But what if I call your bluff, Mr. Edney? You believe in a domestic partnership with the person of your choosing. You still like your wife? Head on down to the nearest courthouse, dissolve your marriage and sign the partnership papers. It’s the same, after all … isn’t it? You’ll still be able to inherit from her (and she from you), sign mortgages together, visit each other in the hospital. It’s close enough, right?
Oh, but you were married in a church? Well then, to not mix church and state, might I suggest that we quit allowing churches to perform marriages? Or, like our European and South American friends, do one, then do the other, because they really won’t have much to do with each other, with that separation and all.
Let’s address the church issue. A common meme of the right is that, soon enough, the state will force churches to perform marriages they don’t approve of — you know, between Baptists and Buddhists, Episcopalians and Estonians, whites and blacks, Christians and Jews. As a non-Catholic, I cannot insist that Father Fred perform my marriage. As a non-Mormon, I cannot insist that Brother David allow me into the temple. We accept that. There’s no fight there. But my outdoor wedding didn’t stop me from calling myself “married.” A church doesn’t need to tell me that. The state does. In fact, it was a lovely lady at the courthouse who sold us the license to use that term, because marriage is a legal term. Marriage is a contract. It begins at the courthouse and, if it ends, it ends there, too.
The fact is, Mr. Edney, that the government already established that “separate but equal” isn’t equal. You’ve been in government and on a school board, you should remember Brown v. Board of Education. They weren’t just talking about education.
The truth of the matter is that the right longs for those days. Oh, I know, there’s the pretense. We’ve incorporated people of color into more of our lives than just the help, although I’d bet that your gardener is Mexican-American, as is your maid. But I’m sure you pay them … well … enough to meet their needs. They don’t need much living down there, do they? But discriminating against skin tone is passé, so you’ve changed tack. Now, the “other” is based on sexual identity, and the right needs to limit their rights — and their voices, their enfranchisement into our society. So you scream church as loud as you can, only it sounds like marriage. It sounds like bigotry. It sounds like hatred.
You said that “the fact is that we are unlikely to get a majority of people to agree on this issue.” Ahem, Mr. Edney, it’s about “rights” … unalienable rights. Un…alien…able…. Cannot be taken away. And just like the majority would still probably vote to keep Mexicans (or blacks or Asians or fill in the blank with the group you disagree with here) from voting if they could, they can’t.
Rights are not up for a vote in this country.
We will only “keep spend(ing) all that money and energy on” this if the right keeps denying rights to their fellow Americans. So go ahead and tell your side to quit “robo-calling for dollars, protesting in the streets, screaming to (your) members about unfairness and discrimination, immorality or irreligion.” Tell your politicians to quit pandering to the right’s bigotry, intolerance, and fear.
Mr. Edney, if you are so fond of domestic partnerships, lead on. “Put the issue to bed.” Put your money where your mouth is. And then advocate a contractual partnership for your children. It’s equal after all. Isn’t it?
Catherine Drew is an El Centro resident.
Oh, but you were married in a church? Well then, to not mix church and state, might I suggest that we quit allowing churches to perform marriages? Or, like our European and South American friends, do one, then do the other, because they really won’t have much to do with each other, with that separation and all.
Let’s address the church issue. A common meme of the right is that, soon enough, the state will force churches to perform marriages they don’t approve of — you know, between Baptists and Buddhists, Episcopalians and Estonians, whites and blacks, Christians and Jews. As a non-Catholic, I cannot insist that Father Fred perform my marriage. As a non-Mormon, I cannot insist that Brother David allow me into the temple. We accept that. There’s no fight there. But my outdoor wedding didn’t stop me from calling myself “married.” A church doesn’t need to tell me that. The state does. In fact, it was a lovely lady at the courthouse who sold us the license to use that term, because marriage is a legal term. Marriage is a contract. It begins at the courthouse and, if it ends, it ends there, too.
The fact is, Mr. Edney, that the government already established that “separate but equal” isn’t equal. You’ve been in government and on a school board, you should remember Brown v. Board of Education. They weren’t just talking about education.
The truth of the matter is that the right longs for those days. Oh, I know, there’s the pretense. We’ve incorporated people of color into more of our lives than just the help, although I’d bet that your gardener is Mexican-American, as is your maid. But I’m sure you pay them … well … enough to meet their needs. They don’t need much living down there, do they? But discriminating against skin tone is passé, so you’ve changed tack. Now, the “other” is based on sexual identity, and the right needs to limit their rights — and their voices, their enfranchisement into our society. So you scream church as loud as you can, only it sounds like marriage. It sounds like bigotry. It sounds like hatred.
You said that “the fact is that we are unlikely to get a majority of people to agree on this issue.” Ahem, Mr. Edney, it’s about “rights” … unalienable rights. Un…alien…able…. Cannot be taken away. And just like the majority would still probably vote to keep Mexicans (or blacks or Asians or fill in the blank with the group you disagree with here) from voting if they could, they can’t.
Rights are not up for a vote in this country.
We will only “keep spend(ing) all that money and energy on” this if the right keeps denying rights to their fellow Americans. So go ahead and tell your side to quit “robo-calling for dollars, protesting in the streets, screaming to (your) members about unfairness and discrimination, immorality or irreligion.” Tell your politicians to quit pandering to the right’s bigotry, intolerance, and fear.
Mr. Edney, if you are so fond of domestic partnerships, lead on. “Put the issue to bed.” Put your money where your mouth is. And then advocate a contractual partnership for your children. It’s equal after all. Isn’t it?
Catherine Drew is an El Centro resident.
