This morning I received an email from the 18th-Century based group "Stand For Marriage Maine" (I will not be linking to them). I have no idea how they acquired my email address, though I was born and raised in Maine and have had that particular email address since before I moved away.
It is especially upsetting for me to read through their message of hate and intolerance, given that many family members and close friends of mind live there. In fact, I am returning to Maine in October to perform the marriage of a friend of mine from high school, someone who is pleased to be able to get married in a state where anybody can marry the person they love (assuming the "people's veto" ballot measure is defeated in November).
My fiancee and I are also likely to marry in Maine in the future, as that is where we are both originally from. It is highly important to the both of us that our marriage take place in a state that has marriage equality, and we're hoping for this ballot measure, likely to be called "Question 1," to be defeated.
From the spiteful, reactionary missive (their emphasis, not mine):
We did it! Because of your help and that of over 100,000 Mainers, we submitted over 100,000 signatures of voters to the Secretary of State to qualify the People's Veto of Maine's homosexual marriage legislation (LD 1020).
This is a historic feat. We gathered almost twice the required signatures in just a few weeks, mostly by volunteers. This extraordinary outpouring of support shows just how strongly Mainers feel about protecting the institution of marriage. Despite the repeated efforts of our opponents and the politicians in Augusta to deny the people the right to vote on this issue, it is a virtual certainty that the homosexual marriage issue will be on the ballot this November. We expect it to appear as Question 1. We are seeking a Yes vote on Question 1 to repeal LD 1020 and the legalization of homosexual marriage. Your Yes vote preserves the definition of marriage between a man and a woman.
Note the repeated use of the phrase "homosexual marriage." I guess they're thinking that will play better to people's innate fear of change, rather than saying "same-sex marriage" or "gay marriage," but one thing that is universal to all such phrases is that they link the notion of being gay with marriage. The bigots may not realize that, but their own language, no matter how they couch it, is only cementing the concept that "______ marriage" is a legitimate idea.
We need to raise a significant campaign treasury to successfully preserve marriage in Maine. Our opponents have a vast network of wealthy homosexuals with seemingly unlimited resources from supporters in places like Hollywood, Colorado, New York and Massachusetts. They have already said they plan to spend as much as $5 million to try to defeat us. We cannot hope to raise that kind of money, but we do need to raise enough money to get our message out. Please make your contribution $50 or $100 today.
Hilarious. This coming from people who are going to use oodles of money from outside the state to try and preserve discrimination for another few years. As is noted at lezgetreal.com(emphasis mine):
Currently, those opposed to marriage rights for gay and lesbian couples stands at around $350,000 while those supporting marriage rights have raised just under $140,000.
The question is largely where this money is coming from. Where it does not seem to be coming from is within the broader Maine citizenry. The bulk of the donations appear to be coming from within the Catholic Church and from outside the state itself. The largest single chunk of money comes from the National Organization for Marriage, the much lampooned group which recently enjoyed much publicity for what they did wrong. They have, so far, donated $160,000 directly and another $9,000 in the form of in kind donations. Focus on the Family has donated $50,000.
The only Maine based organization listed is Maine Family Policy Council, which has donated $650. Other than that, the bulk of the rest of the money is coming from the Catholic Church. The Roman Catholic Diocese in Portland, Maine has already donated $100,000 and another $10,000 from in kind donations. The Knights of Columbus has donated $50,000. Diocese outside of Maine also donated $2,000.
And the author further says, "...the idea of a state determining its own fate seems to be lost on people who are afraid of losing the right to lord over someone else." She also notes that the Catholic Church is in quite the money crunch these days, with Catholic schools being shuttered across the country. Yet, there's apparently plenty of money sitting around for campaigns like this (tax-free money, it should be noted).
More from the email:
LD 1020 actually repeals the statutory framework for supporting and enhancing marriage. It results in monogamous marriage no longer being considered an important enough ideal to include in our marriage statutes. More troubling, the homosexual lobby has repealed the law that established the interests of children as being worthy of our state's efforts to nurture and enhance.
That's because in a series of acts of brazen cowardice and exploitation, the bigots have repeatedly used other people's children as a weapon in their unending war to keep bigotry on the books.
When marriage is redefined to be about any two consenting adults without regard to gender, the focus becomes only about what the adults want for themselves, and not what is best for society as a whole.The roles of husbands and wives no longer are relevant. The reliance on marriage as an important fabric of society no longer matters. And the marriage laws no longer even consider what is best for children.
The "roles" of other people's relationships are frankly none of your business folks, and your obsession with what everyone else is doing is more than a little creepy. You remind me of the couple that called the cops after they saw their neighbor masturbating and proceeded to watch him with binoculars and a telescope for "10 or 15 minutes."
Beyond that, your general need to pigeonhole everyone and slam them into some kind of preordained "role" in society based upon something as trivial as what genitalia they have reveals a deep-rooted fear, and I suspect you have unsettled psychological issues. "What the adults want for themselves" is called "freedom," though I realize you despise true freedom. If you check one of our important founding documents you'll find the phrase "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Again, I understand if you don't like that we were founded as a nation on such ideas, but we were.
Oh, and by the by, mindless rule adherence simply for the sake of following rules has created an unbelievable amount of suffering in the world; it's time to adopt a new paradigm. Look no further than the "drug war" for a major example.
According to census figures, there are just 3,400 same-sex couples in Maine. That is only 1% of all Maine couples. Gay couples already enjoy the benefits of Maine's domestic partner law, which provides them all the substantive legal rights that married couples enjoy. Yet to satisfy the demands of this small but extremely vocal group, the politicians in Augusta have kicked to the curb our marriage laws which have existed since Maine became a state. By bowing to political pressure from the 1% of couples who are homosexual, they have redefined marriage for 100% of Maine society, and have done so with only one public hearing and by conspiring to attempt to deny Mainers a right to vote on this critical issue.
Right, because with people like you around why would anyone lie to the Census Bureau? When you have to be afraid of brutal assault because of who you are, what reason is there to refrain from volunteering who you are to the public?
And since when did what is right depend upon the percentage of people that is directly affected? So now we shouldn't have passed the Civil Rights Act because a non-majority percent of the population was directly impacted by that law? What kind of so-called "Christians" base their morals upon demographics?
As for Maine's domestic partner law, it doesn't provide anywhere near "all the substantive legal rights that married couples enjoy," and if you don't want to admit it then how about your rights above and beyond the domestic partner law get revoked and you see if it's the same? And how about you have nasty email blasts sent out trying vilifying you, and trying to keep you a 2nd class citizen? Then tell me that it's all the same.
As for your last sentence, apparently you think we're a society in which every single issue is voted on by the public. News flash: we have a legislature and a governor for a reason. They pass bills and sign laws. Just like they did this time. First you bitch about judges, now you complain when laws are passed in the way they've been passed for hundreds of years. I though tradition was important to you folks? I guess it only matters when it suits you...
Make no mistake, if Question 1 fails and LD 1020 takes effect, there will be profound consequences for Maine families. A wealth of examples have been identified by legal scholars who have pointed out the conflicts that will arise between the rights of people who sincerely disagree with homosexual marriage, and the rights of homosexual couples to demand that the state enforce gay marriage whether people support it or not. These conflicts can result in people losing their jobs, professionals being stripped of their professional licenses or being fined by the state, and churches losing their tax exemptions. Most troubling is the impact on children, particularly as the public schools begin the process of indoctrinating them on the subject of homosexual marriage.
These consequences are not hypothetical - they have already occurred in states like Massachusetts where homosexual marriage has been legalized.
Ah yes, the old "I'm being oppressed if I can't oppress you" argument. Either you get to be above everybody else and enjoy your own, real-live "special rights," or you're going to claim victimhood. Unbelievable. You might as well be a five-year-old refusing to share, and claiming that if you don't get to have all the candy then you're being punished.
You're not being punished, or oppressed, or victimized when other people are finally allowed to live with dignity, spend their lives with who they love, and proudly be who they are in public without shame or fear. Why you can't understand this concept is beyond me. As it is now, YOU are the one with special rights, and your rights are not taken away in the slightest when other people, at long last, get to taste what it's like to have the rights that you've ALWAYS had.
The email goes on at that point to ask for volunteer time and donations. Which is where you come in. If you live in Maine, please consider volunteering with Equality Maine. And please consider donating, wherever you live.
Here's a wonderful commercial released by Equality Maine:
Here's another:
Link to Equality Maine's youtube channel.