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So the California Supreme Court did it. The judges overturned the ban on gay marriage (http://news.yahoo.com/). It’s a significant civil rights victory, of course; a triumph in the name of capital-L Love. Bravo! Yet I can’t help but feel that it’s a shame the victory had to come through the Supreme Court rather than the people themselves, a result that hysterics burdened with an excess of conservatismo will make use of as they attempt a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.
But from a civics and government standpoint, the case illustrates a key concern about democracy as a political system: the risk of mob rule. We commonly think that because a large number of people believe something, that something must be true. Of course, it is an error in logic. History is filled with examples of large numbers of people believing in things that were later proven wrong, like a flat earth, or an age of 6,000 years for the planet, or the sun revolving around our little blue marble. More critically, history is filled with examples of atrocities being committed not only by the tyrannical few, but also with the support of the general population. Germany, for example. Hitler would not have been able to carry out the horrific program of the Holocaust without the complicity of the military, the clergy, the civilian population. Similarly, the enslavement and segregation of African-Americans here in the U.S. would not have been possible if the overall social attitude didn’t support it.
In the case of gay marriage and homosexuality, the burden of proof to demonstrate harm to individuals or society has, quite simply, not been met by those anti-gay marriage groups out there. The fear-mongering about dire consequences if gays are allowed to marry, often based on little more than religious prejudice, has accomplished nothing but working against letting people who love each other to do what people who love each other want to do: Share their lives and support each other as best they can. Not that any of this actually gets discussed. Oh, no; the anti-gay folk hide behind the “will of the people” and couch the debate in terms of democracy when it’s really all about prejudice.
Itching for a Fight
That overturned ban is an example of how a large number of people who are wrong on an issue nonetheless see their will expressed through a democratic process. And in this we have another illustration of what the Founding Fathers were thinking when they built in checks and balances into the U.S. government– a system followed by constitutional democracies in general.
Since the sky hasn’t fallen as a result of other countries and states having legalized gay marriage, I wonder how predisposed to an amendment Californians will be when they realize in November that life hasn’t really changed since the Court’s decision. Except, of course, for all those happy people who will finally have the freedom straight people have. Still, the anti-gay folk, like the California Marriage Protection Act campaign, don’t seem prepared to leave well enough alone. They’re itching for a ballot fight. While it’s true that Prop. 22 passed with 60 percent of the vote, there is now the chance to correct that error in judgment and put an end to this anti-freedom, anti-love, anti-companionship prejudice – at least insofar as the law is concerned. So let there be a fight for the spirit of independence and progress that gives California its golden shine. I’d like to think that Californians will step up to the plate and do the right thing – let gays live their own lives. In the meantime – thank goodness for checks and balances.
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