I have some mixed feelings on the ruling by the California Supreme Court to uphold the voter approved ban on gay marriage. It would have been nice to see the law overturned- I think it is a bad law and bigoted.

Be that as it may, I didn’t feel comfortable with the idea of invalidating a vote of the people even if it is bigoted and went against my wishes as a gay man. The thing is, people voted on this issue. They heard all the sides and a majority voted…against gay marriage. Maybe I’m naive or maybe I’m not a good homosexual, but I believe the vote of the people have to be respected- even if I disagree with it. The most basic act in a democratic society is to be able to vote in an election. It was something that my ancestors were not able to do because of their color. And maybe it is because of that, I have a hard time basically telling voters that their vote doesn’t count because the vote was less than desirable by people like me.

One of the lines of arguments that comes from supporters of gay marriage is that an election should not be used when deciding on human rights. That might make some sense, but then should any voting body be used?

I want to see gay marriage legal in California. Heck, I want to see it everywhere. But I think in this case, gay marriage supporters are going have to go back to the drawing board and try to educate and legislate for change. That’s the way democracy works.