I’m sure so many of you have already seen this video since it went viral last month, but it bears watching. Repeatedly. Though, sadly, I must say if you’ve seen it before, or are watching it now, it’s likely because you believe in its message and not because you’re a DOMA supporter whose heart and mind will be changed by the images on your computer screen.
I often wonder what would happen if even one person who believes that marriage is the sacred right of heterosexuals were to sit down and watch this, then took a moment, one selfless and reflective moment, to ask themselves the questions, “What if this was me? What if I was the one who was being forced to say goodbye to the person I love seventeen times over the course of the past six years? What if I was forcibly separated by thousands of miles of ocean and the narrowest of minds from the person I should be going to sleep next to every night and waking up with every morning, because it’s the promise we made to each other?” Would it become impossible for that person to continue to believe that the right to equality, not solely in the language of the laws of our country but also in the far more eloquent language of human compassion, is a right that belongs only to a select few rather than to every man and woman, simply because of an ideal that’s been taught, in spite of millennium of social evolution, as a collective fact rather than a speculative theory?
I’d like to think that hearts and minds can be opened to change by letting each other’s lives play in the key of love, and not limiting those lives and loves to those that look exactly like our own.
I cried all over myself when they were saying goodbye to each other. :(
Oh dear gawd! I’m still blubbering. This was an ugly cry, for real, Piper, and I don’t understand how anyone, regardless of religious or political views, could watch it and not get their hearts crushed to smithereens. :(
OMG that sobbing they were doing at the end was my downfall. They appear to be SO in love, and then to find out his Visa application was declined? I just want to hug them both! I want them and all the people in their situation to have what I have with my husband. This type of video just wrecks me.
I know, Jackie! I kept thinking maybe they should live in England now, since marriage equality is all but a given. But I don’t know if that’d even work without lots of legal red tape. It breaks my heart. :(
Or the USA could quit being douchey and just make it legal, lol. Those poor guys!
You know, I honestly could see the SCOTUS overturning DOMA and Prop 8. But, the kicker there is that the provision would still stand that allows each State to decide whether it will recognize same-sex-marriages on a local level, so there will still be inherent problems with that–it’ll be a blessing for couples to be federally recognized as spouses, but the problem of discrimination will still exist at a State level.
I live in Indiana, and I know that our legislators are waiting for the Supreme Court’s decision before doing anything locally. I would imagine the surrounding States’ decision will be an influence too. If Illinois, Ohio, and Michigan were to make same-sex marriages legal, then Indiana might follow suit. But, having said that, there are lawmakers here who’ve been trying to get an amendment added to the State Constitution since 2004 that would make same-sex marriage unconstitutional. :(
Can you imagine some of the Southern states like Mississippi and Arkansas, for example, passing marriage equality laws, though? I mean, Mississippi just abolished slavery earlier this year. :-P
Yeah and don’t forget the wonderful state I live in, Florida is such a waste of space in some regards. They actually defeated a bill here in Jacksonville last year that would have protected LGBTQ from workplace discrimination.
Yes, this is horribly sad. I’d not seen it but I’ll share it like crazy. Right now.
Share, share, share, Paul! It just breaks my heart that these two men, and others like them, are being forced to endure this.
This is very upsetting. What I find so disgusting is that some of the spokes
persons against gay marriage (like a former Speaker of the House) marry and divorce at the drop of a hat. I’m not against divorce, but I’m against not giving LGBT persons the same rights they enjoy.
Jay, honey, I couldn’t agree more. Celebs marry and divorce at the drop of a hat, the self-righteous get caught having affairs, people stay married for the sake of their kids, when all that does is ultimately hurt rather than serve the kids’ best interests. The “sanctity of marriage” seems to be a convenient moniker and a complete misnomer for the argument against marriage equality. They should simply call it what it is–bigotry.