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Oh, Christ. While gay activists were busy angrily masturbating at each other, the people on the other side were busy accomplishing things. They're anticipating that Obama will overturn DOMA (which is like the national version of Prop 8), and they've already taken steps to stop him.
Check out domadefensefund.com -- we won't contribute to their pagerank by linking to it, but we all need to see what they're doing so that we can one-up them, and do it YESTERDAY. Look at how slick they are: it actually looks like they're presenting an urgent, reasonable case. Never mind that their claims are as silly and made-up as "Prop 8 will protect children" -- it doesn't matter whether they're telling the truth. All that matters is that people will believe them.
The facts on DOMA are these:
- Obama wants to repeal it. Hillary opposes it. Lots of Congrescritters want it gone. Even the guy who wrote it now opposes it.
- It won't go away by itself, and Obama can't wipe it away all by himself. Support for its repeal is still tepid among voters, since most folks aren't even aware of it. So if we don't make an efficient push for its repeal, it's here to stay.
- The Bad Guys are making the same claims as usual -- that repealing DOMA would force same-sex marriage on everyone. We know they're just making that up, but again -- it doesn't matter if you lie as long as people believe you.
- No serious organization is taking the lead on overturning DOMA. The first google hit on "overturn doma" is a daydreamy Join The Impact messageboard.
We're still just shaking our heads in wonderment at what they've managed to create while we're still busy looking at our navels: a single unified presence (instead of a patchwork of a hundred Facebooks and forums) on a modern-looking website (instead of an embarrassing dinosaur). To be sure, some of the decisions over the last few months demand analysis. But while we're busy figuring out which opportunities we missed, it looks like we're about to miss an even bigger one.
So, to sum up: we're doomed.
Disclosure: SFist_Matt is the creator of Stop8.org, a site that monitors the media for reporting on California marriage equality.
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Sounds like the gay community is just going to have to learn to like women (or men if you are female).
Careful about thinking about the gay community as women or man haters. Most don't fall into that category at all.
examples:
My 28 Y.O. gay son has many friends, most of them straight women- fag hag heaven.
me gay with two truly close friends. one is a lesbian and the other is straight woman.
you'll find this model more common than you think
I think he meant like as in sexual congress, not like as in enjoy the company of. (Plus I'm sure some of his best friends are _______)
SEXUAL CONGRESS?!?
I am hereby throwing my hat in the ring!
H_Q_L for Sexual Congress in 2009!
Yeah I meant "like" in the biblical sense. I'm sure the gay community is friendly towards all genders.
If they hate gay people so much, why are there so may pictures of old lesbians on their site?
Actually, DOMA is not like the national version of Prop 8. It is true that most of the country is ambivalent (at best) toward the multiple levels of bigotry that have been created against LGBTs and it is important to try to help these passive participants understand what the difference is. Maybe it will help them sleep better knowing they are safe from something that won't harm them...anyway..
DOMA is more like Prop 22 - the Knight Initiative - that was passed in 2000 by 60% of the voters in CA. This is the law that the CA Supreme Court decided was not constitutional because it violates the equal protections guaranteed to all Californians.
In addition to the federal DOMA (signed into law in the middle of the night by Bill Clinton in 1996), individual states have passed their own version of the same law. Approximately 40 states have added this secondary layer of discrimination on their own...because they can...even if it is questionably in opposition to the full faith and credit clause of the US Constitution...and they can do it, because Clinton told them they could.
As a third layer of hatred, many states (now 30 of them) have passed amendments to their constitutions because they really feel threatened by the same sex couples that want to have the same citizenship rights that others have - by others I mean people that get married, get divorced and then get remarried without penalty or limit even though those divorces and re-marriages are not valid or recognized by many religions. Interesting that there is no fear from religious zealots that they may have to recognize re-marriages because the secular law does recognize them.
Anyway, a repeal of federal DOMA would have very limited returns anyway. It would only affect the handful of states that allow any recognition of same sex couples - no matter what they are called (DP, CU, marriage). Legal same sex relations in those states would be eligible for federal recognition (I assume - although the application of that is hard to understand...would a same sex couple have to live in Massachusetts for the rest of their lives to receive social security benefits because 40 other states don't consider them legit?) and the relationships would be recognized in states that aren't layered with acceptions, but fear not...America has already done a real solid job of marginalizing LGBT people by preventing them from having legally recognized families even if DOMA is somehow - miraculously - revoked.
Good job! Must feel good to force a minority group to uphold a higher moral standard that you apply to yourselves - or looking the other way while it gets done for you.
Matty,
I keep reading many bloggers who say that no-one is taking the lead. But you guys are the ones with the web-skills to accomplish it. Why don't you create it?
Or perhaps you can use your site to organize all those other sites into one central clearing house of ideas and coordination and maybe select a lead-site for the DOMA webpage?
Or at least collectively lobby the "jerkoff" organizations like HRC to get the fuck on the ball and start running national ads showing gay families right now like gettoknowusfirst.org is running in CA. (the people we need to move (read:older) watch tv, not the youtube)
Or maybe partner directly with gettoknowusfirst.org and rally everyone else.
Who is supposed to be this person taking the lead?
I and millions want to rally around a central organization, but who?
Instead of declaring doom, why not either create it or point us in a productive direction.
Well, you seem to have some pretty good ideas. Why don't you create the site? Or organize a clearinghouse? Or lobby? Or partner? Or create? Or point? What's stopping you?
Probably the same thing stopping me -- you've already got a day job; and even if you didn't, you don't know how to herd cats.
I don't have the web/tech skills.
I wasn't attacking you.
I DO try my best to organize and lobby people thru emailing and social network bulletins and such but I'm not tech-savy enough to build something like that.
My only point was that you ALREADY have a website where you might add a small section where all these other sites could join in a webring or networking area or something so they all can talk to one another and exchange ideas where if one groups posts, it will email the others of the update. A leader will probably emerge.
whatever. nevermind.