Acceptable abuse

I’m a little stunned this morning.

As practically anyone with sense predicted, the homosexual community reacted extremely badly to the passage of Prop. 8. It’s one thing to have had rights denied to you for centuries, it’s another to have recently-attained rights taken away by people for no other reason than they don’t like you.

So, why am I stunned? Well, certain religious organizations were active in the process to remove those rights, and plenty of others stood complacently by. So, gay people are lashing out at these religious groups. And the stunning thing is that religious folks are acting surprised and hurt!

I swear, I’m reading this in many places online, such as LiveJournal, news sites, opinion blogs: “We’re just treating you like abominations and taking away a chance at happiness you briefly had. We don’t understand why you’re so upset. Why would you have a problem with this?” Of course, it’s not those specific words, but it’s absolutely the attitude. “We don’t understand why you’re so angry, and honestly, we’re a bit offended.”

Frankly, I’ve always attributed discrimination against gay people, in most cases, to malice. “We don’t like you, and it’s socially okay to mistreat you, so we’re gonna.” I never before realized that someone could be unaware that treating another human that way was wrong. “Why does this bother you?”

Wow.

Now, we get to work.

The time is not too early to note, as John Scalzi does even more eloquently, that the movie’s not over.

Last night brought hope to many and anger to many others. But neither the left-wing paradise nor the right-wing apocalypse began at 11pm yesterday; we still have all the social, economic, and diplomatic issues we had 24 hours ago. The new president is a human being who will have to work with, negotiate with, and compromise with other human beings who disagree with him; by this time four years from now, there are likely to be conservatives pleasantly surprised by his administration, and liberals deeply disappointed.

We didn’t elect an emperor for life, we elected a Chief Executive for eight years tops. What happens to the country in the upcoming years is still more our responsibility than his: that’s the privilege and burden of being an American. I think we can handle it if we choose to.

Forward to the Frontier

Since I was four years old, I have maintained an irrational belief in a color-blind human future where we tore around the universe in shiny white FTL spaceships.

I can’t foresee whether, in the long run, history will consider this man a competent president. But I do know that tonight, my species has just taken another tiny symbolic step toward that future where there’s only one human race. And yeah, I’m getting a little verklempt about it.

Good night, everyone. See you tomorrow.

Brief updates

  • 09:38 Was not expecting polling line to be so long. Pleased to see it, but means I will have to go back again after work. Poor time management. #
  • 17:06 Morning wait to vote: 60-90 minutes, impractical. Afternoon wait: 2 minutes, no worries. #
  • 21:17 I cannot believe I’ve got CNN on the TV for the first time in years. #

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