marriage equality backlash

[rm]

As most of you know, there's been some great strides on the gay marriage issue in the last week.

As perhaps fewer of you know (but most of you can surmise), opponents of marriage equality aren't happy and are putting more money, more time, more rhetoric into opposing equal rights for LGBTQ people.

To be frank, I haven't had the time or the fortitude yet to watch the commercials their currently putting forward. I have read the transcripts, though, and I have read the reports that the people claiming to be regular citizens are in fact hired actors.

But I am alarmed. And concerned. And offended.

Regardless of whether you are queer or not, regardless of whether you are an LGBTQ who has any intention of ever taking part in marriage (is it assimilationist? does it fit with our unique cultures? -- these are valid, serious questions) -- this measure of legal equality needs to exist.

But even more than that, the fear-mongering and the anger of people of privilege discovering that they can no longer control the discourse or the lives of others, must not go unaddressed.

I'm old enough to have experienced and witnessed harassment and violence because of the orientation and identity of my friends and myself. It's barely a reality anymore in many places in this country. But it's still real. It still happens. Here, at home. And also, in terrifying measure, abroad.

I want to believe change can come without violence. But I see the rhetoric from the self-proclaimed defenders of so-called traditional marriage, and it's hard, really hard for me to believe that.

I came of age during the ACT UP protests. I wore a t-shirt that showed SILENCE=DEATH in ASL.

Speak.
Speak.
Speak.

bodlon does here with links to the offending campaigns.

Comments

[santousha.livejournal.com]

Their fear rest upon the belief that if they accept this, where will we end up?
They make the astonishing leap from, if we accept same sex marriage, that means that we accept that homosexuality is a good thing, than what keeps us from accepting bestiality and pedophilia?

Others just live in fear and have no basis for this fear other than that others say it's wrong.

I hope these people remember that not long ago they lived in fear of feminism. I hope they remember that not long ago they lived in fear of african-american rights.
And that these same weapons of fear were utilized to hold on to the status quo.
As a woman when I hear them talking like this, I like the conservatives think: If they take away rights from this group, how long before they try to take away mine?
If that doctor can say it's against his/her believe to treat that person, than what keeps other doctors from saying they refuse to treat me because of the way God made me?

If I accept this now, how far will these fundamentalist go?
If I don't speak now, who will speak for me when they decide to come for me?
And it is jarring that many non-LBTGQ don't think this way.
Seriously people, what makes you think that you are safe from persecution?

[ookpik.livejournal.com]

I hope these people remember that not long ago they lived in fear of feminism. I hope they remember that not long ago they lived in fear of african-american rights.

In my experience, many of them (certainly not all) still fear or hate both of these, alas.

[santousha.livejournal.com]

yes, you are right. And if people start accepting that you can deny groups their rights and freedoms, how long before they move on to the next group to deny their freedom?