OPINION: As Sarah
Palin stood before the average American family
Wednesday night, touting hers as one and the same -- her
five-months-pregnant, 17-year-old daughter, Bristol, dressed
in formfitting fabric appearing to almost accentuate
her baby bump while the daddy-to-be, clean-shaven
(unlike his rougher-looking MySpace photos), sat
alongside adoringly, the picture of Abercrombie perfection
-- for the first time, I saw what all this gay
marriage fuss was all about.
I've
always understood the practical reasons -- health care
benefits, tax credits, custody rights -- but, to be
frank, I've been a little perplexed by
semantics. Marriage equality versus civil unions --
what's the big deal?
The big deal is
it's different, and people like Sarah Palin view us
as such. This is a woman who would use her
daughter's out-of-wedlock, underage pregnancy
as a way to shore up the pro-life vote by touting the
decision to keep the baby. This is a woman who cut funding
for underage mothers and for sex education programs
only to put her daughter on a national stage -- not as
an example of what happens when you cut those programs
but as an example of how you can "take lemons and
make lemonade."
This is a woman
who, standing before thousands of "average American
families" Wednesday night, lied through her teeth,
telling the parents of special-needs children that
they would have an advocate in the White House. Never
mind that before she gave birth to a special-needs child of
her own, Sarah Palin voted to cut funding for special
education programs.
On and on, so on
and so forth, Sarah Palin painted herself to be the
picture of the average American family -- a woman who will
fight for the rights of the steel mill worker, the
stay-at-home mom, and the family with five kids
struggling to make ends meet.
But Sarah Palin
doesn't support my family. She probably would have
back in the day, when we were made up of two working
parents raising two kids in a dual-income household
totaling around $70,000 per year. But that was before
I came out of the closet and before my 17-year-old cousin
(the victim of a brutal rape) made the painful
decision to have an abortion. It was before I got
kicked out of the Boy Scouts because they found out my
father was a recovering alcoholic and an atheist -- never
mind that the churchgoing troop leader knocked back a
six-pack a night and beat his wife -- and long before
grandma entertained a gentleman caller or three after
the death of my grandpa.
That just screams
"different" -- anything but average -- and as
we've seen time and time again with the
Republican Party, different equals change, and that
just doesn't fly.
To her credit,
last night Sarah Palin kept issues like abortion and
same-sex marriage out of her speech. The press has dragged
out her positions on social issues over the past six
days, and it is clear Palin takes an extreme
conservative stance on damn near all of them. That rumor
CNN bandied about suggesting Palin supported equal benefits
for same-sex couples was debunked when it was revealed
she did so at the urging of Alaska's attorney
general. When asked, she said she personally supports
spousal benefits for heterosexual, married couples only.
But in parading
out her family, flaws and all, she attempted to convince
Americans that what we were looking at was the picture of
the average American family, and everything else was
different.
Call me crazy,
but why does Sarah Palin's knocked-up, 17-year-old
daughter have a right to marry the man who got her pregnant
-- and man who, until the McCain campaign sicced their
dogs on it, had a MySpace page boasting of his a
desire to never be a dad, never be married, and spend
his life "just fucking chillin'" -- but
my boyfriend and I, who sit at home watching Netflix
and talk about one day adopting a dog, don't?
Is it semantics? Is it the fact that we're the same
sex? Is it religion, fear, that Sarah Plain -- who
touts that she has gay friends -- has never
encountered what a gay family looks like? Or is it all talk
meant to appease the religious right?
Sarah Palin got
one thing right last night. The only thing different than
a hockey mom and a pit bull is indeed lipstick. And perhaps
I'm preaching to the choir here, but I sure as
hell don't want a pit bull second-in-command
for the next four years.
I can throw my
weight behind Obama, and it might help. He doesn't
believe in full marriage equality, but he gets us
closer, and as far as I'm concerned, a step
forward is better than a step back any day. But I'm
now convinced more than ever that the best place for
gay Americans to let their voices be heard -- where we
can make the most noise -- is in California, stopping
a yes vote on Proposition 8.
Now, I know
everyone who isn't in California but is reading this
is wondering why. I mean, sure, it'll be nice
to summer in California while all of our gay brothers
and sisters tie the knot, but what does it mean on a
national level?
California has
long been a leader when it comes to social issues, and as
California goes, so goes the rest of the nation. If gay
marriage sails through in California and the right
wing loses its fight come November, states nationwide
will soon follow suit. But if we fail, it will be years
before we get the necessary support to legalize gay marriage
once again.
Barack Obama may
win the presidency, and that would make me thrilled. But
so too could John McCain and his new conservative sidekick
Sarah Palin, and if that happens, we need a victory
this November.
Support the fight
to stop Prop. 8 from passing in November. Whether
it's with a check, volunteer time, rallying
support, or simply taking that one on-the-fence friend
aside and convincing him or her to go to the polls and
cast a vote for equality, we can beat this.
And to Sarah
Palin and her average American family, I wish you the best.
Really and truly. I just wish you could do the same for me
and mine.
