Unfortunately these measures have passed and are passing all over the United States. California's gotten a lot of attention, but this type of institutionalized bigotry is nothing new. Eleven states adopted similar measures in '04, my own included.

The answer is to refuse to stand for it. Our nation overcame Jim Crow. We can beat this. We'll do it the way we've always had to. We protest. We march. We make noise so that no one gets to rest easy until our voices are heard.

I'm disappointed about Prop 8, but the bigots are out of their minds if they think queer America is going to just hang our heads and slink back into our closets. This is a speed bump, not a dead end.

I'm confident that in our lifetime, and probably sooner than even we suspect, these bigot-laws will be a sad memory in a brighter future. They will be an embarrassing footnote, not the way we live our lives.

Oh boy, I really hope so*. Obama has mentioned his support for gay rights in several speeches, so I'm hoping with him at the helm a lot of damaging, backward, as you say, institutionalized bigotry will be demolished.

But hell yes. Fight and bitch and outflank 'em till we win.


(*And on a side note, am I ever again going to be able to use the word 'hope' in any vaguely politically-orientated topic without feeling like I'm somehow punning?)

I'm a firm believer. We've come too far to give up now. We need to take that anger over things like Prop 8 and focus it in a positive direction. Obama's win is a cause to celebrate, but we've got a long road ahead of us.

Word. Wise word.