One more state heading the right way.

[johnridley]

Veto rebuffed; gay marriage OK in Vermont

Hopefully they will learn from Michigan and other states hard lessons - when the inevitable move to amend the state constitution to redefine marriage or whatever comes, don't sit on your laurels - mobilize and get it kicked out, as many times as necessary.

(text via Detroit Free Press)
The state House Tues­day recorded a dramatic 100-49 vote, the minimum needed, to override Gov.
Jim Douglas’ veto. Its vote followed a much easier override in the Senate, which rebuffed the Republican governor with a vote of 23-5.

Vermont was the first state to legalize civil unions for same-sex cou­ples and joins Connecti­cut, Massachusetts and Iowa in giving gay cou­ples the right to marry. In those other states, ap­proval of gay marriage came from the courts.

Comments

[isherempress.livejournal.com]

Vermonters are fairly independent, MYOB, liberal people.

I'm not so sure we could say the same thing about Michiganians. The culture here is of a type that is more dependent on an omnipotent father figure who provides everything one needs.

Twenty-eight states have passed laws banning same-sex marriage, including Michigan. The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force has a lot of information on this topic. I found this PDF, titled Voting Tallies: State Anti-Marriage Ballot Initiatives to be interesting, as it reminded me that in some states the vote was close.

I believe that the country needs to get marriage away from the government: that marriage should be a religious institution, and civil unions performed by a government representative (clerk, justice of the peace, judge, etc.) be the legally binding contract between two people. As Alan Dershowitz said yesterday on an NPR program, the government doesn't perform circumcisions or baptisms, so why is it in charge of marriages?

Thanks, John, for your support.

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

I'm fairly confident that in 50 years, those bans will be as gone as bans against interracial marriage. It's ridiculous to punish people for what they are. I'd be a lot happier to share the institution with any of the gay folks I know than with most of the straight idiots in the tabloids.

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

BTW I totally agree with you on government and marriages.

I heard an NPR bit on gays in the military a few weeks back, and the people they were talking to said that the younger people in the military had no problem at all with it, it was the old fogeys that were dug in against it, and that as soon as they died off, it'd stop being a problem.

I don't think that discrimination will every totally stop, there are always morons looking for someone different than them so that they can invent a way in which they feel superior (since that sort of person is rarely ACTUALLY superior in any way). But hopefully in the not-too-distant future, such people will be as generally scorned as racists are now.