Roundup of Proposition 8 Coverage

There is no shortage of coverage mainstream news media coverage of the California Marriage Amendment (Proposition 8) trial, which began today in a federal court. I suspect this is because of bias in the newsrooms towards neutering marriage.

This is evident by repeatedly casting the California Marriage Amendment as a "bay on gay marriage" or a "outlawing same-sex marriage". I address that phraseology in this blog entry. Marriage-neutering proponents are equated as "gay rights" proponents, even though these terms are not strictly synonymous. The "right to marry" is another favorite phrase. These newsrooms also tend to have a difficult time quoting someone in favor of the CMA without including a religious reference. We are referred to as "opponents of gay marriage" rather than those who affirm traditional marriage. Even though the amendment has been adopted and is part of the California constitution, it is called a proposition.

Here’s Peter Henderson’s Reuters article.

The United States is divided on same-sex marriage. It is legal in only five states, though most of those, and the District of Columbia, approved it last year.

A majority of states have constitutional amendments reaffirming the historical, biological truth that marriage is a bride+groom union.

"I don't think of myself as a bad person," said Paul Katami, describing the persecution he felt from a media campaign warning California parents to 'protect' their children by voting against same-sex unions in the 2008 poll.

Where did the ads say any persons were bad? Are we really to order our lives around the mistaken inferences of a few people? We didn't vote against same-sex unions. California continues to have domestic partnerships. We voted to restore marriage licensing.

"We hear a lot of 'What's the big deal?'. The big deal is it is creating a separate category for us," Katami said.

It is a separate category by nature. That the law describes that is just. Conversely, he doesn’t mention the fact that he wants to make sure we don't have a word that distinguishes the only kind of pairing that unites both sexes and naturally produces new citizens.

On Monday, District Court Chief Judge Vaughn Walker peppered lawyers with questions even before they had made their cases. He asked lawyer Ted Olson, arguing in favor of [neutering] marriage, whether the institution of marriage had improved as it changed over the years, and why the court should get involved in the case at all, as voters and legislatures act.

"We wouldn't need a Constitution if we left everything to the political process," replied Olson,

That does not follow. The Constitution assigns certain responsibilities to different branches of the federal government, the states, and the people. There is no compelling interest for a court to overturn the state's constitutional amendment in this case, which was adopted by the people and affirmed by the state's highest court.

When Judge Walker asked for evidence that changes in marriage law had improved the institution, Olson replied, "The President of the United States."

Obama's parents, a black man and a white woman, would not have been allowed to marry in Virginia before a Supreme Court decision allowing interracial unions in 1967.

And Obama wouldn't be here and be President if his father and mother instead stuck to people of their own sex. I'll let the reader decide whether or not we'd be better off.

[Much, much more after the jump.]

Lisa Leff continues to cover the story for the Associated Press.

Regardless of the outcome of the case, it's likely to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, where it ultimately could become a landmark that determines if gay Americans have the right to marry.

They already have the very same "right" to marry as anybody else. Any new "right" they are granted is likely to also extend to straights. Hence, this is not a "gay rights" issue.

Rick Jacobs, chairman of the Courage Campaign, a Los Angeles-based gay rights organization, said supporters of same-sex marriage were disappointed with the decision to bar cameras and called on the high court to lift its ban Wednesday.

"It's time that the debate about marriage equality is seen for what it is — a debate over the rights of our friends and families to live their lives freely," he said.

What about our rights to live our lives freely, which includes saying "no" when someone else asks us for something?

At trial, Walker intends to ask lawyers on both sides to present the facts underlying much of the political rhetoric surrounding same-sex marriage. Among his questions are whether sexual orientation can be changed, how legalizing gay marriage affects traditional marriages and the effect on children of being raised by two mothers or two fathers.

These questions reveal a bias. The question should center on the facts of how we adopt laws and whether those laws violate the Constitution. It doesn't matter whether or not sexual orientation can be changed (though it is interesting to see people deny the existence of people I have met) – there are conditions people have that keep them from getting a driver's license, too; counterfeits devalue the authentic; and when a child is raised by "two mothers", the child doesn't have the bonding experience and modeling of a father, and when a child is raised by "two fathers" the child doesn't have the bonding experience and modeling of a mother. If neither fathers nor mothers are important, then we're one step closer to the government owning our kids, aren't we?

That the court is putting people on the stand in this federal case to complain about how a law makes them feel or might make someone feel in the future makes a mockery of the rule of law. I hope every person who testifies in defense of the amendment talks about how violated they feel when it comes to their vote being disparaged and attacked.

Laura E. Davis has this review of what has happened so far, couched in an appeal-to-emotion focus on one of the couples suing to remove part of the state constitution.

Kastanas and Farina say they can live without calling their relationship a "marriage." But they worry about their son having to make that distinction as he grows up.

That these two men decided to buy and egg and rent a womb should not obligate us to reorder society.

"My main concern is for him," Farina said. "Because he's going to be raised in a situation where his friends' parents are married, and he can’t say, 'Mine are married.'"

Most of those kids have their mothers in the lives, and the boy can’t talk much about his mother, either. But Farina doesn’t seem worried about that. Instead, he and his partner deprived this boy of being raised by a mother by design. If their voluntary association really is no different than my marriage, then let's see them make children without a third party. (That some married couples are unable to do this is the exception, while it is the rule-without-exception when it comes to same-sex pairings.) Let's see them provide the child with a mother, as I have done for my children. It is insulting for them to say what they've done is no different than what I've done.

Here's Romain Raynald’s article.

"Discrimination hurts us and doesn't help anyone. The trial will offer a chance for the public to listen to the expert witnesses on both sides and hear the cross examinations of those witnesses," said Jennifer Pizer, Director of Lambda Legal's national marriage project.

This is a ridiculous statement. See what I mean here.

Only five US states today permit gay unions: Iowa, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont and New Hampshire.

This simply is not true. Same-sex unions are legally recognized in many states, including California, in the form of civil unions and domestic partnerships.

The LATimes.com blog has been all over the story, especially back-and-forth over whether there would be a video feed of the trial. As it stands now, it is being recorded and who knows whether or not it will be distributed any time soon?

If you want to see how they covered this, see their blog entries here, here, here, here, and here. That last link has over 50 comments. The print story is here.

Finally, here's the Reuters story on the video situation.

Those attacking the constitutional amendment claim that broadcasting the video would be of public benefit. But I ask – what if one of the defendents is sexually attracted to privacy, or to defending marriage? By the reasoning I've heard from the marriage neutering crowd, such a minority would need to be treated with special deference.

Also, the clever marriage neutering advocates have been saying into any open mic they can find that marriage defenders should not be complaining about death threats and attacks, because we're the aggressors here. Are we really? Who is it who has been aggressive pursuing change? It isn't like thousands of years ago, half of the people got together to stop the widespread practice of same-sex "marriage". Our laws describe marriage, which existed before our laws. The activists want to change that. They are the aggressors. And those who want change have the burden or persuading enough of the rest of us that the change would be of net benefit.

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