Friday, June 26, 2009
Allow gays to marry in Virginia
Editorial commentary
Recent contributions
- What Obama didn't say
- How my education and religious training failed me
- Can we be a two-trolley town?
- Striving for civility
- Commentary archive
From the RoundTable blog
Read the latest entries
Sherman Bamford
Bamford lives in Roanoke.
Several years ago, someone in a conversation told me, "someday you will be able to marry, if you choose." At the time, I didn't think that what was suggested was even remotely possible.
Why?
I am a gay man.
Today I have a great deal more optimism. I know that the day is coming when the government will no longer choose whom you are free to marry and whom you may not. That decision will be made by the couple. And the day is coming when an institution that should be a wonderful celebration of love is no longer a treated as a weapon of discrimination for some.
Even though I have no immediate plans for such myself, I strongly believe in the right to marry.
Separate is not equal. Gay and lesbian couples in most states must complete extensive paperwork just to confer some of the same things to one another that a simple marriage license confers.
According to the General Accounting Office (//www.gao.gov/new.items/d04353r.pdf), at least 1,138 other benefits and protections are available only to heterosexual married couples and are out of reach to gay and lesbian couples. Other groups who have studied the issue say the number is higher -- approximately 1400.
Gay and lesbian couples in legally-recognized relationships cannot move to different states without facing a patchwork of conflicting rules and questions as to the legitimacy of the relationship.
And nothing short of the word marriage confers the same degree of legitimacy or respect as "marriage." Not civil unions. Not any other kind of quaint phrase.
It is shameful whenever laws are enacted solely to deny civil rights to selected groups of people. The 1996 "Defense"? of Marriage Act turned gay and lesbian people into second class citizens -- under federal law. And in the past few years, we have seen an increasingly ugly spectacle emerge -- bitter campaigns attempting to de-legitimize the relationships of gay and lesbian couples everywhere and crude statewide measures to deny fundamental human rights.
For example, in Virginia, three years ago, we saw the passage of the Marshall-Newman Amendment. This amendment goes far beyond any similar law passed in any U.S. state by imposing new harsh measures to keep loving gay and lesbian couples apart.
The freedom to marry must be granted to gays and lesbians of legal age in Virginia. Some will argue that same-sex marriage is available in an increasing number of other states far away from Virginia, and therefore the freedom to marry is not needed here. But that argument is akin to saying that justice and equality should be available in some states and not others, and that those who do not like the current system should simply become refugees.
Because I grew up in a small town in the South, I know what a strong bond this region can have. I look to the future, when a young gay child here will no longer face prejudice, violence, hate crimes or the fear of a debilitating disease that still remains a threat to many people now, as he grows up.
I look forward to the day when there is full equality in Virginia and all neighboring states, but especially in Virginia. It was the Virginian Thomas Jefferson who warned against "legislators and rulers, civil as well as ecclesiastical" who endeavor to impose "their own opinions and modes of thinking ... on others." Our relationships with loved ones should be honored.
