Alone and Unobserved

I’m not interested in investing, business or dailies, so even though IBD is displayed prominently on my floor at the library, until today I had barely spared it a passing glance. As I was pulling last Friday’s issue and replacing it with today’s, though, a small heading on the front page caught my eye.

Same-Sex Marriage
A judge creates a right that’s not found in the Constitution
Issues & Insights A12–13

Oh my, I thought. I’ve got to see what insights the editorial board of an investing newspaper has on that subject. I wasn’t disappointed! Here’s the title and blurb (and a link to the article):

Out of Thin Air
Same-Sex Marriage: A federal judge decides marriage is a constitutional right and overturns California’s Proposition 8 forbidding such unions. The issue is headed to a Supreme Court that Elena Kagan will be sitting on.

Well. “Decides marriage is a constitutional right” is an interesting way to characterize Judge Walker’s ruling. It also has no relationship with the facts. So after reading the rest of the editorial (holding my head firmly all the while to keep it from exploding) I sat down to write a point-by-point response.

The imperial judiciary has struck again with Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker striking down California’s Proposition 8, passed in November 2008 with 52% of the vote, on the grounds that the voter-approved law was a violation of gay couples’ civil rights. …

… In his decision, Judge Walker argues: “Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license.” Except Walker provides no rational basis for identifying marriage as a constitutional right.

This could be the answer to every single one of the erroneous points in this editorial so I’ll get it out of the way now: DID YOU EVEN READ THE RULING?? Walker spent an entire page (page 110, to be precise) quoting Supreme Court ruling after Supreme Court ruling in which marriage is established or accepted as a fundamental right. Years and years of decisions. In fact, according to Walker, “the parties [i.e. the plaintiffs and the defendants] do not dispute that the right to marry is fundamental.” Apparently the IBD editorial board disagrees with (or is unaware of?) not only years of Supreme Court precedent but also the Yes on 8 defendants whose side they pretend to be on.

Prop 8 supporters believe there’s no more a constitutional right to marriage than there is to a driver’s license. On the secular level, both are privileges granted by the state, which is entitled to define the ground rules for its secular reasons and purposes.

Indeed the state is “entitled” to define ground rules for the privileges it bestows on its citizens … as long as those rules are not unconstitutionally discriminatory. Denying driver licenses to homosexuals would be just as unconstitutional as denying marriage licenses is.

See also the “Conclusions of Law” section of the ruling (page 109), where Judge Walker discusses at length just why the State of California has no legitimate interest in preventing same-sex couples from marrying.

This country and healthy societies around the world and throughout history have given marriage between a man and a woman special legal protection because of the recognition that it is the one institution that ensures the society’s future through the orderly procreation and upbringing of children.

It is obvious that the IBD editorial board has not done its homework on the history of marriage, either, which really makes me wonder at their foolhardy bravery in writing on the subject at all. I suggest they take a look at Marriage, a History by Stephanie Coontz and A History of the Wife by Marilyn Yalom for some insight into the REAL reasons behind the institution of marriage throughout history. (Hint: they have far more to do with property, power and politics than procreation.) Heck, even über-conservative Supreme Court Justice Scalia disagrees with them! (Findings if Fact 21c)

Furthermore: No jurisdiction in the United States uses the ability or desire to procreate as the basis for issuing marriage licenses (FF 21); children are better off when their parents marry, including the children of same-sex couples (FF 56); children of same-sex couples show no difference in their development and adjustment than children of opposite-sex couples (FF 69–72).

Lacking a constitutional foundation, marriage is entitled to be defined by the people or their elected representatives.

As former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said about the ruling: “In every state of the union—from California to Maine to Georgia—where people have had a chance to vote, they’ve affirmed that marriage is the union of one man and one woman.”

This should read: “Wherever the privileged majority has had the chance to vote on the rights of an oppressed minority, the majority has affirmed its own privilege at the expense of the minority.” This is not a valid argument in any sense.

Also, Newt, you have no room to talk, you moral cesspool you.

Once again we have unelected judges pulling rights out of the ether and thwarting the will of the people.

The whole point of the Bill of Rights is that the will of the majority sometimes needs to be thwarted.

The editorial goes on to piss and moan about how liberal and dangerous and activist Elena Kagan must also be, based on very little evidence, but that’s boring.

My conclusion: the editorial board of Investor’s Business Daily either did not read the ruling they are critiquing or have willfully decided to misrepresent it for ideological reasons. Which is a shame, because the ruling is a thorough, understandable piece of legal writing that basically speaks for itself.

Shame on you, IBD! You’ve never had any credibility with me since I never paid you any attention, but I certainly know to ignore you scrupulously in the future—unless I want to spend an entire day writing rebuttals to your nonsense.

In his pointed discussion of the shrill, crazy-eyed depths to which the Republican Party and U.S. conservatives have sunk, Johann Hari writes:

How do they train themselves to be so impervious to reality? It begins, I suspect, with religion. They are taught from a young age that it is good to have “faith” – which is, by definition, a belief without any evidence to back it up. You don’t have “faith” that Australia exists, or that fire burns: you have evidence. You only need “faith” to believe the untrue or unprovable. Indeed, they are taught that faith is the highest aspiration and most noble cause. Is it any surprise this then percolates into their political views? Faith-based thinking spreads and contaminates the rational.

(Full article in The Independent)

This is as neat and succinct a criticism of faith and its pernicious effects as I’ve seen. Religion not only teaches people wrong information, it teaches them to hold illogical, baseless, false ideas in higher esteem than reality-based, evidence-backed facts. No wonder so many of them end up firmly believing such insane, crackpot notions as “The Democrats want to institute death panels for the elderly and disabled,” or “The Earth is only 6,000 years old, as we are taught in the Bible,” or “Human-caused global warming is a myth.”

The sooner religion is relegated to a quaint, historical footnote, the better.

Mormon sci-fi/fantasy author Orson Scott Card has made absolutely no secret of three things:

1. He opposes the gay rights movement (claiming that “by and large homosexuals already have” civil rights), supports criminalization of homosexual activity and opposes gay marriage.
2. He advocates overthrowing any government that institutes gay marriage.
3. He does not consider himself a homophobe.

And now he has joined the board of the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), the group behind the campy “coming storm/rainbow coalition” ad and the hilarious 2M4M.org misfire. NOM claims not to be homophobic as well, but are they willing to embrace Card’s extremist, “non-homophobic” philosophy?

Read more about Orson Scott Card’s non-homophobia and his position on the NOM board in this People For the American Way press release.

Hi,

I have personally struggled with being uninsured and underinsured, having to forgo preventive care because I couldn’t afford it and having to turn down prescriptions because I knew I wouldn’t be able to fill them. Being un- or underinsured is a nightmare without end that I would not wish on my worst enemy, but the sad truth is, there are millions of Americans in that situation right now. It is a travesty.

Read FactCheck.org’s blurb on uninsured Americans.

Howard Dean and MoveOn.org have begun a campaign to help Barack Obama pass universal health care reform in this country.

Stand with Dr. Dean

I just signed MoveOn.org Political Action’s petition stating :

Give America a choice. We support health care reform that allows individual Americans to choose either a universally available public health care option like Medicare or for-profit private insurance. A public option is the only way to guarantee health care for all Americans and its inclusion is non-negotiable.

Any legislation without the choice of a public option is only insurance reform and not the health care reform America needs.

Please support President Obama’s health reform. Make sure every American–families, individuals and children–have the medical attention they need. No one should be forced to choose between rent and food and health care.

Sign the MoveOn.org petition

Contact your senator
and
contact your representative
and urge them to support Barack Obama’s universal health care plan.

Thanks,

Sean Tibbitts

I’m sure you’ve all heard about Utah State Senator Chris Buttars’s interview for an upcoming Prop 8 documentary, in which he said all sorts of kind things about The Gays:

They’re mean. They want to talk about being nice. They’re the meanest buggers I have ever seen.

What is the morals of a gay person? You can’t answer that because anything goes.

And this gem, about the gay movement:

It’s just like the Muslims. Muslims are good people and their religion is anti-war. But it’s been taken over by the radical side… They’re probably the greatest threat to America going down I know of.

The best part is that he made these statements to documentarist/anchor Reed Cowan—AN OPENLY GAY MAN. Real smooth, Buttars. Real smooth.

Of course, Utah Senate President Michael Waddoups is defending Buttars and trying to portray this as a “vendetta” Cowan is waging against Buttars. “It’s just unfortunate in my mind that someone wants to continue to [hurt] someone by virtue of a person’s position on the issues,” Waddoups is quoted as saying in this Salt Lake Tribune article.

Yeah, right, Waddoups. Sure, we all hate Buttars, but he’s the one who continually makes himself look like a ridiculous bigot, not us. I can’t believe this man was RE-ELECTED after last year’s debacle, and after the continuing spectacle he’s made of himself his entire time in office. Utah—and especially Utah Senate District 10—ought to be ashamed and embarrassed.

UPDATE (2-19-09, 11:36 pm)
The Utah Senate will be holding a press conference tomorrow (Friday) morning, and there are strong indications that he will at least be stripped of his committee chair–potentially leaving the way open for a slightly more gay-friendly face in the Utah Senate Judiciary Committee. Will update again after the press conference!

UPDATE (2-20-09, 10:34 am)
Well, Buttars has not resigned, but he has lost his place on the Judiciary and Judicial Confirmation Committees. More info at the Deseret News site and the Salt Lake Tribune site. Read both articles—each brings up points the other does not.

I just got word from a friend on the Hill that the anti-gay hordes have been pummeling the Governor’s Office with phone calls ever since he came out as supporting the Common Ground Initiatives and civil unions for gay couples. We need to let him know that he has supporters here in Utah—not all of us are crazy-eyed gay-hating nutjobs like Buttars & Ruzicka!

Call the Governor’s Office at 801-538-1000 and tell him you support his pro-gay positions, and thank him for being an ally.

Get out the word—chief anti-gay harpy Gayle Ruzicka has phone trees on her side, but we have the internets!

Latest in the popular series “Things Patrons Do and Say that Annoy the Shit out of Me” is an episode that happened last night.

Presumptuous Patron: I have a pronunciation question for you.
Me: In which language?
PP: English. First, though—are you gay?
Me: …yes.
PP: I thought so. I work with a wonderful gay man. He’s happily partnered, though, so you can’t have him. [Cracks up at her own wit.]
Me: Oookay…
PP: When he is doing business, the way he pronounces his words, his preference isn’t obvious. When he talks with other gay men it is, but not at work.
Me: Um…
PP: Sometimes, when you talk, the way you pronounce things, your preference is really obvious.
Me: You know what? I’m not comfortable with this discussion.
PP: Well, do you want your preference to be obvious?
Me: I’m not comfortable with this discussion.
PP: All I’m saying is…
Me: I’m not comfortable with this discussion. [I walk away.]
PP: [Called after me] I didn’t mean to offend or make you angry!

This patron apparently had good intentions. She only meant to be helpful, after all! And of course she couldn’t know my history of repression, the years of trying and failing to pass as straight, to be straight, and how I finally came out of the closet and learned to accept myself for who I am. In short, she doesn’t know me—which is exactly why she shouldn’t have brought up the subject at all.

An hour later, I was watching the wonderful new Gus van Sant movie, MILK, in which Harvey Milk calls for all American gays and lesbians to come out of the closet, to stop hiding who they are, to make their presence known. The film is truly excellent, and timely as well: Milk’s main fight was against Prop 6, a referendum that would have allowed schools to fire gay teachers as well as those who supported gays or gay rights. Prop 6 failed, against all odds. Three weeks ago, we lost the fight against California’s Prop 8, in which a lot of the same rhetoric about “protecting the children” and “recruiting” and “teaching homosexuality in schools” returned to haunt us. Milk’s example is inspiring, and the movie reminds us never to stop fighting.

My name is Sean Tibbitts, and I am here to recruit you!

That I’m in contact with any of my old friends is a miracle—specifically a Facebook miracle. It’s thanks to Facebook that I’m still in touch with former roommates, former BYU friends, former dance partners, former fellow grad students, former coworkers, former professors and former boyfriends, as well as cousins, aunts, online acquaintances, fellow atheists, fellow ex-Mormons, fellow gays and so on and so forth.

I’m beginning to wonder if this is really a good thing. I just lost a friend, primarily because of what each of us has posted openly online (see the comments on this post). She is a practicing, faithful Mormon who supported Prop 8 and who opposes same-sex marriage because she believes homosexual sex is a sin. In fact, like many other Mormons and many fundamentalist Christians, she doesn’t even believe homosexuality exists, per se. She has written a great deal about her views on her blog.

I, on the other hand, am a confirmed atheist ex-Mormon gay man who believes the Mormon church is a man-made organization that is characterized by bigotry, lies and self-righteousness. I believe Proposition 8 was motivated by intolerance and deception and homophobia, and that the Mormon church bears a great deal of the blame for its passing. Just last weekend I participated in a protest against the Mormon church’s opposition to gay rights and support of Prop 8. I have also made no secret of any of these things on my blog.

So she found my blog and was horrified and upset by what she found here, and I found her blog and was horrified and upset in my turn. I wrote a blog post in which I speculated cynically about the true reasons behind the Mormon church and its members’ opposition to gay marriage. She wrote a hurtful comment in response, in which she questioned my integrity and called me bitter and closed-minded. I wrote a cold rebuttal, which I closed by stating that I didn’t feel much friendship for her anymore. She agreed.

Are there some former acquaintanceships that are worth preserving, at least for nostalgia’s sake, but which are too fragile to handle the constant barrage of truth and stream-of-consciousness honesty that accompany an online relationship? Would Summer and I still consider ourselves “friends” if neither of us had a blog and neither of us was on Facebook? Is it possible to preserve a friendship by willfully refusing to know the truth about another person?

Just a few years ago, Summer’s devotion to the Mormon church and opposition to same-sex marriage would have been things we had in common, not things that drove us apart or set us at odds. People change. Our ideas of what friendship is also change.

And then there is my family. I don’t really discuss these subjects with them, but I’m Facebook friends with several of my siblings, and I’ve seen their status updates and the causes they’ve joined. And I’m sure they’ve seen my statuses and notes and causes. How is it possible to preserve a relationship, knowing what we know about each other?

[Updated with photos and new fave signs!]

“In their statement on Prop 8, the LDS Church said they aren’t against domestic partnerships, hospital visitation rights, anti-discrimination laws. Well, we’re going to go up on the Hill and start fighting for you, for those issues. If it’s good enough for our brothers and sisters in California, it’s good enough for us right here in Utah.”

I went to the gay rights protest at Temple Square last night, and it was one of the most amazing single experiences of my life. I’ve only ever been to one other protest—an anti-war protest three years ago—and somehow, despite the massive popularity of Gay Pride every year, I never expected to be involved in such an enormous gay-rights protest in the heart of Salt Lake City. Thousands of people showed up. The Tribune says at least 3,000, the Deseret news says 3,500. My friend Craig was interviewed on ABC4 evening news (you can watch the video on his blog). We rallied at City Creek Park—kitty-corner from the Church Office Building—and then marched around Temple Square twice, waving our signs and chanting.

Signs I liked:

• [Craig's sign] Keep your doctrine out of our covenants!
• [My sign] Not here to get even—here to get EQUAL
• Thanks a lot, Mormon Church—now we have to have pre-marital sex.
• Joseph Smith had 34 wives—I only want 1 husband!
• D&C 134:4: We believe that religion is instituted of God; and that men are amenable to him, and to him only, for the exercise of it, unless their religious opinions prompt them to infringe upon the rights and liberties of others
• I pay taxes. The LDS Church does not. I’m who should be represented.

“I grew up a Mormon boy in Salt Lake, Logan and Ogden, Utah, and there were many things I treasure from my upbringing. I learned that community is important. I learned that we need to care for and love each other. . . . Unfortunately, there were other things I learned as a Mormon boy. I learned that African-Americans were inferior because the color of their skin was the Mark of Cain, given to them because of sins they committed in the previous life. I learned that gay and lesbian people (we called them “homosexuals” then) were inferior people involved in perversion. But I have overcome those bigotries, largely because of the wonderful people of your community I have come to know over the years.”

The atmosphere at the rally was electric. Three out gay state legislators spoke—Senator Scott McCoy and Reps. Jackie Biskupski and Christine Johnson—as well as former mayor Rocky Anderson. All three were inspirational, urging us not to hate but to use our fire to effect change.

I would not have believed that this many people would come out to support gay equality in Utah. But it happened. And that gives me a great deal of hope.

Proposition 8 just passed in California, amending the state constitution to take the right to marry away from gay couples. And I will be blunt: I blame the Mormon church.

When the fight was just gearing up this summer it seemed like official Mormon involvement would be minimal, limited to a letter the Mormon prophet sent out to congregations, which stated the church’s position on gay marriage—guess what? they’re against it!—and urged members to “do all they could” to support the proposition. The letter caused a minor furor in online Mormon-adjacent communities, especially among ex-Mormons and those who supported gay rights, or who at least thought the Mormon church should keep its nose out of politics. Looking back at the post I wrote at the time, all I can think is how naïve I was to allow something so small upset me! Because what followed was much, much worse.

On October 8, 2008, the Mormon church really entered the fray with an anti-gay-marriage broadcast shown to BYU students and to congregations all over California. Involved in this thinly disguised political rally were four high-ranking Mormon “general authorities”:

• Russell Ballard, a former car salesman, who is now one of twelve “apostles” in the Mormon church leadership
• Quentin Cook, a former attorney, also an “apostle”
• David Bednar, a former business professor and educator, also an “apostle”
• Whitney Clayton, a former attorney and “President of the Seventy” in the Mormon church (basically one step below “apostle”)

During the broadcast, all four men made it clear that they were not interested in truth, regurgitating falsehoods that had already been debunked, trotting out the old conservative whine about activist judges, and repeating a definition of “tolerance” that you won’t find in any dictionary except the one in Mr. Ballard’s head. And then the kicker: the Mormon church would be asking thirty people in each California congregation to donate at least four hours a week for Yes on 8 grassroots efforts. With 1,367 congregations, that’s 41,010 volunteers! (
You can read a full transcript of the broadcast here.)

And they were as good as their word. Members were pressured to donate to Yes on 8, with many of the richer members being asked for a specific figure, usually at least a thousand dollars. (Estimates of what percentage of the Yes on 8 campaign was funded by Mormons range from 40% to 77%.) There is anecdotal evidence that Mormon leaders threatened to withhold temple recommends from members who didn’t support Prop 8, and at least one Mormon has been excommunicated for speaking out against it.

The slander, misrepresentations and lies continued throughout the campaign, both from Mormon pulpits and from the Mormon-bankrolled Yes on 8 campaign. And it worked! Five million people went to the polls in California two days ago and voted against full equality for their gay and lesbian co-citizens.

I am convinced that Mormon support and pressure made all the difference in the Prop 8 campaign. And now that it seems the Mormon church has won, now that they’ve managed to wrest the right to marry away from those presumptuous, uppity homosexuals, now that they’ve successfully enshrined anti-gay prejudice in the constitution of the State of California? Now they are asking for “civility, respect and love.” “We hope that everyone would treat [each other] that way no matter which side of this issue they were on,” Whitney Clayton was quoted as saying today in the Salt Lake Tribune. “We’re not anti-gay, we’re pro marriage between a man and a woman.”

Well, I’m sorry, Mr. Clayton. You don’t get to ask for civility and respect and love now. You may not have ever raised your voice and you may not have ever called us faggots, but your actions and the actions of your cronies have been so egregiously wrong, so devastating to the lives of thousands, including children, that you don’t get to ask for anything anymore.

I don’t really blame individual members for believing what their leaders told them, or even for their involvement in canvassing and other grassroots efforts. I blame the Mormon leaders themselves. These are not stupid men. Many of them were practicing attorneys and law professors—they cannot possibly believe their own lying rhetoric when it comes to the legal and social consequences gay marriage would supposedly have. They cannot possibly be so blind, and they cannot possibly be so confused.

And so I have no other option but to believe that they are willfully misleading the faithful for their own ends. They are lying to and manipulating millions of people who look up to them as inspired spokesmen of god. And that is my definition of evil.