Tag Archives: freedom to marry

A Little Kitchen Conversation

ACLU Nor Cal’s Associate Director Kelli Evans tells the story of how she responded when her 8-year-old daughter asked if lesbians were going to be banned and what would happen to their family. The ACLU is the Community Organization Grand Marshal at SF Pride 2012 and is blogging throughout the week of Pride.

By Kelli Evans

Recently, I was at home making dinner with my eight-year-old daughter Kaden. As I cooked, she flipped through the mail on the kitchen counter with the curiosity that only eight-year-olds possess. One of the pieces of mail was from a local LGBT advocacy group, advertising an upcoming event. Although Kaden has two moms, one of whom (me) works as the Associate Director for the ACLU, she doesn’t see the word “lesbian” in print all that often in her daily life. She’s certainly heard the word plenty and because of my work is familiar with words and phrases many people don’t learn until high school or later.  Words like equal protection, constitutional rights, and fundamental fairness.

For some reason, seeing the word lesbian in large font on the mailer reminded her of Proposition 8, the ballot measure passed by California voters in 2008 that banned marriage for lesbian and gay couples. Referring to Prop 8, she became visibly agitated and asked me what would happen if voters decided to ban lesbians from California. Would we still be her parents? Would we be safe in our home? What would happen to her and to our family?

I fought back tears and swallowed my disgust and outrage at the fact that my child has to think about such things in the year 2012. I looked Kaden in the eye and told her that no one was going to pass a law outlawing lesbians or LGBT families. I also explained that no matter what laws were passed that we would always be her parents and her family. While I knew that I would die before allowing my family to be torn apart, I also knew that I wasn’t quite telling Kaden the truth.

The truth is that in the year 2012 laws are being passed and enforced that discriminate against LGBT individuals, couples, and families, excluding us from the same rights and protections enjoyed by everyone else.

Kaden doesn’t know, for example, that her parents’ marriage (after being together for 18 years, we hastily got married the day before Prop 8 passed) isn’t recognized by the federal government. Or, that her generally fearless moms hold their breath every time we pass through customs, worried about how the agents will react to a two mom family.

She doesn’t know about the children of thousands of same sex couples across the country who are denied legally recognized relationships with both of their parents. Or about the fact that in states across the country it’s still perfectly legal to fire someone or refuse to hire them simply because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. She also doesn’t know about the LGBT youth and adults who take their lives each year or who are beaten or murdered simply because of who they are.

While I usually tell my child the truth, I didn’t have the stomach to in this instance. Instead, after reassuring her about the safety and security of our family, we talked about how one day everyone will look back and wonder how there ever was a time when equal protection, constitutional rights, and fundamental fairness didn’t apply to everyone. That’s why I work at the ACLU, where every day my colleagues across the country are working hard to make this a reality.

Kelli Evans is the Associate Director at the ACLU of Northern California.

The Unexpected Message The Yes On 8 Campaign Sends To Jews, Mormons, And Other Non-Evangelicals

By Autumn Sandeen from Pam’s House Blend.  Reposted with permission.  Original here.

I don’t always connect dots in the ways others do, so it’s usually interesting to me when someone connects dots in a way I never thought aboutAlliance Defense Fund Employment Policies — especially when it’s a particularly interesting character who makes the connections.

On September 8th, a Jewish, conservative Republican — David Benkof — wrote a piece entitled Right-wing nonsense, where he questioned the Yes On 8 – Protect Marriage Campaign‘s use of the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) as their legal defense team:

I believe marriage is between a man and a woman, so I supported the man-woman marriage Proposition 8 in California – until I discovered the Proposition 8 campaign tolerates discrimination against Jews. ProtectMarriage.com‘s legal counsel, the Alliance Defense Fund, has in effect a “No Jews Need Apply” policy for legal and even secretarial positions. They say they’re not a law firm, they’re a “ministry” and thus have a right to discriminate against Jews and other non-Christians. But even if that’s true, Proposition 8 had hundreds of law firms to choose from. The fact they chose one that refuses to hire a Jew like me is very disturbing. Alliance Defense Fund Guiding PrinciplesInterestingly, Jesus himself was a Jew, so when a group has a policy that would lead them to refuse to hire their own Messiah, you know something’s seriously wrong.

I wanted to check to see if the employment policies of the ADF were as Benkof described these policies, and he’s correct on the facts, in that the ADF doesn’t hire anyone but those who ascribe to the ADF’s vision of Christianity:

[Below the fold: The employment policies of the ADF, and the interesting personal history of David Benkof]

The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian organization, employs talented and dedicated team members who work together to defend the right to hear and speak the Truth through strategy, training, funding and litigation.

Before reviewing currently open positions, please review our Statement of Faith Alliance Defense Fund Statement Of Faithand Guiding Principles and indicate your acceptance and agreement of the principles contained therein.

During working and non-working hours, ADF Team Members, as part of their duties as Team Members, shall: (i) be ready, willing, and able to participate in public and private prayer, chapel or other similar Christian services held or sponsored by ADF, including prayer with and for friends and allies of the ministry; (ii) refrain from statements and conduct that detracts from the biblical standards taught and supported by ADF; (iii) be spiritually ready, willing, and able to fulfill such other ministry functions and requirements as may be requested by ADF; and (iv) abide by the practices and policies of ADF, including without limitation, those that pertain to corporate religious activities, beliefs, and practices.

At the bottom of the Alliance Defense Fund‘s employment webpage, they have an “I accept” button which has the following header:

Clicking this button indicates that you have read and understand ADF’s Statement of Faith and hold to spiritual beliefs which are not in conflict with ADF’s Statement of Faith. Clicking this button will bring you to the open position descriptions.

In other words, the Yes On 8 – Protect Marriage campaign employs a legal team that apparently won’t employ anyone who isn’t a conservative, evangelical Christian for any of that organization’s paid positions.

That would probably be interesting news to the Mormons who are volunteering time and have already donated approximately five million dollars (which is about 35% of the funds the campaign has raised) to the Yes On 8 – Protect Marriage Campaign — the legal team that the Yes On 8 – Protect Marriage organization hired for their campaign discriminates in its hiring practices against a large segment of the campaign’s faith-based donor base.

And to boot, David Benkof’s an interesting character to make this statement. Timothy Kinkaid, with whom I’ve worked previously at the Ex-Gay Watch, wrote a piece for the Box Turtle Bulletin entitled David Benkof: Behind the Mask. Benkof apparently is an ex-gay who was one of the founders of the Q-Syndicate (an LGBT publication), and contributed to the publication between 1995 to 2003. In recent years he’s been seeking to be influential in the restriction of LGBT rights and equality.

Two points, in summary:

– Discrimination is discrimination — the Yes On 8 – Protect Marriage Campaign hiring a legal team that in its hiring policies discriminates against Jews and Mormons is as wrong-headed as hiring policies that discriminate against LGBT people.

– David Benkof really is an interesting character to connect the dots on discrimination by evangelical Christians towards people of other faiths since he now appears to be for discrimination of LGBT people — it really seems that now he’s only against discrimination when it’s about how he currently identifies, not about how he previously identified. It kinda seems like he’s just an upscale version of a James Hartline archetype.

~~~~~

Further Reading:

* Washington Post (July 10, 2006): Bringing the Church to the Courtroom

~~~~~

Related:

* California’s Prop 8: Polling Showing Voters Moving To Defeat Measure

* PROP 8 ballot wording rewritten: to ELIMINATE RIGHT of Same-Sex Couples to Marry

* The Fundamental Freedom To Marry

* Pam’s House Blend tags: Proposition 8; Prop 8; Marriage Equality

Crossposted with permission from Pam’s House Blend

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October 15, 2007 Blog Roundup

Today’s Blog Roundup is on the flip. Let me know what I missed.

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How a Bill Becomes a Law
(or not)

Ba-Da-Bang!


Other Statewide

Local

Federales

The Rest

October 14, 2007 Blog Roundup

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Basic Fairness

Federal Representatives

Straight-up State-level
Stuff

Local News

All the Rest

October 6, 2007 Blog Roundup

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A quick note by Brian: This is kinda off topic, but I wanted to mention the Regional Platform meetings being held around the state to talk about the California Democratic Party’s platform. Here’s the schedule of events.

Think Pieces

Whiskey is for drinkin’

Basic Fairness

Pending Legislation

From Here to DC

Local News

All The Rest

September 15, 2007 California Blog Roundup

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I won’t able to do blog roundups until week after next — any blog roundups between now and then will be created by the far busier members of the editorial staff, so make sure to thank them.

Things to do this weekend

Modern Republican
“Reformers”

Air, Land, Water, Energy

Local News

All The Rest

September 8, 2007 Blog Roundup

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The Thing You Should Read
Today

Charlie Brown v. 15%
Doolittle: Various Takes

Health Care

Environment

Basic Fairness (That’s
still an American value, right?  I get so confused.)

All The Rest

August 29, 2007 Blog Roundup

Today’s Blog Roundup is on the flip. I’m afraid I’m in an all-day seminar for my day job and I’m trying to just work this in between lectures, so it’s pretty much a link dump today. Let me know what I missed.

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August 1, 2007 Blog Roundup

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Budgets are Moral
Documents

Straight-Up Electoral
Politics

Freedom to Marry (Equally
Accurate: Bigotry in the Initiative Process)

We’ve Only Got the One
Planet

And the Rest

July 30, 2007 Blog Roundup

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Budgets are Still Moral
Documents

Voting Integrity

Local Motion

Statewide

The Remainder