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California | San Diego | Government & Elections | LGBTI / Queer

An open letter to those conflicted
by Mandy Oglesby ( aoglesby [at] ucsd.edu )
Wednesday Nov 5th, 2008 11:18 AM
Reflections on the eve of one of the most exalting and devastating night of my life, celebrating a win in the white house and a loss in my own. The passing of prop 8.
Do not be discouraged by the passing of proposition 8. Do not let anyone tell you that the passing of this proposition somehow equates to the validity of the backwards thinking or hypocritical persecution practiced by the people who passed it. Last night was a minor victory for us. Last night half of the voting state of California, 5 million people, stood up for the dignities of Gays and Lesbians. They stood up for the unfair and wrongful elimination of our basic and fundamental rights as Tax paying, democracy loving Americans. They stood up and shouted at the top of their lungs proving once again that this country is still capable of change. In my lifetime I have seen the pendulum swing. Not by much, but by many. Children today have choices. I see them exercising those choices everyday and it is my hope that by the time they are my age we will have fought long enough and hard enough for them to enjoy the rights and privileges of Marriage without consideration to the hypothetical and fear driven scenarios being pumped through conservative airways to continue the long tradition of oppression the 'moral majority' is so fond of. Do not let this be an end, but a beginning of this fight. Write your Governor. Write your Congressman. Write your president. Call your friends and families into action. Open the doors of discussion which have previously been closed and keep them open. KEEP PEOPLE TALKING ABOUT PROPOSITION 8. Do not meet the self righteous and indignant anger of those gloating in their successful tyranny with equal anger. Remain the loving, kind and compassionate person that you are. Communicate with them in the true spirt of the God they've long forgotten. Sincerity, Empathy and Forgiveness. God does not belong to them. Goodness and moral efficacy do not belong to them. Family values do not belong to them. This measure will be on the be on the ballot again, and it will be defeated. The assurance of our success depends on the diligence we exercise until then. I believe in this process. I am reclaiming God. I and I will see full equality and civil liberty for Gays and lesbians everywhere realized in my lifetime.