Prop 8 unconstitutional

I have been spending the summer building a new web site for myself, and I have known for some time that I wanted to have a blog where I could mix my artistic interests, personal interests, and my politics.  So… figuring out what the first post for the blog on my new site would be was starting to feel daunting.

Well, I feel like I’ve got the basic site up and running.  It definitely needs a few kinks worked out, and there will be significant expansion from here, but it’s done enough that I feel like I can go public.  And sure enough… the minute I start feeling close to done…  facebook explodes and tells me that Judge Vaughn Walker has (in what seems to be quite dramatic and scathing language for a judge) declared Proposition 8, the gay marriage ban in California, unconstitutional.

People are understandably happy, and currently the most quoted section (based on my informal analysis) is as follows:

“Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license.

Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite sex couples are superior to same-sex couples. Because California has no interest in discriminating against gay men and lesbians, and because Proposition 8 prevents California from fulfilling its constitutional obligation to provide marriages on an equal basis, the court concludes that Proposition 8 is unconstitutional.”

It is thankfully unequivocal, and I would say it’s refreshingly partisan, except…. this….  more than almost any issue being discussed right now, is one where I don’t see partisan distinction.  I see bigots versus the rest of us, and the fact that we even need to wade through the interminable appeals process that I am certain we have to look forward to, seems silly at best and infuriating at worst.  By virtue of the tyranny of a majority of voters (meaning those who actually went to the polls), those opposed to gay marriage have essentially institutionalized exactly the discrimination that Judge Walker describes in his opinion.

It’s for this reason that I am naively perplexed by the judges subsequent announcement of a stay on the decision, which effectively keeps Prop 8 in place until the appeals process has been exhausted.  If Judge Walker truly believes in the equivalence between the predicament of slaves and that of homosexual couples in California, as evidenced in this statement:

‎”Because slaves were considered property of others at the time, they lacked the legal capacity to consent and were thus unable to marry. After emancipation, former slaves viewed their ability to marry as one of the most important new rights they had gained.”

Then.. what is the point of staying the ruling?

Here… is where the equivocation has happened, and here is where I worry for the future of this decision.  If this case goes to the Supreme Court as the court exists now….  I do not feel certain that Justice Roberts’ court values the rights of individuals as much as this ruling requires.  Perhaps if there was such a thing as marriage between gay corporations…..

Thanks to Dangerous Minds