Whinging It

There are four days left until the election. Four days until the vote on Proposition 8 is in and I know whether my status as a married woman in California is secure, or whether we go back to domestic partnership and the ramifications that carries.

Note: To anyone who says that there’s no difference between the two, the state of California has the power to dissolve a domestic partnership at will, and without the consent of those involved. Not so with a marriage.

Also, heterosexual couples under the age of 65 can’t get a domestic partnership. Domestic partnership is only available to same-sex couples and geriatrics. This is why this whole business is the definition of separate but unequal.

Our neighbor sent an email around yesterday asking if anyone wants to come to her house to eat popcorn and watch the returns on Tuesday. I politely declined, noting that I’m going to be so emotional, whatever the outcomes, that I shouldn’t be around anyone who didn’t choose to marry me.

Lately I’ve been reading Fox News on a daily basis.

My political leanings are decidedly left. But I’m aware of that, and I make a concerted effort to try to find unbiased news so that I don’t get too comfortable in my own liberal bubble. On average, I read three or four online newspapers a day, and find that when two or more papers cover a story, I can usually make an informed opinion about events or ideas without too much of a bias. The San Francisco Chronicle is liberal and often poorly written, but it’s also the newspaper for where I live. The Washington Post leans right. The New York Times is well-written and often has the full story. The Denver Post is the paper of my hometown, and often makes efforts to get facts.

But my new-found addiction to Fox News is purely entertainment. It started as a way to balance the SF Chronicle — I was looking for something that leaned right to the Chron’s left. But Fox isn’t just balancing the scales. It’s bringing extra sandbags and other various heavy things that were lying around the house.

Going to Fox’s site is like dropping into Bizarro America to see what’s important. In the rest of America, newspapers are discussing the stock market and its roller-coaster ways. At Fox, there is front-page news about how President Clinton is potentially ruining Obama’s chances because he (Clinton) insinuated that Obama has asked for his insight on economic strategy. In fact, the sub-heading is: “Clinton was supposed to rally voters behind Obama, but instead he seemed to suggest Obama didn’t have a handle on the economic crisis — and needed Bill’s help.”

SEEMED TO SUGGEST. Now THAT is news. And that’s not even the best example I’ve run across; it’s just what happened to be the case today.

I read Fox News after everything else, and often I try to guess what the headline news will be on Fox’s home page. I rarely get it right, mainly because I insist on being logical about it, but it never ceases to make me smile when this supposed news agency has ignored the biggest stories of the day to focus on something minute and sensationalist.

In reading more than one story, I kid you not, I have double-checked to make sure I’m not reading The Onion.

I would have a grudging respect for Fox News if they just owned their conservative bias. But the fact that they insist on calling themselves fair and balanced makes me guffaw. Sometimes I’m tempted to send a particularly ludicrous story around, but don’t want people to think anyone’s impersonating my email address.

So if you’re decidedly liberal, I highly recommend perusing Fox News for the occasional smile. And if Fox News is your sole news source? You may want to venture out a bit and see what others are saying. Just a little. Start with the Washington Post.

If I were granted three wishes by some type of genie figure, I’d use them as follows:

• One wish goes to winning the lottery, and with the trickiness of genies, I’d be specific. “I want to win the Lotto,” doesn’t cut it. Then I’d just end up winning a $2 scratcher. I would detail that I should be the sole winner of the California SuperLotto on a week that had a jackpot of over $12 million within the next year. I’m sure I’d still be tricked somehow, like I would get sued for $13 million over a technicality, but I think the rest of the bases are covered.
• One wish is for world peace. Blah blah blah. I’m sure the world would become more boring, but in compensation, no land mines.
• Lastly, I’d wish that a Bible would self-destruct anytime someone used it to justify hate or discrimination. Someone says it’s okay to treat women as second-class citizens because the Bible says so? Poof! Somewhere a Bible spontaneously bursts into flames and/or eats itself in a flurry of paper. It would rather self-destruct than have its purpose misinterpreted. It’s like how every time a bell rings, an angel gets its wings. Except cooler.

The last one is mostly to mix it up for the genie. It must be boring to grant wishes for money and beauty and fame all the time.

It helps, I think, to tell people when you’re thinking of going deeper than the shallow end of the pool of self-pity. I’m grateful to those who have reached out to help me find Prop. 8 perspective.

In my life, I have been lucky that it is not often that I have felt that people hate me or would cause me harm without even knowing me. I mean, I’ve known people who dislike me who DO know me, and generally I can pinpoint the behavior that makes them feel that way. (And depending upon the situation, sometimes I can’t even blame them.) But I have rarely felt blatant disregard for my opinion or feelings on a mass scale.

I know. The poor little white girl is finally seeing a little discrimination on a limited scale. I also didn’t get a pony when I was a kid.

Lisa reiterated to me today some wise words her husband told her when she was going through a rough time: I have everything I need to be happy. I have people who love me and whom I love, and I have factors in my life that enable me to be happy. And I am happy in my life, with no exceptions.

And while the Prop. 8 people may be trying to do something unfair, they cannot take away my satisfaction with my life or my will to keep pursuing that. The fundamentals of who Wife and I are, and our relationship with one another, are not affected by others’ hate. Sure we’d like to be treated equally, but it doesn’t mean our life will fall apart if we’re not.

Thank God for that.

I’m having difficulty focusing these days. I can’t seem to get it together to do everyday things like choosing what to eat for lunch or what to wear for work.  I don’t have the energy to work out, something I’m usually very consistent about.

I know these are signs of depression, and I’m aware enough to keep an eye on that (as is Wife), but it’s not a depression in the clinical sense of the word.  It’s not that I’m so sad that I can’t get out of bed in the morning.  It’s that I’m so mad that I have to focus all my attention on not screaming in frustration or crying out in a big howl of fury.

If you’re not in California or you’re lucky enough to live outside the range of my relentless barrage of information on the subject, there’s a proposition in the upcoming election about gay marriage.  Prop. 8 (or H8, as I’ve seen it referred to on the boards by those clever texters) would reverse the California Supreme Court’s May 15, 2008 decision to allow marriage for all consenting adults in California.

My natural inclination is to view this all with the absurdity of a French farce.  It seems crazy to me at all that the government wouldn’t let me get married on May 14, will and can let me get married from May 15 through November 4, but can’t let me get married on November 5.

If this were a play, the starring roles would have to go to Bugs Bunny and Donald Duck. (Who do you think is the top?)

I mean, think about any other civil rights movement in the history of the U.S. Would it make any sense to see the following timeline?

• August 18, 1920: Women get the right to vote.
• December 5, 1920: Nope. Sorry, women. No voting for you. Majority rule believes that having a uterus limits your ability to decide on issues.

The only right I can think of that was revoked in America was the right to drink alcohol (WHYYYYYYY?) and even that was given back fourteen years later. (Scott has kindly reminded me that the second Amendment has also taken hits over the years as well. I should note that I’m also a fan of the right to bear arms, but to elaborate would be an entirely different post in which you would get to witness a rarely-seen melding of interests between the Militia of Montana and the lesbian from Oakland.)

I know that the majority of people who are voting for Prop. 8 are doing it out of the mis-guided goodness of their hearts. I know that it is their opinion that gay marriage is bad for children or that they don’t want to endorse something they think is wrong, and I understand the desire to deny a right to those you don’t agree with.  I personally think that people who litter shouldn’t be allowed any civil rights at all.

But at the end of the day, just because I think someone is a freaking idiot doesn’t mean I’m going to deny him the right to get married or vote. As much as it galls me on a case-by-case level, the grand scheme of it all is that everyone (gay, straight, bigoted) should be treated equally.

Sometimes I hate being on the side of the noble oppressed.  It seems like everything is much easier when you get to be part of the self-righteous majority.