5/23/2008

Vignettes of equality

As you've probably seen in the news, the California Supreme Court overturned a voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage as unconstitutional in California.

It was pretty energizing to hear San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom on the radio the day of the announcement, speaking at an impromptu rally at City Hall.

Today I heard George Takei, who played Sulu on the original Star Trek, on the Stephanie Miller radio show, talk about his wedding plans with his partner of over 20 years. They'll be getting married at the Japanese American museum and cultural center in Los Angeles.

When I first moved to New York City in 1989, I read the Village Voice regularly. There were still a couple of sexual revolutionaries writing for the paper then, and they saw marriage as bourgeois and counterrevolutionary, whether straight or gay. Interesting how things have changed for many gays and lesbians, who just want to have their committed relationships recognized on an equal basis with straight couples. (And let's put in a good word for transgendered people to get married, too. We need a gender matrix, not just a gender spectrum, don't you think?)

San Francisco Meeting has recognized same-sex marriage since 1971. Yet, from what I understand, we've never taken a same-sex marriage under our care. Perhaps now is the time.

4 comments:

Dan Morehead said...

Thanks for this...

Anonymous said...

Ooh gender matrix. That is new to me. I wonder what other concepts are matrices that currently are treated as linear?

I think my brain just exploded. Ouch.

cubbie said...

someone once described gender as putting two dots on a wall and throwing darts at them.

but the quote i really wanted to share is i was talking to someone from our meeting a couple of weeks ago and he said, "my friend and his girlfriend" and then he paused and said, "no one wants to get married anymore... except gay people."

it's funny because most of the queers i know are pretty anti-marriage (i go back and forth myself)-- but i think most of us have agreed that whether we want a potentially screwed up institution for ourselves or not, being denied it is blatantly unfair.

thanks for sharing.

Liz Opp said...

For what it's worth, here's a link that has a list of many (but not all) of the marriage minutes approved by monthly meetings (229 of 'em), most of them in the U.S.

Blessings,
Liz Opp, The Good Raised Up