J. Beaman - The Magazine

Ok, I’m going to calm down now. Andrew Sullivan (although is addressing depression, not anger, we all know they’re cousins) is always making me feel a little bit better about the world.

I beg my gay brothers and sisters: do not let them drive you back to the “psychosis and depression” of the closet. No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. Know that your love is real; cherish it; hold your spouses closer; build your families; take care of your kids; live your dream.

What the Christianists want is to destroy your self-esteem and self-worth. It’s over the wounded souls of gay people that they construct their politics of fear and division. But we endured centuries of cruelty, and after our first taste of liberation, we faced a plague of devastating proportions. But we came back stronger than ever. For the sake of those who never dreamed we would ever see civil unions, for those who died of the plague, for those whose marriages through the ages were never recognized but were as real as any backed by law: fight on. Do not lose faith. Law never trumps love. And one day it will echo it.

And here.

The challenges to Prop 8 have already begun. More here. I’m not enthusiastic. I think, perhaps quixotically, that civil rights movements tend to gain real momentum when the victims of discrimination are publicly humiliated by majorities with power. How we react is very important. We need not to sue; we need to explain. We need to respond with self-confidence. And with charity. Remember King.

And Stephen Bainbridge throws out some esoteric lawyer shit, wondering if the whole thing is bogus.

There will inevitably be a court challenge and that’s when things will get interesting.

Issue # 1: Did Prop 8 amend or revise the Constitution? There are two modes of changing the California state constitution. First, there is an amendment. An amendment can be effected in either of two ways: (1) passage of an amendment by a 2/3 vote of each house of the state legislature or (2) by ballot initiative, as was the case with Prop 8. Second, there is a revision. In order to revise the California state constitution, the change must be approved by a 2/3 vote of each house of the legislature and thereafter approved by public referendum via a legislatively-initiated ballot proposition.

Prop 8 opponents made a pre-election challenge of the proposition’s placement on the ballot on precisely these grounds; namely, that Prop 8 is a revision rather than amendment and therefore can only be effected by the revision process, which required legislative initiation. The California supreme court simply decided not to decide that issue. Now it presumably will have to face it.

I hope so.

And to quote the warm and hopeful Sarah, “I’m inspired and amazed by obama’s win, but there IS a lot of work to be done. a hell of a lot of work. It’s gonna be hard, but i’m ready.”

I’m ready, too.