Celebrate And Educate

This weekend, I had the honor of attending a very good friend's wedding. My boyfriend and I were invited and accepted the invitation and were excited to go for many reasons, including that the ceremony was held at the Krohn Conservatory in Cincinnati. The Conservatory is a big plant life repository, packed full of rare flowers and trees, complete with a room full of Bonsai Trees! To say that the Conservatory was an excellent venue for the wedding is just an understatement.

What I want to say is that it's a totally different thing to attend a wedding as a single person versus a person in a relationship, at least for me it was. Previous weddings I've attended were nice and all, but most of them didn't spark much in me. But this wedding, as with another one we attended a few months back, meant something more to me. It dawned on me that weddings aren't just to celebrate the happy couple, but they help all couples celebrate the idea of love, and there's something magical about that.

Ok, sure, that's a bit sappy. But this is where this spins a bit: Knowing and understanding that aspect of the wedding ceremony provides me with a deeper understanding of why Social Conservatives and Anti-Gay Pricks want to deny us our right to legal marriage. They believe that if we aren't legally allowed to wed in the eyes of the state, we won't celebrate our love. If we don't celebrate our love, we'll continue to be ashamed of it. And if we're ashamed of it, we'll go away.

That's why this fight for Marriage Equality is so important. Our love is real and deserves to be celebrated just as much as any one else's. It seems trivial, but psychologically if we are told that are relationships aren't "legal," then we are more likely to not celebrate them and embrace them. It's a twisted little game.

The oddest thing I learned from the wedding though is that there are some people that are still unaware of the LGBT community's struggle for Marriage Equality. A friend of mine was completely in the dark when it came to what DOMA is and what it means. He also was unaware that Marriage between same-sex couples was only allowed in a handful of states across the county. I didn't know how to react to learning this because to me, this issue seems to be the forefront issue right now. But so many people and potential supporters are still completely in the dark about our struggle.

We have to keep educating people. No matter how close your friends are, please take the time to make sure they are up on the issue of Marriage Equality. Many of these people that are clueless are our supporters, they just need to know that there is an issue that we need their help with.