This identical strategy used by No on 8 in California was also used in Arizona’s fight against Prop. 102 and we can all witness how that turned out.

At a meeting my husband and I attended, we were specifically told to stick to the talking points. I.E. don’t mention “gay” or “same-sex couples” or “children” because of the “gay people are icky” factor.

So, we faithfully and blindly regurgitated the talking points and the banal folks on the right, religious extremes attacked with their visions of doom and gloom about what would happen to Arizona and her “children” if we didn’t append discrimination into our Constitution.

Even though we already had a State law against same-gender marriage since 1996 and that had been upheld by an appelate court and that the State Supreme Court felt no need to review.

That wasn’t the point. That did not register with “the people”. They got spooked by all the “what if” scenarios advertised by all the holy high rollers. Even though they were outright and total lies and fabrications! The majority of our populace just doesn’t seem to want to do their own research. They don’t seem to want to seek the truth about outlandish claims. Then consider that the claims are being made by religous people and before you know it we’re back to the “Scopes Monkey Trial”!

And the funding disparity didn’t help either, No on 102 $575,000 | yes on 102 $7.6 million!

But then again, I don’t think throwing vast sums of money at something that doesn’t work will miraculously cause it to actually start working.

We tried it “their” way. It didn’t work. Let’s not go for a third using these same tactics. What do we have to lose using Ben’s method? We’ve already lost. Why not give it a shot? If it works, great! If it doesn’t let’s see why it didn’t work.

Throwing good money at bad ideas just doesn’t seem to work.

Albert Einstein once said “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.

Time. Energy. Money.

As a recently married gay man, I contributed a lot of each against Prop. 8. I’m sad that we failed to defeat it. But I’m also very angry– and not just about political campaigns fueled by bigotry, conservative religion, and way too much tax-free money–because I could see it coming like a train wreck.

At the campaign kickoff, I asked Mark Leno personally if they were going to do the liberal-tolerance-equality strategy again, pointing out that it has failed repeatedly. Or, were they going to show actual gay people, actual families, and actual lives. You know: reality. He said that focus groups indicated that everybody-make-nice and civil liberties were the way to go. This would affect the undecided voters who were so crucial. I made the same point to HRC’s Marty Rouse and several campaign people, and got the same response. The approach would be political rather than human, in every sense of both words.

Politics may move undecided voters, but it is only as valuable as the last person they talked to. Human connection moves hearts and minds, even people whose minds are made up. People who know gay people don’t usually vote against them. But it’s easy to vote against someone who is invisible, faceless, a menacing other, instead of friend or family, or even someone you just met on the street. And we were quite invisible. We saw the supportive, loving parents, but no gay daughter, no grandchildren. No on 8 seemed totally uninterested in a speakers’ bureau to reach out to community groups and churches; I gave up asking. They wanted volunteers for phone banking and sign waving in the Castro, not personal contact with real voters. At a training we were told NOT to use words like children, because Pro-8 people had appropriated the issue. We refused to claim it, and thus it was used against us. Likewise, don’t talk about this ancient and deeply rooted anti-gay prejudice, either, because by calling attention to a reality in our lives, we might offend people who call us a threat to family, faith, and country.

This all may make sense to professional political people in their world and culture, but not in mine. It fails as a strategy because it embraces THE CLOSET, which is our real enemy, not the Radical Right. The closet is us, making ourselves invisible and unknown, rather than showing the simple fact and humanity of our lives. It is our consent to the lies, our silence in the face of naked prejudice. It is us not standing up for ourselves, and when we don’t, who else will stand with us? I absolutely praise and thank our leaders for their efforts and sacrifices and dedication. But frankly, if our leaders don’t know this, or if perhaps have their own issues of internalized homophobia, they shouldn’t be our leaders. Because here’s the result: we were barely visible, and more people thought that the standard of living of California chickens was more important than the families of their fellow Americans.

Thirty years ago, I worked against the Briggs Initiative. A much smaller group of people, with far fewer resources, in a far less accepting time, succeeded against great odds. Maybe I’m romanticizing, but I seem to remember it was because all we really had to show were ourselves and our lives. We said NO to the closet.

I know this is far from over. We will be back. However, if the future campaign is going to be focus groups, phone banking, invisibility, and cute but irrelevant ads that look good on political resumes but change nothing– don’t expect one minute of my time, one iota of my energy, or one dime of my money.

Seriously though, look how far CA has come in only 8 years. Prop 22 passed by a 61% to 39% margin. In only 8 years this has shrunk to a 52% to 48% margin. Young people opposed Prop 8 by a 2 to 1 margin.

This isn’t going to take hundreds of years. It may take a few more elections but it will happen.

Now we need to look to the not-brighter future and continue the uphill battle.

I now for the first time feel that my children are safe in their schools – without the fear of gay indoctrination…

It’s “know”, not “now”. I can’t believe someone put YOU in charge of MY civil rights!

So, when your children hear all about this hub-bub about gay marriage being banned, you don’t think that some kid in class is going to ask their teacher about this? You don’t think that they will ask “If gay people can’t get married, what will they do?” and of course the answer is “Well, Jimmy, gay people can still get a domestic partnership!”

Hmmm, imagine that. Looks like the kids are still going to learn about gay people in school.

Sorry, bud, but there will be exactly zero impact on the education of children. Other, of course, than the future history lessons that explain your attitude and behavior in pretty much the same terms as they do Southern Americans who supported Jim Crow laws.

It should be a “no-brainer” that ridicule, discrimination, and fear, such as you express, are the causes of many ills in our world. You write, “disturbed deathstyle…horror and long term damage” based on what? Without the gay people in the world the world would be much worse, not much better. But you probably don’t have a clue as to who these might be (many, many talented geniuses from all walks of life).

LIghten up dude – would you turn out your son if you learned that he was left-handed rather than right-handed? Do you think there’s any more choice in being gay or straight than in being left or right handed? Sure, a lefty can learn to write with the right hand. But what’s wrong with using the left?

That’s very true Eddie, you see, there’s this whole group of homosexuals you may have heard of. They’re called lesbians. And I’m going to bet that most of them are about as interested in sodomy as my wife is.

“There are many homosexuals who seek or practice chastity. There are many homosexuals who recognize the unnaturalness of their desires.”

You mean desires that have been observed in literally dozens of other species throughout the natural world? Do you enjoy being painfully ignorant?

“If you want to characterize the opponents of Prop 8 do it honestly.

The opponents were people who defiantly believe same-sex sodomy should be placed at the same level as natural human coitus despite the fact that they are in no sense equal.”

No, they were people who defiantly believe that an accident of birth is not a valid reason to deny homosexuals access to the same basic rights every other human being in the country enjoys. They believe in equality and that discrimination is an inherent evil that has no place in our laws.

If you want to characterize the opponents of Prop 8, do it honestly.