Tag-Archive for » proposition 8 «

What I’ve Noticed: Really Long Edition
August 15th, 2009 | Author: sarcozona

Between things like steep fines and jail time for the “crimes” of being poor and/or a person of color and being unable to get a job because of poor credit, it’s almost impossible to escape poverty in the US.

Moonbow

Moonbow

Yesterday was the anniversary of Japan’s surrender in WWII.

Still sucks to be a woman in Afghanistan.

The Sri Lankan government doesn’t seem much better than the LTTE.

Plants can communicate and recognize self. Awesome.

No wonder we’re all addicted to the internet.

How and why patriarchy hurts men and who stands to benefit from feminism.

Scientists are grown-ups who refuse to give up their sense of wonder & curiosity.

It’s hard to keep believing Isreal is a “victim.”

Another evangelical caught fleecing his sheep.

from flickr user bobster855

from flickr user bobster855

I’m definitely going to make these cookies.

It’s hard to chastise other countries when you’re guilty too.

The Russian government doesn’t even try to hide it.

Attacking Iran would be idiotic.

Going home isn’t easy.

Cutting already insufficient education budgets means students pay more for less.

Odd and disturbing Time magazine cover.

David Trautrimas, Sprinkler House

David Trautrimas, Sprinkler House

Think people don’t use religion to escape responsibility for their actions? Think again.

Why taking physics is important:

Extreme Pool Jump – Celebrity bloopers here

Major Prop 8 supporter gets divorce.

If ecology doesn’t work out, I’m applying at Netflix.

Incredible juxtoposition: US vs. Japanese representations of the bombing of Hiroshima.

Why we sleep: who knows?

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What I’ve noticed
November 23rd, 2008 | Author: sarcozona

Obama is considering a drug czar who opposes needle exchange programs.  Needle exchange programs are very effective HIV prevention tools and help slow the spread of of other diseases such as Hepatitis C.

Not long before the Transgender Day of Remembrance police brutally beat Duanna Johnson, a transwoman.  She was found dead recently. Sublimefemme links to a powerful post about mourning by queenemily.

This is not Pride. This is remembering our dead. This is not something you can make fucking upbeat and acceptable and call “awareness.”

Grace the Spot has a useful guide for surviving and possibly even enjoying a holiday with your family.

Luxury handbag designers tell their customers not to buy counterfeit bags because they come from places that horribly exploit their workers.  Well, turns out the factories of Prada, Mulberry, Louis Vuitton, Samsonite, Aspinal of London, Nicole Farhi and Luella are pretty horrific too:

Workers earn poverty wages, work long hours, and suffer from a variety of health complaints linked to poor health and safety conditions. They complain that there are not enough toilets for all the workers and those that exist are filthy. The only drinking water is from a hose on the toilet floor.

Justin tries to find the best time to drink coffee.

Leibniz, Spinoza, and Descartes’ failure.

Democrats, homophobia isn’t ok.

Actors, sexism isn’t ok.

Princeton has their own version of Proposition 8 – and it’s just as silly as the one in California.

Sublimefemme has an awesome post up about femme invisibility, prompted by the response to Lindsay Lohan.

There seem to be two dominant schools of thought about Lindsay’s sexuality, both of which turn on the “problem” of her femininity.  The first position, which I’ve written about before, is that she couldn’t really be a lesbian because, hell, just look at her!  The other position is the inversion of the first.  It claims that Samantha Ronson is a real lesbian (hell, just look at her!) and Lindsay wouldn’t chose a girl like that unless she was herself really queer.  In this reading, it’s the butch’s supposedly irrefutable lesbian appearance that provides evidence for the femme’s queerness.  However, in both cases, queer femininity is fundamentally framed not just as a contradiction in terms but as a disappearing act.

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What I’ve noticed
November 15th, 2008 | Author: sarcozona

You know that $700 billion bailout?  Did you know the Federal Reserve gave $2 TRILLION in emergency loans?  And they won’t say who that money went to? That’s your money.

Google is better than the CDC at following flu epidemics.

PZ writes about Mormon support for Prop 8 in CA.

Obama includes gender identity in his employment non-discrimination policy for his administration.

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Proposition 8
November 09th, 2008 | Author: sarcozona

Proposition 8 in California passed last Tuesday.  The proposition overturns a recent California Supreme Court decision recognizing same-sex marriage by ammending the state constitution to say “”Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.”  This was heartbreaking news for many LGBT people across the country.  We wondered how one group could make so much progress while another took such a huge step back.

Then the news came that California African American voters, who’d overwhelmingly supported Obama, had voted in favor of Proposition 8 70% of the time.  I was so hurt when I heard that.  Why would people that understood discrimination vote to take away civil rights from an entire group of people?  Especially when exactly the same arguments were used to deny interracial marriages until the late 1960s:

1) First, judges claimed that marriage belonged under the control of the states rather than the federal government.

2) Second, they began to define and label all interracial relationships (even longstanding, deeply committed ones) as illicit sex rather than marriage.

3) Third, they insisted that interracial marriage was contrary to God’s will, and

4) Fourth, they declared, over and over again, that interracial marriage was somehow “unnatural.”

So I’m angry and confused and wish our schools taught history better.  But I was even angrier when I heard about this over at Pandagon:

Los Angeles resident and Rod 2.0 reader A. Ronald says he and his boyfriend, who are both black, were carrying NO ON PROP 8 signs and still subjected to racial abuse.

Three older men accosted my friend and shouted, “Black people did this, I hope you people are happy!” A young lesbian couple with mohawks and Obama buttons joined the shouting and said there were “very disappointed with black people” and “how could we” after the Obama victory. This was stupid for them to single us out because we were carrying those blue NO ON PROP 8 signs! I pointed that out and the one of the older men said it didn’t matter because “most black people hated gays” and he was “wrong” to think we had compassion. That was the most insulting thing I had ever heard. I guess he never thought we were gay.

Responding to ignorance and hate with ignorance and hate makes the situation a lot worse.  And in this situation, people were alienating members of their own community.

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Proposition 102
November 03rd, 2008 | Author: sarcozona

Tomorrow, in addition to voting for a new president, people in Arizona will be voting on Proposition 102.  Prop 102 would add the following to the Arizona constitution:

Only a union of one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in this state.

A similar measure, Prop 107, was on the ballot in 2006.  It did not pass.  Arizona law already defines marriage as between one man and one woman.  The proposition would make further gains in civil rights for queer people more difficult.  More worrying to me is the homophobic sentiment the very well-funded Yes on 102 campaign is stirring up in my home.  Every day I receive fliers and phone calls suggesting that by not voting yes on 102, marriage will be ruined for straight people and our community will be damaged somehow.  This is simply untrue.  First of all, if 102 does not pass, gay marriage will become legal in Arizona.  Secondly, even if it did, in California, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Maine, Hawaii, the District of Columbia, Oregon, and Washington where some form of same-sex partnership is legal, divorce rates have not skyrocketed, there is no epidemic of pedophiles, people have not suddenly started hating children or being mean to their neighbors.  Society has not fallen apart.

If you live in Arizona, Florida, Arkansas, or California, I hope you vote no on the homophobic ballot initiative in your state.  Your vote is affecting the lives of people you know and care about.  To vote for these propositions will do you and your community no good.  It is just cruel.

I have adopted moms that mean the world to me, the day that they were able to get legally married was one of the happiest days in my life.  Even though the institution of marriage isn’t my favorite thing in the world, seeing the looks on their faces, being privileged to be one of their witnesses meant the world to me, and remains one of the most important days in my life.  A few months later the state of Oregon sent them a letter telling them that their partnership of over 13 years was not recognized, and that they were no longer married and my heart broke for them, and every other couple that received that letter.

Many people who support these initiatives, say they do so in the name of “family values.”  But if you vote for these propositions, you are hurting families.

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