Summer has passed and Fall is here, and we are right in the middle of another hot political season. Election Day is just days away, and LGBT issues are on the forefront. So, I have your good news, and I have your bad news.
The good news is that there are many prominent candidates out there who have good track records of supporting various policies that help move us toward full equality—hate crimes laws, anti-discrimination laws, anti-bullying laws, domestic partner benefits, immigration law reforms, repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, etc. The bad news is that almost none of those candidates support our full equality, because they don’t support marriage equality.
Does marriage equality matter to you? Do your candidates know that it matters to you? Do you pressure them to support your full equality as a human being and American citizen, or do you give them a pass because they support your partial equality? If you haven’t thought about it that way before, now is the time. Candidates need to know that you care, passionately and proudly, about achieving full equality, and that most definitely includes marriage equality—because marriage matters.
President Obama, our self-proclaimed “fierce advocate,” opposes marriage equality. Senator Bill Nelson opposes marriage equality. All three of our current candidates for Senate—Kendrick Meek, Charlie Crist, and Marco Rubio—oppose marriage equality. Both of the candidates for governor—Alex Sink and Rick Scott—and both of the candidates for Orange County mayor—Teresa Jacobs and Bill Segal—oppose marriage equality.
You are hard pressed to find more than a very small handful of viable candidates for major political office in the nation who do vocally support marriage equality. (Thank you Commissioner Linda Stewart and Representative Scott Randolph!) So we tend to give the marriage bigots a pass. Yes, I used the word “bigot,” because it is bigotry to believe that your fellow citizens do not deserve the exact same rights, benefits and words that you do.
We must tell them that they cannot purport to believe in “equality,” and yet continue to oppose marriage equality. So I call on you, in this election and every election until we achieve full equality, to not give them a pass. Communicate directly with these people, preferably face-to-face. Tell them how you feel, and that you expect their full and unequivocal support—because marriage matters.
In August, my partner, Vicki, and I were legally married in Boston (after having been together more than 10 years). We decided to marry following the death of a dear friend. We witnessed the heartache endured by her partner who was treated as a legal stranger to her companion of almost 10 years. Even though the couple had executed every possible legal document to contractually approximate just a few of the more than 1,200 rights and benefits automatically conferred on heterosexual married couples, they were not protected.
As we told our family and friends then: It is simply not enough to tell a doctor or a nurse or a funeral director or a relative that I am my soul mate’s partner. I need to convey to them in terms they will understand how much this person means to me. This is my spouse, my wife, the person I have legally tied myself to, in sickness and in health, in happy times and bad, until the end of time. She is not my temporary girlfriend, or dance partner, or roommate. She is my life.
Our marriage experience in Boston was amazing, and it gave us hope to know that there are places where love is love, open to all, recognized and celebrated as a joyous uniting of hearts and souls. Then we flew home to Florida, and the pain of denial of that love returned with a vengeance. Same-sex, committed couples who are denied the use of the words married, spouse, wife, and husband, are also denied the dignity, respect and legal rights imbedded in those words.
Our relationships—even those of 50 years—are judged to be inferior, impermanent, unimportant and superficial by our culture, government and families.
So claim the important words for yourselves now, and maybe the legal rights will follow. When you have found your forever someone, get married. Go to that state or country that will afford you equality, even for a day, to be the legal next-of-kin to your wife or husband. Teach them that marriage is not something to fear or deny or rail against. It is a private legal contract between two people to love, protect and provide for each other throughout this life. And shame on anyone anywhere who would be opposed to that.
As you cast your votes and long for the day when the candidates can no longer deny you your dignity, remember that this is a teaching moment. Teach these people that your relationship is every bit as sacred and significant as theirs, and that you deserve the same rights, responsibilities and words. Marriage does matter—and nothing less than marriage will ever be acceptable.
