Out and Proud

GLBT Fortnight in Review, June 10, 2014

BY ANN ROSTOW

 

Out and Proud

 

Hello dear Readers, and Happy Pride Month! I’m actually thinking that I might have done my duty after several decades of loyal Pride attendance. Here in Austin, we don’t even celebrate in June anymore because it’s too hot. We wait until September and have a parade at night.

 

Is that even legal? We’re supposed to be marking the anniversary of Stonewall for God’s sake. It’s like moving July 4 forward three months so that we won’t be uncomfortable at the barbeque table. I think I may already have mentioned to you that I have a tendency to forget the exact date of Austin Pride because it shifts from year to year. Last year we accidentally missed the damn thing, and the year before we went too early, got bored, and went to an oyster bar.

 

At least San Francisco does it right and on the correct day. I happened to be in D.C. last weekend, and stumbled into a Pride traffic jam. No, I did not get out and join the throng. We went to a gin tasting instead. Yes, I admit my priorities have changed from the days of yore, when going to Pride was actually a little thrilling. Even a little dangerous.

 

But then, for many other years, it was more than a little boring. Have any of you had to sit behind a table handing out newspapers for hours at a time? Of course you have. Maybe not newspapers, but something. Key chains. Voter registration cards. Brochures. Rainbow hats, rainbow pens, rainbow candy, rainbow fans. And you can’t even drink because you represent “your GLBT organization here.” Still, it was always a little bit fun until the day came when I’d rather be eating oysters in a dark leather booth or visiting a distillery. That day will come for you too.

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The Window Is Open in Wisconsin

 

Well, for all my cynicism, I will surely be going to Pride this year, whenever it may be, because this year will go down in our history. This is our annus mirabilis, a year of unstoppable progress which will culminate in marriage for all next year.

 

Every fortnight we have a new mirabilis piece of news, and this week we celebrate the addition of Wisconsin to the short list of Dazed and Confused states, states where marriage is not exactly up and running, but where a bunch of gay and lesbian couples have taken advantage of a marriage window in order to wed.

 

For our Badger brothers and sisters, the window has been open since Judge Barbara Crabb unlatched the locking mechanism with an 88-page ruling on June 6. But although Judge Crabb ruled in our favor, determining that Wisconsin’s ban on marriage was unconstitutional, she did not issue an injunction against enforcement of the antigay amendment. Instead, she scheduled a round of briefings, asking both sides to weigh in on the terms of a proposed injunction by the end of June.

 

That left friendly clerks free to issue marriage licenses, insisting that the language of the decision was the only green light they required. Unfriendly clerks, in turn, were free to keep the window shut as they wait for clear instructions. In a nice twist, when the state asked for an immediate court-ordered “stay” of her ruling, Judge Crabb noted that since she has yet to issue a formal injunction, there is nothing to “stay.”

 

The state went off and running to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. But there again, the appellate court also seems stuck on Judge Crabb’s procedural anomaly. They have asked for briefs on whether or not they have jurisdiction. In other words, can the appellate court even consider a halt to marriages, if marriages have yet to be officially halted by an injunction?

 

Don’t you love it? I can’t figure out if Judge Crabb is just proceeding with caution, or if she’s deliberately arranged a Kafkaesque legal conundrum that serves to let weddings go forward with no immediate recourse for the opposing side.

 

Since I’m writing on June 10, there may well have been further machinations by the time you read this report. Perhaps the pleasant ambiguity will swirl around for weeks. Perhaps not. As you may remember, gay weddings took place for a time in Utah, and then again in Michigan. We also had a window after a state marriage victory in Arkansas.

 

Attorney General Eric Holder has made it clear that the U.S. government recognizes each and every one of these federally approved marriages, even if the states continue to turn their backs on their resident couples. There’s more litigation surrounding the window marriages in Utah, but you know what? I’m not getting into it. I think that recognition issue is pending at the Tenth Circuit, along with the more fundamental question of whether states can ban marriage in the first place.

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Sigh of Relief For Oregon

 

The other big news came out of the Supreme Court, where the entire Court declined to interfere with marriage equality in Oregon. No one stepped in to defend Oregon’s ban on same-sex weddings, so when a federal judge struck the Beaver State amendment last month, everyone from the governor on down was pleased as punch and no one appealed.

 

That did not sit well with the National Organization for Marriage, an enemy faction that fortunately had no connection to the litigation. But (to simplify) just as you and I cannot file an appeal just because we don’t like some court ruling, nor can NOM come out of the woodwork to appeal a decision from the sidelines of a lawsuit. That hasn’t stopped NOM from asking to intervene in the case, and even though they’ve been told no, they’re still trying to stick their nose in Oregon’s business. As such, NOM went sniveling off to the Supreme Court, asking for an emergency hold on marriage while they continued their fruitless attempt to join the party.

 

Happily the Court refused. The emergency motion went to Justice Kennedy, who could have ruled on his own. Instead, he took it to the full Court, where the motion was denied with no explanation and no published dissent. The denial was expected, but it was still a relief.

 

Don’t assume that the Court’s hands-off approach to Oregon signaled a softening of their hard hearted refusal to allow marriage to proceed in Utah. In the Utah case, where the justices did indeed slam the marriage window shut, it was the state that made the request. And unlike NOM, the state was obviously a party to the case. It was the defendant. That Utah decision has led most courts to put marriage rulings on hold, based on the obvious conclusion that the High Court wants to settle the matter on a national basis.

 

In addition to the unusual situation in Wisconsin, the exceptions have come in the aforementioned Oregon case, and in Pennsylvania, where the governor decided not to appeal.

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Good Lawyers

 

You’ve read of course about the continual rise in public approval of marriage equality, a rise that feeds into the snowball effect of continued legal victories. But the rise in our popularity is more than just numbers. It’s manifested in dozens of heartwarming anecdotes from around the country.

 

How about the Wisconsin couple that raced over to one of the friendly clerks to get married, and celebrated with dinner at a nearby restaurant. When the staff learned that the pair were newlyweds, they all pitched in and bought their meal. Hey, would have been nice enough if the restaurant owner or manager had comped them. But waiters, cooks and bussers aren’t exactly rich. What a great gesture.

 

I can’t think of another one off the top of my head, but I’ve had that heart-warmed feeling often in the last several months. Here’s the thing. Just as a hate crime is so insidious because it attacks our community as a whole, these kindnesses affect us all as well. As a news writer, I can’t count the times that I’ve felt sick reporting a hate crime. I’ve felt personally bashed, albeit in a small and indirect way. But lately, the sensation is reversed. Those restaurant workers would have done that for me and Mel. In theory, they did. I’m personally grateful.

 

And there are other nice phenomena. I just read that the vast majority of top American law firms are simply refusing to represent antigay marriage clients. Don’t get me wrong. I believe NOM and the state of Wisconsin and the others have every right to competent attorneys. But I’m also quite happy to let them scrape the bottom of the barrel for the whacko evangelical lawyers. (Plus, they still have Paul Clement so you can’t feel too sorry for them.)

 

Now, surely there must be something for me to grouse about. This column is getting saccharine.

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Waiting For Whoever

 

While I think of some reason to complain, I should fill you in on the status of our appellate cases. We have already argued marriage in the Tenth and Fourth Circuits, so you can expect our first appellate rulings from Denver and um, Richmond? Wherever. Somewhere in Virginia.

 

The Ninth Circuit has scheduled the Idaho arguments for September, and promised to schedule the Nevada case around the same time.

 

The Sixth Circuit now has written briefs from all four states in its jurisdiction. That covers marriage and/or marriage recognition wins in Michigan, Tennessee, Kentucky and Ohio. Oral arguments in the Michigan case are set for August 6.

 

The Fifth Circuit (cue first four notes of Bach’s Toccata in D Minor) has scheduled briefs for later this summer in the Texas case, but has not set a date for arguments.

 

As for what you can expect in the next week or two, I’ve reached the point that I don’t know exactly which lower court federal cases are at the head of the line. I just wait around and check my email. Pop! Pennsylvania. Pop! Oregon. Pop! Wisconsin. We have pending cases in every state at this point. We have already won marriage in 19 states. And we have victories on hold in, what eight states now? Nine? That leaves 22 or 23 states that could pop and I’m just going to let the next one be a surprise.  

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ENDA Nother Thing

 

Finally, here’s something I can complain about. Long time readers will recall that I have little patience for the much hyped Employment Nondiscrimination Act, a piece of legislation drafted at a time when crumbs from the Congressional table were the most we could hope for. Yes, it’s been somewhat improved over the years, but still. The rest of the country is protected from job bias by a powerful federal law that covers discrimination based on race, national origin, sex and religion. Why the hell should we get stuck with a less effective gay-only bill at this stage in our movement?

 

OK OK. I won’t go on the entire rant. Just let me say that, given that I hate ENDA, I’ve long been irritated by the mindless ENDA fans in the official gay community. Every week we’re called to support ENDA! President Obama promises to pass ENDA! Give money to fight for ENDA! Now, at long last, two big major GLBT groups have come out against the bill, citing one of its major weaknesses.

 

According to the Washington Blade, the National Center for Lesbian Rights and the Transgender Law Center say they will not back ENDA until someone closes some of the religious loopholes that riddle this obsolete proposal. Thank you.

 

ENDA has so many exceptions (both religious and procedural) that it arguably would actually hurt us if it passed. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (the aforementioned law that includes everyone else) is increasingly interpreted to cover some forms of sexual orientation discrimination and most forms of trans discrimination. But guess what will happen if Congress passes a special GLBT bill? Courts will refer to ENDA and GLBT plaintiffs will have no access to Title VII whatsoever. Further, any effort to add sexual orientation to Title VII would be set back for years and years.  

 

Pull it. Wait until next year. And introduce a bill to add us to Title VII, a statute that is enriched by half a century of case law. It is where we belong. Oh, and don’t say it’s too hard. The same people who won’t support it won’t support ENDA either. And vice versa.

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arostow@aol.com

Hmmmm. What Shall We Talk About?

GLBT Week in Review, April 30, 2014

BY ANN ROSTOW

 

Hmmmm. What Shall We Talk About?

 

I think there are only three states left in the country that are not embroiled in a federal marriage suit, not counting the 17 states that already celebrate marriage equality of course. Many states are enjoying multiple lawsuits. And I’m not even counting the state lawsuits here and there, like the one in Texas where a local judge recently slammed the state’s anti-marriage law in the case of divorcing lesbians in San Antonio.

 

The latest twist comes out of North Carolina, where a bunch of clergy and same-sex couples are attacking a state statute that basically bans ministers from performing weddings for couples without a marriage license. The lawsuit also targets the North Carolina anti-marriage amendment, but it has been drawing headlines for its claim that the Tobacco State is trampling on religious freedom.

 

Without delving into the aforementioned statute, I’m guessing that the language in the state code was originally meant to prevent straight people from running to the altar without bothering with the bureaucracy of actually getting a license and so forth. Strangely, the law seems to put the burden on the minister, by instituting a fine, forcing a minister to check the paperwork before he or she ties the ritual knot. (Ironically, the law serves to emphasize again, that marriage is a civil status, regardless of how sacred the religious side of it might be seen by the participants.)

 

At any rate, since gay couples can’t get a license to wed in North Carolina, the church plaintiffs are insisting that their right to perform a religious ceremony of marriage is unconstitutionally subjected to criminal penalties. Hey, they have a point! This ought to be interesting.  

 

Off the top of my head, I can tell you that we have a new lawsuit in Georgia, and a full throated suit for equality in Ohio. We’ve already won a marriage recognition case in the Buckeye State, but this latest one is for all the marbles.

 

In significant related news, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has refused to consolidate the appeals of marriage cases out of Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee. Michigan’s attorney general had asked the entire court to go straight to an “en banc” review of marriage equality, but apparently not one judge agreed. The four cases will instead be heard by three-judge appellate panels as is the norm.

 

Keep an eye on Indiana, where arguments will be heard May 2 on whether to skip a factual trial on marriage equality and proceed to summary judgment. In the history of marriage litigation, we’ve only had three trials on the subject, mainly because the conflict is arguably a matter of law, not facts. Nonetheless, we had a trial in Hawaii in the late 1990s. We had the Prop 8 trial. And we just finished a trial in Michigan the other day. (We won them all. Yay!) I’m guessing that Indiana will skip a trial, given that the same judge recently issued a temporary restraining order against the Basketball State in favor of a lesbian couple.

 

Let’s see. A federal judge in Oregon just heard arguments the other day. Since no state authority is defending the ban on marriage in Beaverland, the National Organization for Marriage popped up at the very last minute to demand a seat at the table. NOM’s attempt to intervene will be discussed at a hearing May 14. Meanwhile, the activists at Basic Rights Oregon say they will abandon plans to force a statewide referendum on marriage if the judge rules in our favor by May 23. If that deadline passes, I’m assuming we will see a popular vote to legalize marriage this November. And I’m assuming we’ll win.

 

Next up in the news: arguments on the Virginia marriage law before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in mid-May.

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Criminal Minds

 

Are my columns becoming tedious, Dear Readers? But what choice do I have? Back in the day, before hearing dates and appellate schedules overwhelmed this humble exercise, I had the space to discuss the wacky British lesbian who kidnapped her ex at knifepoint and took her on a harrowing ride down the M5. And the one who tried to poison her ex with sleeping pills and had to call emergency medical services. And the one who broke into her ex’s house and cut up her underwear. And the American woman who murdered her ex and left the body parts in boxes in the garage (carefully marked with her own name) to be discovered years later by her son-in-law.

 

Oh, I forget the details. But I do remember a time when gay news was colorful. And it wasn’t just the lesbians. Don’t forget all those gay male cannibals!

 

I have to assume that our community psychopaths are still out there. But maybe the news radar is so high these days that they’re not getting the kind of coverage that would attract our attention.  

 

I just googled “gay and lesbian psychopaths,” and found a list of six clues that suggest you’re dating a psychopath. If these clues seem familiar, the advice columnist suggests you “walk away” from the relationship. I have to say, that could be a problem, right? It’s the exes that get targeted for deranged shenanigans.

 

In a related note, here’s something I don’t like to see in an advice column. The other day, someone wrote Dear Abby to make a point about kind gestures. This writer, we were informed, went out of her way to help someone. I forget what she did even though she included every detail of her considerate gesture. She then told the recipient to pass along the goodness. Her point to Abby was that self-sacrificing favors were their own reward and helped make the world a better place. Surely there was no reason for this woman to send this account off for publication other than to pat herself on the back. I can’t believe Abby played into this egomaniac, and I was officially annoyed.  

 

The other advice column letters that I hate are the pompous notes from officials asking Abby to remind everyone to check their smoke alarms or stop texting while driving or watch out for phone scammers. We read Abby and her ilk for stories about obnoxious family members and scandalous affairs, not for boring civic reminders.

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The Emperor’s New Faith

 

So here’s a question. Do you think there’s a comparison to be made between Donald Sterling and Brendon Eich? Sterling, as you know, is the owner of the Clippers who was barred for life from the NBA after he was heard disparaging black men in a taped conversation with his girlfriend. Eich is the former CEO of Mozilla, who lost his job when it became known that he donated $1,000 to Prop 8. After Eich was drummed out of his job, the GLBT community began an important debate on how we should treat those who oppose marriage equality. Should we treat them as decent people with whom we disagree, or should we call them out in no uncertain terms? That debate is still going on.

 

It’s a given that Sterling is “worse” than Eich. Sterling has a history of racism, and his taped conversation revealed what we might call “pure” racism. Eich had no history of homophobia, and if Eich had been caught on tape denouncing gay men and women, I imagine no one would have suggested he stay on the job.

 

That said, Eich wasn’t banned for life from the tech industry. He had just gotten the CEO job and in the uproar over his opposition to marriage equality he was deemed a liability. What we seem to be asking ourselves is this: can there ever be a benign reason for someone to support traditional marriage? Was the uproar over Eich unfair, or misplaced? (Significantly, the uproar did not come from gay organizations, but from individuals.)

 

The answer often seems to rest on faith. Don’t we, as Americans, respect people whose faiths lead them to conclusions which we don’t share? In general, the answer is yes. But there must be a limit to this. Faith doesn’t justify racism. Why should faith be allowed to justify hostility towards gay men and women? Why do we allow religious exclusions to civil rights bills and policies? Because of Leviticus?

 

The people who insist faith commands opposition to gay rights are using the Faith Card as a stand in for tradition, for how they were raised, for their unconscious attitudes, for their instinctive dislike of homosexuality. And these are the same reasons that lead others to, let’s say, give a thousand dollars to Prop 8. There’s no call to be churlish in our reaction to our opponents. But there’s no reason to let their actions (and make no mistake, Brendon Eich took action) go unchallenged.

 

Just because Sterling is a hundred times worse than Eich doesn’t mean that both men are not guilty of the same crime. Sterling robbed a bank of a million dollars while Eich shoplifted a set of cufflinks. Still, there’s a connection.

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Resting Places

 

Here’s a nasty story out of Idaho. A 74-year-old Navy veteran, Madelynn Taylor lost her wife, Jean Mixner, in 2012. After Mixner’s death, Taylor went to the state veterans’ cemetery to arrange for the two of them to be buried together when the time comes. Mixner was cremated, and Taylor also plans to be cremated, so it’s not as if the women will take up much space.

 

But, as you might have guessed by the adjective “nasty,” the Spud State authorities said no. Because this is a state facility, the cemetery poobahs refused to recognize Taylor and Mixner’s 2008 California marriage.

 

You know, there are dozens of antigay news stories in any given week, but this one really takes your breath away. Taylor, who is keeping Mixner’s ashes in a closet for now, has lived in Idaho for a long time and has family in the state. “I just feel like it’s the right place for me,” she told the press. “You know, I’m a veteran. But I don’t want to be alone. I want Jean with me.”

 

Governor Butch Otter, in turn, noted in a statement that “Idaho’s Constitution does not recognize same-sex marriage. The voters spoke in 2006 by passing an amendment to our Constitution defining marriage as between a man and a woman.”  Give us a gay break, Butch. I wonder if this is really what the voters of Idaho hoped to achieve when they pulled the levers, or poked the chads, back in 2006. And when people speculate on why our movement has made so much progress, it’s because of people like Madelynn Taylor and Jean Mixner.

 

By the way, not only does Idaho have a federal lawsuit underway, but it is part of the Ninth Circuit, where a marriage case is still pending and where we are still waiting to hear whether our major sexual orientation discrimination ruling from last January will stay on the books without further review from the full court. If the ruling holds, and if the (Nevada) case goes forward, Taylor won’t have that much longer to wait before Idaho’s marriage amendment turns into mashed potatoes.

 

I can’t remember whether I’ve mentioned Mel and my plan to be cremated and mixed together. We decided to buy three tacky urns, perhaps decorated with sparkles and inlaid photos of the two of us smiling drunkenly and holding tropical cocktails. Maybe we’ll have “Mom and Ann” written in script. Anyway, we’ll give one urn to each of the three adult children with instructions to keep them on prominent display forever. Oh, maybe we’ll write “Nana and Grand Ann” and make the grandkids put the urns on the mantle. Something like that. The idea is so outrageous that it’s almost tempting.

 

Maybe we’ll write little notes and put them on the bottom under the ashes that say: “put us back in the urn this instant!”

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arostow@aol.com

 

 

 

 

 

The New Black

GLBT Fortnight in Review, April 16, 2014

BY ANN ROSTOW

 

The New Black

 

Swirling through the debate over marriage and gay rights in general is a deeper American colloquy.  Is opposition to gay equality a matter of opinion to be respected? Or is it a derivative of prejudice to be condemned?

 

We’re not talking about some hostile crazy person who says gays will burn in Hell. We’re talking about someone like Brendan Eich, the head of Mozilla who was forced to resign under duress after it became known that he donated a thousand bucks to Prop 8 back in the day. We’re talking about the head of Barilla pasta, who said his company promoted traditional values and would not use gay families in its commercials. We’re talking about the photographer in New Mexico who said she’d happily serve gay clients, but balked at taking on a lesbian wedding. We’re talking about Bubba Watson, winner of two green jackets who believes gays are sinners but said he loved us anyway (and would have us over to dinner).

 

Many people, including some ardent supporters of marriage rights, have recently written about the need for comity between activists and what I guess you might call passive resistors--- otherwise decent sounding people who happen to believe in traditional values but who wish us no harm. When a computer guy loses his job because he made a political donation that we don’t like over a decade ago, don’t we look like the intolerant ones? Can’t we win our battles in a polite marketplace of ideas rather than the nasty arena of Internet petitions and politically correct screams in the media?

 

In some ways, I would love to join the crowd now calling for good manners on the battlefield of gay rights. I’ve always enjoyed sending digs in the direction of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), who used to pop up on cue like an angry Jack in the box, all red faced due to some completely innocuous incident or remark. Not everything is a slur. Even stereotypes are sometimes accurate. Some gay men and lesbians are complete jerks. We are not perfect, nor beyond criticism.

 

But opposition to marriage equality is not a banality. Or if it is, it’s of the Hannah Arendt variety. Free speech, as we all know, does not guarantee that speech will have no consequence. It only guarantees that the State will not censor our commentaries absent some compelling reason. Indeed, Internet petitions and boycotts are exactly the sort of tools we have at our disposal to fight notions we find contemptible. And if and when someone else finds our contempt alarming, they have recourse to the same arsenal of Democracy. The marketplace of ideas is more of a street fair than a chic boutique.

 

Mr. Eich lost his job not because of an organized campaign from gay activists, but because of several factors: a web site made a big deal about it, an online petition of complaint generated 70,000 names (not such a big number), and Mozilla staffers were upset. It was bad publicity for a firm in a very competitive and youth oriented field. Many other corporate chiefs with unpleasant views have survived.

 

Much of the reaction against those who don’t favor marriage equality now comes---not from the GLBT community—but from the rest of America, particularly young America. We are the new Black. We are the new Correct. This is the side effect of widespread change in America’s view of sexual orientation.

 

Is it sportsmanlike? Gentlemanly? Perhaps not. The LGBT community and our allies aren’t running around looking for adversaries to put to the sword. But nor are we letting people off the hook when they maintain that they have nothing against us, save a harmless desire to stick with tradition. The tradition of relegating gays and lesbians to second class status or worse is exactly what we have been fighting for decades, and there’s nothing harmless about it.

 

I can’t help but suspect that those in and out of the gay community who wring their hands at our inability to be “gracious in victory,” are themselves a product of their times. Baby boomers like me who are so relieved and happy at the amazing progress they’ve experienced that they are inclined to settle for a tolerant society rather than an equal one. But equal is equal. Nothing short of it is acceptable, period. Everyone remains free to maintain their views, but opposition to marriage equality, or any equality, will never go unchallenged as long as the gay rights movement runs forward.

 

We’ve always been fighting for equality. But we’ve been so far away that it’s been sort of a rhetorical goal. Equality, yes. But first, can we remove ourselves from the list of psychiatric disorders? First, can we repeal criminal statutes against gay relationships? Can we serve in the military? Can we keep our job, our housing? Can our partners see us in the hospital, inherit our assets?

 

Equality has only become visible in the last few years. Now it seems reachable. And now we have to make our case to exactly the sort of people who protest that they have nothing against gays save a difference of opinion or faith. It’s exactly that difference of “opinion” that we have been trying to reconcile for half a century. Are we equal or not? For those people who still insist “not,” even those well-meaning nice people, we must continue to express our disapproval. We can’t be gracious in victory until we’ve reached victory to begin with.

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Tenth Circuit Redux

 

So here’s an interesting situation. One week ago, a three-judge panel on the Tenth Circuit heard arguments in the Utah marriage case, specifically the appeal of a federal ruling that struck down marriage discrimination in the Beehive State.

 

Tomorrow  (from my perspective that’s April 17) the exact same panel will hear arguments in the virtually identical Oklahoma marriage case. Are the judges going to ask different questions? Are they going to drill down on some of the issues raised the week before? Will they play devil’s advocate? Will the Okie lawyers take a different tack than the Utes?

 

Last week’s headlines were full of ambiguity, but the general theme was “judges seem split on marriage.”  It sounded, as we expected, that our Democratic appointee, Carlos Lucero, was on our side. Our conservative judge, Paul Kelly, seemed wary. And our middle of the road guy, Judge Jerome Holmes, could go our way if we’re lucky.

 

Much of the discussion revolved around the level of legal scrutiny to be applied to gay marriage and/or sexual orientation discrimination. Unfortunately, the Tenth Circuit recently ruled that sexual orientation bias does not deserve heightened scrutiny (in a 2008 case). On the other hand, the denial of fundamental rights like marriage should also trigger heightened scrutiny when denied. Some judges avoid this conclusion by deciding that, even though “marriage” is a fundamental right, the “right to marry a same-sex partner,” is not fundamental after all. I gather everyone went back and forth over this ground.

 

According to reports, there was also some discussion on the irritating subject of whether gay men and women are good parents. I won’t go into a full rant today, but I have to note (again) that gay men and women will be parents whether or not they are legally married. Further, the Supreme Court has expressly upheld the right to marry for deadbeat dads and incarcerated prisoners. No one questions that the “right to marry a convicted felon,” or the “right to marry a deadbeat who doesn’t pay child support,” is indeed “fundamental.” But the “right to marry a same-sex partner” is somehow unthinkable? It’s only a matter of time before the semantic strings that are holding up this dangling constitutional construction are frayed beyond repair, and I have to hope that this time has come.

 

In other federal marriage news, a judge in Ohio has ruled that the state must recognize same-sex marriages from elsewhere, a decision that flowed directly from December’s federal ruling on recognizing same-sex partners on death certificates in the Buckeye State. The judge stayed his opinion for Ohioans in general, but left it in effect for the plaintiff couples in the case.

 

The Ohio ruling, along with federal marriage victories in Tennessee, Kentucky and Michigan, will be headed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit later this year. The Michigan attorney general has asked that instead of assigning one or more three-judge panels, the full court will review all these cases “en banc.” Of the 15 active judges on the Sixth Circuit, 10 are GOP appointees and five are Democratically named. If you do the math, you can see why an opponent of marriage equality would want the entire bench to get together and hash it out. Even though many GOP judges have ruled in our favor over the last year, those odds are daunting for marriage activists.

 

Don’t forget that the Fourth Circuit will take up the Virginia marriage case next month, so we’ll have plenty of action in store. Plus, we are waiting for lower federal court rulings in a zillion other states. In fact, of the 33 states where marriage is not legal, only five are not party to legal action.

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Georgia On My Mind

 

I could have gone on with marriage news, but we have to limit our intake. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have time to register our disappointment that Blubba won the Masters (it’s not just his Biblical literalism, but must he button his polo shirt up to the neck? I hate that.). Nor would we find the space to mention that Our Gay Bishop Gene Robinson is to give the Easter prayer at the White House, or that some airport cab drivers in Cleveland are refusing to drive taxis with Gay Games ads on the side.

 

Hey. How about the Chicago man, Kelvin Matthews, who was arguing with a Sprint customer care representative about an account that was supposed to be closed. When Sprint sent him an email to confirm whatever arrangements they made, he noticed it was addressed to: “Sissyboy Kelvin Gay Matthews.” Say what? Sprint offered him a free iphone and two months of service, but Kelvin refused and cancelled. Matthews is straight and married, not that there’s anything wrong with that.

 

The story reminds me of the convenience store that was in the news this week because the manager put up a sign that told clients to pull up their pants. Tired of the baggy look, the Georgia man wrote: “Only “FAGS” like to keep their pants down. Pull your pants up or be proud to be a FAG.”

 

“It really offends me by them coming in, pants down,” Anil Patel told the press. “So it is not that I’m against them, gay people or anything like that, but just trying to prove a point. If you are going to come in my store, make sure you have your pants on.”

 

You know. It’s hard enough to fight stereotypes. And indeed, as I mentioned earlier, some stereotypes are real. But coming up with completely erroneous generalizations about our community adds surrealism to insult. Readers? Have you ever seen a gay man running around gangsta-style with his pants around his hips in public? Emphasis on “public?” Oh, and notice that Mr. Patel “has nothing against us,” a mitigating aside that has become a de rigeur preface to even the most horrific antigay remark.

 

And finally, keeping the previous item in mind, I recently read an essay (in the New York Times, bien sur) that questioned why the media tiptoes around words like “fag” when used in a news context. Why say that Mr. Patel “used a gay slur” or that someone “told the press to go away using language that cannot be repeated in this newspaper?”

 

Why not say “fag,” or “fuck off,” if that’s what was said or written? It’s not as if the media itself has deliberately selected a slur or an obscenity. It’s part of the news story. I don’t know how many times I’ve had to look up a story ten times before I can figure out exactly what “slur” or “term of denigration” was employed in some situation that I’m trying to describe. We’re all grownups here. If the guy said it, report it.

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arostow@aol.com

Oh Oh Oh… It’s Madness

GLBT Fortnight in Review, March 19, 2014

BY ANN ROSTOW

Oh Oh Oh… It’s Madness!

 

Don’t tell my editors, please, but I’m way behind on my column because I had to fill out my billion dollar March Madness bracket. All these decisions to make. Is Wichita State for real? Can Harvard make another run? Will Joel Embiid return in time for Kansas to beat New Mexico in the second round? And what do I do with my own struggling home team, the University of Texas, who everyone is picking to lose in an upset to Arizona State.

 

My answers: yes and no; not this year; Kansas will win with or without him; and yes, Texas will beat Arizona State, but that’s as far as we go this year.

 

Years ago, before I married into a family of college hoops fanatics, I used to dread this time of year when the sports channels were overrun with boring games between no-name schools. One time, however, I was watching Gonzaga play just after I had written a story about some bad anti-gay thing that happened at Gonzaga. Amazingly, I was fired up about the game, rooting hard for Gonzaga’s foe and I had a brainstorm.

 

The following year I vowed to rank all 64 teams based on a gay factor. Was the team from a pro-gay state? Did the college have an antidiscrimination policy? Did gay groups on campus say the place was friendly, or not? After convincing my editors (at the Texas Triangle) to promote the big gay bracket issue, I dove into the project only to realize that it was insanely labor intensive. I wound up working for hours and hours and hours, and in keeping with my natural penchant for sloth over slog, I vowed never to do it again.

 

Happily, given my conversion to college basketball, I no longer have a need for gimmicks. But I still root against Gonzaga on principle. They’re not even at the dance this year. Hah! As for my bracket, I had no choice but to get it done by today because as you may know, Warren Buffett is giving a billion dollars to anyone who correctly predicts the entire contest. That could be me! I think the odds are unbeatable. You’re more likely to hit four holes in one in a single round of golf, or be struck by lightning on the one-year anniversary of the day you were bitten by a shark. But still. Anything can happen right?

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There’s Something About Marriage

 

It’s hard to admit, but I have also been avoiding this week’s column due to a certain marriage equality fatigue. Since marriage equality is the subject I have pursued relentlessly for nearly two decades, my sense of ennui is significant in some way. We have come so far that even a compulsive analyst of the fight for marriage can no longer wade through federal court briefs, or even track exactly how many cases are pending in federal courts. I think I read this week that five cases were just filed in Indiana alone. In another article, I read that three cases were filed in the Hoosier State. You know what? I’m not checking this out! It’s too much. I can’t give you the attention to detail that you deserve.

 

In Tennessee, a judge has issued an immediate order to recognize three marriages, just the plaintiffs in one case, but still. In Virginia, where Olson and Boies just won a marriage case at the district level, Lambda and the ACLU have been allowed to intervene in the appeal before the Fourth Circuit. The big gay guns have their own Virginia case and the Team of Rivals had opposed their motion to intervene to no avail. Now, the Fourth Circuit has announced a fast schedule that competes with the Tenth Circuit cases of Utah and Oklahoma. Basically, we will see appellate court arguments on marriage in early April at the Tenth Circuit, and early May at the Fourth Circuit. One or both of those appellate rulings will likely reach the High Court.

 

There are also two major headlines out of the Ninth Circuit. First, we just learned that the huge huge huge ruling in the gay juror case will not be appealed. Not to the full Ninth Circuit, and not to the Supreme Court. That means that sexual orientation discrimination remains presumptively unconstitutional throughout the western United States. This is now binding law, period. Thank you, Abbot Labs, for keeping your powder dry, perhaps with us in mind.

  

Second, the strange Nevada marriage case now on appeal to the Ninth Circuit has been shelved again, for no clear reason. This case, Sevcik v Sandoval, is the oldest federal marriage case on our community docket. For a time, it was combined with a case against Hawaii, but when the Island State legalized marriage, their case dropped off. The case against Nevada (which we lost in lower court) was put on hold while the Supreme Court considered the Prop 8 and Windsor cases. Then last summer, it resumed its sluggish progress.

 

In late January, the Ninth Circuit’s aforementioned gay juror ruling reset the legal standards in evaluating antigay bias cases. Shortly thereafter, the state of Nevada admitted it could no longer defend its marriage ban, and it looked as if the Ninth Circuit would move forward towards a big victory for equality. Earlier this month, the court even set up a schedule for April arguments before postponing them “indefinitely” the other day.  A procedural problem? Anyone out there know for sure?

 

Oh, but there’s so much more. A case or two just filed in Florida, a divorce case for two lesbians moving up in Alabama, and a decision expected any day now in the Prop 8-style marriage trial in Michigan. Meanwhile, briefs are flying in both directions all over the country in the run up to a summer of explosive legal headlines.

 

Keep in mind that all of these lawsuits are either sitting at a federal appellate court, or on their way to one. Unlike the state marriage suits we know and love, these rulings will use the force of federal law like a sledgehammer to smash the constitutional amendments that have barred our unions in over half the states. (Or not, of course, but I think most will.) At any rate, the Supreme Court will not be able to duck the central question of marriage equality once these appellate rulings hit their docket, a historic moment which will come sooner rather than later at this rate.

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I Heart SCOTUS

 

Speaking of the Supreme Court, the justices have decided not to review the “I Heart Boobies” case out of the Third Circuit, a confrontation between a Pennsylvania school district and a bunch of middle school girls who wore the saucy slogan on pink bracelets ostensibly to raise awareness of breast cancer. The school took it all too seriously, banning the bracelets as the sort of provocative disruption that districts are allowed to mitigate without offending the constitutional rights of students. The Third Circuit disagreed, basically ruling that the bracelets weren’t that big of a deal.

 

We were watching this case due to our communal interest in gay T-Shirts and other student statements. We all know that kids do not leave their constitutional rights at the schoolhouse gate, but those rights are nonetheless diminished to some extent once the students give themselves up to school authority for the day. Just a few years ago, for example, the High Court ruled that a student could be disciplined for carrying a druggie poster (“Bong Hits for Jesus”) to an off campus event. So, can a school make you take off your “Day of Silence” shirt? More interestingly, can the principal ban antigay hate speech? What about a shirt with a quote from Leviticus? It remains murky, but we err on the side of the student as did the High Court last week.

 

In other gay-related SCOTUS news, the justices are about to hear the Hobby Lobby case that asks to what extent a corporation can skirt the law through a claim of religious freedom. Many observers have now noticed the link between Hobby Lobby (whose owners don’t want to offer insurance that covers contraception) and the sort of antigay business owner who might not want to serve gay customers.

 

But you heard the comparison here first, months ago when the High Court agreed to take the case. At issue are several questions, one being the constitutional rights of corporations versus individuals. Without diving fully back into the swamp of religious freedom where we have wallowed so often in the past, let me just note that once again, while everyone loves to discuss religious freedom, few are questioning whether and why hostility and prejudice towards gay men and women even qualifies as a legitimate tenet of religious faith in the first place. At any rate, arguments are scheduled for next week so it will be all over the press.

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The End of Days for Fred?

 

So, we heard this week that our old pal Fred Phelps is in poor health, and living in some kind of medical facility. His estranged son Nathan says it’s a hospice and that the 84-year old man is close to death.  Nathan also wrote that Phelps has been kicked out of the Westboro Baptist Church, which is hard to believe considering said “church” is nothing more than a collection of Phelps family members living on a compound in one of Topeka’s residential neighborhoods.

 

Aha! Further research indicates that there was indeed a power struggle within the Phelps family this summer and that Fred lost. Also, in case some of you are hoping to go picket this lunatic’s funeral, his daughter announced that he won’t have one. Really? I bet they do something for the old buzzard.

 

I noticed while looking into Fred’s status that some in our community are torn about celebrating a man’s death. But you know what? It’s not a zero sum game where you have to either celebrate or maintain some respect. This is a brutal, hateful and mentally deranged individual, who inadvertently advanced gay rights by personifying religious bigotry at its worst. His dying days will bring me a grim satisfaction, and his death will simply mark the end of the weird phenomenon that was Fred Phelps. I hope his “funeral,” or whatever ritual ensues, is a lonely affair. No protestors, no news media, no attention, no care whatsoever.

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Vox Unpopuli

 

I have a few hundred words left. Just enough for the two lesbians murdered in Texas by an antigay dad, or maybe a recap of who did or did not march in the St. Patrick’s Day Parades, and which beer companies decided to boycott to show gay support (Guinness and Sam Adams, maybe others).

 

Instead, how about contrarian gay writer, Brendon Ambrosino, a man who has stood out from the crowds on each side of the gay debate by deliberately taking the road no one else travels?

 

There’s a reason no one travels these roads. Most gay journalists don’t think being gay is fundamentally a choice, don’t have much sympathy for far right leaders like Jerry Falwell, and don’t believe that gay activists are bullies when they confront discrimination or bigotry. Ambrosino, whose columns inspire sputtering fury from the rest of the gay writing cohort, has just been hired as a gay voice for Vox, a new online venture run by clueless Ezra Klein, who admitted he wasn’t really up to date on Ambrosino’s body of work, but said he liked writers who didn’t say the same thing as everyone else.

 

You know, everyone likes a fresh viewpoint. But although many aspects of gay civil rights are up for debate, that debate is marked by some bright lines that can’t be crossed by any serious writer. And yet… they can be crossed by someone like Brendon Albrosino! They can be crossed by someone who wants to be noticed on that lonely road to nowhere and who doesn’t have the mental agility to explore the nuanced complexities along the side streets that intersect our common path. There are a lot of people on those side streets and they’re not going to be noticed by conventional editors who are fundamentally unversed in the gay rights movement. Not unless they’re really good, which Brandon Albrosino is not. Ergo, he’s a contrarian--- which is almost always a euphemism for a simplistic publicity seeker posing as a thinker.

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arostow@aol.com