The Washington, D.C., Metro Weekly, an LGBT paper, reports this December 12 post from Full Equality Now's website:
The bus is a particularly painful place for these advertisements to be located, as they cannot be avoided. Because of these advertisements, countless LGBT citizens are forced to stare down discrimination as they board the bus to go somewhere or are even passed by an advertisement on the street. The irony is that public buses were the birthplace of another struggle for equality under law not too long ago. For LGBT citizens to have to experience discriminatory messages as they go about their daily life is unacceptable and must be stopped. For this reason, we demand that WMATA remove all advertisements posted by Stand for Marriage DC as soon as is possible.What I Say: Oh fuck you, Miss Mary. What a whining, sniveling complaint - just like the Princess and the Pea. This is a democracy, not a gay Disneyland; every political ad in the whole freaking world is "offensive" to somebody - grow up and deal with it, honey. And buy a case of Kleenex, if you're that pitiful and sensitive; you'll need a lot of them in this cruel world.
Your Head Trucker is seconded by the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance - who express themselves more politely:
As supporters of civil marriage equality, we also embrace the principle of free speech enshrined in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which makes our own advocacy possible. Indeed, the then-named Gay Activists Alliance thirty years ago won a court battle against WMATA for the right to place educational posters in Metro buses with the message, 'Someone In Your Life Is Gay.' WMATA is a quasi-governmental body and is thus subject to the First Amendment. We, the undersigned, therefore urge you to reject the misguided censorship advocated by Full Equality Now DC.
4 comments:
I have to say I'm all for Full Equality for gay people but I'm a little over this push for marriage. I want to have the full benefits if something should happen to my partner but I really don't want to get "married" to ANYONE!
Um, you can't have it both ways, Stan. I've told my story here in this blog of all that happened after my husband died. We considered ourselves married; but the law and society and his family did not.
So the next day I was, essentially, a homeless man. That was pretty rough doings, I tell you what.
You either shack up with somebody and take your chances on being cleaned out by his family if he suddenly drops dead or is hit by a bus.
Or you form a legal bond intended to be permanent, a legal contract with him that spells out rights and responsibilities recognized by the law and by everybody in society: that is the classic legal definition of marriage.
I don't see a middle ground there. You either do or do not intend a permanent union of mutual help and responsibility. You either is or is not married, call it what you will.
Not that everyone needs to be married; but some of us would like the choice.
We have something here in Colorado called a "designated beneficiary." Any two adults can mutually consent to make each other their DB, which is quite flexible. It allows the couple to designate not only financial resources and control, but other things like making health care and end-of-life decisions, funeral arrangements, etc. for each other. All of this works as long as there is no other conflicting legal instrument in place, such as a will, living will, etc.
The process is quite simple. You can go down to the county records department or download the document and instructions from the State's website. Then you both fill out the form, sign it in front of a Notary, and file it with the county. There is a $15.00 filing fee, no attorneys involved, etc. Then if at a later time, one or both of the parties want to end the arrangement, you go back and file a revocation document (and pay another filing fee). This works equally well for same-sex and opposite-sex couples who are not or do not want to be married.
I don't know if other states have this or not. Might be worth checking out. We have talked about doing this but just haven't gotten around to doing it yet. We need to get on this, because somebody could shove one of us under the bus tomorrow. You never know!
Gary, DO NOT DELAY protecting yourself and your partner. I begged my husband for 5 years to do some basic paperwork in that direction and he continually put it off.
Then one night he walked out of the house and never returned.
The unthinkable DOES happen. When you least expect it. So you guys get on the stick and avail yourself of what protections your state does afford.
Texas offers nothing but a kick in the teeth.
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