Marisa in Madrid: Post-election reflections from abroad
First, read what Marisa thought about the American election before the results started coming in.
After staying up until 5 a.m. to see Obama’s victory safely sealed, I slept through class until noon. When I woke up, the first thing I did was watch his victory speech, which made me cry. How incredible! Looking at all of the pictures from the rally made me wish I had been back in Chicago for the election, but I also noticed something else. All of the young people in the pictures were smiling and shouting, but the older people were crying. For them, this has been a long saga from the Civil Rights Movement to what many people are already calling a “post-racial America” and Obama’s election is the culmination of a long, hard-fought battle for equality.
At the same time, I was disappointed to see that my home state of California looks like it’s going to pass the ban on gay marriage, overturning the ruling made by judges in San Francisco last year. I couldn’t believe that so many people had voted for something so clearly discriminatory at the same time that they marked their ballots for the first black president of the United States. It made me realize that, just as racial prejudice was the storyline of our parents’ generation, homosexuality will likely have its own version of the Civil Rights Movement during our generation’s lifetime.
Think about it: almost all of us know people who are gay and have little problem with their sexual orientation, and many of us support gay rights such as the right to marriage even though it doesn’t affect us personally; meanwhile, people among the generations of our parents and grandparents are often the ones holding most tightly to anti-gay prejudices, just as their parents and grandparents clung to racism and fought the inevitable progress of civil rights for African Americans. Just some food for thought, I guess, on such an historic day.
In the meantime, I’m excited to see what the response will be in Spain. I already know what my uber-conservative (and pretty racist) señora is going to say. But I’d like to see what normal people are thinking and how this election might already be changing some opinions of America over here in Europe.
Read Marisa’s previous post l Meet the rest of our abroad bloggers
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I can assure you being in Grant Park was a wonderful experience last night, especially standing in the very front row. As a supporter of President-Elect Obama from the very beginning, more than 4 years ago, it was wonderful to see my candidate elected to office. I voted for Obama because of his fresh insight into the future of our country, his commitment to ideals of social justice, and his capacity to lead a nation to a brighter future. The fact that he is black only shows our country was able to look at him as a candidate and not as a black candidate. What a wonderful moment in history.
Your thoughts on California’s decision to ban gay marriage, however, disturb me. To me, it says a great deal when – arguably – the most liberal state in the country voted clearly to maintain a traditional interpretation of marriage. Your fellow Californians recognized the importance of family life and the dignity of marriage. This is not discriminatory. Just as America voted to protect our future as a country, California voted to protect something intrinsic to our way of life. It is so important to recognize that they voted for marriage, not against homosexuals.
Patrick
November 5, 2008 at 6:12 pm
i only wonder if that’s the same argument people made against interracial marriage decades ago… “it’s unnatural and untraditional.” i guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree on that one.
Marisa Johnson
November 5, 2008 at 6:26 pm
“It is so important to recognize that they voted for marriage, not against homosexuals.”
Does that dissociation help you sleep better at night? One day people will wake up and see the bigotry in their arguments “to protect marriage.” But unfortunately, like Marisa said, I don’t think it is going to be for a few generations. Until then, know that I’m praying for you to see the error in your ways. It’s never too late to stop your hate.
You see, you used words like “importance of family,” Patrick. Or “dignity of marriage.” I find this incredibly, incredibly insulting. You are saying that two people of the same sex cannot form a loving family and raise children. You imply that two people of the same sex, in a loving relationship, who choose to get married somehow mar marriage as an institution. That, I am sorry, is bullshit.
Can you please define marriage? To me, it should always be about love between two people, and, if the two people are religious, then their union in a spiritual sense.
It hasn’t always been this way. Way back in the day, if you didn’t own property, you couldn’t get married. Not so long ago, women were the property of men when entering into marriage. All too soon ago, members of different races could not marry.
So, with change, marriage has only been sullied, right?
By having the only requirements for marriage be two different sets of reproductive organs, you, sir, are destroying the sactitiy of marriage (if it ever had any to begin with).
Please, tell me how an abusive marriage between a man and a woman is better than a loving marriage between two women or two men. Better yet, please do explain to me how a loving marriage between a man and a woman is better than a loving marriage between two women or two men.
Wow
November 6, 2008 at 1:23 pm