Cowardly New Jersey Supreme Court Passes the Buck to State Legislature That All But Insures Marriage Apartheid Will Be Imposed on Same-sex Couples...
Yes, the enemies of fairness and equality should be licking their bloody chops again with glee right about now. The spineless October 25th Same-sex "Marriage Parity" ruling by the New Jersey Supreme Court is ostensibly just another victory for homophobes - albeit, far short of the pseudo-Christian, radical Right's obsessive/compulsive agenda of having every Gay and Lesbian in this noisome nation rounded up and put into concentration camps. Nevertheless, they have succeeded, via the gutless NJ Supremes, in getting the equivalent of a yellow star of David or, more historically accurate, a pink triangle, judicially sewn onto the very fabric of our lives by branding our families as somehow not important enough to be really considered "family" in every sense of the word.
The key word here is Marriage. Like so many ignorant assumption on the part of too many insecure homophobes, heterosexual do not and have never had a monopoly on family, love, commitment, sacrifice, military service, heroism, faith and moral decency anymore than they have been the only ones in a marital relationship. Same-sex couples have since time immemorial been married to their life-partners with or without an official recognition of it. And that is what it really is all about, isn't it? It is about acknowledging a reality that many malicious and insipid people cannot face. It is also about fairness and a birthright of equality to which all American citizens are entitled. Anything less is a denigration of our lives and vile affront to those we love and cherish most intimately.
The recent New Jersey court ruling should not come as a surprised though to anyone. This is just another example of a long line of recent rulings which have been shamefully engineered, utilizing the most tortured judicial rationalizations, to preserve the status quo at the expense of the disenfranchised. But what is so disheartening is that this ruling came from one of the heretofore most "Liberal" courts in the nation. All the while, loving and committed same-sex couples are being handed fair judicial rulings in constitutional courts in other, truly progressive, nations throughout the civilized world. Small wonder why America is held in such low esteem abroad, she has done so little to earn the respect of her own people. The sad legacy of the not-so-United States lies in the fact that America is, at best, nothing more than a modern-day feudal society which just simply masquerades as a constitutional republic.
Regrettably, one of the most progressive courts in the country has once more demonstrated how gutless even the most liberals minds are when it come to standing up against the invidious contagion of bigotry. Once again social justice is only given a complete thumbs-up when it involved just politically "safe" and non-controversial minorities, or when the consequence of doing anything less could result in urban neighborhoods set ablaze, bloody riots, and subsequent enormous property damage. It is a good thing that most members of the GLBT community are pacifist by nature. If any other minority were treated as we are, there would most likely be very dire consequences in retaliation.
In the 1980's, racism in South Africa was very much like it was in America's shameful and not too distant past. Today, South Africa leads the continent in embracing civil and social equality for all of her citizens. Same-sex marriage equality was recently upheld by the South African Supreme Court who, mindful of the dehumanizing effects of apartheid and the lie of "separate, but equal", ruled out any form of segregation in regards to marriage equality in South Africa. On the other hand, the myth that is United States of America's constitutional guarantee of equality in all things under the law is once again evident in how America treats the least politically powerful amongst her citizens. The full equality and human rights of Gays and Lesbians is the last arena in the United States where the forces of bigotry and the forces of humanity are pitted against one another and are engaged in a war for civilization. The fomenters of group-hate are once again fighting tooth and nail to uphold the status quo of civil rights for only "socially approved" members of society.
In a country that obsessively delights in pitting one faction of society against another, tens of millions of Gay and Lesbian Americans are just the latest minority that right-wing extremist Republicans politicians can exploit using bigotry for political gain. Unfortunately, the GLBT community is also considered a reliable crop that left-wing Democrats can harvest for political gain as well without having to make any real commitment towards civil equality for this community of loyal voters. No doubt mindful of this, the New Jersey Supreme Court cowardly passed the buck to a Democratic Party controlled New Jersey state legislature who will, I have no doubt, uphold the status quo and impose an humiliating apartheid "marriage-lite" segregating domestic partnership in the form of state limited Civil Unions for same-sex couples.
It is a slap in the face of civil rights and a pandering way of saying: "Hey, look you're almost as good as the rest of us -- but not really". It is, in effect, no different than erecting barriers like the 1950`s "Whites Only" signage over lunch counters and water fountains in America which spelled out very clearly how certain people were meant to be kept apart. But today it is, "Heterosexuals Only Over Here" and "Homosexuals Go Stand Over There or Just Go Away". Our segregation doesn't even allow us to sit in the back of the bus -- rather, it forces us to board a different bus altogether; one that is not even going in the same direction.
That is why it is unconscionable these days that so many leaders in the Black community refuse to see the parallel. This just demonstrates how easily human beings of all stripes can be seduced -- either through political polarization; religious extremism; cultural prejudices, or all of the above. The self-centered and retrogressive lure of social tribalism inflates oppressors from every group in society, but especially those in power, with false assertions of group superiority. That is the nexus in both the irresistible power of bigotry and consequential rationalizations of discrimination.
Group-hate is the real root of evil in the world. All you have to do is trace the incessant occurrences of ethnic and group conflicts in the world from the present day back to the beginning of recorded history. Human civilization travels along a bloody road paved with the broken bodies of those who had the courage to stand up to those in the majority who held the reigns of power. Less strife and fewer civil wars were avoided eventually because of coalitions which were formed to protect minority populations -- although this is not always true in many part of the world. But today, in America and elsewhere, Gays are an easier, lower risk target that invokes little public outrage because, lets face it, bigots are cowards essentially and the public, in general, are apathetic, self-involved herd animals who will happily ignore the wolves amongst them unless the predators are heading their way.
A recent CNN/Time poll cited around 57% of Americans opposed to same-sex marriage equality. Before the US Supreme Court struck down state bans on interracial marriage, all major polls in the 1960's had the public opposing interracial marriage by much higher margins -- most polls as high as 90% against what was considered then to be "race mixing" or miscegenation Eventually, in 1967, an "activist" U.S. Supreme Court did their job, which state legislatures had avoided for political purposes, and corrected the inequities. Today, it's far past time that an equally courageous, fair and impartial judiciary stand up to the tyranny of the majority and affirm that the phrase "equality under the law" is not just another empty platitude that the US Constitution has come to symbolize, but rather it is a legal mandate and an absolute, unassailable, uncompromising guarantee of freedom and equality that all American citizens, great or small in number, can actually depend upon.
Let's face it, the United States of America has never been really "United". America has never been a fair or decent county for all her people. America is like a feel-good Hollywood movie, it all about selling a pipe dream to the biggest ticket buyers and essentially ignoring all those who can't afford to fill up as many chairs in the audience. It has boastfully made a promise of equality in all things to all people, yet it has jealously reserved those so-called "equal" rights for only "approved" members of society as if the United States of America is some kind of exclusive County Club with private memberships handed out, like awards, only to those who met the subjective standards of a self-appointed, self-styled, elite Rules Committee.
The Revolutionary War is still being fought in America as one generation after another must fight a never ending battle against tyranny. I suppose then it should come as no great surprise that a legitimate United States has yet to be born. Any family which can so easily cast aside or abuse so many of its own children is a poor family to emulate. America may be a lovely, inviting dream offering great and limitless opportunities for the privileged and for the social conformist, but it is a relentless nightmare of social oppression and legal inequities for many, many others.