Fuck you, California.
Y'know, I have many reasons to dislike California. There's the overcrowding. There's the interminable cultural void that is the entire Southern half of the state. There's the fact that they regularly manage to suck the Colorado river dry before it reaches the ocean, because people think they need lawns, golf courses, and fucking PALM TREES in a goddamn DESERT. But y'know what? Their assfuckingbackwards Supreme Court really took the cake this week.
One minute they tell everyone that same-sex marriage is a constitutional right. Intelligent, logical, open-minded folk everywhere rejoice. Then when the silent bigot majority passes Prop 8 (so much for CA's rep as a liberal hippie wacko state, eh?), the justices decide that really, when you get down to it, a "right" is only actually a "right" so long as a majority of the state population agrees with it.
God help us all if the SCOTUS worked like that:
Women voting? Well, since they can't vote yet, let's just have all the menfolk vote on that, and see if the little ladies get their way.
I mean c'mon now. It's not like we're here to serve as a check or balance to the legislative system or anything. Really, we just want to do whatever the drooling, bigoted masses tell us to do!
Seriously people. Either it's a fucking RIGHT or it's not. Unless you're trying to say that rights aren't actually anything that ought to be guaranteed (shades of BushCo, there)? Like, "Sure, you have the right to not be punched in the face as you walk down the street… but really, if enough people want to punch you in the face, I suppose maybe it's OK"? (Bad example. I can think of a few folks I'd like to apply that logic to. ;-)
So I'd like to send a big Lilly Allen shout out to the cowards fine folks on the California Supreme court, and all the inbred cumstains who voted for Prop 8 in the first place:
Yeah, my state is a disappointment right now but we don't all suck. I still blame the dust bowl era for the bad politics.
P.S. Off the high horse Alaska.
28th May 2009 at 9:46 pm | permalink |LOL … I never said all the residents of California suck, did I? But blaming the dust bowl seems like a bit of a stretch … at least I only have to go back to the '70s to blame the TransAlaska pipeline for Alaska's fucked-up oil-whore problems. ;-)
28th May 2009 at 10:03 pm | permalink |Because, you know, putting civil liberties and personal rights up for public vote was such an AWESOME idea in the first place.
At least they're further ahead than my backward little state. God bless Alabama, except the queers, liberal fags, blacks [when the yanks ain't lookin'], and… yeah pretty much anyone who ain't southern baptist.
29th May 2009 at 6:52 pm | permalink |I'm still confused as to how it was even allowed to be put up for vote in the first place.
It's a subject in which the government should have absolutely no authority.
Everything should be a civil union, in the eyes of the state.
If the respective religions of the people of that state or nation, sees it as "marriage" or "blood bonding" or whatever the fuck they want… that should have nothing to do with it.
In the eyes of the government, any coupling should be a civil union.
Other than that… as much as I dislike what has happened in calif, it's still a state with a lot of potential. (and as much as I hate to admit it… the governator (watch his digg interview), seems mindboggingly earnest… and highy intelligent (watch his reply on legalizing marijuana… he never said he was for it, and yet kept knocking in how much revenue it would give…))
./Your skill in drunken posting has increased by 0.01.
30th May 2009 at 3:04 am | permalink |Y'know, I'm the native born Californian son of native born Californian parents, yet due in no small part to over crowding, I live in rural Georgia. My home state wouldn't be overcrowded if the other 49 states would keep there nutcases.
30th May 2009 at 9:55 am | permalink |I don't like the cultural practices of "holier than thou 'Real American' Alaskans", but I'm not condemning your entire state.
Luckily for the rest of America, California (lawns, golf courses, and fucking PALM TREES aside)provides fully 40% of our country's produce & over 10% of the entire nation's agricultural output.
I fully agree that disallowing gays the same rights as heterosexuals is wrong. Perhaps the state's supreme court dropped the ball here, without doing a lick of research, I'd be willing to bet the supreme court of Alaska has dropped some pretty serious balls themselves.
At the time of the "One minute they tell everyone that same-sex marriage is a constitutional right" decision, there was no law, voted on by a majority of the electorate, in place to refute that decision. With the passing of the ill conceived Prop 8, that condition changed.
It is my hope that a continuation of the American process, that has served us fairly well for over 200 years, will result in the reversal of this, IMHO, unfair condition.
It is my fear that the cannibalistic division of America by the extremist on both the right & the left, will bring the afore mentioned American process to a complete standstill. we are almost at that point now.
It is only thru compromise that consensus can be reached in a society as diverse as ours. But when each side adopts the stand that ONLY their opinion has merit, and that of the other side is simply fodder for ridicule & insult, no compromise is possible.
I personally have no issue with allowing gay marriage. However, since many heterosexuals feel somehow threatened by the concept, I don't understand gays refusal to consider the alternative option of civil unions. It seems little more than semantics to me.
I must admit I am happy for anything that damages my home state's reputation as "a liberal hippie wacko state". Although most of the country appears to judge us by the antics of a small group of folks in a little town called Hollywood, the truth is that by and large Californians are truly a conservative bunch (not my favorite, but, remember a guy named Reagan?). I don't mean the neo-conservativeness du jour, but true conservation; environmental protection, fiscal restraint (as evidence the electorates recent refusal of Arnold's more debt policies)and belief in a live & let live interpretation of our constitution (the present gay marriage fiasco notwithstanding). At the same time we don't think that liberal (the base of which is after all liberty) is a dirty word.
And in truth "when you get down to it, a "right" is only actually a "right" " so long as a majority approves of it. That is, after all, what the experiment of America is all about.
I know I've been more than a little defensive in this post, my home state receives a lot of shit from the rest of the country (and yet people keep flocking there, over 11% of the nation's population). I apologize for that. But the deeper point I want to make is that we must, if the nation we all love is to survive, stop taking stands that leave no room for compromise.
In the midst of all the flames to follow, can I get an Amen?
@Adam S.: Oh, yes. In all fairness, California is way ahead of a lot of states about a lot of things … emissions standards, anyone? But yeah, why the fuck would you put it up for a vote anyhow? I guess CA has a hugely wide latitude for voter amendment of the state constitution. For better or for worse. hehe
@Zef: I completely agree about the civil union thing. But imagine the Xtians wailing about godless satanic atheists taking over the country! OMG WE'RE ALL GOING TO HELL!!!11!!!!1
Separation of church and state? What's that?
@Zeke: Yeah, CA ain't all evil. I like to use a little rhetorical device called hyperbole sometimes. ;-) However, I seem to recall housing prices in Oregon heading through the damn roof, before I moved 10 years ago, mostly due to Californians migrating northwards. So you're not alone in your interstate immigration problems.
And the idea that a "right" is only a right if the majority agrees? Total bullshit. Perhaps you've heard the phrase "tyranny of the majority"? The concept was referred to frequently in the Federalist Papers, and is the reason for having two Senators per state, regardless of population, in the Federal legislature.
Majority rule is absolutely NOT the basis of the "experiment of America." The US is a republic, NOT a democracy. If it were a true democracy, based on majority rule, we wouldn't need to bother with Congress or Supreme Courts at all … everything could be decided by a national popular vote.
As for why gays aren't satisfied with civil unions? Look up the phrase "separate but equal", particularly in regards to landmark Supreme Court decisions.
Sure, if the US went with Zef's idea of EVERYONE getting civil unions, and religious "marriage" being between two people and their church, that'd be great. But having "marriage" for some people and "civil unions" for others? That's like having separate water fountains for blacks and whites. Even if the two fountains are of equal quality and cleanliness, it's still a slap in the face.
30th May 2009 at 1:35 pm | permalink |Actually we are both a democracy & a republic. And whether the majority is a popular majority or a majority of our representatives, it is still the law of the land, unless our judiciary branch, in place as a protection against the "tyranny of the majority", rules that law as unconstitutional.
2nd June 2009 at 6:20 pm | permalink |I hope that is the outcome of proposition 8.
But your argument that compromise is impossible on this issue because "it's still a slap in the face" is just another example of one side or the other taking stands that leave no room for compromise.
@Zeke: Democratic Republic, if you want to nitpick. ;-) A pure democracy and a republic are incompatible.
One wonders what history would look like if "compromise" were the rule for civil rights issues? Separate but Equal would still be the law for blacks in the South. Perhaps women would only be allowed to vote IF the individual state they lived in passed a resolution saying so? Anti-discrimination laws wouldn't exist in anything resembling their current strength… Hell, interracial couples would probably be limited to civil unions in more than one state.
Nope, sorry. Civil rights have no room for compromise, IMO. I suspect you'd feel the same if you were ever thrown in jail for sitting at the front of a city bus, or even if you were told that your particular relationship partner meant you weren't allowed to get married.
2nd June 2009 at 11:38 pm | permalink |If you don't give gay civil unions the same legal rights as hetero marriages, you're discriminating. The moment you make the rights bestowed equal, the only thing that separates them is the religious aspect. Any law that says marriage is restricted to hetero couples is therefore saying "this religion's interpretation of marriage is the right one, and too bad if you don't agree", which would be a violation of a little thing called the First Amendment.
There is no compromise. It's discrimination or it's not, there is not middle ground.
3rd June 2009 at 1:30 am | permalink |In a right thinking state/nation religous marriage shouldn't be recognised at all. Any union between two people would be a civil union, no matter what the composition of said couple.
That means no tax breaks unless a civil union has been declared and so on.
5th June 2009 at 2:41 pm | permalink |@ian: I've been saying that since gay marriage was first mentioned as an issue. :-) Civil unions for any two adults who want to legally bind themselves together, and leave the "marriage" for the churches.
5th June 2009 at 5:18 pm | permalink |Utopian ideals of the perfect society are great for conversation. But in the real world; wealth is not shared, war is not extinct & your average joe is not unbiased. In the real world, only compromise works.
7th June 2009 at 6:06 am | permalink |@alphabitch- You wonder "what history would look like if "compromise" were the rule for civil rights issues?"???? Compromise over the course of 200 years, and still on-going, is what has allowed the changes from a country that valued slaves as 2/5ths of a person thru the compromises of the 13th 14th & 15th amendments to the compromise of separate but equal and the continuing compromises of the civil rights act of 1964, which required the compromise of being passed under the commerce clause, now that's what I call a "slap in the faces of blacks".
So get off your high horses and do a little horse tradin' to move things in a positive direction, if the moves must be incremental to succeed, then make the compromise and set to the battle for the next step forward. Maybe in this manner someday we savages can truly become civilized.
By the way, I fucking love the video!
@Zeke: Well, given that gays already have the right to vote, are already counted as 1/1 person in the Census, can attend integrated public schools & even get to sit anywhere they like to on public transportation, there really isn't much progress left to be made there … except, y'know, letting 'em get married if they want to.
If Alabama voted to ban interracial marriage, but allow mixed-race couples to have civil unions, would you be arguing that was a reasonable compromise?
9th June 2009 at 2:54 pm | permalink |(Now someone from Alabama is probably going to show up and try to tear me a new one … hehe)
9th June 2009 at 3:08 pm | permalink |They have the internet there? *cough*
9th June 2009 at 8:48 pm | permalink |@grimbles: I'm pretty sure they do in the big cities. ;-)
10th June 2009 at 12:21 am | permalink |@Zeke – you are of course correct and when it comes to realities then pragmatism is always a good policy, however you need to have the vision to see what the goals are in order to work towards them.
10th June 2009 at 4:10 pm | permalink |