Gay Marriage is Legalized in California

I normally keep personal topics on a small blog called SF Breeders, but today's big CA Supreme Court win was too big to not spread to a larger audience - feel free to ignore if not interested...

In a tight 4-3 vote, the California Supreme Court today ruled that same-sex couples have the constitutional right to marry.  This is a huge win for everyone, especially for the countless LGBT couples in San Francisco which want to have the full rights of a married couple when it comes to raising children in SF - why shouldn't it be easier for them to join all of us in the pain and joy of raising children in San Francisco?  Given that my brother will be marrying his boyfriend in NY in August (technically a civil ceremony), I'm now encouraging them to swing by CA at some point in August to make it fully legal.

In addition, as my father pointed out, it's going to be a big economic win for California.  For the months of June through November, we're going to have countless gay couples rushing to get married in CA, driving the economy upward since weddings are incredibly expensive affairs.  On a less favorable note, tons of right wing, conservative and religious organizations will now hurl tens of millions of dollars into CA politics and media trying to to pass the November ballot initiative banning this inevitable process - but at least it will help our economy in the meantime  :)

The anti-gay wedding bigots may win in the short run, as has happened in most states in the US where this process has gone forward. That having been said, this decision is one more chip in the wall, and as we saw in Berlin, that wall eventually comes down.  As the homophobic older voter base continues to die off, the gay marriage effort will finally pass, just as it did with inter-racial marriage in the 60's, but unfortunately, millions of loving gay couples will suffer in the meantime. 

For now, however, this is a great day for everyone, including parents in San Francisco.