Wallabies rugby star Dave Pocock, who is boycotting marriage until there is equal love in Australia
It is not realistic to ask male-female couples to do this, but I find it very touching when such couples do make a stand like this. It’s a big sacrifice, and when it comes from a famous rugby player like Dave Pocock it makes a doubly strong point.
Elizabeth Taylor (apparently she hated Liz), was a woman of depth on-screen and off. Here is her early and brilliant speech in favour of gay marriage at the 2000 GLAAD awards in California, with thanks to Rex Wockner for reminding us of this vision. Taylor fought for equality long before it was sexy, and we’ll remember her long after we finally achieve it.
“All of my life I’ve spent a lot of time with gay men — Montgomery Clift, Jimmy Dean, Rock Hudson — who are my colleagues, coworkers, confidantes, my closest friends, but I never thought of who they slept with! They were just the people I loved. I could never understand why they couldn’t be afforded the same rights and protections as all of the rest of us. There is no gay agenda, it’s a human agenda.
“All of us should be treated the same, and GLAAD knows that. Why shouldn’t gay people be allowed to marry? Those against gay marriages say marriage should only be between a man and a woman. God, I, of all people know that [the remainder of the sentence was inaudible due to an audience outburst]. I feel that any home where there is love constitutes a family and all families should have the same legal rights, including the right to marry and have or adopt children!
“Why shouldn’t gay people be able to live as open and freely as everybody else? What it comes down to, ultimately, is love. How can anything bad come out of love? The bad stuff comes out of mistrust, misunderstanding and, God knows, from hate and from ignorance … the bad things never came out of loving acts, loving gestures or loving relationships. That’s why I’m here tonight — to celebrate you and your families. And to tell you to hang in there and to say, once and for all of us, long live love.” Continue reading →
This is going to be HUGE!
Like this blog on a scale of one million to one.
We all need to work together and to help each other. None of us is really free, and can sleep with a totally clean conscience until all of us is free.
I am very excited for old friend Jeremy Heimans and the wonderful team from Purpose that are building this global movement
I’m in the US as the country shifts focus from Hallow’een to the mid-term congressional and Senate elections. One thing that caught my eye while political trend-spotting was this article from the New York Times magazine about the increasing role of behavourial psychology and economics in political campaigns.
So many gay rights seem to go to a public vote these days, I think it is wise for gay rights groups to keep abreast and get involved in this emerging field.
Where do I start?
You might wonder why someone who tries to understand the dilemmas of Australian Senator Penny Wong would be less charitable about a gay and lesbian rights organisation (like the UK’s Stonewall) being weak on marriage equality (their defence here).
The first difference is that Penny Wong isn’t paid to promote gay rights; Stonewall is. Secondly Penny Wong answers to millions of constituents who really don’t support equality. Secondly Stonewall answers only to gays and lesbians who – across all known data – do support marriage equality. Thirdly if one pitches oneself as “the” gay and lesbian charity, as Stonewall do in their slogan, then one has to represent properly.
As Stonewall co-founder Michael Cashman MEP puts it: “what part of equality doesn’t Stonewall understand?” And just as importantly, how did they put themselves in this corner?
Here’s a sad story from Connecticuit, United States, about a botched cancer treatment that has not lead to proper compensation because the two women owed it were not married.
Why weren’t they married? Because they weren’t allowed to be. Yet another case proving that separate civil unions are not equal to marriage. This couple spent every possible moment together and have said all along they would marry if they could, and up until now that has counted for nothing in the eyes of the law.
Thankfully a jury now agrees with the couple’s claims and the surviving partner might get her due.
If you have a need to communicate about repression of your rights or your community, Reporters Without Borders has set up a cyber-shelter that will allow to get your message out without compromising your identity and security.
For anyone from the dozens of countries where homosexual sex acts can lead to jail or death, and places such as Malawi, Kenya and the many other countries where gay marriage advocacy or unofficial weddings lead to ridicule, threats and arrests … this could be a forum for you.
Here is a bit of a tear-jerker story about a lovely American couple – about how their relationship works and how awful it can be when an institution denies you a right because – in their eyes – your relationship doesn’t count because it’s not a marriage.
Another reason why we need marriage equality.
Even in the grave it seems you’re still unequal.
Did you watch A Single Man, Tom Ford’s film starring Colin Firth about a gay professor widowed when his lover is killed in a car carsh? He’s barred from the funeral by the homophobic family of his dead lover. 48 years after the film is set it’s still happening.
Anyways, the Governor Tim Pawlenty (Republican presidential candidate) is screwing over gay couples again. This time it is by rejecting the right of gays to claim dead domestic parnters’ bodies as proposed in a “Final Wishes” bill
Yeah – cos indentifiying and collecting my dead domestic partner hurts your marriage? WTF!?
Says Pawlenty: it’s a “non-existent problem” (except when you get turned away from the morgue in the middle of your grief) and “I oppose efforts to treat domestic relationships as the equivalent of traditional marriage. Accordingly, I am opposed to this bill.” (yeah, right on moron)
While this might be good news for lawyers and bigots, it’s a genuine travesty in the same US state where the first gay marraige happened 40 years ago this week (later overturned) and incidentally where the original book version of A Single Man, by Christopher Isherwood is published by University of Minnesota Press.
Here’s a convincing comparison you can use in any country to show why marriage inequality is wrong. Take a section of the population or a city roughly the size of the lesbian, gay and bisexual population (about 5% at best recent estimates), and ask the person you are talking or writing to whether they think that group should be banned from marriage?
Examples (see here for more details)
