In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Don’t Divorce Us

Cara

Though I really wasn’t expecting to . . . just like Melissa, I cried like a baby:


(Music is the only audio in the video, and helps but is unnecessary to viewing.)

The faces of real people whose lives could easily be changed are more than enough to get one crying.  But thinking about how I would feel in a similar circumstance, where someone else gets to decide the status of my relationship to my husband — and interestingly, also like Melissa, my husband immigrated to this country to be with me and so I do know something about what that kind of fear is like — well.  It really does just confound me that anyone thinks some of us deserve more rights than others.

Sign the letter to the Supreme Court, asking them to invalidate Prop 8. Do it now.

20 thoughts on Don’t Divorce Us

  1. Regina Spektor + Adorable couples pleading for their marriages to be recognized = me bawling in a corner.

  4. I snuffled a lot.

    I would really like to see some anti-marriage-equality type come up with a response to this video that doesn’t absolutely reek of moralizing lunacy and completely disregard for others. Go on, I dare you, Huckabee or whoever wants to pretend to be a “compassionate conservative” with political views that aren’t just read straight out of the Bible but are intelligible as real political discourse. I wanna see what you think should happen to all these families.

  6. There’s nothing saying you can’t, Roov. I signed it, and I’m not in CA. They ask for zip code, so I imagine that they can easily filter us out if they don’t want/can’t use our signatures.

  7. Good point. Cool–they’re welcome to filter me out if they need to, and at least I’ll be on the record.

  8. Here’s one that doesn’t shriek of moralizing,Isaac Asimov once wrote re’ Harlan Ellison’s ,”I Have No Mouth,but I Must Scream,” that it was ‘all emotion and no thought’.Does that strike anyone on this site as hysterical?
    ANd,yes,Some of my best friends are still Liberal Arts Majors

  9. I’m from Australia, so I can’t sign. Our government is in the damn stone age anyway, so marriage is a lofty dream for most of us GLBTetc folk. We’re fighting for it, but there’s a long way to go.

    Keep fighting, man. This damn video made me cry. (As did hearing Andrea Gibson read out “I Do” for the first time.)

  10. I saw this, and I’m not a crier, but damn… I broke down and tears ran.

    So I was thinking… I’m posting it to my facebook profile. I think anyone who bothers with fb should. People (including fb friends who are rather closed-minded) would have to be made of stone to not see the happiness and love these people share. So I’m hoping a few of my conservative friends and relatives are curious enough to watch the video when it pops up in their fb feed. Maybe, just maybe, some will be moved. Maybe it’ll make them think. I think it might be worth a shot.

    I only bother to suggest this because I was watching it, and thinking, “God, that’s moving… but who’s watching this? Is this only going to end up preaching to the choir?” And so I suggest we put it into wider circulation via facebook. Just a thought 🙂

  12. Some day people are going to look back on this and won’t believe what small-minded bigots we were at this time. I just hope this time comes sooner rather than later.

  13. I didn’t think I was going to cry either, but about half way through I lost it. It just makes me so angry that these people have to beg and fight for basic human rights. I put it on my facebook page too. Here’s hoping someone will look and realize what a travesty this is.

  14. I’m from Australia, so I can’t sign.

    It let me enter a UK postcode rather than a ZIP Code, so you might be able to.

  15. I made it all of 5 seconds in before the crying started. Touching video but heartbreaking that this type of thing is still an issue.

  16. Here’s one that doesn’t shriek of moralizing,Isaac Asimov once wrote re’ Harlan Ellison’s ,”I Have No Mouth,but I Must Scream,” that it was ‘all emotion and no thought’.Does that strike anyone on this site as hysterical?

    You know, Corwin, I always wonder about someone who criticizes an argument because it was “all emotion and no thought.” That trope works really well when you’re talking about something objective, but its pretty much just a steaming load of horseshit when you’re talking about things that don’t involve numbers or absolute Truth (provided you believe such a thing even exists). Its comforting to believe that we can all sit down as rational beings and have a nice, reasoned discussion about all the issues of the day until we’ve come to an understanding. Its nice to believe that people who have an emotional response to an issue and don’t have the good sense to cover it up are hysterical (read: feminnized/irrational/illogical/unworthy). The problem is that sometimes words aren’t worth the breath.

    What we’re talking about is a discussion of emotion. Its a discussion of subjective things. It is a discussion of who society will allow the term “family” to apply to. This isn’t something for careful thought, this isn’t something where impartial parties can hammer out a compromise over a nice cup of tea. On one side of the discussion are people who want that little girl (and hundreds of thousands of other family members like her) to be able to have what anyone else would have if their loved ones hadn’t had the audacity to love someone with the wrong genitals. On the other side are a horde of moralist bigots with a history of oppression, hate, and murder who think two men kissing is either gross or a violation of the laws of their (lets face it, wholly illogical) god. Fuck thought. Give me emotion and a goddamn book of matches.

  17. Pingback: True love conquers all « NOT MY GAL

  18. And another non hysterical comment.
    First,one supposes people writing petitions to the court asking for the invalidation of something passed by a popular vote would understand the voting side that garnered the most votes won the actual petition (vote)Secondly,by it’s very nature ,the court is supposed to be shielded from popular pressure.(And an amicus curiae is what the authors are proposing.)
    Please comment on that in your usual highly intellectual manner WA(16)

    AndWA-as someone who was on the admission committee of a semi prestigious(non Ivy) professional school,I have some exposure to ‘unfairness”.Society has mandated academic institutions take certain groups with lesser standards(grades,standardized tests,etc )than others.
    Do you:1) approve of this?
    2)Feel society has the right to do so?
    30Care to comment on how long this should continue?
    Just so you have a little more info,half-as in one of two for you math challenged- of the African American 3rd years fail boards part I.Thoughts?
    And I’m not asking for Quantum Electro Dynamics-simply tell me why one would write a petition in this situation.

  19. I see you’ve brought your usual mix of unsupported condescension, narcissism, poor grammar, and non sequitur, Corwin. I know you’re too busy to bother with such plebeian chores as composition and proof-reading, so I’ll do my best to piece together what you meant.

    If you’d like to talk about the mechanics of voting, we can do that. The actual “vote” in California wasn’t nearly as clean as you’d like to imagine. First of all you had a religious organization pouring money and engaging in deliberate deceit regarding the proposition. Second, there had already been several rounds of voting on the legislative level (you know, that first layer of defense against mob rule) on the same issue. Then there was a court case. Before that were a number of highly popular local decisions. Further complicating matters is the fact that the proposition had a very regional breakdown of support. Perhaps more importantly, the will of the people shouldn’t matter at all as what we’re discussing is a matter of civil rights. The mob doesn’t get to abuse the minority just because it has superior numbers.

    Now I know, the court is supposed to be insulated from popular opinion (Scalia has made his feelings on people petitioning the court abundantly clear) but it takes a certain disconnection from the reality on the ground to really believe that. The courts have never really been insulated. They are staffed by men and women who live in the community, who have bias and prejudice and personal conscience, who watch the news and read newspapers, who sometimes listen to their clerks, who sometimes care about how history will remember them. No one wants to be remembered as the justice who took a principled stand to support a civil rights abuse on the order of Dred Scott. So yeah, the courts are supposed to be insulated, but only a fool would believe thats actually the case.

    As for the second half of your post, I’m not really sure what your race baiting is aimed at. What is the connection you’re trying to draw between gay marriage and affirmative action? Why is the success (or failure) of law students at all salient to the discussion? I’m sure theres an insinuation you’re trying to make there, but from where I sit it just looks like you’re trying to defend outright discrimination by whining about your privilege being checked elsewhere.

    Finally, some of us know that petitioning the court won’t do shit. Some of us know that the supreme court isn’t going to represent our interests. Some of us know that the whole charade is a waste of time. But we smile and follow along anyway for the sake of due diligence. We fight because we know that even if we lose the case we win the war by garnering sympathy. We build support with every outraged citizen who can’t believe that little girl in the video isn’t allowed to have a normal family. We endure, we hope, we wait for the elderly people who disproportionately supported prop 8 to die, we gain allies, and if push comes to shove we repeat Stonewall.

Comments are currently closed.