As an update to one of last week's posts, I'd just like to point out that same-sex marriages performed anywhere in Mexico must now be recognized by all Mexican states. Currently, Mexico City is the only district that grants marriage benefits to same sex couples in the country, but any couple that is married there must also be considered married in their home town. Legally.
In Costa Rica, LGBT citizens (and likely other minorities as this is probably a precedent setting case) no longer have to worry that their right to get married will be voted on by the general public. We in the states know how well that turns out. But their high court had the forethought to say that the purpose of a Democracy is not to put to vote minority rights, rather it is to protect the livelihood of all of the Democracies citizens. They did not legalize same-sex marriage, but they prevented the country's population from acting out of hate at the ballot box.
Meanwhile in Canada… well, nothing new there. Happy queer couples are still happily married (or angrily getting divorced, I suppose it depends on the couple) with the full blessing and protection of their government.
But here in the States? We still believe that same-sex marriage should not be recognized on a Federal level because "the chilren's" might have to be subjected to {insert random inconsequential, glib snippet or overtly untrue statement here}, and that recognizing marriages performed with full legal sanction of one state cannot be recognized in another because then Satan will rise up and rape our sheep, and that putting minority rights up for popular vote is fun. Man, I'm so happy that we are the leader of the free world!
How do we expect other governments to listen to our opinions when we can't even rationalize basic human rights?
2 comments:
Our country (the United States) is not founded on ONE FEDERAL Government. We are a collection of smaller, State governments that operate under the U.S. Constitution but remain mostly free to do as they (the people living in said State) choose.
You see something wrong with the people living in Montana, recognizing or not recognizing something like gay marriage, when you don't live there nor have any stake in what goes on there.
The reason why the U.S. is a world leader is because, historically, our Federal government wasn't jumping in and making sweeping legislative decisions for every single person, with absolutely no consideration of local traditions, values, or geography.
That's pretty much the case for most western nations. But the states are not free to do whatever they please, particularly when it comes to anything the the federal government regulates. As the many cases being built across the country show, marriage equality is a federal issue. The rights that opposite-sex couples enjoy as part of their mariage are being denied to same-sex couples even in states that offer marriage licenses because LGBT couples are not being afforded the same federal rights.
So when a state like Montana refuses to allow for same sex marriages, I do see something wrong with it. If I were to marry my husband in Massaschusets then travel to Montana for vacation, let's say, then none of the rights conferred to me by Massachusets would be recognized in Montana. We get into a car crash and the hospital could refuse my right to visit him. Yet that is not true for heterosexual couples because their marriages are afforded state an federal weight.
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