is live blogging from Rick Jacobs at Courage Campaign’s Prop 8 Trial Tracker and by Teddy Partridge and David Dayen at FDL

Here are some highlights and observations from yesterday’s opening statements and testimony.

Judge Vaughn Walker questions defense attorney Charles Cooper’s contradictions

   Walker: If the Prez’s parents had been in Virginia when he was born, their marriage would have been unlawful. Doesn’t that show a TREMENDOUS change in the institution of marriage? doesn’t that show evolution? Isn’t that correct?

   Cooper: Racial restrictions were never a feature of the institution of marriage. (laughter in our courtrtoomm)

   Cooper: These restrictions were loathesome, and a detail. “Man and woman” has been universal, across time and all societies.

   walker: Is the evidence going to show these racial restrictions are different than the restrictions imposed by Prop 8?

   (like a bug pinned to a piece of wood)

   Cooper: Naturally procreative instincts….

   Walker: Only purpose?

   Cooper: Basis of marriage is procreation. It is a pro-child societal institution.

   Walker: Many things attend marriage, will your evidence show that those are all secondary to procreation?

   Cooper: This is about deinstitutionalizing marriage…

   Walker: Yes, you say that. But will your evidence show that?

Up Date From FDL h/t to Dayen

Geoff Kors, the Executive Director of Equality California, which led the opposition to Prop. 8 in November 2008. He was excited about the first day of testimony, particularly the words of the four same-sex partners who took the stand, the first time in a federal trial that same-sex couples have testified. “Their testimony was really moving. You heard them say that marriage is not just about rights and benefits but about love and commitment.”

Kors also singled out Ted Olson’s opening statement as the conservative case for marriage equality. Olson said that allowing certain couples a separate status despite similar rights and benefits creates a stigma without a compelling rational basis for doing so. “To have a conservative legal scholar take that position is very powerful.”

Before the trial began, Kors released a statement calling on the Obama Administration’s Justice Department to issue an amicus brief in favor of their position in Perry v. Schwarzenegger.



   “The time has come for elected leaders to empower all Americans, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. Once again, we call on the Obama administration to join Equality California and others in urging the federal courts to strike down this grossly unjust law. In doing so, we will bring our nation one step closer to realizing its promise of equality for all. Our country’s bedrock principles of democracy and freedom are at stake.”

Kors elaborated on that after the first day of testimony. “This is the civil rights trial of the decade,” he said. “We’re asking the Justice Department to weigh in on a basic principle. This doesn’t only apply to the LGBT community, but all minorities. And to be silent is unacceptable.”

(emphasis mine)

I’m certain Kors isn’t holding his breath

Today was the opening salvo in the arguments to overturn Proposition 8, the ballot initiative that denied legal marriage to same sex couples. You can follow the live blogging of the trial at FDL: The Seminal and Firedoglake Covers the Prop 8 Trial

The Courage Campaign is also following with Prop8 Trial Tracker

H/T to Robyn for the link

Sharp Words Open California Same-Sex Marriage Case

SAN FRANCISCO – In the opening volleys in the federal trial over the fate of California’s ban on same-sex marriage, lawyers for both sides were sharply questioned by the judge overseeing the trial, in a case that is being closely watched by gay-rights groups and supporters of traditional marriage nationwide.

snip

Judge Walker set a questioning tone early, repeatedly interrupting an opening statement by Theodore B. Olson, a lead counsel for the plaintiffs – two gay couples who filed their suit in the spring after the California Supreme Court upheld Proposition 8. The judge asked Mr. Olson why domestic partnerships, which are allowed in California, were not sufficient for gay couples and wondered what kind of evidence would be introduced to show harm to same-sex couples who are not allowed to marry.

Mr. Olson, a prominent conservative litigator whose co-counsel is David Boies, his foe from the 2000 battle over the presidential election, countered that marriage “was a building block of family, neighborhoods and community” in America, and that to deny gays that right was to effectively make them second-class citizens. Proposition 8, he said, “isolated gay men and lesbian individuals and said, ‘You’re different.’ ”

snip

Advocates for Proposition 8, who assert that Californians were well within their rights to establish a definition of marriage, were also pointedly queried by Judge Walker.

Charles J. Cooper, the lead counsel for the defense, opened his case by arguing that limitation of marriage to men and women was a tradition “across history, across cultures and across societies” meant to “channel natural procreative activities between men and women” into stable relationships.

But Judge Walker interrupted Mr. Cooper to ask about other marital benefits like companionship and support, and he noted that there were no restrictions on marriage for heterosexual couples who could not or did not want to have children. The judge also questioned the assertion by Mr. Cooper that same-sex marriage would “radically alter” traditional marriage and could decrease marriage rates for heterosexuals.

This is the first part of an ungodly long piece I posted during the actual inauguration over at Fire on the Mountain. I have decided to trim it a little and post it in three parts, today, tomorrow and Friday, in the hopes that more folks will read it. I may even put it up at Daily Kos, though I can’t imagine that it will be well received there.

With Barack Hussein Obama making history and a wave of optimism engulfing the country, it is a good time to review what faces us ahead. I want to flag three features of the road we are heading down over the coming months.

   * First, there is a green light for struggle to advance on many fronts.

   * Second, the anti-war movement, by contrast, faces a huge roadblock to moving forward.

   * Third, as far as the economy goes, the bridge is collapsing and we are on it.

A Green Light for Struggle

Since November 4, there has been a dramatic uptick in popular struggle in this country. The election of Barack Obama, and the massive mobilization of people from all parts of the US and all sectors of society that made it possible, have created a vastly different terrain of battle than that of the last 8 years. Last month, I heard “Si Se Puede” and even “Yes We Can” chants rising from within a crowd of hundreds of SDSers and other serious young militants mobilized to defend college students who were carrying out an occupation (overall successful) of the New School in NYC.

The emotional highlight of the last few months has been the victory won by another occupation. Union workers at the about-to-close Republic Windows & Doors plant in Chicago seized control of their factory and won nationwide sympathy, including a statement by President-elect Obama affirming the righteousness of their cause and ignoring the illegality of their tactics. When they won their demands, the UE members left the plant chanting, yep, “Si Se Puede” and “Yes We Can.”

Now a wave of protest against the police murder of a young Black man, erupting at times into outright rebellion, has shaken Oakland, CA. Police departments across the country are reviewing their “deadly force” policies and training–and updating their riot preparedness plans.

Any one of these can be dismissed by the cynical as an isolated particular. Let me instead suggest a look at the broadest protest movement which has broken out since the election–the battle which followed the passage of California’s anti-gay-marriage Proposition 8. This ballot initiative, a little gem of rancid bigotry, not only denied same-sex couples the right to wed, but even officially “un-married” tens of thousands of lesbian and gay Californians. It was hands-down the biggest bummer of Election Night, 2008.

But look at what has ensued!

First, there were a couple of weeks of near-spontaneous demonstrations, pulled together by email, instant message and Twitter. Often thousands strong, they reached all 50 states. Many protesters quickly–and correctly–identified and focused on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS) as the main target. Rallies took place in front of Mormon temples not only across California and in other modern-day Sodoms like NYC but even at LDS Central in Salt Lake City.

The effect has been profound. The demonstrations gave rise to an incredible cultural flowering in defense of gay marriage, from the movie-star-laden YouTube micro-musical “Prop 8: The Musical” (starring Jack Black as Jesus) to the tongue-in-cheek petition drive launched in Princeton, NJ for an initiative forbidding Princeton freshmen to walk on town and campus sidewalks.

Major media outlets and think tanks undertook investigations which showed that, just as protesters charged, LDS money and machinations were at the center of the Prop 8 campaign. Boycotts of tourism in Utah and of Mormon firms, as well as other businesses run by Prop 8 backers, are underway. Members have quit the church or spoken out publicly against its embrace of bias.

On the political front, Obama has felt the heat, especially after his inaugural invitation to Prop 8 supporter Rev. Rick Warren triggered a spasm of revulsion even among his loyalists. One response to the pressure has been his unexpected and unequivocal pledge to move rapidly to end the Armed Force’s homophobic “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.

To grasp the new mood of struggle, try and imagine the scene if Proposition 8 had passed during the grim 2000 or 2004 elections. The anger would have been swamped in the overall angst and depression. The flowering of protest and culture would never have taken place. Most important, we would not have the current mood, the overwhelming optimism that the passage of Prop 8 is just a bump in the road which will soon be behind us.

cross posted from The Dream Antilles

In the continuing post Prop 8 fall out, the Mormon Church is ramping up its attacks on gay people, slurring gay people and even accusing them of domestic terrorism. The campaign of hate continues to rage, just as it simultaneously continues to claim that it is a victim of attacks.  Let’s fight back.

I know.  The Mormon Church denies that this was ever a campaign of hate.  There I pointed that out.  In a wonderful circumlocution, the Church even denies that its work on Prop 8 is anti-gay.  No, it’s about being “pro- marriage,” they say.

Jump with me across the broom.

Perhaps as penance for something I did in a past life, I am prone to perusing the back pages of Daily Kos.  Like Diogenes looking for a human being among his fellow Greeks, I search for those who might learn that hatred starts small and begins with the words we use.

I seek to teach.  Mostly I discover people who are unwilling to learn.  I find people who are so invested in their juvenile attempt at humor that they can’t stop to learn why it is juvenile, why it is demeaning, not to its supposed targets, but to those whom it actually hits, and as the conversation progresses (I refuse to give up the hope that everyone can learn not to hate), I get to learn how deep and varied their hatred actually is.

I find pseudo-intellectual  analysis of why only the so-called normal people deserve equality in this society.  Upon challenging their reasoning, I often find the same people have a very low opinion of education.  I ask questions that don’t get answered.  Apparently, those questions do have an effect, however.  You’d be amazed at the number of times people assume that the questions I ask must be asked in anger and respond in kind…and never answer the question.

And I find hatred, both the small and the large of it.