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maurice (wildecat1814@yahoo.com) writes:
> Eric Bohlman wrote in message news:...
>>> ambidge@ecf.toronto.edu (Chris Ambidge) wrote in
>>> news:I6ztGA.Box@ecf.utoronto.ca:
>>> > DISPIRITED U.S. GAYS CHOOSING CANADA
>>> > By MARINA JIMÉNEZ / Globe and Mail Wednesday, Nov 10, 2004
>>> [snip]
>> > "It's clear that the U.S. is becoming a place that is hostile to
>> > the long-term health of same- relationships," said Phil
>> > Schwab, a 36-year-old research policy analyst with a PhD
>> > in agricultural genetics. He relocated to Ottawa from
>> > Washington with his Canadian partner three months before the election.
>> > "We are the leading edge of the wave," he said. "More and
>> > more s will come here, especially after 11 states voted
>> > to prohibit same- marriage in their constitution. Many
>> > of these changes will be challenged in the courts as uncon-
>> > stitutional, so the battle is not over, but it becomes a struggle
>> > to get equality for same- relationships."
>> Is becoming? It becomes a struggle? Has it ever *not* been a struggle?
>> Hello, anyone home? Can anybody name *any* civil rights movement that
>> amounted to pure progress without any major setbacks?
>> The pace of progress in the civil rights movement has been so rapid in
>> recent years that any setbacks are going to look a lot bigger than they
>> really are. How close were we, for example, to getting marriage or even
>> civil union in Ohio? We've had a bunch of new obstacles set in front of
>> us, that's for sure, though we should have been able to anticipate that
>> this would happen (and the people working the most seriously for marriage
>> *did* anticipate them). But some seem to be reacting as if a solid brick
>> wall is being built around us and is almost finished. That's defeatist.
> While I agree with what you say (No progress without struggle and all
> that),
> I think there are a couple of things driving this "defeatism." First,
> many people have lived their entire lives without the same rights they
> feel are due them. As you get older, the desire to have that once and
> for all gets much stronger. You want to feel what it is like before
> your life is over. As a result you don't want to wait for all the
> knuckle-draggers to get with the program that it is not their business
> to decide how other people live their lives.
> Second, when blacks were struggling mightily with civil rights in the
> 1950s and 60s (and even several decades before) there really were no
> other options. What other country could black Americans go and obtain
> the rights that were denied in the U.S.? Gays now have that option.
> Canada, Netherlands, Spain, Belgium, and other countries either have
> or will have legalized same marriages (not civil unions which is
> more likely to pass in the U.S. at the federal level than marriage).
> Canada is a particularly attractive option: it is a first world
> country just north of the U.S. Now that these other options are viable
> s have an out not available to blacks (except blacks could and many
> did leave the segregationist South to escape the worst of this
> nation's Jim Crow laws). I think it is a good analogy in this time and
> situation. Again people just want to get on with enjoying what's left
> of their lives why the constant struggle all the time and about
> everything that should be so clearly granted? I hope Americans don't
> wake up one day to find this country has become the new Argentina
> because of this regressive nonsense.
Nothing should be taken for granted. Unless it becomes publicly clear
that we queers are the majority (including s, lesbians, biuals,
transuals and transvestites), any and all our already acquired rights
will have to be wakefully watched for.
Thinking otherwise would be unmitigated silliness.
Manuel
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