IGF CultureWatch

Two decades ago, when I first came out of the closet, my mother had an irritating habit of referring to my boyfriend as my "friend."

You could almost hear the scare-quotes around the word as she would speak it. "This is John's, um, 'friend.'"

When I complained to her about it, she feigned innocence. "Well, he is your friend, isn't he?"

"No, Mom, he's my boyfriend," I retorted.

"Isn't that based in friendship?" she tried.

"Mom, how would you feel if someone referred to Dad as your 'friend'?"

"That's not the same thing!"

Which was true, as far as it went. Mom and Dad had been together for decades; the boyfriend and I had been together for mere weeks. Still, he was my boyfriend, not my "friend," and I bristled every time she would use the latter term to refer to him.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago, when Mark (my partner of seven years) and I were visiting my parents in Texas. We stopped by the large salon where Mom recently started working.

I'd visited the place before, but Mark hadn't, so Mom grabbed him by the hand and started introducing him around. "Hey, everybody-I want you to meet my son-in-law."

I smiled to myself.

Mind you, there's no "law"-either where we live in Michigan or where my parents live in Texas-that recognizes the relationship Mark and I have. We have a big fat expensive binder full of powers of attorney and what-not, but legally speaking, that's it.

But "son-in-law" wasn't about legal reality. It was about our familial reality, which is far more important to Mom. (Us, too.)

The funniest part of it is that she often didn't even bother to mention his name. This pleased me. My family has a longstanding habit of referring to family members by roles instead of names. So Mom will say, "Your sister called" instead of "Jennifer called;" "It's your uncle's birthday" instead of "It's Uncle Raymond's birthday." This never struck me as odd until a high-school friend pointed it out. It's certainly inefficient ("Which uncle?") but it nicely expresses the tight fabric of our family.

Mom's comfort-level transformation happened years ago, and I wouldn't have even noticed "son-in-law" were it not for the occasional perplexed reaction it evoked. (Jennifer, who lives near my parents, is unmarried.)

"Your son-in-law?" her co-workers would ask, wondering if there was another daughter they hadn't met.

"Yes, my son's partner!" She now says it without batting an eyelash.

Notwithstanding the importance of law, these kinds of shifts will do more to bring about marriage equality than any court decision or legislative initiative.

That's not just because black-robed justices are no match for red-aproned Brooklyn-Sicilian mothers. It's because marriage is, at some level, a pre-political reality. Yes, the law creates something, but it also acknowledges something that's already present. Both roles are important.

In calling Mark her "son-in-law," Mom is saying something that is false legally but true socially. The fight for marriage equality is largely a fight to align the legal reality with the social one. And the more often ordinary people refer openly to that social reality, the easier it will be for the legal reality to catch up.

I've written in this column of my friendship with Glenn Stanton, a Focus on the Family employee whom I regularly debate on same-sex marriage.

There are different kinds of friendship, of course, not to mention different levels and layers. We're not "best buds," but we're not merely work acquaintances either. Despite our deep disagreements-which we express publicly and vigorously-we genuinely enjoy each other's company.

And so I looked forward to Glenn's recent Michigan visit to debate me at Saginaw Valley State University. Glenn would fly into Detroit on a Monday night and depart on Wednesday morning; on Tuesday we would drive the 100 miles to Saginaw together.

Naturally, I invited him to stay with my partner and me. Mark and I have two guest rooms, each with a private bath; we often entertain houseguests.

"You invited WHO to your house?" another friend asked incredulously. "The religious-right guy? I can't believe you'd welcome such a person in your home."

But I couldn't imagine doing otherwise. Even if Glenn were not a friend-even if he were just another debate opponent with whom I was traveling-I would have extended the invitation. I come from a family where hospitality is second nature. And while I am not a Christian, I find Jesus' lessons on hospitality to be some of the most moving parts of the Gospels.

So I extended the invitation, and Glenn accepted immediately. We talked about checking out the Henry Ford museum and other Detroit landmarks. I asked him, as I ask all guests, whether there was anything special he'd like us to have on hand for breakfast.

Then, on the day of his planned arrival, I got the phone call.

Glenn explained that he felt unable to stay with us, and so he had booked a hotel instead. On the advice of his colleagues he decided that staying at our home wouldn't be "prudent." It might suggest the endorsement of our relationship, and thus send the wrong message to Focus constituents.

This struck me as nonsense, and I told him so. Glenn has expressed his moral disapproval of homosexuality in his writing, in our public debates, and in our private conversations. Staying under our roof could hardly eclipse all of that. His disapproval is beyond dispute.

For example, in his Christianity Today article about our friendship, he affirmed his "opposition to all sexual relationships that are not between a husband and wife," and argued that whatever virtues might exist in a gay relationship (honesty, kindness, dedication), they did not redeem homosexuality itself.

But in the same article, he also described us as "dear friends." He elaborated:

"John and I constantly hear disbelief at how we can be so opposed on such a life-shaping issue yet remain friends…John has hosted me at his own campus and had me to his beautiful home."

Indeed I did. That visit was for a meal. This one would be for a place to sleep. I couldn't see the substantive difference.

Of course, I can speculate. A meal takes place in the dining room, whereas sleeping takes place in bedrooms, where you-know-what occurs. Glenn would be just yards away-albeit past thick plaster walls and behind closed doors-from whatever it is that Mark and I do in bed.

FYI, here's a play-by-play account of what Mark and I do in bed, at 1 a.m., after a two-hour post-debate drive: (1) I climb in trying not to wake him. (2) He grunts and rolls over. (3) We sleep.

I'm not naïve about the culture at Focus on the Family, but I was still angered and hurt by that phone call.

That's partly because of my family's culture of hospitality. Glenn's decision to stay at a hotel was like telling Grandma that you'd rather go to a restaurant than eat her food. Italian-Americans (like many other cultures) take such things seriously.

It's partly because I've defended both Glenn and Focus against charges of hypocrisy and have taken a lot of flak in the process. "Sure, John, they claim to be your friend. But just wait…"

It's partly because of the gross incongruence of calling someone a "dear friend" but not being able to stay in his home.

And it's partly because it underscores the ugly myths that I fight against every day, even in my debates with Glenn.

The opposition claims that they're interested in truth. But the reality of our lives-the fact that we brew our coffee and toast our English muffins just like everyone else-seems too much for them to handle.

I don't have children, I don't want children, and I don't "get" children.

Some of my friends have children. I like their children best at two stages of their lives:

(1) When they're small enough that they come in their own special carrying cases and stay put in them.

(2) When they're big enough that they don't visit at all, but instead do their own thing while their parents do grownup stuff.

In between those stages, children tend to run amok, which makes me nervous. My house is full of sharp and heavy objects. I did not put them there to deter children-honest!-but I am more comfortable when children (or their parents) are thus deterred. It's safer for everyone involved.

Having said that, I admire people who have children. I have a flourishing life largely because I was raised by terrific parents. When others choose to make similar sacrifices, I find it immensely praiseworthy.

Which may be why opposition to gay adoption makes me so angry.

Mind you, I am not by nature an angry person. Regular readers of this column know that I go out of my way to understand my opponents. Rick Warren compares homosexuality to incest? Well, what did he mean by the comparison? What was the context? What's motivating him?

Attack gay parents, however, and my first impulse is to pick up one of the aforementioned sharp and heavy objects and hurl it across the room.

That's partly because these attacks criticize adults who are doing a morally praiseworthy thing. And it's partly because the attacks hurt innocent children, toward whom I feel oddly protective, despite my general aversion.

Back in November, a Miami Dade circuit judge ruled that Florida's law banning gays from adopting is unconstitutional. This is very good news.

The Florida ban took effect in 1977, the era of Anita Bryant and Jerry Falwell. We've come a long way since then-or so I'd like to think.

Yet the Florida religious right is trotting out the same old arguments, repeatedly insisting that having both a mother and father is "what's best for children."

Let's try addressing this calmly.

Every mainstream child health and welfare organization has challenged this premise. The American Academy of Pediatrics. The Child Welfare League of America. The National Association of Social Workers. The American Academy of Family Physicians-you name it.

These are not gay-rights organizations. These are mainstream child-welfare organizations. And they all say that children of gay parents do just as well as children of straight parents.

But let's suppose, purely for the sake of argument, that they're all wrong. Let us grant-just for argument's sake-that what's best for children is having both a mother and a father.

Even with that major concession, our opponents' conclusion doesn't follow. The problem is that their position makes the hypothetical "best" the enemy of the actual "good".

Indeed, when discussing adoption, it's a bit misleading to ask what's "best" for children.

In the abstract, what's "best" for children-given our opponents' own premises-is to not need adoption in the first place, but instead to be born to loving heterosexual parents who are able and willing to raise them.

So what we're really seeking is not the "best"-that option's already off the table-but the "best available."

What the 1977 Florida law entails is that gay persons are NEVER the best available. And that's a difficult position for even a die-hard homophobe to maintain.

It's difficult to maintain in the face of thousands of children awaiting permanent homes.

It's difficult to maintain in the face of gay individuals and couples who have selflessly served as foster parents (which they're permitted to do even in Florida).

It's difficult to maintain in light of all the other factors that affect children's well-being, such as parental income, education, stability, relationships with extended family, neighborhood of residence, and the like-not to mention their willingness and preparedness to take on dependents.

What the Florida ban does is to single out parental sexual orientation and make it an absolute bar to adoption, yet leave all of the other factors to be considered on a "case-by-case," "best available" basis.

Meanwhile, thousands of children languish in state care.

For the sake of those children, I resist my urge to hurl heavy objects at the Florida "family values" crowd. Instead, I ask them sharply and repeatedly:

Do you really believe that it is better for children to languish in state care than to be adopted by loving gay people?

Those are the real-world alternatives. Those are the stakes. And our opponents' unwillingness to confront them is an abysmal moral failure.

When Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson was invited to deliver the invocation at the inaugural kickoff event, I expected some conservative evangelicals to complain. And they did.

Forget the fact that Robinson's invitation seemed like a token gesture after the controversial choice of evangelical pastor (and Prop-8 supporter) Rick Warren for the inaugural invocation-a far more prominent platform.

Forget the fact that Warren himself praised the choice of the openly gay bishop as demonstrating the new president's "genuine commitment to bringing all Americans of goodwill together in search of common ground."

Indeed, for the moment, forget common ground. As one right-wing blogger put it, a good evangelical doesn't seek common ground with the "Bishop of Sodom."

And so they complained. Not only about Obama's choice of Robinson, but about the prayer itself.

What grieved them so? Was it the prayer's failure to mention Jesus? Its lack of scriptural references? Its line about blessing the nation with anger-"anger at discrimination, at home and abroad, against refugees and immigrants, women, people of color, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people"?

Yes, yes, and yes.

But those were not the parts that worried the evangelicals who contacted me a few days ago. They were concerned that Robinson's prayer expressed a theme that they "have been trying to warn people about for some time now," and they wanted my comment.

What is this worrisome theme? What sinister agenda had the "Bishop of Sodom" expressed in his prayer, wittingly or unwittingly?

It turns out that the troubling line was this: "Bless us with freedom from mere tolerance, replacing it with a genuine respect and warm embrace of our differences."

Puzzled? The line strikes most of us as innocuous, or even benign. "Genuine respect and warm embrace of our differences"-who can argue with that?

But that's not the part that bothered them. They were worried about "freedom from mere tolerance."

We will not appreciate the right-wing mindset-or for that matter, the culture wars-until we understand why that sentiment scares our opponents.

When Robinson says "Bless us with freedom mere tolerance," our opponents hear "It is not enough for you to tolerate us. You ought to embrace us. You ought to approve of who we are, which can't be easily teased apart from what we do. After all, our relationships are a deep and important fact about our lives-just like yours are. So what we are asking is for you to give up your deep conviction that these relationships are sinful and instead affirm them as good."

That is in fact precisely what we are (or should be) asking for, and precisely what Bishop Robinson is praying for.

No, we don't seek such affirmation because we need our opponents' validation. Rather, we seek it because it reflects the truth: our relationships are just as good as theirs.

We seek it for another reason as well, one that frightens them even more. Statistically speaking, some of their kids will turn out gay. I want those kids to know that there's nothing wrong with them. I want them to be able, insofar as possible, to count on their parents for affirmation and support.

And that's where the culture war really is a zero-sum game, and "common ground" is impossible without dramatic concession: we want their kids to believe something that is diametrically opposed to what they want them to believe. There's no point in sugarcoating that conflict.

If I were religious, I might pray over it, as Warren and Robinson do-although when it comes down to specifics, it seems they are praying for very different things.

Or are they? One need not be a relativist to recognize that we all have an imperfect grasp of the truth, a truth that we nevertheless seek. When we find it-or at least, firmly believe that we have-we don't want it to be merely "tolerated."

That's as true of Rick Warren as it is of Gene Robinson.

As I pointed out to my evangelical caller, I'm sure that he wants me, a skeptic, to move beyond "mere tolerance" of Christianity to embrace Jesus as my personal Lord and Savior.

No one who values truth wants it to be merely tolerated. We "tolerate" nuisances; we embrace truth.

That doesn't mean that we believe that truth ought to be forced upon people, as if that were even possible. And this is where I think our opponents' fears, while palpable, are ultimately unfounded.

We want them to move from mere tolerance to embracing the truth. They want us to do the same-although they see the truth quite differently. We will attempt to persuade each other.

But we cannot force truth-not by legislation, not by court decisions, and certainly, not by prayer.

Why are our opponents so obsessed with "butt sex"?

I've personally pondered this question more times than is probably healthy. It occurred to me a few weeks ago when a poster on a conservative blog complained that gays "expect us to approve of butt sex and call it marriage."

Really?

Then last week I was reading an essay by the philosopher Michael Levin. After denying that homosexuality is immoral, he goes on to describe it as "disgusting, nauseating, closely connected with fecal matter. One need not show that anal intercourse is immoral to be warranted in wanting to be as far away from it as possible."

I think I would have liked "immoral" better.

Then, yesterday, I received an e-mail from a 15-year-old living in a small UK village. He's thinking about coming out to his "mum and dad," so he asked them what they thought about homosexuality. They told him, in no uncertain terms, that it was "wrong, unnatural, and disgusting." He continued,

"But one major point they kept pointing out was... ummm... well they said it was gross how a man would stick his... yeah up another guys... ummm... yeah. And they said it's where they sorta... yeah I ain't going into much detail….But what I really want to know is how would you respond to someone who thinks like that?"

I replied, in part, "In the abstract, of course it's weird (and from some perspectives, gross) to think of a man sticking his penis up another man's bum. But isn't all sex weird in the abstract? Sticking a penis in a vagina, which bleeds once a month? Sucking on a penis, something both straight women and gay men do? Pressing your mouth-which you use for eating-against another person's mouth, and touching tongues, and exchanging saliva (i.e. kissing)? Weird! Gross! (In the abstract, anyway.)"

Sex makes no sense in the abstract. But then you have urges, and you eventually act on them, and what once seemed weird and gross becomes…wow.

Our opponents recognize this in their own lives, but they can't envision it elsewhere. It's a profound failure of moral imagination-which is essential for empathy, which is at the foundation of the Golden Rule.

How can one "love thy neighbor as thyself" without any real effort to understand thy neighbor?

Our opponents contemplate our lives, our love, our longing, and what do they see? "Butt sex." Such obtuseness is depressing.

Of course, not all gays engage in "butt sex"-some of us never do-and not only gays engage in "butt sex."

Of course, most of what we do in bed is exactly the same as most of what they do in bed: cuddling and touching and caressing and kissing and sucking and rubbing and so on. (Not to mention sleeping, which when shared regularly can be beautifully intimate as well.)

What we do is the same not just in terms of formal acts. It's the same in terms of being weird, and silly, and messy, and sublime.

Yes, Virginia, we make funny faces when we come, too.

It's always easier to criticize the weirdness in others than to confront the weirdness in the mirror. (Perhaps that's why mirrors in the bedroom are thought to be kinky.)

Our opponents take anxiety about sex-a natural and virtually universal human phenomenon-and wield it as a weapon against us. Shame on them.

As for the marriage-equality fight, what do you say to someone who thinks that we expect her "to approve of butt sex and call it marriage"?

Thankfully, another poster responded to that one more effectively than I ever could.

The respondent described herself as a lifelong Christian, daughter of a conservative minister, and "personally against gay marriage but passionate about gay civil rights." (This description will strike some as paradoxical, but bravo to her for understanding the difference between personal beliefs and public policy.)

She then warmly depicts a gay couple she knows who have adopted two special-needs children. The children, she writes, "RADIATE happiness at each other, their parents, and the people around them. Somehow 'butt sex' doesn't seem to neatly contain all the emotions, commitment, and wondrous devotion that their parents' relationship has provided them with."

She concludes by chiding her fellow Christian, "Please think carefully before you speak."

Amen to that.

In terms of gay-rights progress, brace yourself for a difficult year.

This is not because things are getting worse. It's because the national conversation on gay-rights issues is getting harder.

One reason is that, as cliche as it sounds, we are more polarized than ever. Gone are the days when House Speaker Tip O' Neill could lambaste President Reagan by day and play cards with him after 6 p.m.

It has become too easy to surround oneself solely with like-minded people. (The internet is one key factor.) The result is a bunch of echo chambers, where opponents seem not just wrong, but borderline-insane.

The second reason is that the gay community's specific goals have shifted. We are no longer asking merely to be left alone, as when we were fighting sodomy laws and police harassment. Our central political goal, for better or for worse, has become marriage.

Marriage is not merely a private contract between two individuals. It is also an agreement between those individuals and the larger community. It requires, both legally and socially, that community's support. And so the old "leave me alone" script no longer quite works.

A third reason the conversation is getting harder is that the gay community is at a crossroads regarding how we treat our opponents.

On the one hand we talk about reaching out, promoting dialogue, emphasizing common ground. On the other hand we are quick to label our opponents as hate-filled bigots.

This combination obviously won't work. A bigot is someone whose views, virtually by definition, are beyond the pale of polite discussion.

One sees this contrast in the fracas over Obama's choice of Pastor Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at his inauguration.

Compared to most evangelical pastors, Warren is a moderate, who focuses on common-ground issues such as poverty over the usual culture-war stuff.

But Warren supported Prop. 8, the California initiative that stripped marriage rights from gays and lesbians. (He has since suggested some possible support for civil unions.)

Obama's camp is taking the "big tent" approach, acknowledging differences but emphasizing shared values. In a similar vein, Melissa Etheridge has opened a dialogue with Warren.

Most gay-rights leaders, by contrast, have decried Obama's choice of Warren. As one friend put it, "it's like inviting a segregationist to lead the invocation-I don't care what other good things the guy has done."

And there's the rub: Warren does indeed espouse a "separate but equal" legal status for gays and lesbians (at best). Should we treat him the way we treat segregationists?

Before answering, remember that the majority of Californians, and a larger majority of the rest of the country, hold the same position as Warren on marriage. So does Obama himself (though he did oppose Prop. 8).

So in asking whether inviting Warren to lead the invocation is akin to inviting a segregationist to do so, we are also asking whether the vast majority of Americans are akin to segregationists.

It's a painful question to confront. And the only fair answer is "yes and no."

On the merits, yes. For practical purposes, no.

From where I stand, the arguments against marriage equality look about as bad as the arguments for segregation. They commit the same fallacies; they hide behind the same (selective reading of) scripture; they are often motivated by the same fears.

But I'm mindful of the fact that "from where I stand" includes decades of hindsight regarding segregation. The nation isn't there yet on gay equality.

Today, nearly everyone finds the following sentiments repugnant:

"I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of Negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with White people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the White and black races which will ever FORBID the two races living together on terms of social and political equality."

The segregationist who wrote that? Abraham Lincoln.

It is easy now to paint all segregationists as hatemongers, waving pitchforks and frothing at the mouth. Easy, but quite wrong.

The fact is that most segregationists were people not unlike, say, my grandmothers, both of whom were wonderful, loving, decent human beings, and both of whom-much to my embarrassment-opposed interracial marriage.

Their reasons had to do with tradition and the well-being of children. Sound familiar?

My grandmothers were not hatemongers. They were products of their time. So was Lincoln, so is Rick Warren, and so are you and I, more or less.

I don't mean for a moment to let Rick Warren off the hook. He ought to know better. Maybe someday he will.

In the meantime, prepare yourself for a challenging 2009.

Marjorie Christoffersen seems like a nice enough person by all reports, including those of gay friends and acquaintances.

But Christoffersen made a $100 donation to Prop. 8, which stripped marriage rights from gays and lesbians in California. Now some customers of El Coyote, the landmark Los Angeles restaurant where she worked for two decades, are boycotting.

After angry protests, Christoffersen has tearfully resigned. Meanwhile, some of the other 88 employees have had their hours cut, and business is down about 30%.

Is this outcome the predictable result of taking rights away from a community that has been burned once too often? Collateral damage in an ugly culture war?

Or is it a step too far-punishing an entire business (and a gay-friendly one at that) for the private act of one employee, a generally decent person who can't quite yet wrap her mind around gay marriage?

A few facts are worth noting as we ponder these questions.

Christoffersen's small contribution was a personal one, not supported by the restaurant (except rather indirectly, insofar as it pays her salary).

True, she is the owner's daughter and a familiar fixture there, but at El Coyote she kept her Prop. 8 support to herself (unsurprisingly, given the sympathies of her coworkers and patrons). It became known only as activists scoured donation rolls for "hypocritical" Yes-on-8 donors.

Indeed, in the wake of the controversy over Christoffersen, El Coyote has given $10,000 to the efforts to repeal Prop. 8-a substantial public penance for their employee's private $100 "sin."

El Coyote has many gay employees, including managers. While they were aware of Christoffersen's Mormonism and her conservative political beliefs, they got along well with her. They report that (apart from the marriage issue) she was supportive of her gay friends and coworkers.

Some of those gay coworkers are now hurting. And it's not just because they miss Christoffersen or hate seeing her so upset-she can't discuss the incident without crying-but also because, with business slowing down, they fear for their jobs.

Meanwhile, opponents of marriage equality have begun to use Christoffersen as an example of how gay-rights advocates want to destroy freedom of religion, speech, and conscience.

What do I think?

I think Margie Christoffersen sounds like a basically good person, someone who is wrong on marriage equality but is (or at least was) possibly winnable on that point someday.

I also think the simplistic black-and-white approach that suggests "You're either with us or against us" works even less at the level of day-to-day life than it does for, say, George Bush's foreign policy.

I think punishing El Coyote for the contributions of a single employee-one whose views on this subject hardly seem representative of its management or staff-is certainly overbroad and probably counterproductive.

And yet I also appreciate the outrage of those who want nothing to do with anyone and anything even remotely associated with "Yes on 8"-a campaign which not only took away marriage rights, but did so by despicably portraying gays as a threat to children.

Against that ugly backdrop, it's hard to get worked up about a diner's business slowing down.

What concerns me most, however, is not misdirected punishment of El Coyote, or the occasionally harsh words for Christoffersen.

What concerns me most is the right wing's misusing this case as Exhibit N in their ever-growing catalog of alleged threats to their freedom.

For example, in the National Review Online, Maggie Gallagher refers to the protests and boycott as "extraordinary public acts of hatred" and criticizes "the use of power to silence moral opposition."

But nobody "silenced" Margie Christoffersen. She expressed her viewpoint by contributing; others expressed theirs by boycotting. That's how free expression works.

So call the boycott counterproductive if you like, or reckless, or even mean-spirited. I might quibble with some of your characterizations, but I see your point.

But please don't call it a violation of anyone's rights. Neither Christoffersen nor El Coyote has a pre-existing right to anyone's patronage.

Don't call it a violation of her religious freedom, unless religious freedom means the freedom to strip away others' legal rights without their being free to walk away from you.

And for heaven's sake, don't call it a violation of her freedom of conscience.

Christoffersen is free to think, speak, or vote however she likes. Others are free to avoid her.

In the culture war, as elsewhere, freedom is a sword that cuts both ways.

I have a confession to make. I'm getting ever so slightly tired of the reaction to Prop. 8.

I know I shouldn't. I know that the loss in California is terrible, and far-reaching, and deserving of attention. We had marriage, and voters took it away. A majority took away minority rights in a close election. That sucks.

I also know that we should do everything possible to capitalize on the outrage gays and their supporters are feeling right now, organizing marches and coming out to their friends and family and whatnot. The last thing I'd want to do is curb their enthusiasm.

And if I follow any of the above with a "but…," it's going to look like I don't really mean it-even though I do. What happened in California really sucks.

But…

It's important, as always, to maintain some perspective.

Gay and lesbian Californians will go back to having virtually all the statewide legal incidents of marriage via domestic-partnership legislation. That's not quite as good as marriage, but it's better than what most of the rest of us have.

Here in Michigan, not only do we lack domestic-partner legislation, our constitution bans it. And our attorney general interprets that ban as prohibiting public employers from offering health-insurance benefits to same-sex partners. We had them, and voters took them away.

So while California may have been the first state to take marriage away from gays, it's hardly the first to take rights away from gays-or the most significant in terms of tangible benefits.

This past election day, Florida passed a ban similar to Michigan's, and thus much worse than California's Prop. 8. Not only did it pass, it passed with a whopping 62 percent of the vote. With all the fuss over California, you may not have heard about it.

Arizona passed a ban that was limited to marriage, and thus less obnoxious than Florida's and Michigan's (and many others). But Arizona's ban appeared on the ballot only because of a dishonest last-minute parliamentary maneuver-another story you should have heard about, but probably didn't.

And for what may be the worst bit of gay election-day news, consider Arkansas, which passed a ban on unmarried persons serving as adoptive or foster parents. That ban was specifically targeted to fight "the gay agenda," but what it means is that thousands of children who could have stable loving homes will instead languish in state care.

Of course, we could broaden our focus even further, and note that in some parts of the world, being gay is still grounds for arrest, imprisonment, and even execution. In that light, even Arkansas looks downright welcoming.

None of this should make us any less outraged about what happened in California. I repeat: what happened in California sucks.

But I hope the people getting outraged about California will take a moment to look around at the rest of the country-and the world-and get even more outraged. Because what happened in California is nothing new.

For some years I've noticed a kind of myopia from some quarters of the GLBT community. They tell me: "We've won this war, John-gayness is a largely a non-issue. Sure, there are some stragglers in the South and the Midwest, but they'll catch up soon enough. In the meantime, trying to engage them just dignifies their bigotry. It's time for you to accept that we're living in a post-gay society."

Prop. 8 stung so much, in part, because it proves that we are not there yet.

This myopia is not limited to California, or even the coasts, though it does show up more there. It exists anywhere that liberals have the luxury of spending their time mostly around other liberals. (I write this as a liberal philosophy professor in an urban center, so I'm hardly immune to the phenomenon myself.)

And so when Sally "Gays are a bigger threat than terrorists" Kern gets re-elected by a 16-point margin in Oklahoma, these liberals look on with a mix of perplexity, smugness, and pity. That is, if they look on at all. (In case you missed it, Kern's comfortable re-election happened on November 4, too.)

Of course, the other side has its own brand of myopia, as we all continue to become more polarized and isolated.

What's the solution? As I've said over and over again-in columns, in speeches, in any forum available-we need to keep talking to each other. We need to engage our opponents. We need to keep making the case.

If there's a silver lining to this Prop. 8 defeat, it's the wake-up call that reminds us that we're not there yet.

Proposition 8 passed, revoking marriage rights for gays and lesbians in California and setting back the gay-rights movement throughout the country.

So did similar bans in Florida and Arizona, not to mention an Arkansas ban on adoption or foster parenting by unmarried couples. Supporters of the latter ban-written expressly to thwart "the gay agenda"-apparently believe that it is better for children to languish in state care than to have loving gay parents.

With the pressure of the election behind us, we can step back and talk about long-term strategy. What must we do to convince majorities that our love is just as worthy as theirs?

Some will complain that we shouldn't have to convince them. In an ideal world, that would be true. In the real world, it's useless whining. Let's face it: complaining that we shouldn't have to fight for fundamental rights never helped anyone secure their fundamental rights.

Here are my top five strategic suggestions as we move forward.

1. Tell our stories. A striking feature of the various anti-amendment campaigns was the invisibility of those they were supposed to help: gay people. I'm grateful for straight people who support our rights. But straight people can't directly illustrate the palpable ways in which our families matter to us.

For every time the 'Yes on 8' campaign showed that little girl telling her mom how she learned in school about two princes who got married, I wish 'No on 8' would have shown a little girl asking her mom why Aunt Ellen and Aunt Portia can't get married. Or a little boy asking his two adoptive dads-who sacrifice to make his life better-why they can't get married.

I'm guessing that focus groups showed that images of actual gays turn off swing voters (which, if true, would be further evidence of the stigma we still face). I'm skeptical about focus-groups-focus groups, after all, gave us New Coke.

But whatever was true for the campaign, it's time now for the long view. Over time, people tend to be more pro-gay the more they know actual gay people.

2. Cut the vague talk about "rights" and "discrimination." It's wrong to take away rights, right? Well, sure-but we need to be more specific than that.

Gay-rights opponents cleverly granted the premise that it's wrong to take away rights, and then argued (falsely, but effectively) that marriage equality meant taking away THEIR rights, specifically their parental and religious rights, or that gay adoption interfered with a child's right to a mother and father.

It's not enough, therefore, merely to demand "rights" or to oppose "discrimination." We need to flesh out why these rights matter and why this particular discrimination is harmful and wrong. That requires talking about the moral value of our relationships-and not just talking about it, but showing it (see #1).

3. Use words like "bigot" and "hate" sparingly. There is no doubt that some of our opponents are hateful bigots. (I've got the mail to prove it.) But 5.7 million California voters?

No. Most of those who voted yes are people you'd recognize as your coworkers, your neighbors, your grandma. Misinformed? Absolutely. Shortsighted? Without a doubt. But generally not hateful.

Furthermore, as a strategic matter, labeling widespread religious and parental concerns as "hateful" doesn't typically convert those who harbor them.

4. Don't let opponents hide behind religion. Eighty-three percent of weekly churchgoers voted in favor of Prop. 8, and they contributed a large percentage of the $36 million raised to promote it. Ninety percent of self-identified atheists and agnostics voted against it.

To be sure, there were progressive religious organizations and individuals who strongly opposed the amendment. We should continue to harness their enthusiasm: God, after all, can be invoked by all sides of the political spectrum. But we should also recognize the dangers inherent in accepting beliefs "on faith."

In my view, America is due for a healthy dose of religious skepticism, as well as a vigorous conversation about what religious freedom means and why.

5. Patience, yes; complacency, never. Time is on our side. California marriage-equality opponents drew 61 percent of the vote in 2000 but only 52 percent this year. Voters under 30 heavily opposed Prop. 8.

Meanwhile, ordinary gay and lesbian citizens are motivated like they haven't been in some time. They are peacefully demonstrating outside churches and city halls; they are donating time and money; they are coming out to friends, neighbors, and co-workers.

Ironically, opponents' efforts to "protect children" from learning about gay people has not only catapulted us to the front of the news, it has increased our determination to make our everyday presence known.

We need to do that for our own dignity. But we also need to do it for those children, who deserve an equal chance at "happily ever after" regardless of their sexual orientation. Keep fighting the good fight.

On election night, I was less anxious about who would become president than about whether a certain little girl could marry her princess.

I'm talking about the little Latina girl in the California "Yes on 8" commercials, who comes home from school to tell her mommy about a fairy tale in which a prince marries another prince.

"And I can marry a princess!" she cheerfully announces, prompting a worried look from her mother and a voiceover in which a law professor warns that if gay marriage isn't stopped, parental rights will be trampled.

Statistically speaking, the chances that she'll want to marry a princess are low. In any case, reading the "wrong" fairy tales won't alter her sexual orientation. If books had that sort of influence, every Cinderella would grow up to desire a Prince Charming and vice-versa.

In the real world, some Cinderellas fall in love with other Cinderellas; some princes fall in love with other princes. In California, they may be allowed to live happily ever after, but they won't (for the time being) be allowed to get married. Prop. 8 passed 52-48%, after a $74 million battle. (A similar measure passed in Arizona, and Florida voted to prohibit not just same-sex marriage but also civil unions and domestic partnerships.)

I say "for the time being" because nobody expects this to be the end of the story. California same-sex couples will continue to receive the statewide legal incidents of marriage via domestic partnerships. Meanwhile, other states, mainly along the coasts, will recognize same-sex couples: some with domestic partnerships, some with civil unions, and a few with outright marriage.

Eventually, this hodgepodge will prove legally unwieldy, or socially inconvenient, or morally embarrassing-probably all of the above-and California will revisit the marriage question. If trends continue, marriage equality will someday win the day.

In the meantime, what difference does it make if princes and princes can only have "domestic partnerships" but not marriage?

It makes a difference in two important ways. The first is legal: because of this amendment, a same-sex couple married in Massachusetts (for example) will have absolutely no legal standing when traveling through California. The text is clear: "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid and recognized in California."

Since our Massachusetts couple has marriage, and not "domestic partnership," the Golden State would treat them as nothing more than roommates-which could prove devastating in an emergency situation.

As the law professor intones in that "Yes on 8" commercial: "Think it can't happen? It's already happening." The hodgepodge of legal statuses for same-sex couples has proven a legal nightmare for those who travel or relocate.

The second difference is less tangible but just as powerful: the cultural significance of marriage.

Here we saw a fundamental tension in the "Yes on 8" message. On the one hand, they argued that since gays had "all the rights" of marriage, there was no reason to demand the word itself. On the other hand, their tenacious fight to keep the word exclusive attests to its significance.

Because, you see, princesses don't dream about someday "domestically partnering with" the person they fall in love with. They dream about marrying him-or, in a minority of cases, HER.

To that minority, 52% of California voters sent a discriminatory message: you are not good enough for marriage. Your relationships-no matter how loving, how committed, how exemplary-are not "real" marriage.

One thing that opponents and supporters of Prop. 8 agree on: "real" marriage transcends state recognition of it. And that's another reason why this debate will continue. Because it's not just a debate about what California should or should not legally recognize. It's also about what sort of relationships are morally valuable, and why.

Notably, same-sex relationships were virtually invisible in the "No on 8" campaign. I assume that's because campaign research showed that images of gay couples don't resonate with undecided voters.

Maybe that's true in the short run. But in the long run, people are far more likely to support gay rights when they know gay people and see the palpable ways in which marriage matters to us.

Moving forward, then, we gay and lesbian citizens need to tell our stories. We need to show that gays, like everyone else, want someone to have and to hold, for better or for worse. We need to show that when we find such relationships, it's a good thing-not just for us but for the community at large.

We need to explain that we are not interested in confusing children, or in forcing princesses on little girls who don't want them. But we also need to show that girls who grow up to want princesses deserve to live happily ever after, too.

If trends continue, we will someday make that case-in time for that little girl to marry whomever she chooses.