Proposition 8

It appears that proposition 8 has passed in California. The issue of gay marriage seems to me to be a very simple question of basic human rights, and I find it strange that a supreme court decision can be over-ruled by a simple majority of voters. If given the opportunity, many voters as late as the 1960s would have denied African Americans the vote and equal treatment under the law, and I see many similarities between these two cases.

In my ethics class last spring, one of my colleagues did a presentation on gay marriage and concluded that to respect the rights of those with religious beliefs, a "marriage" should be closely linked with the church, be defined as the union of a man and a woman, and entitle the recipients to a church ceremony. Civil unions, on the other hand, would not be religiously affiliated, would not occur in the church, and would be offered to homosexual and heterosexual couples. Both marriages and civil unions would grant the couple the same legal rights. This makes sense to me and bridges the divide between religion and civil rights.

So why does it always come back to this vitriolic hate between religion and homosexual rights supporters? It just makes no sense to me.

In any case, I fully support gay marriage, under any title the law wishes to give it, so long as the same legal rights and protections are afforded to all our citizens. And I'm sorry to hear that religious creed is now embodied in the California state constitution.