I sat having drinks with some local women today, who are neighbours and are the wives of friends of my husband. It was our daughter’s birthday BBQ today and we were having a clear up and a drink after her party, chatting about nothing much. One of them made a comment about so-called sexual deviants, meaning anyone who wasn’t straight. And I realised three things. My neighbours are bigots. They think I’m straight and also a bigot. And they would most likely shun me if they knew I was bisexaul. I didn’t really know what to do with that. So I thought I’d check out the blogosphere and see what other people thought. I like your blog and look forward to reading more of it.

It seems (as an outsider, so to speak, and a relatively young one at that) that there’s been a great deal of change in attitude towards gays and lesbians over the past few decades. If people (even in California) are still unsure about whether there should be a right to marry someone of the same sex - well, laws can be revisited as people change their minds. Saying “no” now does not mean “no” in 20 years, or even 5.

Would it be unfair to be “made” to wait until 20 million people change their minds? It’d be unfortunate, sure, but that’s kind of the way that democracy works. It’s *not* supposed to work by a handful of people deciding (rightly or wrongly!) that they know “what’s best”, particularly when 20 million people were unconvinced by the same “equal protection” argument.

Nobody was forcing opposite-sex marriages on those who don’t want them, either. If you don’t want to marry someone of the opposite sex, don’t do it. Everyone had the right to do so; that’s “equal protection” right there. (Unlike, for instance, a law saying that “only white people could get married”, which - these days! - would be seen as horribly wrong. That wasn’t always the case either… but that attitude changed as well.)

> Either we’re all equal in the eyes of the law, or we’re not.

Yes, it really is as simple as that - and in this case, the court decided that the preferences of the few (”I want to marry someone of the same sex” should be held greater than the preferences of the many (”I think that marriage should only be between a man and a woman”). Clearly the court chose one set of preferences as more important.

(Changing soapboxes briefly, “we’re all equal” doesn’t match up well with “hate crimes” legislation that calls for crimes against specific “groups” to be investigated more rigorously, does it?)

No one is forcing same-sex marriages on those who don’t want them. If you don’t want to marry someone of the same sex, don’t do it.

Either we’re all equal in the eyes of the law, or we’re not. It’s as simple as that.

So really what you’re celebrating is that a handful of people overturned the will of a very clear majority of the people - celebrating it because THIS TIME it’s an outcome you like. Seven people (appointed, not elected) have bypassed the will of millions.

Regardless of whether the outcome is seen as positive or not, the mechanism can only be seen as a dangerous overthrow of democracy.

On a side note, also loses points in my book for a lack of creativity, if he had said “Oh well, I’m a eunuch” it would have at least made it interesting!