Great Day for Americans... Sad Day for Gay Americans

It is certainly a great day for Americans! The people have spoken and we now have an inspiring, intelligent, qualified man who will be our 44th president! AMAZING! I had tears in my eyes while he spoke last night. It was such a good feeling to know we’re going to be on a more positive track as a country. There will certainly be hard times ahead – but now we will have a leader FOR the people.

However, it is a very sad day for gay Americans. Apparently in Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, and now likely California – we don't deserve to have the same rights as a straight person. In Arkansas - they passed a law that bans gay couples from adopting children. In Florida and Arizona voters passed amendments to their states’ constitutions denying marriage, and in some cases civil unions or domestic partnerships as well, to same-sex couples. And now it appears in California the constitution of the state will be amended to take away a same sex couple’s right to marry.

We have come a long way in this country. We’ve made leaps and bounds in the fight to overcome racism - but homophobia seems to be something many people just can't get past. I think mainly people can’t get past marriage being a “religious institution”. But the fact is – it is NOT completely. So many CIVIL benefits come from marriage. I hope the debate over same sex marriage will make this country rethink what marriage really is. Ironically these people believe they are defending its sanctity. If it’s so sacred, why do half of them end in divorce?! I could run out tomorrow and marry any woman I hardly know – but I can’t marry the person I want to dedicate my life to and that I love – because he’s the same sex.

I think Ellen put it well when she said to John McCain:

“… it is looked at -- and some people are saying the same -- that blacks and women did not have the right to vote. I mean, women just got the right to vote in 1920. Blacks didn't have the right to vote until 1870. And it just feels like there is this old way of thinking that we are not all the same. We are all the same people, all of us. You're no different than I am. Our love is the same.
To me -- to me, what it feels like -- just, you know, I will speak for myself -- it feels -- when someone says, "You can have a contract, and you'll still have insurance, and you'll get all that," it sounds to me like saying, "Well, you can sit there; you just can't sit there." That's what it sounds like to me. It feels like -- it doesn't feel inclusive...It feels -- it feels isolated. It feels like we are not -- you know, we aren't owed the same things and the same wording.”