Puppet show. (courtesy the beloved, with a touch of post-production by yrs truly)
Archive | May, 2008
13th of 20
At the lake. Not sure if the exposed diaper at the waistline has the same raw sex appeal as this same look but with the undies. Am hoping that by the time he’s marketing himself the whole pants-falling-off thing will be a shocking memory for us all.
11th of 20
Moms group toasts the marriage equality news.
Youbetcha, the moment the California Supreme Court handed down its decision to uphold the constitutionality of same-sex marriages, on the basis of the equal protection clause in the constitution, the battle to defend it began. (For more, see Christopher Lisotta’s piece in The Nation; likewise The Bilerico Project’s Karen Ocamb’s round-up last Thursday, for which I owe a hat tip to Dana at Mombian. Wikipedia’s page on the case is already updated on the matter.)
Still, we had to celebrate. After all, we’re all proud members of Our Family Coalition, on whose behalf the case was argued, alongside fifteen couples and Equality California.
I know I’ll get queasy this summer and fall, being bombarded with the anti-gay people [oops!] anti gay-marriage ads and arguments, reliving the bile and bigotry of eight years ago, only now with two of my own children listening in. And it’ll be a nail biter all the way up to November 4th.
I was talking with a staffer at Our Family last week, sussing out her take on the proposition’s prospects this fall. She was talking about how the whole thing will come down to a get out the vote effort, and usually the right wing has proven to be very motivated on this issue. (Huh? Catastrophic war a motivator? Staggering economy? Relation between the two? Might any of this be a motivator?) I would like to think that if they read any of these LGBT parent blogs, they’d have a hard time forgetting the images of obviously loving families they see writ all over them, and they’d keep flashing on their own kids, maybe, when they tried to justify why our families’ legal and fiscal instability should be inshrined in the state’s constitution. I’d like to think that.
But then Yensing uttered two phrases that made me feel just a tad better about the battle royal we’re facing: (1) presidential election year, and (2) Barack Obama candidacy. Who pulls in a ton of younger voters, a cohort notoriously pro-marriage equality and pro-LGBT civil rights? Obama. Who pulls in forward-thinking, open hearted ones of all ages? Obama. Whose campaign rhetoric is all about overcoming the divisive politics of the past? Obama. Whose candidacy is going to get more folks’ asses to the voting booth this fall than we’ve seen in a long time? Obama.
So. Obama, plus we are going to fight this one like hell. Start now by supporting Equality For All’s campaign against the anti-marriage equality initiative. This is predicted to be the most expensive LGBT civil rights battle the state has ever seen, and we’re going to need help.
Hope springs eternal.
[I know this was totally a post, not a maxi-caption. Even in my book. Just couldn't help it.]
[Later note: addenda in the comments. What can I say. It's a Big Issue.]
10th of 20
I think this occasion calls for flowers. (Window dressing, neighborhood florist’s.)
Extree, extree! CA Supremes say: Gay nupes a-okay!
The observant and widely blog-read will recognize none other than Sassa, of Accident of Hope fame, availing herself of the gravel pit. Today’s landmark court decision in favor of same-sex marriage was handed down smack dab in the middle of an inter-state lesbian parent blogger schmooze-fest. Auspicious, since Chicory got hitched here with her gal Klove, back that love-struck February, four years ago.
Now here, listen to what the highest court of the nation’s most populous state has to say:
. . . we conclude that, under this states Constitution, the constitutionally based right to marry properly must be understood to encompass the core set of basic substantive legal rights and attributes traditionally associated with marriage that are so integral to an individuals liberty and personal autonomy that they may not be eliminated or abrogated by the Legislature or by the electorate through the statutory initiative process. These core substantive rights include, most fundamentally, the opportunity of an individual to establish with the person with whom the individual has chosen to share his or her life an officially recognized and protected family possessing mutual rights and responsibilities and entitled to the same respect and dignity accorded a union traditionally designated as marriage. As past cases establish, the substantive right of two adults who share a loving relationship to join together to establish an officially recognized family of their own and, if the couple chooses, to raise children within that family constitutes a vitally important attribute of the fundamental interest in liberty and personal autonomy that the California Constitution secures to all persons for the benefit of both the individual and society.
Furthermore, in contrast to earlier times, our state now recognizes that an individuals capacity to establish a loving and long-term committed relationship with another person and responsibly to care for and raise children does not depend upon the individuals sexual orientation, and, more generally, that an individuals sexual orientation like a persons race or gender does not constitute a legitimate basis upon which to deny or withhold legal rights. We therefore conclude that in view of the substance and significance of the fundamental constitutional right to form a family relationship, the California Constitution properly must be interpreted to guarantee this basic civil right to all Californians, whether gay or heterosexual, and to same-sex couples as well as to opposite-sex couples.
- California Supreme Court Press Release
- National Center for Lesbian Rights Press Release
- National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Press Release
- The whole ruling here
9th of 20
Angel’s wings.
Psst. The California Supreme Court ruling on the Marriage Cases is supposed to be handed down today, in the vicinity of around 10am PST; watch the court’s web page for more details. (I got the skinny courtesy the nice folks over at Our Family Coalition, which happens also to be one of the entities being represented).
Voting open 'til Feb 19, 2012.
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