I am sad to say I have stopped giving money to HRC or anyone else fighting this fight, because their tactics and strategy continue to not only fail, but increase resistance. Of course there would be resistance anyway, but if we had paid attention to strategy rather than principles, we wouldn’t have 39 states that now specifically discriminate against same sex marriage. If we would stop talking about “marriage” and start talking about legal and financial rights, we would get a lot further.

I am also sick to death of the disorganization of our efforts. The Obama campaign was successful in large part because it was possibly the most organized Democratic (or any other) campaign ever. If we learn from that exampel we might someday be successful.

There’s a website for it: http://protest8.blogspot.com/.

Also there are a few comments on a post at the Protest 8 site wondering what the heck a protest would do (sway conservatives? ‘course not. bring about another vote in another 8 years? not the object.). Several commenters do a fine job of explaining the function of popular protest (indicate degree of strong opposition publicly. rally folks to keep up the fight.).

This never should have been up for a vote in the first place, so strong response to the outcome — to my mind — is part of a continued opposition to the protective function of the judiciary being circumvented by a majority vote (on the ballot due to paid signature gatherers, not due to grassroots sentiment), not just a sour grapes response to “the people’s will.”

We all full well know that if “the people” could vote at the time of Brown v. Board of Education, or Loving vs. State of VA, any other Black civil rights legal milestone, “the people” would have voted in exactly this way. It is one of the core narratives of civil rights movements, that the judiciary anticipates popular sentiment by a minimum of one, usually two decades plus.

I’m sure I will be able to intellectualize some other position, eventually, and in the meantime am just trying to keep my commitment to non-violence. Thank you to all out there who can bear with us for the moment, and who are willing to stand with us in through the long fight.