Pat Gozemba“Religion is far more of a choice than homosexuality,” quipped Jon Stewart to Governor Mike Huckabee on the December 9th Daily Show. Let’s remember that line. It stopped the erstwhile evangelical presidential candidate, Huckabee of Arkansas, cold.

And while I’m on Arkansas, let’s remember Arkansas is the state where voters just supported a ban on allowing unmarried (read LGBT) couples from adopting children or even becoming foster parents. Huckabee supported that ban and he continues to call homosexuality a choice. And his logic goes: if it’s a choice, it can be un-chosen.

Appropriately, Stewart asked the governor, “At what age did you choose not to be gay?” The governor had no answer. Stewart chided him, “You’re not being asked to marry a guy.” Huckabee’s response, a big old “aw shucks” smile.

Pushing his new book, “Do the Right Thing” (couldn’t Huckabee do the right thing himself and think up a new title instead of stealing Spike Lee’s), the very righteous governor trotted out the old canards against marriage equality. He recited the litany: anatomically gay couples are unfit to procreate, 5,000 years of recorded human history (back to the Old Testament) says marriage is between a man and a woman, and now 30 states have voted that marriage is one man and one woman. (Stewart pointed out that in 30 states more folks voted for McCain than Huckabee).  

Stewart knows his stuff. He came back at the Old Testament’s moral authority by noting its support of polygamy and slavery. He pointed out that marriage wasn’t a sacrament until the Twelfth Century and that for a long time it was nothing more than a property arrangement. He wondered if Huckabee had thought about the prohibition of people of different races marrying. Huckabee just smiled, preparing to recite his next inane objection to marriage equality: the definition of marriage.

How could society change the definition of marriage, Huckabee wondered incredulously? Stewart had just pointed out that throughout history, the definition has changed many times. Non-sequiturs are standard operating procedure for the religious right. “They’re asking people to redefine the word,” Huckabee blustered. “They have a lot of work to do to convince . . . the American people.”

At his point, Stewart rose to eloquence on the self-righteous posturing about the semantic absolutism of the definition of marriage. “It’s a travesty that people have forced someone who is gay to have to make their case that they deserve the same basic rights as someone else. It seems like semantics is cold comfort . . ..”  

In essence, Huckabee wants us to know: You’re a same-sex couple. You don’t fit the definition. Sorry, that’s the definition and the definition cannot change. Stewart’s forthrightness in arguing the case of marriage equality to an evangelical absolutist is an excellent primer for all of us who still have to argue for our civil right to marriage. And besides, he does it with such good humor. Take a look:

 

(Tip of the hat to Cathy Burack for sending the link to Stewart on YouTube)

 

Unfortunately, for the LGBT community, voters who went to the polls in record numbers on Tuesday, voted their fears on the issues that matter to us most—respect for our families. We lost votes on marriage equality in three states: California, Florida and Arizona. And in Arkansas, voters banned unmarried couples from serving as foster or adoptive parents. This measure, clearly aimed at gay families, is perhaps the most damaging of this year’s initiatives in that it so blatantly carries the message that gay people are harmful to children.

Continue reading at Beacon Broadside.

by Pat Gozemba

Rep. Byron Rushing (D-Boston) first alerted me that the 1913 law prohibiting out-of-state gay and lesbian couples from getting married in Massachusetts would soon be history. Rushing the great African American leader of all civil rights causes in our state was out in front of even the gay movement in announcing impending justice.

Just as the Peabody Essex Museum June 26^th panel on same-sex marriage was about to close, Rushing pleaded for one more word. He urged members of the audience to call their legislators and ask them to support the repeal of the outdated racist law that had its origins in preventing out of state inter-racial couples from coming to the Bay State to marry. “Mark my words, we can do away with that law before the end of this legislative session. Call your legislators.”

As the panelist sitting closest to him, I blurted out, “Really?” He smiled.

Sixteen days later, it fell to the lone Black member of the Senate, Sen. Diane Wilkerson (D-Boston), to lead that body in taking the first step to repeal the law. With a unanimous voice vote on July 12, 2008, the Senate began the process of dismantling the racist law. Wilkerson told The Boston Globe that the law’s racial history makes her proud to back the repeal. “This is one of the most pernicious statutes on our books. This bill puts the final nail in the coffin of those dark days.”

A skilled orator, Wilkerson, during the 2004 Massachusetts constitutional convention debates over whether the legislature should undo the Goodridge decision, gave one of the most searing rebukes to those legislators wavering on the issue of equality. Recalling her upbringing in Arkansas during Jim Crow, she declared, “I know first hand that world of almost being equal, I could not in good conscience ever vote to send anyone to that place from where my family fled.”

If history is prologue, it will probably fall to Rushing to steer the bill through the Massachusetts House. The cause of justice could not be in better hands.

The truly “final nail in the coffin of those dark days,” will be the signature of African American Governor Deval Patrick on the repeal.

The authors see the appropriateness of bringing their struggle to Arkansas the scene of such heroic struggle 50 years ago at Little Rock High School.

In 2004 Arkansas voters amended their constitution to prohibit marriage equality by a 3 to 1 margin. Now the Little Rock-based Family Council that spear-headed the constitutional amendment is at it again. They are working to get on the ballot for 2008 an initiative that would ban unmarried couples from adopting or fostering children. (That’s gay and lesbians–especially.)

The first draft of the Family Council initiative was rejected by the state attorney general  as too partisan for inclusion on a ballot. According to Laura Kellams of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, the Family Council wanted to include on the ballot a statement that “referred to marriage as the ideal child-rearing environment and to ‘cohabiting’ households as more prone to instability, poverty, and other societal ills.”

Jerry Cox president of the Family Council wanted that language on the ballot but will do what he needs to do to get the attorney general to approve the initiative–including toning down the initial language.

This current initiative would not be a constitutional amendment but it would become state law if passed by the voters. It would take a two-thirds majority of the legislature to remove the law.

Currently lesbians and gays are tacitly excluded from fostering or adopting children. Opponents to equality are looking to lock in that inequality.

The University of Arkansas has sexual orientation as a protected class in its Affirmative Action program. Their are no benefits for LGBT people and their significant others. Arkansas is still on the civil rights frontier. More