Nevertheless, it was a referendum by popular vote.
Civil rights should not be left for the masses to take away as they see fit.
If southern states had voted on civil rights for minorities during the
1960s, do you really think anything would have changed?
No. There will always be a part of humankind that fears change, and will do
anything to prevent it, as demonstrated by the continuing existence of hate
groups, racism and bigotry. It was also demonstrated by the lies and
deception used to help pass Prop 8. What you call a referendum on the
definition of a word has resulted in the stripping of rights from a certain
group of people, essentially writing bigotry into California's constitution.
Just because marriage has been defined one way for "thousands of years" does
not mean the definition cannot change. Slavery was accepted for thousands
of years, too, but today we know it is wrong and have largely eliminated it
from the world. The end of slavery in this country had to be forced upon
some people, unfortunately, so that others could be free.
The subjugation of women was accepted for thousands of years, and even
though part of the world knows it is wrong, there are still many places
where women are treated like property. One can blame religion for a large
part of this problem, and I can put heaps of blame upon religion for the
passage of Prop 8 and other laws around the country that are used to either
explicitly or implicitly force religious beliefs upon people who do not
share those beliefs.
I will not sit idly by while religious groups use hate and lies to turn this
country into a theocracy.
John
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