sturtle [dot] com

I am not sold on this election.

Rest assured, I voted for Obama. (I’m not quite a Yellow Dog Democrat, but I was born with a case of jaundice, so, you know: close.) And I’m happy that he won, and I’m happy that some of the candidates using hatred and xenophobia this election cycle got totally busted, and I’m especially happy that Sarah Palin will remain about as far from Pennsylvania Avenue as anyone can be and still remain on US soil, because that woman would be more like Bush than Bush: okay on-script, but at heart, a complete idiot and a puppet.

However: there were some significant losses yesterday, namely on the gay marriage front. Now, I don’t necessarily think that gay marriage is the be-all and end-all of GLBT rights–in fact, I think an equal protection clause would be more effective and useful for us. And no matter what the results of yesterday’s showdown might’ve been, I still wouldn’t be able to marry in my home state of Louisiana. But it’s still not pleasant being told that your relationship is somehow less valid–in the eyes of the public, the IRS, hospitals, etc.–than some late-night drunken Las Vegas wedding chapel hitching. (I’m looking at you, Britney.) I mean, Jonno and I have been together longer than any of my mother’s or father’s recent marriages. Doesn’t that count for something?

More to the point: it is more than a little ironic that on the same day America saw a major civil rights victory, we also saw numerous civil rights setbacks. Even worse: those setbacks were delivered at the hands of many people who voted for Obama.

I hate to resort to cliched arguments, but why was it okay for the civil rights battles of the 1950s and 1960s to be decided by judges, while today’s civil rights battles have to go to referendum? Wouldn’t it be in everyone’s best interest to acknowledge civil rights and put some of this stuff behind us, so that races could be about economic packages and foreign policy and other real issues? Hell, Dems could have a reasonable shot at wooing Christian conservatives, and the GOP might be able to win more of the GLBT vote. Or would that just bore everyone to tears and keep them home on election day?

But beyond the GLBT-rights losses, there’s another issue, a more personal one: this race brought out serious emotions in my friends and colleagues. While I know many will be over the moon today, plenty of others will want to crawl under a rock. And while I could gloat and say, “Now you know how we’ve felt for the last eight years,” I don’t plan on doing anything of the kind. Maybe it’s because I like to see both sides of an argument, or more likely because I don’t like seeing people in anguish, but I’m just going to tread softly for a while until everything’s back to normal.