Our Traditional Non-Traditional Wedding

[OneBlueSky]

this is a lovely account of this guy's wedding, and his thoughts about how others view his love for his partner . . . great read . . .

Our Traditional Non-Traditional Wedding
by Steve Silberman

http://levity.com/digaland/married/

(snip)

Keith and I are not political activists. His family has traditionally voted Republican, and his parents voted for Bush in the recent election. Until recently, Keith's father was the mayor of a small town in the Midwest; the first time I met him, he took me aside and said, "I know that you are very special to Keith, so that means you are very special to us." There was such simple, human, Midwestern forthrightness in that statement. No banner-waving, no Biblical injunctions, no soapboxing. Just a clear and compassionate message: We love our son and trust his ability to make the most personal decision of all.

Keith and I didn't get married to commit a pioneering act of civil disobedience, to "redefine marriage" as President Bush claimed during his campaign, or to outrage the religious right. We took our vows because getting hitched seemed like the sane next step of our commitment. We figured the best way to defend the sanctity of marriage was to have one and live up to the promises we made to one another.

As we were making preparations for our ceremony, Senate majority leader Bill Frist equated same-sex marriage and "prostitution or illegal commercial drug activity in the home." Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia unleashed a 21-page torrent of warnings from the highest bench in the land, comparing homosexuality to "fornication, bigamy, adultery, adult incest, bestiality and obscenity." Soon after we were wed, President Bush declared his support for a Constitutional amendment banning marriages like ours, warning the nation that we were out to "change the most fundamental institution of civilization." Now even some Democrats are saying that the President rode that threat into a second term. They insist that to get real and get elected, any future candidate must distance himself from the issue entirely.

These grave declarations from the guardians of our public welfare have a familiar ring. They bring to mind the statements made in support of laws against miscegenation that were on the books in 16 states until 1967, when the Supreme Court overturned them in a case memorably named Loving v. Virginia. The couple in question, a white man named Richard Loving and a black woman, Mildred Jeter, drove to Washington to say their vows, because their home state of Virginia banned interracial marriages. For this offense, they were exiled from Virginia for 25 years by a trial judge who declared, "Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages."

- more . . .