We are a family

Personal Commitment- La Nacional Restaurant, 239 W. 14th St, New York City, New York- July, 27, 1989

Domestic Partnership- Municipal Building, One Centre St., New York City, New York- The Friday before Stonewall 25 in 1994

Civil Union- Putney, Varmont- July 2001 (Google the interview by the LA Times for an article.)

Married- Embassy Suites- Fallsview, Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada- October 2005

Today, June 26, 2013 Federal Recognition of us as a legal family.

24th Anniversary July, 27, 2013 Exchanging newly designed rings, Santa Fe, NM

By MachineToole | 06/26/2013 12:00 PM | 6 comments

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The rulings were definitely worth a celebration, especially for gay people who live in California. For them, it was a monumental day. Also very good for the folks already married in the other 12.

For the rest of us, it's progress. I think that the biggest gay ruling to date for most of the country remains Lawrence v. Texas, which said that the government could not consider us criminals because we are gay.

BearinFW 06/27/2013 04:47 PM

Yes BearinFW, Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of happiness is an ongoing war to be fought for. In that- some battles are won and some lost. Historically we can go back to the Magna Carta, or Plato‘s definition of Democracy as a system of “rule by the governed”. It is however our concept of a “Bill of Rights,” those solid guidelines which cannot be voted in or out depending upon time and tide that is what sets us apart on the record of significant events. Yet, these too are only laws and rules which mean nothing unless we uphold them from being corrupted. We see the Christian Taliban trying to impose their version of Sharia Law. They state that it is what the ‘Founders’ had intended. They declare that it is what a god wants. It is only their Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of happiness based upon their religious stability that they care about. They won the battle when having DOMA created. We won the battle yesterday (DD Day, Wednesday June, 26, 2013). They pressured a president to approve “Don’t ask- Don‘t Tell.” The dismantling of these discriminating legislations should and need to be celebrated... for the moment... and then we use the positive energy achieved to move forward. In a later blog today you can read how Fox News has denounced the new decisions. They and theirs will try to erode the equal rights ruling just as they have been somewhat successful limiting ‘Roe v Wade.’
We can’t just ‘gloom and doom,’ or just wildly party, or stick our heads in the sand, or walk around with a gun because someone might be after us. We need to seek truth and justice. (and not all the justices believe that.) We need to be vigilant. But, ‘We Must Celebrate‘ when it is appropriate or we have a potential of being as rigid as the people in the god business who have no reality in truth... only the dreams of their version of a perfect where perfection does not exist nor should it.

MachineToole 06/27/2013 12:01 PM

To be honest, Toole, the states that allow gay marriage now are, for the most part, the bluest and most pro-gay states in the country. They're kind of the "low-hanging fruit," if you will.

This is why the Supreme Court is eventually going to have to intervene nationally, because the states to come get progressively harder and harder, and in some cases, without federal intervention, marriage rights might be generations (that's multiple generations) away.

Today's DOMA ruling was big, but it really just builds upon Kennedy's two previous landmark decisions. The BIG ONE is probably still a decade or more away.

BearinFW 06/27/2013 01:34 AM

OK, so what does this all mean... IT IS POSSIBLE... It is ours to win true equality or to loose it. The tide is with us today, but tides are known to ebb and flow. We do not sit back and say it is for the next generation to possibly be equal. (picture) This is my Spouse & me in front of the Stonewall (Today, June 26, 2013). Those who fought back here did not say, “we will leave it up to others.” We, today, will only help win what they started... Yes, there are other states that need to be stirred up... They too will find that the water is and has been clear. It is only fear that is muddy. Equal rights mean ‘Equal’ rights for all, but only if it is fought for for by us all. No one is giving it away.

MachineToole 06/26/2013 07:52 PM

One interesting question raised by the DOMA ruling:

Are the feds going to afford benefits to married same-sex couples in states where their marriages aren't recognized by the state?

For example: A married couple moves from New York to Texas. Do they lose federal recognition? Say a surviving spouse is drawing Social Security benefits and moves from New York to Florida. Does she lose them? Can a couple from Arkansas who holds a valid marriage license from Massachusetts expect to get federal benefits?

I've heard various opinions on this today, but it is something that is going to have to be ironed out.

Also, going into these rulings, I had not feared the Prop. 8 case, thinking it was going to apply to CA only and didn't pose much relevance elsewhere. Boy, was I wrong, and we narrowly averted disaster on this ruling. The minority view was that the initiative (vote of the people) should hold precedence. If that view had prevailed then it would have essentially said that the public had the right to vote on our civil rights, and that the state constitutional amendment elections were not subject to the review of most courts. We dodged a real bullet here, thanks to, of all people, Antonin Scalia? I about dropped dead of a heart attack when I saw that he voted in favor of a gay rights case. Did hell freeze over?

BearinFW 06/26/2013 07:17 PM

Congrats to gay couples in California, to the 12 current states, and DC. But there are still 37 states to go. Today's rulings move us forward, but we still have a long way to go.

BearinFW 06/26/2013 03:33 PM