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California Stands up for Discrimination
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11/06/08 07:20 AM ET
It was a great night and a tremendous victory for Barack Obama. But, as they say, you can’t win ’em all, and the night was not without its disappointments.
For me, the biggest disappointment was California’s passage of Proposition 8, which overturned a recent Supreme Court decision affirming same-sex marriage. Gay marriage bans also passed in Arizona and Florida.
Talk about irony. On the same day California voters overwhelmingly voted to make Barack Obama the nation’s first African-American president, they also voted to ban same-sex marriage, a measure Obama opposed.
In other words, they rejected one form of discrimination — while affirming another.
Because that’s what Prop 8 and other similar measures are all about: treating one class of Americans as second-class citizens, simply because they happen to be gay, not straight.
All Americans should recognize that that form of discrimination is wrong, just like discrimination based on sex, religion or race is wrong.
There’s no difference between refusing blacks permission to sit at the same lunch counter, or drink from the same water fountain, and refusing gay and lesbian couples to get married. None. It’s discrimination. It’s unconstitutional. It’s un-American. It’s wrong.
Visit Mr. Press's website at billpressshow.com.
For me, the biggest disappointment was California’s passage of Proposition 8, which overturned a recent Supreme Court decision affirming same-sex marriage. Gay marriage bans also passed in Arizona and Florida.
Talk about irony. On the same day California voters overwhelmingly voted to make Barack Obama the nation’s first African-American president, they also voted to ban same-sex marriage, a measure Obama opposed.
In other words, they rejected one form of discrimination — while affirming another.
Because that’s what Prop 8 and other similar measures are all about: treating one class of Americans as second-class citizens, simply because they happen to be gay, not straight.
All Americans should recognize that that form of discrimination is wrong, just like discrimination based on sex, religion or race is wrong.
There’s no difference between refusing blacks permission to sit at the same lunch counter, or drink from the same water fountain, and refusing gay and lesbian couples to get married. None. It’s discrimination. It’s unconstitutional. It’s un-American. It’s wrong.
Visit Mr. Press's website at billpressshow.com.
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