Family Pride’s Blog

A little over a week ago, we brought you the story of Cathy James, an OUTSpoken lesbian mom in Florida who attended the ultra-conservative Family Impact Summit in Tampa. In case you missed the story, click here. Today, Cathy speaks out about her experience.

I want to thank David for asking me to comment on my experience at the Family Impact Summit. Jim Burroway from Box Turtle Bulletin pretty much summed up the interaction I had with the panelists so I would like to tell you about the press conference and a few comments I have after 2 weeks of reflection.

When I found out in mid-August that a large group of national anti-gay leaders and speakers would be meeting in mid-September about 4 miles from my house, I was aggravated. Under the leadership of Nadine Smith, Executive Director of Equality Florida, a half dozen local gay leaders joined with some heavy-hitters of our own, to plan a press conference and witness rally on the afternoon before the conference started. Speakers at the press conference included: Nadine Smith, Equality Florida; Wayne Besen, Truth Wins Out; Rev. Irene Monroe, Faith In America; Sally Phillips, Hillsborough Florida GLBT Democratic Caucus; Rev. Phyllis Hunt, MCC Tampa; Marty Rouse, Human Rights Campaign; Barbara Leavitt, spouse of former ex-gay; Rev. Cedric A. Harmon, Americans United for Separation of Church & State; Michelle Kenoyer, a non-gay ally who lives about 5 miles from the site of the summit.

My aggravation turned to anger when my Florida District 56 State Representative Trey Traviesa and the Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections became sponsors of the summit.

While planning the press conference I kept feeling that our response was too national. These bigots were in MY backyard and I was not happy about it. I talked with several friends about what WE could do. I didn’t want to waste a vacation day and $100 to attend the summit only to be told I am an abomination. We talked about a protest on Saturday. My Holy Spirit moment came when the summit opened up Free Sessions on both Friday and Saturday.

The Free Session on Saturday was a town hall entitled “Defending Marriage: What’s at Stake? My good friend Zeke and I signed up to attend. As a cradle Catholic who attended 12 years of Catholic school and 2 more at a Baptist college, I will never shy away from a discussion of religion. It was difficult sitting through the homophobic, ridiculous and illogical statements by the moderator Rena Lindevaldsen and panelists Peter Sprigg and John Stemberger, but my blood was boiling as the statistics expert Dale O’Leary said that I was much more likely to have psychological disorders and addictions than she was and that my partner and I are harmful to our child.

In pondering what I heard and what I said as scribed by Jim Burroway, I have the following observations:

• Be thoroughly familiar with what the anti-gay crowd is pushing to the religious community. They believe that they have a tried and true system to refute our demand for same-gender rights including marriage. The program, produced by Focus on the Family, is called Ten Persuasive Answers to the Question … “Why not gay marriage?” by Glenn T. Stanton. The pamphlet that accompanies the DVD they gave to all participants tells the reader to “Master the responses to these questions and you will be well-suited to defend the family.” You can study these questions here (1-5) and here (6-10).

• Do not ever be silent when someone is spewing hatred of our community. If you do not have the talking points or the courage to speak out, become an OUTspoken family. Family Pride will provide you with the materials to give you the knowledge and courage to combat our detractors. Seek out a Family Pride workshop or contact Family Pride and offer to help them conduct a workshop in your area.

• Do not accept bigotry as religious truth. Religious teachings that justify bigotry must not be sanctioned by our religious communities. Rather, they must be publicly exposed and denounced. Check out http://www.faithinamerica.info.

• Do not allow anti-gay bigots to use the “values” card. I am a values voter too! I value diversity. I value equality. I value my family.

• BE OUT & INVOLVED – It is so easy to stay at home and leave the work to others. Trust me, I did that until about 2001, but I found out that in Florida as a non-biological mom I have no legal rights in my child’s life. Be out in every part of your life – with family, at work, at church, at your child’s school. Serve on the board of your homeowners’ association, serve in ministries at your church, volunteer with the local or statewide LGBT advocacy group, volunteer at your child’s school, start a Family Pride chapter if your area does not have one.

• Financially support the work of Family Pride, other national, state and local advocacy organizations and political candidates that advocate for all citizens. Remember, they work hard for your family every day.

I’m not sure that this pontification is what David had in mind when he asked me to write a blog, but remember … be careful what you ask for!!

Cathy James is a founder and board member of Securing Our Children’s Rights, Inc., a statewide organization committed to repealing the ban on adoption by gay Floridians. She can be reached at cathy@ourchildrensrights.org.

Jason Kuznicki is a researcher at a public policy organization.  He and his partner have been together for nine years and have been married under Canadian law for four.  The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of his employer. Read more from Jason at positiveliberty.com.

This week the Maryland Court of Appeals — the state’s highest court — ruled against recognizing same-sex marriages.  The mood at our house was pretty dismal the night of the decision.  Had the Court ruled the other way, the marriage Scott and I celebrated in Canada in 2003 would almost certainly be valid today.

It didn’t help that the Court decided by a single vote.  Changing the mind of even one person would have made the difference — a difference that will define who we are to our neighbors, our families, and our children, perhaps for the rest of our lives.

As a family looking to adopt, we face some wide-ranging consequences.  Some of these may not be known for months or years.  But they need to be documented, and I will be writing a series of blog posts that will show just what this decision is costing us.  All of the well-meaning people out there need to know our side of the story.

They need to know.  Why?  So that they will stop electing politicians who demonize gays and gay families.  So that they will push their representatives to support marriage equality rather than indifference or demeaning half-measures like civil unions.  And they need to know so that our children can have the same legal protections that the children of straight couples enjoy.

The religious right talks a lot about preserving the sanctity of heterosexual marriage.  Sanctity is great, but we have to remember its very real human costs.  If preserving the sanctity of heterosexual marriage means hurting or even breaking up some families, then is it really worth the cost?  (Since when does the government dole out “sanctity”?  And since when does sanctity require hurting people?) Maybe as a society we’ll decide that all this is right and appropriate. But we at least ought to know the price we are paying.

In this series, I’m going to document all of the time, money, inconvenience, and loss of dignity that the Court has imposed on us.

I’m going to keep the receipts.  I’m going to do the math:  Adding up the extra taxes, the fees, the money spent on lawyers.  The vacation days that we’ll spend reading the fine print, lest someone take our children away.  And at the end of this journey — wherever we end up — I’m going to give an account of just how much this precious sanctity has cost our family.

It’s worth pointing out that relatively few of these costs are government benefits that would otherwise come out of taxpayers’ pockets.  For example, a second-parent adoption is a complex legal process that may end up costing us a lot — but it will also end up costing the taxpayers, too.  Conservatives often say they don’t want to see taxpayers subsidizing relationships that they consider immoral.

Fine:  Let us get married.  This cost, among many others, will disappear.

There is another cost, too, one that will be harder to document.

There is a quietly gripping passage in Margaret Atwood’s novel The Handmaid’s Tale in which a young married couple has just learned of the new law putting the husband in charge of all property.

It doesn’t matter, the husband tells the wife.  He insists that it won’t change anything.  The wife, though, knows better.  The law is a living embodiment of a set of values.  The law is a teacher, and it works a subtle but often decisive influence on the public.

The woman who learns that she can no longer own property on an equal footing with her husband may hold the new law in contempt.  But the woman’s daughter may grow up in a different world.  That’s what the law can do.

For gays, the law has taught some harsh lessons over the years:  We are deviants, perverts, and criminals.  We shouldn’t be around children.  We shouldn’t be treated as family.  Sometimes, we shouldn’t even be treated as humans.

Straight and gay alike, we’ve absorbed these lessons, and it’s a tribute to our cultural and intellectual independence, to our stubbornness and our willingness to think for ourselves, that we are even having a debate about same-sex marriage today.  The law is a teacher, but as students, we can choose to think for ourselves.

The law taught us all a harsh lesson this week.  I thank my straight friends who assure us that it doesn’t matter, and that they think of us as married anyway.  But I’m still saving my receipts.

If there’s one thing you do today, you should watch this video. It’s currently making the rounds online.

In this touching, un-edited clip, the Republican mayor of San Diego announces that he supports marriage equality. He says that he can’t look his lesbian daughter or gay staffers in the face and tell them that their love is unequal.

Watch the clip and let us know what you think.

The road to equality sure has its ups and downs, but the secret is not to dwell on either. So long as we stay on message, hold our heads up high and keep fighting the good fight, we’ll continue to make progress and learn from the challenges we encounter.

Having said that, it sure has been a rough week. Tuesday marked a 4 - 3 split decision from Maryland’s Court of Appeals, reversing a lower court decision and upholding the state law barring gay and lesbian couples from marrying.

The majority opinion said that while the court agrees that marriage is a fundamental right, it says there is no fundamental right to marry someone of the same sex.

Then, to add insult to injury, Gov. Schwarzenegger “terminated” the California marriage bill for the second time in a row. The bill would have granted gays and lesbians marriage rights in California, and was overwhelmingly approved in the state’s legislature.

The only thing that would change his mind, he said Monday, is if voters overturned Proposition 22 which was passed by the electorate in 2000 to stop gay marriage, but which courts have ruled only applies to marriages performed out of state.

“It would be wrong for the people to vote for something and for me to then overturn it,” Schwarzenegger told reporters at a news conference.

As cheesy Terminator puns flood my mind, all I can think is, “Arnold, we’ll be back….”

For a quick, doable action - sign Equality California’s 2007 Marriage Petition. Why? According to Equality California:

Because California lawmakers have once again made history by passing AB 43, the Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act. For the second time, the Legislature has passed a bill, authored by Assemblymember Mark Leno and sponsored by EQCA, granting same-sex couples the choice to marry.

In 2005, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed the marriage bill, and now we have a second chance to urge him to support fairness and equality for all Californians. We have a second chance to let the governor know that we aren’t going anywhere – and that our numbers are growing.

Even if you’re not from the Golden State, let’s send a message of strength in numbers to Gov. Schwarzenegger! Sign the petition today!

As something of a political junkie, I’ve been intrigued by how soon and how quickly the 2008 presidential race has progressed. That we are over a year out and already have supposed a “front runner” in at least one of the parties is striking.

I haven’t made up my mind quite yet – I refuse to succumb to the pre-primary hoopla – but I do have some favorites so far. There are a couple who I think would make a good president; another who I agree with but doesn’t stand a chance.

And then there are the ones whose candidacies I find troubling because their platforms are so diametrically different from my own. Once again, the anti-gay agenda has become a rallying point for some of the leading contenders on the right.

Touting himself as the only true conservative, Fred Thompson has emphasized his consistency on various social and fiscal issues. Unlike some of his counterparts, he hasn’t shifted his stance on gay marriage; he was always against it. Thompson has publicly endorsed a federal Constitutional amendment that would ban marriage, but his language is more nuanced than previous attempts, and in his opinion, is more likely to pass.

As mayor of New York City, Rudy Giuliani is best known for his leadership on 9/11. He is also credited with “cleaning up the city” by cracking down on crime, albeit with a highly controversial police policy that targeted particular segments of the population. Always viewed as a social moderate, Giuliani has since shifted his stance on gay rights, but has tried to maintain a centrist stance.

A statement from his website reads, “Rudy Giuliani will nominate strict constructionist judges with respect for the rule of law and a proven fidelity to the Constitution. Those judges will follow the text of laws and of the Constitution and will not make policy from the bench.”
Read: “Dear Conservative Base, regardless of what I’ve supposedly stood for in the past, I won’t nominate anyone to the bench who supports all families (or a woman’s right to control her own body.)”

Mitt Romney, arguably my least favorite of the candidates on the right, spent the greater part of his tenure as governor of Massachusetts bad mouthing his constituency and whining about being a red dot in a bleeding-heart blue state. Though he declared himself as a more ardent supporter of gay rights than Ted Kennedy in 1994, Romney, showing himself to be little more than a disingenuous political opportunist, is now quite anti-gay rights.

If your Labor Day gatherings were anything like mine, a certain bathroom sex scandal was the topic of choice. As summer unofficially comes to a close, let’s take a moment to refocus on some of the more important issues for our families.

There was a groundbreaking victory in Maine on Thursday. A tip of our hat to our friends and neighbors at GLAD. EqualityMaine’s website posted this statement regarding the decision:

This morning, Maine’s Law Court issued a ruling that paves the way for two siblings in foster care to be jointly adopted by the two women who have raised them for the past six years. At last, Ann Courtney and Marilyn Kirby of Portland will be able to form a permanent, legal parental relationship with their foster children, 10-year-old “M” and her brother, six-year-old “R”.  The case was argued by attorneys at Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders.

Also on Thursday, in a historic ruling, an Iowa judge ordered Polk County officials to accept marriage certificates from same-sex couples. Less than 24 hours later, the county won a stay of the judge’s order, halting marriage equality. Nonetheless, some 27 same-sex couples were able to file for applications, and Sean Fritz and Tim McQuillan of Ames, Iowa were able to get married and return their license to the courthouse in time. Thus, they are the first official same-sex couple to be married in the state.

I think it will be interesting to hear the reactions of presidential candidates regarding the Iowa decision. Many candidates have expressed their belief that marriage equality is a state issue - so shouldn’t we expect to see those same candidates support this big leap for equality in Iowa? Only time will tell.

Stay tuned. September is shaping up to be a historic month for our families.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. A thousand words is a conservative estimate for this picture, snapped outside a Neighborhood Church in Pasadena.

The banner, which reads “LOVE makes a family. We support marriage equality!” was slashed. For the third time. It’s a reminder of tension between our movement and organized religion. It’s a reminder of the hate and homophobia that LGBTQ people face around this country and the world. It’s also a reminder that not all religious institutions are against us and our families. In many ways, this banner offers a beacon of hope: that more religious institutions will stand on the side of equality and justice.

In response to the incident, the Neighborhood Church of Pasadena released this statement:

Pasadena—Neighborhood Church of Pasadena will hold a peace rally on Sunday, September 9 at 1pm to officially designate the historic property as a “Hate-Free Zone” following the third slashing of the church’s Marriage Equality Banner.

Neighborhood Church invites the community to join members and staff as they wrap the sanctuary and entire adjoining campus in a hate-free ribbon in a show of unwavering solidarity and dedication to equality for all marriages and families, and to reinforce the church’s “Stand on the Side of Love” covenant.

The ribbon will also be signed and decorated with “pledges from the heart” declaring support for peace, equality and justice for the Gay and Lesbian community, the freedom to marry, and the belief that LOVE makes a family!

The banner was slashed on July 29, and following the peace rally, church officials plan to raise a new banner.

When we came across California resident Jim Smith’s story, we knew we had to share it with all of you. Here’s what Jim has been doing in the Golden State - in his own words.

My ‘same-sex domestic partner’ and I moved to California almost ten years ago and had twins by surrogacy five months ago. When the legislature passed AB 849, the “Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act” in 2005, I called the Governor’s office several dozen times, but each conversation ended when the call was digested into a tally mark.

When I heard that he might be getting another chance this September, I wanted to do something more substantial – something I could share with other people and the press, and something that might actually get through to the Governor. If he knew me and my family, it would be a lot harder to veto us. So I started to send a brief letter to the Governor every day, asking him to sign AB 43 for a different reason. Some are typewritten, some I do by hand, and occasionally I slip in a picture of my family for him to contemplate.

I’ve been keeping copies and documenting the process on my blog. I have only received one reply – a form letter – which gave me fodder for July 28 that you can read here.

I’m not sure where this will take me, but I do know that it has helped build my debating and writing skills along with my knowledge of the issues. For instance, before I started, I didn’t know what to say to staffers who said signing it would be illegal, or even the gay community’s concern that we will just get backlash. I know that the simple answer to both of those is that if the Governor vetoes this bill, he is telling the people of California that discrimination is OK. We can’t have the Governor emboldening the Opponents of Equality right before a petition initiative. Spending fifteen minutes a day trying to figure out how to get him on our side seems like a small investment to make for some big payback later.

Feel free to contact me through the blog comments or email me at signab43@gmail.com

We bring this post courtesy of Steven Goldsten, the Chair of Garden State Equality. This piece is cross posted on Steven’s blog.

Caving in to massive public pressure from Garden State Equality, Lambda Legal and other civil rights organizations, United Parcel Service this week announced that it would give benefits to employees in New Jersey civil unions on the same basis as the company gives benefits to married straight employees.

Earlier this month, UPS said it would not treat civil-unioned couples in New Jersey the same as married couples because as the company had read the law, the New Jersey legislature did not intend for civil-unioned couples to be considered “spouses” as straight married couples are considered.

It’s time to share with you some inside information about the drafting of the civil union law last December that tragically gave UPS legal room to come up with its original interpretation.

First, make no mistake: UPS’ original decision to deny equal benefits to civil-unioned couples in New Jersey was discriminatory, disingenuous and mind-bogglingly dumb as a business practice. Continue Reading »