Commentary

Email this article

This time, I know our side will win

By Walter G. Meyer

February 13, 2006

San Diego--“I think everyone looks weird with purple hair, but that isn’t my decision to make for them and I absolutely believe they have the right to dye their hair any color they want.” That is how I responded to the people I encountered at gay pride who told me they didn’t want to get married.

Or I’d tell them, “I don’t want to join the military either, but wouldn’t you agree I should have the right to if I wanted to?”

At Pride and for a few hours of CityFest and at several events since, I worked the marriage equality booth asking people to sign cards to help combat the initiatives that were destined for June’s ballot to ban not only same sex marriage, but domestic partnerships in California. The first attempt for the June ballot failed, but the opposition is still trying for November. It was an enlightening few days.

But there were a few interesting refusals. More than a few objected on the grounds that they didn’t want to get married. However, they probably had friends who did—friends who had been together for years and suffer because of same-sex discrimination. The first step was to stop these constitutional amendments from taking away the rights we had fought for in terms of domestic partnership benefits.

The Prop 22 people are not happy that the courts are striking down the initiative, so they would like to enshrine their bigotry in the state constitution and make it constitutional to deny basic civil rights to people who are gay. Some would then say, “But they couldn’t do that—the U.S. constitution…” and I would argue “And how long will it take to get that fight to the Supreme Court? For how many years would we be denied our rights until the court ruled, and what might the Supreme Court look like after Bush appoints a few justices?” (That last statement often got them reaching for a pen.)

And I would explain the very real fear that if such an amendment passes in California that the far right would be so energized that we would see even more such clauses added to every other state’s constitution. But if the voters speak out in California, Bush can’t keep blaming these decisions on “activist judges.”

One of the more interesting refusals came from an elderly man who proceeded to tell me that he thought gay people didn’t deserve any sort of rights, were disgusting and immoral! I asked him what he was doing at Pride and he said, “I came to be disgusted!” and stormed away. I wish I’d have thought to yell after him, “I hope you got your money’s worth!”

One of the more fun refusals came from a handsome young man who threw his arms around me and said, “You have the prettiest eyes, but I am too drunk to even remember my name right now.” He then kissed me and staggered away.

One woman signed and then asked if the pretty woman working with me was who she thought it was. I told her it was. The woman then asked if that was her partner with her. I told her it was. She then asked if they would be interested in a three-way. I told her she’d have to take that up with ladies in question, that I wasn’t going to be any part of that.

One acquaintance I asked to sign said, “Nope. I don’t do anything political, I don’t vote and I don’t care what happens.” I thought it was sad that he is the first in line at every circuit party and would have a fit if anyone denied him his “right” to do drugs and get drunk, but trivial matters like civil rights were too much to worry about.

CityFest was a slightly different crowd. Although many told us they had already signed our cards at Pride, we had many more straight people there so it was good chance to reach a much broader audience. We had an opportunity to not just preach to the choir for a change. We got many more refusals, but also some very heartwarming responses. The number of hetero couples with children who were eager to sign and express their outrage that such things could even be considered to deface the constitution gave me great hope not only for our future rights, but the future as a whole. Parents, I see, are raising their kids to believe that discrimination is so wrong.

One of my favorite responses was from an older African-American woman. I told her what this was all about and she snapped at me, “I am so tired of this shit!” I thought she was going to say she was sick of all this talk about gay rights. Instead, she grabbed my pen and clipboard and said, “I thought we had taken care of this civil rights stuff back in the sixties and here we are still having to fight the same old battles. Why are we moving backwards?” She angrily filled out the card and strode away, rightfully indignant.

It felt good to have so many people of all stripes thank us sincerely for taking the time to do this and to be helping fight the good fight. As Paul Henreid, as Victor Laszlo, said in Casablanca, “This time, I know our side will win.”

--------------------

Walter G. Meyer is a freelancer in San Diego who has found time to write a few books when he isn't too busy writing about anything just about any topic from local baseball to endangered sea turtles. waltergmeyer.com