There is a sea change underway, a global warming that is causing the ice that once kept the LGBT community capped off �" or at least invisible to the larger communities we live within �" giving way from every different direction. You can feel it all around. It isn't a linear thaw �" where we pick up the politically liberal, then move to the moderates, and finally the conservatives. The cracks are coming from all different places and spaces all at once. The cracks are generated every time someone takes a small, brave action toward challenging the silence and embracing themselves or the LGBT people they love �" when a person decides to casually come out to a co-worker, when a same-sex couple walks hand and hand into their church or synagogue, when a father mentions he has a lesbian daughter to a neighbor, when gay dads both join the PTA together, when a union or a company revises its policy to ensure they receive the full 100 percent Human Rights Campaign rating, when a grandmother insists her grandson bring his partner to Christmas dinner �" the net effect is that now we are seeing ever wider expanses of water with the world beckoning us to just come on in with the rest of them.
Over the last 15 years, I have had thousands of conversations with LGBT people talking about why marriage equality is not a frivolous concern of wealthy gays, but vital as a basic issue of economic and social justice and most importantly, because it takes aim right at the heart of homophobia. And, that is exactly what has happened. There has been a cultural shift away from focusing on what gay people do sexually (a subject that obsesses devout homophobes) and focusing on who we love, who we are committed to, what our common interests are. Standing for marriage equality requires that we stand up for the dignity of our relationships and asks those who love us to stand with us and attend our weddings, introduce our spouses and treat them as they would any heterosexual partner. Marriage equality explains who our beloveds are, not just to us, but who they are in relation to our extended family as married kinship. We have been sewn back into the family quilt, our marriages are recorded on the extended family tree with everyone else.
We are integrating. I can foresee that in my lifetime, legalized homophobia will seem as insane as people who freak out about people of different races marrying and having children together.
This has been yet another historic week for our community and the signs of global warming were all around us. We cheered on well-known conservative attorney Theodore Olson as he masterfully responded to every question and curve ball thrown by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel of judges to affirm marriage as a civil right and highlight how Proposition 8 stood for nothing but unfounded prejudice and unfair discrimination.
Terry Stewart was our home team favorite who in just five minutes stripped the "rational basis" cited by the opponents down to show its blatant animus at its core and reveal it as inconsistent with all of California's family law.
Thanks to Eva Paterson of the Equal Justice Society, the Reverend Jesse Jackson called into our community rally to state his support for marriage equality. "We cannot stand idly by while Prop 8 seeks to target gays and lesbians for a disfavored legal status, as America's newest 'second-class' citizens," he said. I received a phone call from the Reverend Amos Brown of the Third Baptist Church offering his support and wanting to brainstorm how we can build bridges of mutual support. The Reverend Roland Stringfellow of California Faith for Equality pulled together a powerhouse of clergy leaders from all different faith traditions whose very spiritual presence of love and support called out the opponents across the street screaming "God Hates Fags" as the shams and bullies they are. There is a coming together for each other that is happening all around us that will have profound benefit not just for gay Americans �" but for all Americans as united we continue to forge that vision of One Big Tent America with all hands welcomed on deck ... and you know we don't destroy, we renovate!
Marriage Equality USA needs more red hens volunteering to step up and engage in education and outreach in every county and in every community. We need leaders willing to make it happen. Read my wife Davina Kotulski's book Love Warriors: The Rise of the Marriage Equality Movement, which is chock full of suggestions and talking points to get you there. Join us!
Molly McKay is the media director of Marriage Equality USA. A copy of Reverend Jackson's complete statement, and information on how to volunteer, can all be found on Marriage Equality USA's website (http://www.marriageequality.org).