I just moved from Georgia to California and was hoping to enjoy my “Blue State” but it has turned a little more 'red' overnight! I'm thrilled over Obama – but the Prop 8 news was very bitter.

I do wonder where/when the rights of the individual are upheld over the consensus of the majority? What annoys me is everyone equates gays as non-religious heathens. I DO believe in God and I believe I have a God given right to marry whom I choose. However, the Majority’s God seems to be able to trump my God? I thought I had the right to practice religion freely? If it isn’t hurting anyone – why should it not be allowed?

I liked the comment above about how EVERYONE should need a civil union and could then have personal religious unions if so desired. Gay persons may have a religious union belief as well. I think the “marriage certificate” from a church or religious group should only apply to the religious teachings and bearings within that specific faith. Religious congregations should not be forced to marry any individuals they can’t in good conscience bless. But the legal rights should come from the government and be completely separate from religious rituals and rights within the faith.

“Marriage” has been blurred too much with religion in the United States. Why can’t the states & schools simply state: “Marriage is the union of two people.” You don’t have to put religion/sex/sexuality into the mix.
I think many people have gotten lazy in rearing their children and think it is the states responsibility to teach their own religious views? If your child is at a state public school – they should be offered the traditional secular instruction. Example – If you as a family don’t believe in evolution – you should instruct your children that although the ‘world’ believes in evolution – that we as a family do not. To navigate in the world and be successful, the kids need to ‘know’ about it, even if they do not personally believe in evolution.

The most bitter part of Prop 8 for me is that I was raised Mormon. I know families are important to them – but how does gay marriage lesson what they personally hold dear? Are you not going to be as good of a husband or wife if I am suddenly allowed to marry? Are you going to be any less of a parent? It is absurd! As my brother stated earlier today – divorce is a much bigger issue and they don’t seem to be spending millions of dollars on the problem of broken homes and families?

Additionally, I think it is completely SHAMEFUL of the Mormon Church to point the finger when in their early history they practiced non-traditional marital polygamy? Additionally, the Christian Bible has several instances where “God” condoned polygamy. Yet the Christian Majority was able to force the Mormon minority to give up “polygamy” if they wanted Utah to become a member of the United States.

I was taught in school what monogamy and polygamy terms meant. Strange it was all OK if the guy is having sex with multiple women (polygyny) simultaneously – or a woman with more than one husband (polyandry) – but the gates of hell are going to open if we make even mention of homosexual marriage? Can’t we agree at what age our children can be taught certain topics or terms? If the kids are young and the topic comes up – send a note home to the parents to have a needed conversation with their child why there is a child with two mommies or parents of two races or no parents at all?

If the “majority” is allowed to plow the LGBT community out of the way – when does it suddenly turn on the rest of society? Maybe marriage can only be officiated by a religious entity – atheists could not get married. Or maybe you can only get married if your church has a following of 1 million followers or more? Or maybe you can only get married by a Catholic priest or in a Mormon Temple? Or maybe Hindu or Muslims are not allowed to marry since they are not Christian? Do I have to form the GAY RELIGION and how many people must be members before I’m able to be taken seriously that my God says I can marry another man? Then go to the Supreme Court and say my religion says I can marry another man and my Constitutional rights are being violated to practice my religion! I know I have a lot of existing ‘practitioners’ – I’d just have to get them to all come out to church once a week!

I am sick of the fanatics of all the religions imposing their views and beliefs upon everyone who doesn’t believe exactly like themselves.

I love my country. It grieves me my country often appears to hate me. It saddens me many of my friends have had to immigrate to Canada or other countries to marry and live because one of them were not a U.S. citizen and could not remain in the U.S.A. as a gay couple. I know the religious zealots would love it if all gays left – but should I have to leave my country, family and friends to have the freedom to exist and love whom I choose? Doesn’t this sound vaguely familiar to the reason why the Pilgrims came here in the first place?
I just want to live. Be with my mate. Pay my taxes. Go or not go to church. Be a good citizen and leave the world a lot better than when I was born.

Sorry to vent and hope I wasn’t too preachy! Can’t wait for further discussion!

On children, we don't teach heterosexuality so I certainly don't want homosexuality taught. Kids tend to naturally accept and use the language of “two daddies” or “two mommies” when they see same sex couples. And when they do it's the parents who freak out at it. Those kids are not thinking sex. They are thinking couples. It is the parents who are thinking sex and the religious right and social conservatives who literally insist on keeping the word sex in the discussion. Remember the LOL story of their auto-replacing the word “gay” with “homosexual.” I know of no one who wants gay sex taught in schools.

We do have a societal interest in addressing these issues in public schools because we want to provide a safe environment to educate our kids. And we know that gay kids tend to get beat up! It was suggested above that gay people could move to get marriage rights. I guess we could divvy up the country and evangelicals could more too. I am obviously biased but inclined to think that if gay marriage had passed we'd find our way to a negotiated tolerance that might even lead to mutual acceptance.

On the comparison of same sex marriage to miscegenation… In his excellent book, The Race Card: How Bluffing About Bias Makes Race Relations Worse, Richard Thompson Ford argues that “in the 1960s when the Lovings challenged Virginia’s antimiscegenation law, they weren’t just “making a symbolic political statement.” They were fighting a one-year jail term, suspended on the condition that they would not return to the state. So, apparently, gays aren't suffering enough for the fight for marriage rights to be legitimate.

He goes on to argue that marriage “is one of the few social institutions left that unapologetically divides the sexes into distinctive roles… Maybe this desire for stable sex roles is itself a type of prejudice: radical feminists have written volumes arguing as much. But it isn’t homophobia.” In my post on this topic, I argue it is.

In the California battle, as in the whole election season, there were actions on both sides that I didn't like or link to. The last anti-Prop 8 ad that made the blog rounds was not pointed to by me. These messages are designed to play on our fears. It's far easier to scare us and reduce us to our base instincts than it is to try to raise us up to a reasoned discussion. We need leaders who at least try raise us up to that discussion rather than those who feed off our base instincts and fears.

that last post of mine, and the previous couple, were around the teaching of homosexuality in schools, not gay marriage itself.

I'm not sure what that means, so I'll take it off the table for now.

It is my main problem with the gay marriage movement, in fact. I support civil unions, but I do not support gay marriage, simply because I do see the latter as as forcing the majority of Americans to accept something that is morally unsound to them.

Too bad for them. Equality does not require acceptance, it requires legal protection. No one is forcing anyone to “accept” anything, only to recognize it legally.

Society does define norms, and also does need to tolerate those outside those norms (within logical reason, of course). But tolerate is not equivalent to legitimize.

And our society once thought that black people weren't normal. So what?

Tolerating may not be the same as legitimizing, but equality requires legitimization even if it doesn't require toleration. Ask the people who protested the integration of schools about that one.

It is my main problem with the gay marriage movement, in fact. I support civil unions, but I do not support gay marriage, simply because I do see the latter as as forcing the majority of Americans to accept something that is morally unsound to them.

Society does define norms, and also does need to tolerate those outside those norms (within logical reason, of course). But tolerate is not equivalent to legitimize. There are plenty of cases throughout history of societies that are tolerant and accepting of homosexuality, but very few that embrace it as the equal of heterosexual relationships or marriage.

They were only asking the topic not be brought up as age inappropriate. That is a reasonable request, but apparently, a concession that the public educational system was unwilling to make. And no, the Wirthins' position is not not teaching our children that homosexuals are bad as such, only that the behavior in which they engage is not one that our family condones. To place a young child in a tug-of-war of values between authority figures, i.e. a teacher and parent, is unconscionable. Apparently, a majority of the citizens of California agreed.

I'd like some more information on this. What age is the cutoff you propose? And if a child grows up under a married couple, then they are already being exposed to straight marriage. Is it inappropriate for children to see their own parents show affection for one another?

As for the tug of war, I say, “oh please.” Say our parents are staunch supporters of slavery or opponents of women's suffrage, should schools be expected to leave the Civil War and the Seneca Falls convention out of the curriculum?

“Nor do you have a right to impose your morals on those others.”

Then why do you hold the reverse to be a legitimate exercise of imposed morality?

You know that equivalence is false. No one is forcing you to enter into a same-sex marriage, no one is forcing you to legally preside over one. Same-sex marriage advocates merely want you to keep your illogical prejudices to yourself, and not create laws based on them.

“Nor do you have a right to impose your morals on those others.”

Then why do you hold the reverse to be a legitimate exercise of imposed morality?

Yes, the Constitution and its amendments were voted on by various bodies, but the process was much more laborious and required supermajorities. I'll concede I should have noted that.

Manchester2–

No concession for you. If you find it uncomfortable to explain to your children that your religious beliefs require you to discriminate against others, you are being hurt by no one but yourself. It's nothing but cowardice on your part. Schools don't indoctrinate- they educate. They inform the children that some people have different beliefs and that the law requires that those others be treated equally. The schools do not and cannot force the students to adopt any moral opinion about those others. You are simply afraid that your child will look you in the eye and ask you, “Why do we believe those people are bad?” You have no valid answer. Nor do you have a right to impose your morals on those others.

And sorry again for my imprecise language, I meant socially conservative in terms of this specific issue.

As long as supporters of gay marriage refuse to accept that it is more than just 'backwards, ignorant, religious nut-jobs' that oppose this, the longer it will take to make any additional progress

Maybe it will slow progress, maybe it wont. But I won't stop using appropriate labels, because people that oppose gay marriage are ignorant, backwards and often religious nut-jobs, at least regarding this issue.

I find it hard to characterize almost 52% of California as 'social conservatives', unless that definition is to mean 'those not as liberal as me'.

I tried to make the point before, and other are as well – many people, even many who otherwise consider themselves social liberals and progressives, nonetheless oppose gay marriage on ethical and moral (not just religious) grounds.

As long as supporters of gay marriage refuse to accept that it is more than just 'backwards, ignorant, religious nut-jobs) that oppose this, the longer it will take to make any additional progress. And as some gay activist leaders warned, using the courts to try and force the issue on the American public is backfiring.

There is a huge difference between Brown and Roe that cannot be denied.

Brown was well grounded in the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment (and was a much needed repudiation and reversal of the abhorrent ruling in Plessy v. Ferguson).

Roe created a new constitutional right whole cloth to meet a social objective, where none had existed before.

That is the reason one continues to be contentious to this day, while the other is utterly non-controversial.

Better yet, make everyone have a civil union, and those who see marriage as a sacred union between a man and a woman can have a religious and non-legal traditional marriage.

That's fine by me, in fact it makes more sense than having government involvement in what has traditionally been a religious construct.

As I understand from my reading today, what really tipped the scales on the approval of Prop. 8 was the argument that allowing gay marriage to stand would be condoning the indoctrination children in public schools re. the normalcy of gay marriage, regardless of the religious convictions of parents.

Well that's a weird/sad argument against it.

I suppose these social conservatives would rather their children grow up and be like Ahmadinejad who famously denied gay people existed in Iran.

Newsflash to these folks, if your kid is gay he or she will probably end up A) in a same-sex relationship, stripped of the rights you enjoy as a heterosexual, B) in a straight relationship that's marred by emotional problems or C) alone will feelings of guilt and shame over his or her sexual orientation.

I beg to differ on your idea that “it does not hurt anyone else.” As I understand from my reading today, what really tipped the scales on the approval of Prop. 8 was the argument that allowing gay marriage to stand would be condoning the indoctrination children in public schools re. the normalcy of gay marriage, regardless of the religious convictions of parents. As a parent of two, I resonated with the interview from Rob and Robin Wirthin and their nightmare experience in Massachusetts on this score. Not every parent can afford to pull their child from public school and enroll them in a private or religious school, particularly when school vouchers are blocked by the lobbying of the NEA.

If you will forgive a poor analogy, I vote no on any initiative promoting gambling, because I think gambling is wrong. Even if it creates jobs, or funds education, which I support,the moral issue trumps with me. ( I am not comparing homosexuality to gambling).

I think the issue can only result in one side or the other being deeply offended, unless there is a compromise. I believe civil unions are a great compromise, provided they give total equality under the law. Give equal rights to all, and let religious beliefs keep the title of marriage. Better yet, make everyone have a civil union, and those who see marriage as a sacred union between a man and a woman can have a religious and non-legal traditional marriage.

And I don't know the answer to your last question. I'd wager that none of them are the result of direct democracy.

Congressional acts are not a shortcut, even when they fly in the face of the will of the majority (see the Civil Rights Acts of the 60's as a great example). Of course, that requires politicians with the backbone to do what is right, even if it threatens their re-election possibilities. Those are few and very far between, unfortunately.

And to your point of civil unions and the few states that do allow gay marriage. How many of them have been accomplished by either legislative or direct democracy vs. court decisions?

I too am worried about the married couples I recently watched walk down the aisle, and in some cases signed as witness for, and their ability to remain married.

Some positives, at least here in California, with respect to this issue: 1) When California voted in 2000 to pass the law defining marriage as between a man and a woman, it won overwhelmingly, yes votes at 62%. Just 8 years later, there's been a 10% improvement, and this was knowing that, should the ban not pass, gay marriages would definitely continue. 2) Young people overwhelmingly voted “no” and old people overwhelmingly voted “yes”. The demographic is changing, and it's changing quickly. Out with the old, in with the new. 3) While I'm angry now that our Consititution can be changed by a simple majority vote, it does mean that in 4 years or 8 years when there is a true majority in California who believe in equality, it will only take a majority vote to pass another constitutional change that says that the definition of marriage as passed yesterday no longer stands.

Anyway, keep up the fight, this ain't over yet. That long arc of history pointing toward justice and equality cannot be stopped.

That doesn't mean the strategy can't be improved, but I don't know how to be honest. I think equality will come partly from the top down as well as from the bottom up. Maybe in 4 years a new ballot initiative will show up in California and gay marriage will be legalized? It's possible.

As for majority rule, in cases like these it makes me question my belief in direct democracy. Like everything else, it's murky. We simply can't have the majority of people impugning the rights of minorities, it's just wrong. But at the same time, the majority is usually in favor of doing so. We've had slavery, Jim Crow, Japanese internment, discrimination against Muslims and now this move to specifically hamper the rights of gays.

It may open the floodgates, or be a slippery slope or whatever metaphor you want to use, but sometime I think the courts or the President or Congress has to act in contradiction to the majority.
It certainly calls into question the wisdom of majority rule and all that. Then again, I suppose our founders realized the murkiness and the dangers of majority rule and set up our representative system accordingly.

I also think it's wrong t