Much media coverage and opinion sharing on the first day of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts. Andrew Sullivan is in fine form with this op-ed in the NY Times. An excerpt:
"It's hard for heterosexuals to imagine being denied this moment. It is, after all, regarded in our civil religion as the "happiest day of your life." And that is why the denial of such a moment to gay family members is so jarring and cruel. It rends people from their own families; it builds an invisible but unscalable wall between them and the people they love and need. ...
"I remember the moment I figured out I was gay. Right then, I realized starkly what it meant: there would never be a time when my own family would get together to celebrate a new, future family. I would never have a relationship as valid as my parents' or my brother's or my sister's. It's hard to describe what this realization does to a young psyche, but it is profound."
The AP
reports that opponents of allowing gay couples to wed say their
motive isn't based on hatred. But fundamentally, they believe that
gay people are radically inferior to themselves, and that we sully
and besmirch their marriages by claiming a right to our own. And
that dismissive antipathy may be even worse than outright
hate.