Box Turtle Bulletin

What Marriage Is All About

A one minute instructional video for opponents of marriage equality:

[Hat tip: Autumn Sandeen]

“We’re Living In Sodom and Gomorrah! Damn You People!”

A gentle BYU grad (or maybe just a fan?) responds to Judge Walker

By the way, his own straight marriage looks like it’s not in such great shape. Restraining orders, court appointed psychologists, etc. So much for opposite sex couples being better.

[Hat tip: BTB reader Stephen]

NOM bunkers down in a mostly-empty park in St. Louis

Fresh off their bizarro rants over the overturn of Proposition 8 in California, the National Organization for Marriage rolled into St. Louis, Missouri. And irate marriage-protectors up in arms over the activist judge arrogantly thumbing his nose at the voters turned out in droves.

Not really. The Trial Tracker reports:

We count 35 NOM rally attendees from afar, and we’re now up to 214 equality supporters.

Now we can’t be certain that there were only 35 people there. No equality supporters were allowed anywhere near the park, even those who had pre-registered and brought their invite with them. So since the count was from a distance maybe there were 40 attendees,or even 50, once you count the staff. But it’s a sad sad day for NOM if the ruling couldn’t even draw a crowd.

As I mentioned, NOM took a new approach this time; they kept protesters – and even the gay press – at a distance. So the protesters were pretty much left with waving at the cars and cheering when supporters honked. And as NOM is not yet posting pictures or comments on the event, we’ll just have to imagine what was said at the rally:

Brian Brown, speaking for the entire anti-gay marriage movement officially gave up and decided to endorse equality and decency. He said that we must treat others the way we want to be treated and encouraged the listeners to call their legislators and ask them to support marriage equality.

Nah, that probably wasn’t it. I’m guessing it was more along the lines of “blah blah activist judge blah blah one man and one woman blah blah they’re picking on us.” In any case, I’m certain that the pro-equality side was having a much better night than NOM.

UPDATE:

Even NOM is getting bored with their rallies. While they posted two pictures of the St. Louis Arch, they decided that their abysmally dismal St. Louis rally was worthy of only one picture and a single sentence.

They like to talk about the people out there who are “following our rally online” but I suspect that those followers are mostly mythical.

They’ve breathlessly announced the following for Saturday’s rally:

I hope you’ve made plans to join us at the Georgia State Capitol in Atlanta tomorrow. We’ve just confirmed that Dr. Alveda King, Director of African American Outreach of Priests for Life, and the niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., will be able to attend and speak at the rally!

I wonder if their Atlanta rally will continue to be lilywhite inside the rally and racially diverse out where the protesters are?

LaBarbera Award: Bryan Fischer. Again.

Disenfranchising LGBT Americans from the institution of marriage isn’t enough for the American Family Association’s Bryan Fischer. He also thinks LGBT Americans should be legally banned from public office:

He is Exhibit A as to why homosexuals should be disqualified from public office. Character is an important qualification for public service, and what an individual does in his private sexual life is a critical component of character. A man who ignores time-honored standards of sexual behavior simply cannot be trusted with the power of public office.

He also thinks that this should have disqualified Elana Kagan from the Supreme Court:

This, by the way, is why Elana Kagan should not be elevated to the Supreme Court. Although she has not come out of the closet herself, her lesbian partner has, and Ms. Kagan’s sexual preference is an open secret in Washington circles. Her indulgence in sexually aberrant behavior should make her ineligible to serve on the highest court in the land.

Kagan’s lesbian partner? Where did this rumor come from?

Bryan Fischer is a repeat honoree. The Prop 8 decision has spawned two other award winners in the past twenty four hours so far. Prop 8 is really bringing out the crazy, isn’t it?

McCain Blocks Defense Authorization Bill Over DADT

And complains about the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act in the process.

LaBarbera Award: Family Research Council

The Family Research Council has detected a conspiracy:

After two decades of criticism that he wasn’t gay-friendly enough, the 65-year-old judge paid back his skeptics with the most powerful rebuke against man-woman marriage this country has ever seen. Back in 1987, his impartiality on homosexual issues was so stunning that Democrats actually opposed his nomination to the court where he now sits. But the reporter writes, “We now know what Walker never bothered to reveal when he was being castigated as anti-gay: He is gay.”

It turns out that the Judge behind Proposition 8’s undoing was just biding his time until he could unleash his ultimate agenda: decimating marriages that have defined civilization since the beginning of time.

How clever is that? Judge walker threw everyone off by his “impariality” for twenty-three years. First, in a particularly inspired stroke of brilliance, he got himself blocked for being too “anti-gay” when conservative icon Ronald Reagan tried to appoint him to the Federal bench in 1987. But hat was okay because he knew, clever as he was, that another Republican President, George H.W. Bush, would manage to get his second appointment attempt through the Senate just two years later. Successfully embedded, all he had to do was just wait there for the next two decades until someone would decide to propose, campaign for, and pass a state constitutional amdendment banning same-sex marriage. And to do that, of course they would use animus against LGBT people to achieve their noble aims. Because, you see, Walker knew that would happen. He also knew that he would still have to bide his time until someone else brought a Federal suit against the state of California and file it in San Francisco. And he just sat there, omnicient and all-powerful, waiting for his trap to spring as the random selection process that assigned cases to judges landed the lawsuit onto Walker’s docket. And with that, his diabolical plan had come to fruition and he could finally “unleash his ultimate agenda.”

Genius!

For good measure, the FRC ominously hints that the decision striking down Prop 8 may lead to violence:

 In the meantime, the Left might want to think twice about its victory lap. Instead of aiding their cause, this decision is feeding the unrest across America that our government has become tyrannical.

Insane consipracy theories and warnings of violence. That’s a very combustible combination. Be wary folks. Things are going to get really rough for a while.

AFA Calls for Judge Walker’s Impeachment

Following up in American Family Association’s Tim Wildmon’s reaction yesterday to the Federal Court decision declaring California’s Prop 8 unconstitutional, the AFA has issued this action alert demanding impeachment proceedings against Judge Vaughm Walker:

Impeachment proceedings, according to the Constitution, begin in the House of Representatives. It’s time for you to put your congressman on record regarding the possible impeachment of Judge Walker. 

Take Action
Email your representative today and urge him to launch impeachment proceedings against Judge Vaughn Walker for his outrageous ruling against natural marriage. 

Kagan confirmed

From the WaPo

Elena Kagan, the former solicitor general of the United States, is now the 112th Justice of the Supreme Court. The eminently qualified former Harvard Law School dean who has never donned the judge’s robe will replace liberal jurist John Paul Stevens, who retired in June after 35 years on the bench. Because Kagan is considered a liberal, the ideological makeup of the court is not expected to change.

My gut tells me that this is good for gay issues, including marriage, but Justices have a long tradition of thwarting expectation and presumption.

California politicians weigh in on Prop 8 ruling

Unsurprisingly, the Democratic and Republican responses to Judge Walker’s rulings were different.

In the Senatorial race, Democratic incumbent Barbara Boxer released the following statement:

This historic decision is a step forward in the march toward equal rights and reflects a growing legal consensus that marriage equality is protected by the U.S. Constitution.

Carly Fiorina, the Republican nominee, is quoted by AP as disapproving of the decision.

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Carly Fiorina says she disagrees with a federal judge’s decision overturning California’s gay-marriage ban.

Fiorina says California voters spoke clearly against same-sex unions when a majority approved Proposition 8 in 2008.

In the gubernatorial race, Jerry Brown – who at Attorney General refused to defend the proposition – released the following statement:

In striking down Proposition 8, Judge Walker came to the same conclusion I did when I declined to defend it: Proposition 8 violates the equal protection guarantee of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution by taking away the right of same-sex couples to marry, without a sufficient governmental interest.

Republican Meg Whitman’s campaing, on the other hand, released the following statement:

Meg supported Proposition 8 and believes marriage is between a man and a woman. Meg also strongly supports California’s civil union laws. Today’s ruling is the first step in a process that will continue.

Hunh? A process that will continue?

So everyone has now made their statements. But with California voters so evenly split over marriage and not one breathing fire over the decision, I think it extremely unlikely that Whitman – or even Fiorona – will make gay marriage an issue in their campaigns.

Prop 8 Rally in West Hollywood

At about six last night I headed to the West Hollywood park to join others who were there to celebrate the outcome of Perry v. Schwarzenegger. I should have tried to get there earlier as the park was packed. Unlike the National Organization for Marriage’s ‘big park, few people’ dynamic, this was a smallish park with hundreds of people jammed in every space with others out on the sidewalk listening even though they couldn’t see.

There was a huge cross-section of the community. I stood behind a young Latina couple in their early 20’s and beside a couple of elderly gay men who brought their dog. Across the way I saw a go-go boy holding up his phone to take a picture of the speakers. I saw people that I know have a wide range of experiences and perspectives all there to celebrate our common cause for equality (the best T-Shirt I saw said “fiscally Republican, socially Democrat, sexually liberal”). Old friends and strangers, we were all family.

To my surprise this turned out to be the rally to be at. Not only were the plaintiffs and the board of the American Foundation for Equal Rights present, but Ted Olson and David Boies as well.

This was my first time to hear Ted Olson speak live, and it was fascinating. He has a deep voice and speaks slowly and I first wondered how he could keep the court’s attention. Then I realized something odd: while the crowd had been mostly attentive for other speakers, it was now completely silent. Olson’s inflection and word choice left you wanting to hear what he next had to say; it was not a courteous attention, it was a rapt attention.

It became clear to me the power of persuasion that this slow speaking man with his carefully measured words could wield and how extremely fortunate we were to have him on our side. When Olson speaks, you want to agree with him. And when he and Boies were done speaking I was convinced that we will take this to the Supreme Court and we will win.

It was thrilling. I’ve been to a lot of political rallies and heard a lot of speeches, but this event will stand out for me.

UPDATE: I finally found the quote. At the rally Boies said:

Most of what you’re going to hear from the other side is going to be a series of attacks,” he said. “They’re going to attack the judge, they’re going to attack the judicial system, they’re going to attack everything they can think of to attack except the court’s opinion because I guarantee you… most of the people that are going to criticize the opinion will not have even read it.”

Maggie, Brian, he might as well have called you out by name.

Mexico City’s marriage equality law is legal

When Mexico City changed their law so as to allow same-sex couples to marry, anti-gay activists sued. They wanted the nation’s supreme court to find it unconstitutional to provide equality. The court has now ruled (CBS):

The Mexican Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of gay marriages in Mexico City. Gay marriages have been legal in Mexico City since March, but have drawn opposition from the Catholic Church and the Mexican government.

The 8-2 vote not only upheld gay marriage in Mexico City, it also said the law was valid to allow homosexuals to possibly adopt children.

They found that while the Constitution does protect the family, it doesn’t define “family”.

Schadenfreude Alert, Part 4: Stacy Harp’s take on voting

We don’t talk much about Stacy Harp. She’s so far out on the end of the lunatic fringe and so motivated by unmasked hatred that she’s pretty much irrelevant – even to the usual band of wackadoodles (think of an unsuccessful Fred Phelps).

But Harp did write something that I know a lot of the less-informed anti-gays are saying. In the midst of one of her “sodomite”-laden rants, she opined:

So what are people saying? Well, as you can imagine, many in the Church are upset, but ya know what, it doesn’t matter because only one in four Christians actually take the time to vote in elections. If the Church – you know the people in the Church who say they are followers of Christ Jesus – would get off their fat rumps, then this situation would be different because who we put in office, influences who becomes a judge.

It’s a common rant among anti-gay activists that any jurist who see the word “equal” in the constitution and thinks it applies to gay people is a liberal activist judge. They think that we need to elect politicians who will appoint judges that do what they want, not what the constitution says.

The problem?

Judge Vaughn Walker’s first appointment by Ronald Reagan was blocked because he was thought to be anti-gay. Eventually he was put on the bench by George Bush, Sr.

Nineteen Sudanese Men Flogged for Being LGBT

According to Reuters:

A Sudanese court on Wednesday sentenced 19 young Muslim men to 30 lashes and a fine for breaking moral codes by wearing women’s clothes and makeup, a case exposing Sudanese sensitivity towards homosexuality. Many of the defendants tried to hide their faces from the around 200 people who watched as they were lashed straight after their sentencing. The men had no lawyers present and said nothing in their own defence. The trial judge said police had raided a party thrown by the 19 men and found them dancing “in a womanly fashion”, wearing women’s clothes and makeup.

One lawyer who was present reportedly said that legal advocates would have been afraid to serve as lawyers for the defendants.

Exodus Posts a Blogsplotch Against Masturbation

I was tipped that ExodusYouth, (which, just as its name implies, is the youth arm of the ex-gay group Exodus International) has a blog post on the sin of masturbation. Well, actually, the title asks whether masturbation is a sin or not. I assume the rest of the post answers the question, or at least examines it somehow. And I assume it is somehow relevant to the whole struggling ex-gay what-do-I-do-with-my-sexuality conundrum when you’re not allowed to form romantic interests in people who you find interesting.

I assume the post goes into all that, but to be honest, I wasn’t able to read the whole thing. It’s because it’s long — and yes, it’s very long, at some 1,600 words. And not because it has such inane stuff like “An orgasm was not originally designed for relaxation or for self-indulgence,” or “Can you imagine what it would be like, men, to never have masturbated,” or (in the worst advice ever) “We also must daily deny ourselves, our fleshly desires, and self-focused motivations to Christ.  The longer we starve an addiction, the easier it becomes to resist.”

No, none of that is why I stopped reading. It’s this: go to the blog post and this is what you’ll see:

Excuse me while I go find some paper towels.

LaBarbera Award: Maggie Gallagher

It’s official. Maggie Gallagher had spent several years trying to cultivate an image of a well-informed and reasonable pundit with her Institute for Marriage and Public Policy. But founding the National Organization for Marriage, Gallagher has become among the more hysterical voices against LGBT people. And as we noted earlier today, she is now in full meltdown mode over the recent Federal Court decision declaring Prop 8 unconstitutional. More evidence of her unhingedness comes this op-ed in tomorrow’s San Francisco Chronicle:

If this ruling is upheld, millions of Americans will face for the first time a legal system that is committed to the view that our deeply held moral views on sex and marriage are unacceptable in the public square, the fruit of bigotry that should be discredited, stigmatized and repressed. Parents will find that, almost Soviet-style, their own children will be re-educated using their own tax dollars to disrespect their parents’ views and values.

That’s right: today marriage equality, tomorrow Soviet-style education camps.

Say, didn’t we just read something just yesterday about bogus threats to children?