Today the federal trial of Prop H8's constitutionality began. I've been obsessively following Twitter feeds and reading liveblogging of the morning's arguments, since the bigots managed to get their collective undies in a big enough twist to have the recording/internet posting of the trial postponed until Wednesday, when SCOTUS will make a ruling on whether or not it will be allowed at all. This is, mind you, after nearly 140,000 people wrote in declaring they wanted the trial televised, and only 32 wrote in and said don't do it. For every pro-H8 supporter who wanted the cameras out, there were 4,375 advocates for transparency. And yet they still got SCOTUS to stall it. Sigh. And they say they're the oppressed ones.
But something that keeps coming up in the pro-H8's arguments this morning, is the idea of "protecting the children" by denying LGBs marriage equality. Remember the "Protect our children. Restore Marriage." ads during the campaign? The idea that children will somehow be harmed by same-sex marriage and need protecting from it? It's been brought up again and again by the pro-H8 side. And this time, I just want to ask...
What about the gay children? Many gay and lesbian and bisexual people have known their orientation from an early age. If they're protecting children by denying us rights, what about those children to whom they are ALSO denying rights? They're "protecting" gay children from being equal citizens under the law. They're "protecting" these children from the dreams of growing up and getting married that so many kids have. Personally? Realizing one's dreams of future happiness is a pretty shitty thing to "protect" someone against. Gay children are children too. And they deserve the protection of equality.
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