I don’t give a f*ck what you “feel” about gay marriage and neither does Judge Walker.
I know everyone has feelings about things.
We have feelings about who to vote for as president.
We have feelings about the new couch our roommate bought.
We have feelings about whether our neighbor should be able to dress his own kid because he makes him look like an a$$hole.
These feelings, feelings in general, are really important. They are a way for us to navigate the world, filter information and express our individual preferences. The problems begin when you start to confuse feelings with evidence. Feelings are individual thoughts and preferences. Evidence, which is often scientifically proven, is a set of facts that substantiate something. Even this can get a little tricky, which is why there are rules in the fields of law and science about what counts as evidence. Feelings do not count as evidence.
If they did, John Travolta would have boarded the scientology spaceship a long time ago.
This very logic is what is so exciting and important about the Prop 8 trials and Judge Walkers ruling. While the overall number is thankfully shrinking, there are still a lot of individuals who feel that gay people shouldn't get married. Well, Walkers ruling was the equivalent of him saying,
"You may believe that drinking your own urine will allow you to see in the dark but there is no evidence to support that. On the contrary, the evidence says the opposite."
His ruling told the state of California that you can't deny an entire group of people their human rights based on your personal feelings that it will do harm, when there is overwhelming evidence that it does no such thing. Throughout the history of our country there have been many landmark rulings where emotionally charged matters have been grounded in logic through court decisions. Many civil rights issues from abortion to desegregation have been decided in the courts because as a country, despite the rhetoric, we clearly believe that one person’s values should NOT trump another person’s civil rights.
For example:
Plessy vs. Ferguson – Remember when we thought separate but equal was ok? Oh wait we still do, it’s called domestic partnerships, but you get the point.
Loving vs. Virginia – That ruling made sure that people couldn’t be denied the right to marry based on the color of their skin.
Lawrence vs. Texas – When the Supreme Court overturned an earlier ruling and decided that criminalizing same sex conduct is unconstitutional.
THERE IS NO EVIDENCE!!! Despite spending millions of dollars to get Prop 8 passed and having ample opportunity to call witnesses to substantiate it, the defense failed on all counts. {FAIL} Believe me, if there was any evidence to support Prop 8, they would have found it.
ATTN: Opponents of gay marriage - This means it’s time to stop believing in things that don’t exist like Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and that there is actual rational evidence to support denying gay people the right to get married.
There are a lot of other benefits of deciding gay marriage in the courts. For one, it takes the power away from voters because let's face it, most of the time when people vote it's 80% feelings and 20% information. If you live somewhere like NYC you might be thinking what's wrong with that? Everyone here supports gay marriage. I'm sure they do, but have you been to Alabama lately? It’s also unwise at this point to leave it to legislators because it’s not as though Obama or the democrats are chomping at the bit to take up the case. In fact, they couldn't be happier that the stay on Prop 8 has been extended so it doesn't distract from the "real issues". Yes, they actually said that and if it doesn't piss you off you should check your pulse.
When you put this issue in the courts you take it away (for the most part) from uninformed, impassioned voters and some politician’s political agenda. It becomes something that we have to prove and something that gets subject to logic through things like the rational bias test. In the Prop 8 trials we proved, that gay marriage does not undermine heterosexual marriage, that it does not negatively impact families or children. Doing this, proving this was an incredible victory and one that all gay people and those who support them should understand and be able to articulate to others.
