Like most California voters I know personally (and 48% of the entire state, actually) I am ecstatic over Barack Obama’s win, but deeply troubled by Tuesday’s outcome on Proposition 8. Prop. 8, which narrowly passed with 52% of the vote, will add a provision to the state constitution clarifying that marriage is only valid and recognized in California if it is “between a man and a woman.”
I rejoiced at the court’s decision to allow same-sex weddings last May as gays and lesbians across the state posed in tuxedos and white gowns, but now it looks like I’ll eventually be attending some weddings in Canada if this provision isn’t challenged.
I can think of a few reasons the ban should not have passed but did:
- Church-funded initiatives to get out the vote in favor of Prop. 8 framed the issue in terms of legitimizing homosexuality as an identity and practice, rather than an issue simply of whether same sex couples should have the same rights afforded to heterosexual couples.
- This election saw a huge number of new voters turning out for Obama, and several voter misinformation campaigns tried to take advantage of them and the confusing language of Prop. 8.
- This is a stereotype but this time we did see a much larger black and hispanic turnout than in recent past elections.
Last week I read Lawrence v. Texas (2003), the landmark Supreme Court case that made all state sodomy laws unconstitutional, for my gender studies class. We talked about how there were two possible arguments against laws criminilizing sodomy: the right to privacy and equal protection for heterosexual and same-sex couples. But the court’s opinion only discusses the right to privacy, which means there is no precedent for granting the same rights to heterosexual and homosexual couples.
Though it is still unclear what will happen at the level of the state courts in California, I am pessimistic about whether gay marriage—which was also banned in Arizona and Florida, though neither state ever issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples in the first place—will ever make it to the Supreme Court.
According to an LA Times article published today, opponents of the gay marriage ban may have a case at the state level if they can argue that the constitution’s change"substantially alter the basic governmental framework,” and therefore is a revision that must be passed by two-thirds of the state legislature.
Complicating the issue further are the 18,000 marriage licenses the state has issued to same sex couples since last summer.
Tthe article’s author, Goodwin Liu also addresses a good question I have heard people indifferent to the ban pose: “Why does it matter whether gay couples remain married in a post-Proposition 8 world? One answer has to do with the dignity and stature that marriage confers. Even if marriage provides no greater rights than domestic partnership, a separate-but-equal regime unavoidably signals that same-sex relationships are of lesser worth.
Another answer has to do with the future of gay marriage writ large. Gay marriage is in the cross-hairs of a culture war, and culture wars, both sides know, are won through symbols, examples and personal experiences.”
Thirty years ago, homosexuality was a diagnosable mental disease in the DSM. If this crucial shift in the psychological community and political arena is indicative of a slowly sweeping cultural change, then maybe the gay marriage ban is just a cultural blip on the path to full legitimization, the dying cries of vociferous but transient majority.
As a registered California voter, I’m keeping my eye on this issue.
UPDATE: My favorite memory from the Prop. 8 Protest in downtown Chicago last Saturday:
Tall Man: I can see some anti-gay marriage protestors over there.
Woman: Oh no! Are there very many?
Man: I don't think so; their sign says there's just one man and one woman.
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