The Aftermath of Prop 8

The Aftermath of Prop 8

As they walked the streets of Los Angeles, they ask for rights that were once taken away from them back. The right to get married should be between two people of any gender. Election Day, November 4, 2008 history was made; African American Barack Obama was elected president of the United States. But on that same historical day the right to get married was taken away from so many American citizens. Proposition 8, the ban on gay marriage was passed.
Marisol Lopez Zuniga, 28, is Mexican American and is a Lesbian. For Zuniga the outcome on proposition 8 was not a surprise, she says, “We live in a state where conservative minds dwell and the campaigning prayed on the fears of people who are too absent minded and closed minded to see that this was a civil rights case.”
After the disappointed outcome of this proposition thousands of gays and lesbians protested outside of the Los Angeles Temple of the Mormon Church in Westwood, who was a big proponent against gay marriage. In San Francisco and Sacramento more protesters gathered to fight for their rights.
Zuniga was not one of those protesters, “Protest make the issue look negative in my mind,” she said.
Fifty- two percent of Americans voted for proposition 8 to pass. But the shocking turn of events was the majority of the people who voted for proposition 8 to pass were African Americans and Latinos. Approximately 70 percent of African Americans voted yes on proposition 8, as well as 53 percent of Latinos, and 49 percent of Asians. African Americans and Latinos are more religious that is why the majority was so high.
Zuniga feels that the minorities who voted against her are entitled to their own opinion but she is disappointed that her own culture is so repressed and unwilling to be open-minded.
Gay activists are claiming that being gay is the “new black,” saying that it is a modern day civil rights movement. Zuniga believes that the discrimination against gays is fundamentally the same as the discrimination against African Americans because they are both fighting for rights.
Marriage is a social, religious, spiritual, or legal union of individuals, not just between a man and woman. In the religious definition marriage is union only between a man and a woman, but in May of 2008 the California Supreme Court ruled differently. The California Supreme Court ruled 4-3, the statues that limit marriage to a relationship between a man and a woman violated the equal protection clause of the California Constitution. The Supreme Court also ruled that same sex couples have a right to marry under the California Constitution. Proposition 8 over-ruled that decision.
By this turn of events Zuniga feels attacked, she says, “the people who were against the proposition will argue that they are trying to protect the sanctity of marriage (defined by a man and a woman). However, how can they defend the institution of marriage as a holy union when they allow drive thru Vegas weddings and justice of the peace weddings? Why can we as gay/lesbian couples not be allowed to honor the values of marriage which are to honor, obey and be loyal to a person just the same as the straight couple? We deserve the same rights that they have; the only difference is that they are a man and a woman. I am affected by this in the future if I ever decide to get married, but a civil union is not the same as marriage.”
After the California Supreme Court ruled in favor of same sex marriages approximately 18,000 same sex couples married between June of 2008 and early November before the 2008 election. Because of those who are close minded, the 18,000 same sex couples who married their marriages no longer exist.