no¥embflLlS._2004 ? Ju st out, 5
Thankfully, 1 don’t expect much when it
comes to Just Out’s political analysis, and I am
rarely disappointed.
J ack D anger
Portland
The truth
To the E ditor :
Some conservatives might say that this state
ment is not true and that they are only trying to
protect the sanctity of marriage. If that is so,
then let’s allow civil unions to be recognized
with the same rights as marriages.
If they truly aren’t doing this out of hate and
only to protect the definition of marriage, then
afford us the same rights of those who can he
married under some sort of legal status. By not
allowing us those same rights, they are telling us
and the world that we don’t deserve those
rights. Until the day comes that gay people are
afforded the same rights, segregation legally
exists in the state of Oregon.
and state, to set a higher standard for all Ameri
cans whether Christian, Jew, Muslim, Hindu,
Catholic, agnostic or even the atheist? 1 have to
say it is neither the government’s nor the politi
cians place to chixise whose Gtxi rules America.
We Americans need to be wary of any one
group claiming its beliefs as the law of the land
and setting its agenda as what is right for Amer
ica. We are a country of many religions, faiths,
social and political beliefs, ethnic backgrounds,
traditional and nontraditional families. We all
make up the great American melting pot.
Just because the Christian right has won the
presidential election d i«s not mean that they
can go unchecked and determine what is right
for America. They won this time, but what hap
pens next time if we elect a conservative Mus
lim to office? Would they like conservative Mus
lim beliefs being taught as law without tolerance
in our daily lives or our public schools? How
about the forcing of women back to second-class
citizens only allowed in public with the permis
sion of their male family members and their
heads covered? Would it then be OK to rewrite
the Constitution forcing their Muslim beliefs on
all of America, making America a Muslim state
under Muslim law? I think not!
Religious extremism is the very thing we are
fighting in this war on terror— the Islamic funda
mentalists who are trying to force their religious
views on the world. Two wrongs do not make it
right even if you claim to have God on your side.
n many ways 1 know how 1 felt about Mea
sure 36, and 1 know my reasons as to why 1
voted against it. The biggest impact that 1 felt
Measure 36 would have to me was that it would
assert the hatred of my existence.
Although 1 had this thought running
Tivo S alazar
through my head, 1 can’t express the actual sad Portland
ness 1 felt on the morning of Nov. 3 when
thought became reality. 1 woke up with an odd
An o p en le tte r to
feeling, like the world outside had somehow
M e a s u re 3 6 s u p p o rte rs
changed, and the city and state that 1 had grown
to love had somehow become a little more sur To the E ditor :
real as 1 stepped out my front dtxir that morning.
o the Yes on 36 voters: You may have won
It didn’t become clear to me as to why I felt
the WAR, but not the BATTLE.
this way until I called my mother in eastern
Washington to talk about the election. It wasn’t
D avid W. H artsook
the loss of John Kerry that was difficult to dis P(/rtland
cuss, but rather Measure 36. I don’t talk much
politics with my mother, but I had mentioned
The m o ra lity m an d ate?
the measure to her during the past few months.
That morning, when she asked me what the i To the E ditor :
measure was going to actually do, I broke down.
hose morality, whose God is right for
It was at that point that I realized I had legally
America?
become a second-class citizen. How awful to
The Christian right assumes that the re-
R ick R aymen
realize that your home and your country endorse
election of Bush sets a mandate for their moral Portland
the tact that you are not afforded the same rights
ity. They assume this puts their version of truth
as any other American. Tears started welling as
about God, guns, gays and country, prayer in j D on't fo rg e t th e
I explained to my mother how this law didn’t public schools, abortion, social welfare and stem
p ro g re s s w e h a ve m ade
just affect straight and gay partners, hut it also
cell research as their exclusive conservative
affected me as a single gay man.
mandate for Christian change in the taking To the E ditor :
This was the start of an epidemic of hate
hack of America.
he passage of Measure 36 was devastating
championed by legal conformation. I didn’t real
for a lot of reasons, but mainly because it
Didn’t our founding fathers start a revolution
ize how I would really feel about this until it was
to break away from the Church of England’s con lets us all know that— despite the show of
over. I never thought the day would come that 1 trol over the colonies and the daily lives of its national solidarity after 9/11, our sense of unity
would feel isolated from my sense of freedom,
people? As Americans, is not our duty to stand up
country and the right to exist like anyone else.
and fight injustice and the separation of church
Continued on Page 7
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• • •
R
eviewing the 2004 election results almost
forms the outline for a doctoral disserta
tion, but I’ll offer a short review.
It’s now clear the issues of gay marriage and
abortion rights motivates the Bible-thumping
evangelicals living in the exurbs (Wilsonville,
Vancouver, etc.) to turn out and vote. Never
mind the fact that these evangelicals are hyp
ocrites— they don’t care about 45 million Amer
icans without health insurance, they don’t care
about the hundreds of thousands of innocent
women and children being killed by U .S. troops
in a foreign land. This block of voters delivered
Dubya those 3.5 million votes that won the
2004 election on the national level. (By the
way, let’s make it a rallying cry right now: 51 per
cent of the vote is N O T a mandate, and don’t
let anyone get away with saying that— 51 per
cent is BARELY a majority! A ’mandate’
requires 60 percent or more of the vote to be
considered as such!)
Ginsidering the big issues on the national and
international stage right now, I would much rather
have won on the national level than locally.
I mean, do you realize that the U.S. econo
my is teetering toward collapse in the next few
years? Consumer debt is at record-breaking lev
els. The Republican-controlled Congresses
since 1995 have borrowed a staggering $7.4
TRILLION from China, South Korea and Japan
to keep federal spending at record-breaking lev
els. (The vast majority of this federal spending
goes toward corporate welfare. For example, the
Republicans have our defense budget at $432
BILLION— twice what it was during the height
of the Cold War!)
The U.S. trade deficit is at a record-breaking
level, and the U.S. dollar is at record lows
throughout the world! And the U.S. gold supply
in Fort Knox hasn’t been audited/counted since
1958! The ONLY thing keep our economy
afloat right now is more spending with borrowed
money, both by consumers and the federal gov
ernment. (This leads into explanations/scenar-
ios as to why Bush wants to privatize Social
Security: to shore up deht-ridden Wall Street for
a few more years.)
Personally, I believe the Democratic Party
ought to adopt these positions on gay marriage
and abortion rights: Leave it up to the states.
The Republicans have always advocated states’
rights (albeit to condone racial and female gen
der oppression), but there are quite a few states
that are progressive and willing to advance the
causes of gay marriage, abortion on demand, liv
able wages, etc.: New York, Illinois, New Jersey,
Vermont, Massachusetts and California. Want
an abortion or a government-sanctioned gay
union? G o to one of these forward-thinking,
progressive states. Want livable wages? Relocate
to a progressive state.
One more word, if 1 may. I was an adult dur
ing the 1970s, so 1 remember how the Republi
can Party suffered HEAVY losses in the 1974 and
1976 elections after the Nixon/Watergate deba
cle. Don’t panic, because soon enough the
Republicans will abuse their positions of power
or go so far right that they’ll alienate the vast
majority, and then they’ll be voted out or indict
ed, imprisoned and forced to resign from office.
D avid M indrup
Portland
9
9
•
I
feel sad and disappointed, but I don’t consider
the election results a national “setback”—
more a wake-up call about where we really are
and where most of the country is. Our local com
munity worked hard and made a difference. Now
we need a new national strategy and a new way of
talking about ourselves and to.continue the work
of shaping a culture that more fully embraces us.
D akota I nyo S wan
Portland
next
a s ixai
and national lesbian, gay, bisexual and
transgender organizations regroup an d
reorganize for the struggles ah ead, w hat
do you see as priorities for community
organizing in the coming m onths? How
would you go about implementing your
ideas? Respond a t w uw .justout.com .
[D on’t forget to include your nam e, city
and daytim e telephone num ber.)
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