And ample illustration of why I (along with any other sane person in this state) might need regular, high doses of Mary Oliver, my children, and everything else that is holy, over the next week.  

This incident, captured by a woman at an intersection I’ve walked through countless times, since I was a girl:

The Face of Proposition 8 from Theremina on Vimeo.

An account of it is at the post’s page on Vimeo linked above, and at Lavendar Newswire here: “Yes On 8 Supporter Physically Attacks Observer; “Christians” Drop F-Bomb, Anti-Gay Slurs.” (26 Oct, 2008)

Highlights, especially helpful since a Yes on 8 enthusiast grabbed the camera phone and disabled it off mid-clip:

That’s when she attacked, clawing, grabbing and then shoving. I didn’t fight back; she was much bigger than me. Calling me a “nasty fucker” and threatening to kick my ass, she pried my phone out of my hand and tried to break it in half while her friends egged her on.

Please note that I never touched or threatened her in any way (unless you want to consider my pulling the edge of her sign out of eye-poking territory a threatening gesture).

…I stood there for another minute or two, checking the phone’s applications for damage. One of the other sign-wavers, a teenage boy standing nearby, leaned over and whispered “fuck you, dyke.”

Please also read this: “More Anti-Gay Violence from Yes n 8, This Time from Mormon Crowd. Time to Turn Out to Support, Protect Your Brothers & Sisters!”, posted earlier today (28 Oct, 2008):

My wife appeared with an “Ex-Mormon 4 Equality” sign and that fueled a personal attack that was verbal and in-your-face, literally 2-3 inches from her. It included prolonged screaming, taunting, name-calling and anti-gay hate speech including things like “you need to be f’d by a man.” That was one thing, but when they actually circled around her and began closing in physically (grabbing at her), she called for the police officer nearby.

…We spoke tonight with a woman who was in Hawaii during the election that determined their laws on same-sex marriage, and she relayed that the homophobia really escalated after same-sex marriage was defeated.

Evidentally, people didn’t feel so bad about keeping their comments to themselves anymore. Let’s not allow this to happen in CA.

And then More from the Oakland Front Lines (Mormons Gone Amok), later the same morning.

they really didn’t even understand the measure very well, they just Hated gay people. They would yell things like “Yes on 8 No HIV” “Yes on 8 I love women.”

So to top it all off, the police were there keeping order because most of the Yes on 8 people were young men and boys who were very very riled up. When the police left they started to approach us and it felt a little scary so I called 911 and asked them to come back. They reluctantly said ok and stated, “Ya no, we can’t baby-sit you all the time.”