Wednesday, November 05, 2008

4,851,132 Thank Yous!

Thank you to every one of the 4,851,132 people who voted No on Proposition 8 (with 99% of precincts reporting). To our families, our friends, our neighbors: Your vote DID count! We appreciate your support---you'll never really know what a personal victory it has been for Karyn and me to have our families behind us. And to our friends...well, you're the best!

There is more work to be done and more friends to make...I'm sure we can find enough new friends among the 5,344.012 who voted Yes on Prop 8!!

It was very interesting to see how the actual votes played out. In some places, we fared better than anyone would have previously thought. In little Mono County, we only lost by 553 votes. In Karyn's family's home county, Lake County, we only lost by a little over 1000 votes! And in our county of Los Angeles, we lost by only 20,806 votes.

A lot of progress has been made in the past 10 years, even more in the past five. A lot of hearts and minds have been won, and we need to build on that very strong base. I think it's fair to intuit that no one who voted No on Prop 8 was ambivalent---but I know many people who voted yes who were ambivalent. The money spent by certain religious factions, (including the one I was raised in, the Catholic Church, via its Knights of Columbus group), brought in far more money earlier than the No on 8 people; we should have anticipated that, and the fervor that went with it, and met the opposition with a stronger campaign. The lies that were told in those Yes on 8 advertisements have to be met with truth and education. We have our work cut out for us.

We were disappointed, but not demoralized; we are eventually going to have the right to marry legalized for all gay people because I believe the fundamental issue is one of equal access to civil rights. There may be a few really bad hair days between now and then, but hey, we've got all the best stylists!

Thank you, everyone, and stay tuned!

4 comments:

azteclady said...

You guys are so freaking brave and strong and sane, you put the rest of us to shame.

*hugs*

T.T. Thomas said...

Thanks ALady! *****back 'atcha.

azteclady said...

*waiting (im)patiently for December*

T.T. Thomas said...

hahaha....she didn't know what WDW meant---she asked me if that was a variant of WD-40! LOL. Well, it's understandable: She last went to Disneyland in 1965, when she was five years old. The first ride the family went on was the Matterhorn. After that, they couldn't even get her to go on the teacups!

We have a couple other friends in Florida, though, and you make three. Not only would it be a fun trip, it'd probably be way therapeutic! Well, it's Staycation for the near future, so...send pictures?