*The last two paragraphs of this post are extremely important.*
In a number of blog posts over the last couple of days, NOM has declared that its rally at the Supreme Court in March last year will become an annual event.
In this March 18 post, Brian Brown rewrites the history of Hollingsworth v. Perry and United States v. Windsor. The emphasis is original:
Last year's tremendously successful March brought thousands of marriage champions to the nation's capitol the day the Supreme Court was hearing arguments in the Prop 8 and DOMA cases.
Tremendously successful? Brian, you lost both cases. And since the rally in March last year, the number of states with marriage equality has gone from 9 to 17. If the rally was "tremendously successful", I've yet to see how.
We sent a clear message to the powers that be in Washington that Americans believe marriage is the union of one man and one woman, and that children deserve both a mom and a dad. The voices and presence of several thousand marriage champions echoed through the halls of Congress and the Supreme Court that day.
Let's not forget this scene on June 26, the day the decisions came down:
He then gives NOM's opinion of the two cases decided on the day:
You see, last year the Supreme Court gave us something of a split decision in the Windsor case involving DOMA. While tragically invalidating a section of DOMA that defined marriage under federal law, the Court reaffirmed that marriage is and always has been in the purview of the states to regulate and define.
First of all, their hypocrisy is once again on display. NOM claims to support the right of the states to define marriage. But they also support Section 3 of DOMA, which banned the recognition of state marriages at the federal level, which is a restriction of state's rights.
Secondly, marriage equality nationwide is not incompatible with the states' rights to define marriage. The states have the right to regulate and define marriage to the extent that the constitution allows. Considering that the Court has held in Meyer v. Nebraska, Loving v. Virginia, and Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur (to name a few cases) that marriage is a fundamental right, and that all people are guaranteed equal protection of the laws, I think it's self-evident that marriage equality is required nationwide. The states can regulate marriage in other areas, but cannot impinge on this constitutional requirement, just like they cannot impinge on the constitutional requirement of the right to interracial marriage.
The next two paragraphs read like this. The emphasis is mine:
This gives us a new impetus to our already vibrant defense of marriage in the states and at the federal level! And since the vast majority of states already define marriage as the union of one man and one woman, we continue to engage the battle from a position of strength!
Unfortunately, the Obama administration and federal judges across the country are doing everything in their power — including ignoring the plain words of last summer's Supreme Court decisions — to impose same-sex marriage on everyone nationwide.
Because gay marriage will not only be legal, it will be mandatory and we'll all have to get gay married.
Brown then engages in some wishful thinking regarding SCOTUS' stay of Robert Shelby's decision in Kitchen v. Herbert:
Fortunately, we've already received strong signals from the Supreme Court that this sort of lawlessness won't be tolerated as the entire bench moved to stay a decision striking down Utah's state marriage amendment. That decision, along with decisions by federal courts in Oklahoma, Virginia, and other states, is under appeal.
Brian, it's normal for rulings to be stayed pending appeal. The judges in Oklahoma, Texas and Virginia have all stayed their rulings. But they obviously don't see legalizing same-sex marriage with their decisions as lawlessness. And it has occurred before that a court has stayed a ruling by a lower court before issuing the same ruling. When Vaughn Walker struck down Prop 8 on August 4, 2010, the Ninth Circuit stayed his ruling indefinitely. But on February 7, 2012, they came to the same conclusion as Walker, striking down Prop 8. Additionally, the decision by SCOTUS to stay the ruling in Utah was unanimous, but I doubt that a decision upholding marriage discrimination amendments would be unanimous. Therefore, I don't believe that the decision to stay the ruling is a reflection on how they will rule on marriage discrimination amendments.
That's all the meaningful content of the March 18 post. On March 20, they further explained their rally:
Next Wednesday is the anniversary of the fateful hearing in the case of Perry v. Hollingsworth — the Proposition 8 case. On that day, the voices and values of the voters of California were put on trial before the Supreme Court. And unfortunately, when the decision came down, those voices and values were silenced by the activist judges of lower courts.
It is an outrage to think how, in California and elsewhere, citizens have had their will ignored and overturned by self-interested elites in league with a powerful lobby funneling big money from Hollywood into their campaign coffers.
1. If your values are unconstitutional, don't expect to be able to make laws based on them.
2. It sounds like Brian believes that judges run campaigns and are given money by Hollywood to win elections, which is absurd.
And as these pro-marriage voters have been relegated to second-class citizenship status behind a privileged and protected class of bullies, insult has been added to the injury: not only have they been told to shut up and get out of the way, but they've been called names while being shoved to the sidelines — they've been called bigots and haters and worse.
Their ability to be blatantly hypocritical and not see it never ceases to amaze me. In the first part of the sentence, they call us bullies. In the last part, they criticize descriptions of them as bigots and haters. They can dish it out, but they cannot take it.
I will readily admit to using the terms bigots and haters against people and groups who deserve it, like NOM. But I don't call them names while crying because they call us bullies. That's the difference. They have every right to call us bullies. It's just that we can take it, because we have a thicker skin than they do. We don't think that speech that we don't like is the end of the world and we don't think that being criticized is being persecuted.
But their hypocrisy in calling us bullies extends further than this. On January 30, they reported on Utah Gov. Gary Herbert's State of the State address, saying:
Bravo to Governor Herbert, and we here at NOM agree entirely that this debate must be kept free of all manner of acrimony and animosity, bigotry and intolerance.
Brian, you have called us "
dumb", "
thugs and bullies", and "
rabid, bullying, anti-democratic and even anti-American". So forgive me if I can't believe that the above blockquote contains words that you actually live by.
And Brian, stop pretending that you're the second-class citizens and that LGBT people are the privileged class. In 29 states, it's legal to fire someone for their sexual orientation. In 33 states, same-sex couples cannot marry. In 34 states, it's legal to fire someone for their gender identity. And you're part of the problem.
He continues:
Bakers, photographers, florists, and others have been dragged into court and told that sacrificing their beliefs and betraying their consciences is "the price of citizenship.”
1. A business is not a person, so it does not have free speech or freedom of religion. Additionally, running a business is commercial conduct, not speech or religious conduct.
2. If you open a public accommodation, then you bestow on yourself the responsibility to obey laws applicable to public accommodations. If that includes anti-discrimination laws, then you cannot discriminate.
3. The idea that employers do not have absolute religious freedom in their businesses was established a long time ago, in United States v. Lee in 1982.
4. Anti-discrimination laws protect everyone. They also make it illegal to discriminate on the basis of religion. Considering how much NOM talks about freedom of religion, this should matter to them.
5. NOM supports not forcing people to violate their consciences... unless they support marriage equality.
Brown continues:
Kids in schools have had to hear their parents' values insulted and smeared by intolerant ideologues...
PolitiFact has rated this "False".
... and have been sent to the principal's office for exercising their rights of free speech.
I believe this a reference to a free speech out of Howell, Michigan. On October 20, 2010, an anti-bullying day was held in many places across the country. This was particularly important as Tyler Clementi had committed suicide the previous month. During the day, then-high school student Daniel Glowacki challenged his economics teacher over his request to a student that she remove a belt buckle with the Confederate flag. The teacher was wearing a purple shirt, and he asked why the purple shirt was okay but the Confederate belt buckle wasn't. He then told his teacher that the shirt offended him because he was Catholic, and proceeded to make anti-LGBT statements. The teacher kicked him out of class. Last June, he won his free speech case in federal district court. The damages assessed was one dollar.
I trust the federal judge and conclude that his teacher overreacted, as offensive as what he said was. But this is in no way related to marriage equality. In its constitution, Michigan bans same-sex marriage, civil unions and anything else at all. Even if the decision due in the next few days strikes down Proposal 04-2, it is likely to be stayed, so nothing is likely to change quickly.
Back to NOM:
Military chaplains have seen a culture of intimidation and fear built up around their office, and the attention they pay to the men and women they serve has been divided by the need to watch over their shoulder for the lurking P.C. police.
1. Evidence, please?
2. Who or what is responsible? Is this even real? Or is it just perceived?
They then explain the reasons that they are having their rally:
All of these things and more add to the litany of reasons we're #Marching4Marriage:
We're #Marching4Marriage because kids deserve a mom and a dad.
From the American Academy of Pediatrics:
There is ample evidence to show that children raised by same-gender parents fare as well as those raised by heterosexual parents. More than 25 years of research have documented that there is no relationship between parents' sexual orientation and any measure of a child's emotional, psychosocial, and behavioral adjustment. These data have demonstrated no risk to children as a result of growing up in a family with 1 or more gay parents. Conscientious and nurturing adults, whether they are men or women, heterosexual or homosexual, can be excellent parents. The rights, benefits, and protections of civil marriage can further strengthen these families.
NOM:
We're #Marching4Marriage because citizens' values demand a voice.
Okay, fair enough. But if those values are unconstitutional, the laws that are formed on them won't last long.
We're #Marching4Marriage because it's not bigotry to acknowledge biological fact.
It isn't. But acknowledging that two men or two women cannot create children has nothing to do with marriage equality, as having children is not a requirement for marriage. And it
is bigotry to use someone's biology as a reason to deny them equal rights. The same argument was used to justify racism and racial segregation. The "biological fact" being acknowledged was that blacks and whites have different genes and skin colors. This was then used as a justification for treating black people as inferior and separating the races.
We're #Marching4Marriage because running a business shouldn't mean shutting the door on your beliefs.
I've addressed this already.
We're #Marching4Marriage because marriage is the very foundation on which our society stands.
And how is marriage equality a threat to that? In my mind, same-sex marriage strengthens marriage. If you wanted to destroy marriage, you'd want it done away with completely. You wouldn't want to expand the group of people who can enter into it.
That's about all of the substantive matter of the posts. One thing I got out of this is that NOM seems pretty serious. I do believe that they may be able to have an impact with these marches. So I would like to propose that if you can, consider rallying in Washington on June 19 for marriage equality. Don't feel obliged to do anything; I can't be in Washington then. But if you can't make it either, you can still help with this just by telling anyone you know about this idea. To spread it on social media, use the hashtag #June19Equality. Any awareness helps.
When NOM had their "Summer For (Straight) Marriage" Tour in 2010, the counter-protests they faced made them look pathetically insignificant. I think we can do it again on June 19.