Month: November 2008

A reader writes:

It’s been a gray and intermittently rainy day in the Green Mountain State. Our protest took place in front of the Burlington City Hall, which is at the foot of the Church St. pedestrian mall. Despite the weather, I’d estimate that 250 people turned out.

The basic theme of the speakers was: Vermont needs to return to its place at the head of the line when it comes to GLBTQ rights. Robyn Maguire, field director for the Vermont Freedom to Marry Task Force, served as emcee and told the crowd to volunteer to help lay the foundation for a bill to be introduced next year (which really means in a few months) that would open civil marriage to gay couples. What I found striking, though, was that I recognized no one who had been a part of the battle for civil unions eight years ago. The crowd was on the young side (and nicely peppered with straights and gays). Maybe the old guard has given way to new leadership that is owning the struggle.

But why didn’t we hear from the lawmakers who will sponsor this bill come January? Where were some of the original plaintiffs and lawyers from Baker v. State to tell us what we’re up against? We know many of these people, but it looked like they decided to stay home today. (And we drove quite a piece to participate; many of them live a lot closer to Burlington than we do.)

The best part of the rally was the moment of silence near the top of the hour. The speeches, to be somewhat uncharitable, all sound the same after a while. But the quite was strangely moving, and all the more so as it was punctuated at the end by the chiming of the bell atop City Hall.

So: effective as far as it went, and the local news media covered it. Time will tell how whether it will reposition Vermont at the forefront of this battle. I have my doubts.

A reader writes:

It was a truly eclectic group, as fits the local culture – a liitle urban hipster, a little suburban, a little left over hippie, a little rural.  The mood overall was pretty up. A lot of emotion in the speeches, not a lot of substance as to where we go.  I would put the number around 2 to 3 thousand.

A reader writes:

Went to the rally at City Hall in NYC today and was struck by the celebratory mood in the air. Today felt like the first time we got a glimpse around the corner the country is beginning to turn, like everyone knew we would win this thing despite the latest setback. It may take longer than we’d prefer, but America will still come through. Today simply reaffirmed that for me, and I didn’t appear to be alone.

That’s how it felt in DC too. Yes We Will.

A reader writes:

I am 35 years old, straight & a military veteran. I have never in my life participated in a civil protest before, but today I couldn’t ignore the call. 

Today is game-day at OSU’s Beaver Stadium in Corvallis, so the traffic was very heavy for this college town of 50,000. There were a few haters giving us the thumbs-down or other rude gestures on the way to the game, but overwhelmingly the response was enthusiastic & supportive honking from the football crowd.  Of the 100+ protesters, a very large portion of them were straight and there with their spouse or family. 

My gay brother-in-law Mark passed away a few weeks ago.  I wish he could have lived a little while longer to see this fight finally won.

A reader writes:

I attended the pro-gay marriage protest in San Francisco this morning, and I have never seen a protest that badly organized in all my years attending badly organized protests in San Francisco. There were lots of people there, for sure, and the organizers should be commended for getting the word out.  But there was no stage, so no one could see the people who came to rally us.

No one could hear what the speakers had to say because the audio equipment looked like it must have been picked up at the flea market right before the event. No organizers were to be seen anywhere, soliciting money for the cause or getting people’s contact information. Thousands of people were there, for sure, but because no one was there to tell people what to do, and because no one could hear the speakers, people were wandering in circles, unsure what good they were doing or why they were there in the first place. This is San Francisco, a boozy city where waking up for a protest at 10:30 in the morning on a Saturday is quite the commitment, and no one was there to take advantage of all these people’s good will. I also saw no fewer than four signs comparing Prop 8 to the Holocaust (not helpful, and sure to rally anti-gay marriage supporters), and there were no organizers there asking them to carry different signs.

With these organizing skills, it is a small wonder we lost this election. Those in charge of this cause claim that they’ve learned their lesson — that from now on, they will know the importance of grassroots organizing. Today did not convince me that anyone has learned anything.

It might just be time for some new leadership.

A reader writes:

As a straight man, and a lifelong Republican (until the Palin pick), I was rare company at the DC Prop. 8 protest.  I went because discriminating against homosexual marriages isn’t just wrong, it’s ridiculous. 

Walking through the crowd in front of the US Capitol, I was nearly moved to tears.  To look into the faces of so many people and realizing that their lives felt incomplete, that they were told by our government and by many in our society that they are somehow less than human, that they do not deserve the same rights as everyone else, was nothing short of depressing. 

This was my first protest march ever; yet, through the cold rain of a November Saturday, for far longer than I’d walk on any other day, in the company of people with little in common with me, I felt completely fulfilled.  The protesters felt like family.

Apologies for the lack of posts. Aaron and I were at the protest in DC, and just got back. It was really uplifting: a great vibe, even in the rain. A big turnout, skewed young, gay and straight, all races and colors and creeds. In the twenty years I’ve been fighting the marriage fight, I have never seen the gay and gay-friendly population this energized on this issue. It took me back to the 1980s and 1990s, but the atmosphere was more confident, more mainstream, and less angry. I have no doubt any more that we will win.

And as we marched past the World War II Memorial, with Lincoln in the background, something a little miraculous happened. A rainbow broke out over the capitol past the Washington Monument.

A reader writes:

I’m not very good at counting these things, but I’d say we had about 1,500 at the rally, an astonishing number considering that the organizing for this started Monday night, there wasn’t even a vote in Minnesota on gay rights issues, and temps were in the mid-30s.  The sun had come out for the first time in days.  It was mostly people in their 20s, and a surprising number of straight couples and families with children. There were no counter-protesters. There were no anti-Mormon signs or statements from the speakers.  In fact, state senator Scott Dibble, an openly gay man, said of those who supported Prop 8: "They are good people.  They care about their families.  We must show them how much we care about ours."