So I have to comment, after a significant hiatus, on the events yesterday here involving the California Supreme Court. Yes, the court, consisting of 6 moderate Republican judges and 1 Democrat judge, voted 4-3 to declare California's state law that only allows marriage to occur between a man and a woman unconstitutional. While people around the country will surely have vastly different views of the ruling, and indeed, it might be a short-lived celebration for those of us who support the equal rights of our gay friends and relatives to marry, it is a celebration nevertheless. They don't call it "gay" for nothing; the Castro community here in SF set up an impromptu street party to celebrate with a truck with big ol' speakers and a DJ on it, and I went over myself just to see what was going on and to raise a celebratory glass with my lesbian friends. None of them are getting married, mind you, but still, it was a day of joy, and it deserves my support as a straight white male as well!
Just being in the Castro, it felt as though everyone let out a collective sigh of relief; there was definitely lots of happiness, but it mainly seemed as though people were saying "finally a positive resolution" to each other and to themselves. Beyond that, it just was so positive more than anything else, it was so full of unbridled enthusiasm that it was infectious. With so much to get a person down in recent days, with natural disasters left and right, a contentious election season that doesn't seem to make anybody feel good, and the economy tanking and taking down most of the country with it, it just felt like the people of San Francisco got a bit of a reprieve yesterday.
Today I came across an article by Mark Morford, one of my favorite columnists, who is always reliably irreverent, and beyond his baiting of the cultural conservatives out there, he makes the very valid point that this court ruling, and the Massachusetts ruling before it, does nothing to directly hurt anybody or infringe on anyone's rights. Let me reiterate that; despite however you may feel about gay marriage personally, or about homosexuality in general, what two people do in their own homes ultimately has nothing to do with you. I have had conversations with friends and thought for a while myself about what the problem is with expanding the definition of "marriage" to homosexual couples, and beyond people's visceral reactions to it, I still can't see the issue. Religious beliefs certainly will color one's views of marriage and what it represents, but as the saying goes, there are as many religions in the world as there are people, so someone's orthodoxy could very well be another's apostasy.
Anyways, I don't want this post to devolve into total relativism, so I'll stop here. Just let me say that I'm happy for my friends and I'm happy for our society. Whether this ruling stands come November or not, the fact that it has happened is a positive step for us all.
