Voting on Equal Rights is a National Disgrace
Last week, I pointed out that the GLBT movement might be the first where a majority gets to vote on the rights of a minority. If the basic freedoms of women, immigrants and African Americans were subject to the whims of voters, there is no doubt that this nation would be decades behind. Yet, we continue to blindly accept that these degrading and un-American referendums are tolerable, when they are not.
Ironically, ballot initiatives were once helpful in gaining visibility. The 1977 anti-gay vote in Miami, led by beauty queen Anita Bryant, put our issues on the national radar. Even though we lost, we were given a rare forum to introduce ourselves to the American people.
In 1978, California voters defeated the Briggs Initiative, which would have banned gay schoolteachers, showing that victory was attainable. But whether it is a loss in Miami and a win in California in 1977-78, or a defeat in Maine and the victory on domestic partnerships in Washington State last week, success or failure is beside the point. All Americans are losers by virtue of participating in a disgraceful process that is an affront to human dignity.
Unfortunately, we have never had the luxury to stop, take a deep breath and consider if these grotesque referendums are the best use of our time and limited resources. With a record of 0-31 in marriage initiatives, now may be a good opportunity to review our complicity in a process that doles out or strips away basic rights by majority vote.
We must first recognize that a virtual campaign-industrial-complex has been built and financed around these fights. There is an army of field staff, media consultants, signature gatherers, advertising experts and fundraisers who work (and in some cases thrive) on these ballot initiatives.
In California, both sides spent as much as $73 million. Even in the small media market of Maine, several million dollars were spent on campaign staff and advertisements. The financial burden for these wars repeatedly falls on the same besieged philanthropists and everyday people who care enough to open their wallets. The four key questions we must ask ourselves before we continue down this road:
1) Are referendums the best use of our human resources?
2) Are they the best use of our finite capital?
3) Are these votes legitimizing the un-American concept of mob rule?
4) Are these quixotic and narrowly focused battles the best way to educate and create lasting progress?
Perhaps, these campaigns are unavoidable and we must soldier on and slog through the muddy terrain of lies and fear-based thirty-second ads. I won't pretend to know the answer, but there is no doubt that our traditional tactics must be looked at with fresh eyes and vigorously debated.
There has been much disagreement as to whether our ads in these campaigns are too "soft". I think this misses the larger point that campaigns are not conducive to education. "Vote No on Prop 8" may be a good campaign slogan, but it is hardly a compelling message for changing hearts and minds.
Campaigns by their very nature go for the short term fix, when we may be in need of more enduring strategies. Repeatedly investing in such hand-to-hand combat has potentially precluded deeper discussion with the American people, so they fully understand how our families are harmed, the damage caused by discrimination and the inequality we face, from taxation to immigration law.
It is also clear that our opponents are trying to bleed us to death financially. We can never outspend the combined forces of the Mormon, Catholic and Evangelical churches, which can afford referendums in every burg in the nation. To put the monetary imbalance in perspective, the annual budget for the largest GLBT organization is only $30 million. Meanwhile, in 2007 the Archdiocese of Los Angeles paid a $660 million settlement to 508 victims of sexual abuse by clergy.
Instead of investing millions on referendums, what if we used the money to send our field experts into communities to educate, without asking people to take sides on a divisive measure? What if we built powerful outreach programs geared towards minority communities? How about training talk radio hosts and buying airtime in small, conservative media markets like Lewiston, Maine or Bakersfield, California?
By turning away from such votes, we strengthen our position by increasing our moral authority. At the very least, it forces our foes out of campaign mode and into an ongoing, intelligent discussion, where it is more difficult to twist the truth and manipulate emotions.
Winning in California and Maine would have been exhilarating. But, would you have felt less dirty and exploited by the referendum process in victory?
I didn't think so.
Follow Wayne Besen on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Truthwinout
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Good points!
Can I vote on your marriage? Of course not.
Marriage is firstly a civil matter in America, as marriage licenses are issued by and recorded in town halls not church halls, or mosques or temples.
Onward to equality, Joe Mustich, Justice of the Peace,
Washington, Connecticut, USA.
Kudos to CT for supporting marriage fairness and equality.
Can I vote on your marriage? (LOL)
Why doesn't GLBT get congress to rewrite the laws regarding civil unions that mandate that they receive the same benefits as marriage...As of now marriage is deemed a religious term with prerequisites that include heterosexual participants. It seems that especially with a democrat controlled congress laws can be passed to achieve the rights of the GLBT community
Marriage may have religious connotations to some people, but legally religion is purely optional. Though not the majority, many people get married by justices of the peace, notaries, ship’s captains, etc. Some religious sects are in favor of same sex marriage. Why should conservative religions get to tell others what to do? That caused bloody wars in the Protestant Reformation in Europe.
The point of where to put ones money reminded me of a line in Milk which I saw on HBO last week..."people vote 2-1 in favor if they know someone"...I think there are a lot of people (like me) out there who are just sort of ambivalent on this issue. they live in a gray area on this. They are not bigots, but they don't see this as the major priority in their life. But if a friend said to them "hey, I'm gay, and this is a really important vote for me...can I ask you to support me as a friend in this", it may make it a very easy decision. Has there been campaign to simply ask a straight friend for support? Just wondering.
middle who exactly did you have to beg to help you get your constitutional rights? We're the only people who's very rights and lives are being put up for popular vote like we're running for prom queen.
this isn't high school.
You don't get what I'm saying. this is not everyones issue right now. Jobs/economy, war, daily life, etc...being angry at everyone who is not 100% on board the gay marriage bus and telling them they don't understand freedom is shortsighted. I'm suggesting reaching out a hand and pulling people who are probably 75% with you over to your side. But keep doing it your way- 31-0 is as bad as the Rams. On a side note, why does Huffington not have a gay area? Seems like if they can have a green, New York, and Chi, that a gay area would be a good fit?
I just finished reading a book that bottom line stated that religion and reality don't walk on the same side of the street. Think about it. If someone on the street told you that you can take bread and wine and change it into the actual body and blood of Christ, no religion involved, you would think they were nuts. If all these people who start religions because of revelations were having revelations about anything but God we again would have serious questions about their sanity. How many of them tell you about when the world is coming to an end. Not one of them has been right yet. These are the same people who control a whole lot of what goes on in our lives. I have to question how sane we are to continue to let this go on.
Mr. Besen,
Perhaps, just perhaps you should listen to what your fellow Americans are saying:
You can't sell it and we aren't buying it.
And I also believe if you try to take our right to vote on such issues, you are in for a mighty big surprise.
You started it and we are finishing it.
You started this, but we're going to finish it. The younger generations are on our side, and that alone insures we're going to win. What you hate-filled homophobes have is what's not being bought by the ones who matter.
SonofLiberty1 I couldn't care less what my fellow Americans think of me. People in this country shouldn't have their civil rights put up for popular vote. This isn't high school and I don't want to be prom queen. See you in court.
Careful! this kind of talk will make a lot of folks, on both sides, have to go out and earn a real living!
The idea that the rights of a US citizen can be "voted" on is obscene at best!
Anybody want to have a vote on Muslim American rights? Ridiculous you say!
And I would agree!
Tell me what the difference is?
In America it wouldn't surprise me if it became fashionable to publicly flog gay people or women choosing to have an abortion.
The Christians won't have to worry though it will still be okay for married couples to cheat as God will forgive them.
Wayne Besen, your eloquent voice rings across this nation, so that ALL gay people are equal Americans, and the broad discrimination that ordinary gay people,American citizens face is wrong, it the act of this discrimination threatens ALL American rights. The "gay exception" of rights will only be the legal crack in the consitution that could create a world that even the most paranoid right winger conspiacist could imagine.
Well, isn't that ironic,
To protect the rights of ALL Americans, this dangerous eroding of rights for some threatens all.
Do not be so comfortable in your basic rights when you are witnessing attacks on people all around you.
"We can never outspend the combined forces of the Mormon, Catholic and Evangelical churches, "
What occured in Maine should make it clear that it's not about who can spend more, it's how that money is spent. The 'No on 1" side spent $4 million to the $2.5 million the "Yes" side spent and still lost.
I read a post last week from someone who was in Maine during the campaign and he said that the majority of the "No" funds were spent in the urban areas which already was supportive of the LGBT community while the "Yes" side outspent the "No" in the rural areas by about 10-1. If you look at a map of the voting pattern, you will see that ONLY the urban areas voted "No" while the rural areas voted overwhemingly "Yes".
Think about it.
It is not even about how the money is spent.
I feel content that the vote showed that there is not a majority oppinion that this minority should have equal rights.
As the article pointed out, asking the question in that context to the mob was the offensive thing.
Criticising the minority how they spent their money to try and defend their rights is like criticising the farmer's who finally settle when Monsanto starts harrasing them.
"or a defeat in Maine and the victory on domestic partnerships in Washington State last week, success or failure is beside the point. All Americans are losers by virtue of participating in a disgraceful process that is an affront to human dignity."
The LGBT community needs to face reality, how things are, not how things SHOULD be. Those who continue to claim that the voters have no right to decide this issue because it's a matter of basic civil rights need to realize that, because the 1972 Warren Court ruled, for all practical purposes, that SSM marriage is not a basic civil right, the voters do have the constitutional right to vote on the issue. The only way that is going to change is if this Court, or a future one, over rules the Warren Court.
Ted Olson and David Boies are trying to do just that. But they better have the strategy to petition the Court to designate the LGBT community as a protected minority (which it has NOT done to date) or it's very unlikely that the Roberts Court will over rule the Warren Court.
The community should, by all means, continue to attempt to convince SCOTUS to rule that SSM is a basic civil right but in the meantime it needs to deal with the fact that the voters do have the right and figure out a way to convince the electorate to vote in it's favor.
"Review our complicity" - wow....that says it all. If we wanna STOP being dumped on all of the time, we need to crawl out from under the toliet seat, stand up COLLECTIVELY, and find our dignity as taxpaying, contributing members of society.
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