This is for all the assholes who voted yes to prop 8. You are petty and mean, hurtful, smallminded, selfish, and ignorant. You lack empathy, compassion, and love. You certainly aren't very Christlike, and you definitely should be ashamed of your hatred.
To have witnessed on the same night the amazing election of Barack Obama, and the *revocation* of an established constitutional right in California… the mind reels.
I hope this doesn’t give our merry band of hate-mongers in Massachusetts any bright ideas. >.<
How sad for you to write this. Christ in NO WAY condoned homosexuality and why is it wrong for people to disagree with you, This is really sad. I will pray for you and your children. I am in no way all thise not so nice words you used and would never use them against you just because you disagreed with my point of view.
The point is everyone can have their own point of view, Teresa, without imposing their own personal point of view on someone else. Get it?
I’ll tell you what I’d like you to pray for and that’s ending the existing tax-free status of any church that has a political agenda. Sure, tax free status for charitable arms of the church, but for the rest, sod off. For the Mormon church to fund most of the television advertising in this state encouraging voters to vote yes on prop 8 and for insinuating that gay marriage is going to be part of the California school curriculum and further imply that it will in some way damage our children…gragh…excuse me, I was just getting a bad taste out of my mouth.
I can think of a number of friends who today must feel so diminished by this vote. It sickens me, as do its supporters.
Hey Teresa,
I did fire off this post while very, very angry and disappointed, but I still stand by my opinion.
The thing is, I don’t think it’s wrong for people to disagree with me. When my kids wanted to tear up the Yes on 8 signs they saw, I told them, “No. You can’t sensor someone else’s right to express their views.”
In my opinion, you are of course free to think whatever you like about same sex couples, but you *aren’t* free to take away their right to be wed.
I’m Unitarian, though not a Christian (and please don’t pray for my family, we’re just fine, thanks!) but I appreciate the things that Jesus taught. If I’m not mistaken, he was the one in story who wanted to stop the mob from stoning some poor woman to death, even though what she did went against what he taught.
When I think of Jesus, I think of someone who is only able to be loving and kind. You’ll never get me to understand the line of thinking that leads people to think there is something wrong with being gay. It’s not a viewpoint I can even begin to comprehend. To me, banning marriage for same sex couples is as ridiculous and random as it would seem to you to ban marriage for people with brown eyes. I had such a strong reaction to it because it was incredibly painful and hurtful for so many people that I love and admire. And I don’t think Jesus would vote for that. Ever.
Oh! Lin and d. thanks so much for your comments 🙂
Let me just weight in, here. It WAS an night of extremes. While overjoyed at the result of the presidential election, I was completely downcast by the results of Prop 8. A full 40% of the money raised by Prop 8 proponents can be traced to the Mormon Church. There is even a bishop in this state who ASSIGNED donation amounts to his ward members! Revolting. Alternatively, Steve Young and his wife donated $50K to the NO on Prop 8 campaign, there were letters delivered to the powers that be in the Church protesting the involvement in this issue. One had 17K signatures and had I known it was out there, there would have been 2 more! So, don’t paint the whole church with such a broad brush. That said, to flat out lie to people too weak minded to think for themselves is pitiful and they out to be ashamed of themselves. The sanctity of their marriages is not threatened by committed, loving same-sex partners but it sure is by their own heterosexual members who cheat on their spouses, molest and/or rape their own children, bankrupt their families with gambling debts and harbor secret pornography addictions. I know this exists – I work in a family law office. I see it every day. And this from a church that once practiced polygamy and would to this day had they not valued statehood. Nice. Let’s talk about that beam in your eye, Brothers and Sisters!
My mom (Viellefemme) she kicks some ass. I’m just sayin.
YAY jenijen! you rock.
i had expected such hateful legislation to pass in florida, but california surprised me.
Thank you, this is exactly how I feel. On Monday, I drove past a major intersection in my town and saw a woman standing in the pouring rain, holding up a “Yes on 8” sign. And I thought, why, why do people feel so strongly about homosexuality? It’s crazy, ridiculous, and ignorant. My only hope is that the court system will find this to be a discriminatory law and overturn it!
Oh, and by the way, the judiciary exists to counteract the tyranny of the people.
You are absolutely correct, mean people do suck. The fact that 8 passed is unbelievable and embarrassing.
You said you had no problem with Jesus then why not my prayers? I certainly agree you have a right to your opinion but your post strongly suggested that others who think differently have no right. In the same manner you think homosexuality is not wrong is as much as due to my beliefs I think it is. Again, my right to believe such. When you stand by morals today you get accused of hate. I am not condemning you, just the manner in which you wrote it shows hate in my humble opinion.
THANK YOU.
You have just got yourself a new reader.
Thanks to DancingMom linking, you have another new reader!
Teresa – one day you will be ashamed of the bigotry you disguise as your religion and morals. In the meantime, Jesus is surely disappointed that you would rather be right than to love.
On a more earthly level, Teresa, are you just trolling the blogs so you can spew your hate and gloat? Go away, go back to your cave. The rest of us will be proudly standing in the sunlight, defending our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters and moving forward to make the world a kinder more just place. That is the Lord’s work and we are proud to do His bidding.
It is not the right of any person to deny another person the right to marry. It’s especially troubling when it is done in Jesus’ name (as if that makes it OK). The whole concept of marriage was originally one of financial security—women were like property. We’ve evolved now and I think some would argue that marriage as an institution of love is actually harder to maintain. People whom are excited about being married, being committed to one another, should be allowed the opportunity. It is disgraceful to deny them all of the rights and privileges that come with it.
this is sad. i mean i don’t know why ANYONE would want to marry anyone, but, I don’t know why anyone would worship any God that hates.
To frame this as a “difference of opinion” misses entirely the point of what Proposition 8 managed to do.
I’m reminded of a conversation I had several years ago with a friend of mine from high school — a smart girl, born and raised to a very Lutheran home. She went to Central College, very Dutch, very proper, very conservative, and made lots of friends — not a few of whom are gay.
We were talking about gay marriage on our way to lunch. My opinion on the subject, which hasn’t changed, was that the issue revolves around individual freedoms and what the state can and cannot command of its citizens. We are an ostensibly free people — free to pursue our personal happiness, first and foremost. Most (many? some?) would agree, I think, that marriage is exactly one such pursuit. The right to a family is not reserved for the privileged.
Marriage is also exclusively controlled by the state. It is a Status, one that carries a variety of financial, legal, and social implications. Implications we are unequivocally free to take on in the event we decide to attach ourselves to another.
Which makes you wonder, who are YOU to put yourself between two consenting adults wishing to cement their commitment in its most legally cognizable form? The California Supreme Court did not allow the legislature to interfere so unconscionably — and I hope it recognizes that U.S. Constitution does not allow such deeply disturbing violations as well.
She saw a different issue — the “Institution,” she thought, was somehow jeopardized by gay marriage. The “values” of marriage — religious or otherwise — were undermined, by her reckoning, in allowing two men or two women to develop a monogamous, exclusive relationship into a union until now enjoyed exclusively by heterosexuals. Civil unions were good enough for them, she thought.
When I asked her if she would vote to ban gay marriage, she said yes. And I told her, by my reckoning, that a vote of that kind was an anonymous way for her to foreclose the weddings of several of her friends. But when I asked if she would walk up to those same friends and tell them, face to face, that they did not deserve the right to marry whomever they please — it became a different issue entirely. Suddenly, she wouldn’t even let someone else tell them that. Suddenly, it became a human issue rather than an institutional one.
I think that’s what bothers me most about this whole movement to wall off gay folks from exchanging their vows. So many get caught up in the abstract, in the beliefs about marriage and homosexuality, and ignore the fact that we’re talking about people and their private lives.
How the marriage of two men or two women will have any impact on my life — or anyone else’s — utterly escapes me. If you don’t approve, that’s your business. You, Teresa, have a right to believe that homosexuality is immoral, in the same way you have a right to believe that, say, premarital sex is immoral. For that matter, you have a right to be a racist, or a bigot, or any hold any number of views in which one is led to believe that certain people should not be allowed the same constitutional freedoms as others.
You do NOT have the right to abuse our system of government in such a way that inalienable freedoms are revoked from segments of the population simply because they make you a wee bit uncomfortable.
P.S. – Incidentally, we have heard all of these supposedly “moral” arguments before to protect the grand institution of marriage. Except, back then it was about the dastardly threat of inter-racial couples.
P.P.S. – Viellefemme doesn’t just kick ass, she kicks SERIOUS ass.
This was a tough one for our family – my 8yo son, wide-eyed, asking, “Why shouldn’t gay people be able to get married?” Good question, son, good question. The idea is so odd for him. It is sad to think that in a year when we can elect an African-American man to the White House, we are still bigoted enough that we will vote to restrict the fundamental rights of some of our citizens (Don’t try to argue that this is not bigotry – it is, pure and simple – tell me how homophobia is different from racism). Gay marriage is not a threat to our children, to our families, to our communities, or the ‘institution’ of marriage. This has nothing to do with any of those things – it has to do with individuals, families, who now have now lost the right to have their relationship recognized.
When we trick or treated last week, my children wanted to boycott those houses that had a “Yes on 8” sign in their yards. I told them they didn’t have to – its just candy after all – they told me they didn’t want candy from “those kind of people”. They talked with some people that had Obama signs in their yards, and let them know they approved. I am amazed at how they are so strong in their opinions (not all of which agree with mine), and so proud. They were so disheartened to hear yesterday morning that 8 had passed.
I am sad that they are growing up in a world where “those kind of people” are making our laws, determining the rights and futures of others, based on their own religious beliefs. They certainly have the right to their opinion, their beliefs, but they do not have the right to thrust their beliefs onto me, my family, or anyone else who doesn’t agree. Jen – I have to agree with everything you said!
I am happy to know that this initiative is already being challenged in court, and probably will never be enforced.
Thank you Jen for putting it so succinctly 🙂 On a day that should have been so full of hope and healing I was devastated by sadness, pain and anger. I had to take my children to school totally unable to answer their questions, “But why would anyone do that?” “Mom, I don’t understand.” Neither do I kids, neither do I. The only sense I can make of it is that they are scared of something, that they feel attacked by something and are lashing out. At what I don’t know. Maybe they don’t realize what they have done, maybe they believed all those lies about kids being taught to be gay in schools. Huh! If it was so easy to change someone’s sexuality how could anyone possibly be gay in our culture, or most others for that matter? Personally I think they should be taught about homosexuality in schools, then fewer of our sons and daughters would commit suicide. I saw my lesbian friends there dropping off their kids at school too. I did not know what to say to them, “I’m so sorry”? I’m still struggling to move on from this, (and struggling with my desire to spray-paint SHAME all over those churches with the Yes signs outside), but what I can hang onto is the friendships built during this horrible process, the connections made, the adults and children educated and those who, for the first time, found the courage to stand on street corners with banners and let the world know just where they stood.
Speaking out as you did is an amazing antidote to feeling the hate we have felt levied at us (evidenced in California, Florida and Arkansas elections) simply for living our lives. Thank you very much.