A Proposition 8 Reflection

We'd like to welcome Liz Acosta, a writer and photographer in Los Angeles and herself a blogger over at happyland2007.com, to the gayrights.change.org community! Liz has a guest post below that touches on her organizing against Proposition 8, and how this issue alone pushed her into politics. Given that today is "Light Up the Night for Equality," the event organized by Join the Impact in the wake of Proposition 8's passage to show nationwide support for marriage equality, Liz's post below is perfect timing. So read the post, and then tonight between 5:00-8:00pm, find a local vigil near you and stand up for marriage equality by "lighting up the night."

I have to admit that before the election, I was stubbornly politically ignorant. I would change the channel, scoff at activism, and avoid all discussion. I excused my lack of registration as avoidance of jury duty. I said that politics never discussed anything I cared about.

In the months leading up to November 4th 2008, it all changed.

Proposition 8 - yeah, I could get behind the effort against it. My awareness was still belated, but burgeoning. I registered to vote, I went on a No On Prop 8 bike ride with friends, I waved a banner on a street corner, I spoke with my friends and family about it, I even deciphered all the legal writing, and read up on California education and marriage laws.

I have to admit that I was complacent though. Friends on MySpace posted volunteer opportunities that I shrugged off. I'm a California native and I live in West Hollywood, where the rainbow flies freely. I didn't even know that Yes On 8 signs even existed, and if they did, it was only in some godforsaken place like...Orange County. It was going to be okay, right?

Wrong.

I was slapped with a bitter dose of reality as I watched the numbers climb against us. Only minutes before we'd been embracing triumphantly over Barack Obama's victory. As many have said, the evening ended on a bittersweet note.

The very next day I poured out into Santa Monica Boulevard with everyone else. Upon encountering my first group of demonstrators, I was filled with a rush of optimistic excitement - this was important! This was history! I was...doing something!

But as we walked down the boulevard, waving signs and yelling chants, I couldn't help but overhear a gentleman seated outside a restaurant say, "They're preaching to the choir."

It has been more than a month since then, and I find myself gobbling up every Prop 8 news item that pops up in my friends' Facebook feeds. Most recently the situation at El Coyote has come to my attention.

The restaurant's now infamous manager, Marjorie Christoffersen, donated a hundred bucks out of her own pocket to support Prop 8, even though her restaurant is frequented by members of the LGBTQ community. Following this revelation, a boycott was organized, causing Marjorie a great deal of duress, business to flounder, LGTBQ employees to fear for their jobs, and me to wonder..."What exactly am I supposed to do?"

Not that I, fresh out of college and burdened with student loans, can afford to eat out often. But if I could, would I buy my margarita elsewhere? If I did, would I be supporting the right business? What if the manager voted No but the bartender voted Yes? What if the gay waiter is depending on my tip?

There is no question in my mind that this is a civil rights issue, identical to the African-American Civil Rights Movement of the fifties and sixties. There is no question in my mind that this is an issue that requires attention and restitution.

But the El Coyote Boycott is just one of many confusing reactions that has left my generation baffled, and maybe even frustrated. We feel a certain sense of history, a certain sense of duty, and a certain sense of optimism, but how exactly are we supposed to channel it?

At the bottom of this issue lies discrimination, and ignorance is the foundation of hate. Our true weapon here is education. It's easy to lock ourselves up in our sanctuaries of friends, neighborhoods, and communities, but we have to reach out. We have to make ourselves uncomfortable, we have to express our beliefs openly with friends, family, and coworkers. We have to demonstrate to those who don't understand that well, we're just like them, and we want love and security and family.

My mother surprised me this election year. I knew that my father, though a staunch Republican, would vote No On 8, but I was uncertain of my mother, who shies from political discussions with a joking, "I voted for myself" and once objected to an innocent lesbian kiss scene my film school partner and I wanted to film outside my parents' house because "What will the neighbors think?"

She told me she voted No On 8, and that it shocked her conservative co-workers.

And maybe that's all she said to them, that she voted No, and that was it.

But it would have been enough to plant a seed of thought in their minds.

It's my turn to nourish it.