oh, propositions

let's talk about politics and some current ballot propositions. i'm in california and there are a couple of heavy, controversial ones. protecting marriage is one. the title says it all: eliminates right of same-sex couples to marry. let's talk about this.
eliminates right. well, to me that means there is a right present. the right that is present is marriage.
how is taking away rights in any way what we want to happen in this country? a country of freedoms and equality for all. an amendment to a state's constitution and over the california supreme court ruling allowing same-sex marriage is threatening to disallow freedoms and grant inequality.

proposition 8 discriminates in two ways--one favoring heterosexual couples by continuing their right to marriage and the other oppressing and discriminating against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (lgbt) couples who will lose the right to marriage. it is a proposition that segregates the population and chooses in favor of or against based on religious values. i say this because the writers of and primary fiscal contributors to the proposition are from religious organizations. should the right to access marriage be decided upon my religiously affiliated beliefs?
my issue is there are all these protections and freedoms we are supposed to have, namely equality and separation of church and state. neither of which seem to be occurring in this proposition. as a sidenote, i am aware that separation of church and state (and proponents of proposition 8) is not all or nothing; there are religious organizations who oppose eliminating the right to marriage for same-sex couples. it is their stance that actually attempts to keep a separation of church and state. unfortunately, it must be a pretty small separation.

throughout all this, there are some lovely perfectly logical explanations (ples) for taking away equality/eliminating rights/ruling the state through church. it is okay to eliminate rights because proposition 8 will:
restore marriage.
"It restores the definition of marriage to what the vast majority of California voters already approved and human history has understood marriage to be."
not an attack on the gay lifestyle.
less government.
"It overturns the outrageous decision of four activist Supreme Court judges who ignored the will of the people."
protect families.
"Proposition 8 protects marriage as an essential institution of society. While death, divorce, or other circumstances may prevent the ideal, the best situation for a child is to be raised by a married mother and father."
protect children.
"It protects our children from being taught in public schools that 'same-sex marriage' is the same as traditional marriage."
"As social and legal norms change, there would be many unwanted consequences for families. For instance, all children would be taught that they can marry someone of the same or of the opposite sex when they grow up. Their parents would be unable to object to such teaching. Experts predict such misinformation will cause developmental insecurity in many children and encourage experimental behavior, with disastrous outcomes."
protect marriage.
and my favorite, proposition 8 doesn't take away the rights of gays.
"Gays have a right to their private lives, but not to change the definition of marriage for everyone else."

why are these ples, you might ask. i have some thoughts...
restore marriage--before the 1970s in california there was no definition of marriage being between a man and woman. which means that since california became a state over a hundred years ago (1850) the definition of marriage was written in gender-neutral language. so, from what time period does marriage as being between a man and a woman need to be restored?
less government--it sounds like when there needs to be a constitutional amendment that overturns a state's supreme court ruling, that is more government that is involved in people's personal lives. we are all part of the government! when you have an elected official, you are part of the government. when you vote, you are part of the government. when you write legislature, bills, or propositions, you are part of the government. all propositions on their face are for more government. also, this proposition is about amending the constitution, not about reversing the ruling of judges. this proposition is about amending the constitution in order to take rights away from lgbt couples.
protect families--children are not in danger with both of their legal guardians/parents are able to marry. children are not in danger when raised by lgbt individuals or couples, on the sole merit of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity and expression. this ple is all about fear. the logic is there, but the need for this argument is based on fear. when fear of the lgbt community is so high that there is a movement to try and remove children from settings with these individuals, there is a problem. families are not threatened or in need of protection when all people have access to the right to marriage. in fact, when all people have access, more families can be legally recognized. why would families need protecting when there can be more of them?
protect children--this is a similar ple to "protect families." although, in this ple, it is important to note the assumptions that are made...there is not one word, one mention of education in proposition 8. current california law gives parents the overall authority over their children's education in terms health and family issues. parents have an absolute right to remove their kids and opt-out of teaching on health and family instruction they don’t agree with. this ple is saying that it is okay to eliminate rights of lgbt people because of the potential that kids will be taught that everyone (straight and lgbt folks) has the right to marry. ultimately, this once perfectly logical explanation becomes perfectly ludicrous explanation--we should eliminate rights to one group for fear that we teach our kids about equality. that's interesting reasoning. let me know how that works out.
doesn't take away the right of gays--heck yeah it does! that is exactly what this proposition says it will do--IN IT'S TITLE! for this reason, i wouldn't say it is actually logical, however i suppose it could be read as such. on the radio i heard this ple used because "gay people are allowed to marry; gay men just have to marry women." this is another topic altogether, but this is why we need to begin recognizing the differences between equality and equity--this argument raises the need for equity.

the value of marriage is not lost when all people have the right to marriage. the value grows exponentially. i challenge the thought of marriage losing its value as fewer people have access to it, and more people are prevented from choosing to enter into it.

now, i am not saying vote this way or that; i am saying think about the effects and impacts of your vote. what do you want your vote to stand for?

blindspots

the past couple days i have been thinking about the concepts and connections of colorblindness and pansexuality. my guess is this will come out a little convoluted though, so hang on until the end.

i don’t believe in colorblindness, but i hear so many people saying it has advantages (not necessarily what the advantages are, just that advantages exist) and how they believe in it. the lack of explanation makes me wonder: what exactly are the advantages to colorblindness?
seeing someone for who they are not for the race they are. that’s the advantage, right? i struggle to figure out whether this is a perfectly logical explanation (ple) to the question/dilemma of living in a race-conscious world. a way to minimize that consciousness. or is it something other than a ple--is it a cultural shift in consciousness around the importance of race? is race beginning to lose its power over how a person, and how groups of people, are perceived and treated?
then, i think about cases like jena 6. doesn’t what happened there--in a segregated louisiana prove that we are not yet blind and don’t have the capacity to be so? i know this potentially is a rhetorical question, but i don’t wish it to be one. i want to talk about it.
i don’t think we actually talk about race enough. talk about it to understand it, and to understand the impacts it has. likewise, i think colorblindness should be talked about more as well. what it means and the impacts of its existence--in theory and in practice.

about colorblindness...i think it’s the not caring that gets to me. when a person says the world should be colorblind and follows that sentiment with the fact that they don’t care about a person’s race, it scares me. it feels like an attempt to wipe away belief systems, traditions, and experiences. if i say i am colorblind and i don’t care about your race, it seems like the additional message i send it that i also don’t care about your history and experience in this world.
i’m no expert, but i do believe race matters. on the systemic and cultural levels, race matters because it is used to advantage some and disadvantage others. on the individual level, race matters because it shapes how we see ourselves and how we are able to see and connect with others. there are high stakes in one’s race. i believe a person’s experience is impacted by race and i don’t want to be blind to that.

similarly, i don’t want to be blind to a person’s gender. pansexuality describes a sexual orientation where gender doesn’t matter. it’s attraction regardless of gender identity and expression.
intellectually, i know that the concept of pansexuality is about acknowledging there is a continuum of gender and not a binary system of gender. which i agree to; gender identity and expression are continuums, not a rigid system of two and only two. however, because pansexuality is attraction regardless of gender identity and expression i think there is blindness present. blindness to how we live gendered (and sex-roled) experiences. even if they are genderqueered experiences.
pansexuality is also viewed as being more open-minded. a more progressive perspective of gender and sexual orientation. if that’s the case, am i lacking open-mindedness because i don’t believe in its reality? perhaps it is not even about open and closed-mindedness. maybe a better way of thinking is on, off, and idle. much like our machines and technology. as gender is seen as a binary, it is on; when it is seen as a continuum, it is idle; when it is not seen at all, it is off. now, after writing that i think with that logical that pansexuality is an interesting mix of idleness and off. idle because it acknowledges the continuum, but off because of its practice of blindness.

everything is so gray and unresolved. i don’t even know how to continue to describe these two concepts and their connections. i am riddled with questions i just don’t have answers to...
do race and gender still play the same roles now as they did when i was a kid and teenager? what role do they play?
am i stuck in an archaic way of thinking about race and gender?
is the attempt at non-judgment actually judgment after all?
are colorblindness and pansexuality applications of social justice or movements away from social justice?

dear void of the unknown, please help me find pathways of thinking and articulating these dilemmas i have laid out before you.