Quote:
Originally posted by sgtclub
This is the right decision from a process standpoint, but I don't think it was a waste of money. Newsom and the Mass SC did a lot to put this issue front and center, and while I don't think a mayor should willfully oppose the will of the people or that a few judges should decide the issue for the country, this is an issue whose time has come.
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Sadly, I'm beginning to fear this is not so. While I think this is the kind of thing that needs to come from a change in fundamental legislative policy, like much of the civil rights movement did (the Civil Rights Act had to be passed by Congress before there could be an Ollie's Barbeque case), I very much fear that the "marriage for both or marriage for neither" position staked out by the gay rights advocates will be its undoing.
I would guess maybe 55-60% of Americans, when pressed, will say there should be civil unions for same sex couples, because it's unfair that you're born gay and you don't have basic rights to make a family. But I would guess 80% of Americans would say that
marriage is something that can only exist between a man and a woman. I am so frustrated that the gay rights movement totally misjudged the temperature of the American people on this issue that they misframed the debate and ensured legislative losses all around the country to counterbalance their one judicial victory. I posted about this before --- the symbolic insistence on the term marriage would result in too much pushback to accomplish the more basic policy goal of equality.
If there were a way to retreat gracefully from marriages to "thanks, we'll be happy with equal tax treatment and survivorship and custody rights under state law," it should be pursued now. What's the use of having a symbolic right in California and Massachusetts that isn't going to be recognized in any of the other 48 states? In three years, we'll be having child custody battles where gay Massholes will abscond with their kids across state lines, then claim out-of-state courts can't recognize their marriage or the relationship between the non-custodial parent and the kids. All because of the pushback over the word "marriage." Fucking hell.
