Sequel of the random stuff

In no particular order:

• Same–sex marriage was illegal in North Carolina, but the people there voted to ban it again.
  • The last time North Carolina amended their constitution to concern marriage was to ban interracial marriage (via).
• If it was legalized, same–sex marriage could provide a one billion dollar boost to the American budget each year for a decade. Marriage equality, it’s good for the economy!
• Teh cute.
• Yet another misogynistic fundamentalist pastor. He’s against women voting and blames them for everything. No surprise there.
• I’ve often said that complementarianism is really hierarchicalism. And now (via) Rachel Held Evans reports that complementarianism is losing ground. Good.
  • Evans also quotes someone who writes that (my emphasis) “For millennia, followers of God have practiced what used to be called patriarchy and is now called complementarianism.” Well, at least he’s honest.

Obama officially supports marriage equality

Barack Obama has officially come out in favour of marriage equality.

Credit’s due where credit’s due, but frankly, this is no surprise to me. There was no doubt in my mind that he supported same–sex marriage the whole time. He just didn’t say so in a hopeless attempt at hair–splitting, meet–in–the–middleism in a pathetic try at compromising with unreachable wingnuts.

I told you this would happen

At Fannie’s Room I came across a link to this article at Slate. It mostly concerns different–sex couples in Illinois who are opting for civil unions rather than marriage. In other words, there are fewer marriages than would otherwise have been the case.

The appropriate response to this is, of course, “I told you this would happen”. Just as I predicted over a year ago when this law was passed, and just as has happened in France, by allowing different–sex couples access to civil unions, it creates a competitor to marriage, and therefore weakens marriage and reduced the number of marriages. Had marriage equality simply been allowed none of this would have happened. This is why the supposed concern over the “sanctity of marriage” actually isn’t. Someone who was truly concerned about the sanctity of marriage would not create alternative to it. Rather, they would support marriage equality and therefore increase the number of marriage. Since none of the opponents of marriage equality (that I know of) appear to be doing anything to prevent the benefits of marriage from being available to those who aren’t married, it is clear that opposition to marriage equality is really motivated by bigotry.

And since Hawaii’s civil unions law also allows different–sex couples to enter into civil unions, I predict that the same thing will happen there.

This person really said this

[TW: Anti–Semitism, misogyny, homophobia]

While looking for something else entirely, I came across this disturbing blog. It’s called Santorum 2012 and self–describes in its Twitter feed as “A blog in support of, but not affiliated with, Santorum for President.” Considering that this blog’s Twitter feed says “All RTs [that is, retweets] are endorsements” (my interpolated note) and that some things originally tweeted by a member of Westboro Baptist Church (Fred Phelps and his ilk; the people who protest at soldiers’ funerals) are retweeted (that is, endorsed), I think I’ve found out all I need to know about this person. The fact that WBC are serious in their homophobia makes me pretty certain that this blog is not a Poe.

I’d like to draw me readers’ attention to one particular post. It’s titled “Plan B is nothing but ‘Plan A’ for the Immoral“. The topic of that post is criticizing the support that the women on The View have for birth control. The complete text is as follows (my emphasis and parenthetical notes):

In the town where this blogger was raised, five or more women under the same roof is considered a brothel (according to Snopes, this is false).  So, it’s not surprising that the ladies on “The View” are supportive of birth control methods, including abortion and Plan B.  Not only are these women typical immoral ‘feminists’, they are also, in some cases, Lesbians and/or Jewesses…. (Last sentence asking people to watch a video in that post omitted).

Rather that attempting to come up some legitimate argument to make, this person attacks the women of The View because they are female, feminist, lesbian, or Jewish.

Misogyny, lesbophobia, and anti–Semitism, all in one post.

After the jump are screenshots I’ve saved in case this person tries to delete their post.

Prop 8 struck down

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has, in a 2–1 ruling, struck down California’s bigoted Proposition 8 (via). Hence, unless a stay is issued, same–sex couples will be able to marry in the 9th circuit’s jurisdiction California again. Personally, I expect a stay to be issued and the appeals process to continue, hence I don’t think same–sex couples will be allowed to marry.

In the decision is granted the proponents of Prop 8 standing to defend, and it rejected the claim that the trial judge, Vaughn Walker, should have disqualified himself because he is gay. The striking down was the correct decision. And in reaction to the ruling, I expect the wingnut and homophobe types to freak out.

From the decision:

“Proposition 8 served no purpose, and had no effect, other than to lessen the status and human dignity of gays and lesbians in California.”

Update: The actual ruling is an extremely narrow, California–specific ruling, and I have therefore corrected that error. Also, the Daily Dish has a mini–roundup of reactions.

Anti-gay bigotry weakens marriage

I came across this story on Pam’s House Blend (my emphasis):

Gay activists in Russia are planning to ask air passengers to boycott Aeroflot, Russia’s leading airline and not to use its services until the creation of equal conditions for all workers.

The call [for a boycott] comes following the revelation that gay flight attendant Maxim Kupreev was forced by his employers to enter into heterosexual marriage with his former high school girlfriend following his announcement last year to create an LGBT group within the company to fight for the protection of the rights of homosexual employees.

[...]

According to internal Aeroflot sources reported by GayRussia.eu, 25-year-old flight attendant Maxim Kupreev was given an ultimatum late last year to enter into heterosexual marriage or to lose his job. At the end of 2011 he married his school friend Sofia Mikhailova who got the right to fly Aeroflot for 10% of the fare – and other company privileges.

In order to register marriage with Kupreev, Mikhailova had to dissolve her real marriage to Grigoriy Andreykin. The divorce was finalised on 11 October last year.

Besides the fact that this is blatant bigotry, I’d also like to emphasize that this is actually weakening the sort of marriage anti–LGBT activists are always claiming needs to be protected.* First, Kupreev did not marry for any of the reasons anti–LGBT bigots are always claiming the purpose of marriage is (like having children), but rather to keep his job. And it required some other (different–sex) marriage to accomplish that. And if those things don’t weaken marriage, it’s beyond me how same–sex marriage possibly could.

* As far as I know, marriage equality hasn’t been much of an issue in Russia, and therefore I can’t know what sort of arguments are used about it over there. However, if I had to guess, anti–LGBT activists over there would probably use the same sorts of (refuted) arguments that are used over here.

When you think they couldn’t go any lower (updated)

Shorter GOP in Michigan Senate: “It’s okay to bully in the name of Jesus.”

A bill was recently passed by the Michigan Senate. It is a purported anti–bullying bill, but in reality the bill basically protects those who bully based on moral convictions:

This section does not prohibit a statement of a sincerely held religious belief or moral conviction of a school employee, school volunteer, pupil, or a pupil and parent or guardian.

In other words, it’s a how to bully act.

In addition, while IANAL, the law protects sincerely held beliefs, including those by teachers. If a teachers sincerely believes that people in group X are going to burn in hell forever, this law seems to protect those statements. Hence, the la looks like it also serves as a backdoor way to legalize proselytization in school, therefore violating the Establishment Clause.

Via Lawyers, Guns, and Money.

Update: The section in question has been dropped from the bill (via).