About two months ago, my partner and I attended a panel discussion hosted by Becker and Poliakoff, PA and Equality Florida, in which leaders from The Fusion Coalition, Equality Florida, and the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR), made very impressive presentations addressing the issue of marriage equality versus civil union and what is at stake for citizens and residents of Florida. My partner and I gained an enhanced dimension of clarity regarding marriage equality, civil union, and domestic partnership. Here are some things we learned:
1. Although many folks use the phrases “marriage equality,” “civil union,” and “domestic partnership” as if they were interchangeable, each of these terms in and of themselves mean very different things.
2. There are nefarious reasons why some folks want us, the general public,
especially the voting public, think that “marriage equality” and “civil union” are basically the same thing.
3. Marriage equality is much more than freedom to marry for same-gender-loving couples. It’s about civil and legal rights on the federal, state and local levels, the access to which, at the present time, excludes lesbian and gay couples.
The above list is not exhaustive, but it gave us a good start to launch this newsletter under the auspices of TheGLBT.com. We wanted to contribute to this very important movement and its related issues by reaching out to as many people as we could, whether they are gay, not-gay-but-gay-friendly, bisexual, transgender, transitioning, or questioning. But how to do this? Well, for the past two months, we have been engaged in searching out so many sources of information that would enlighten us even more, and we decided that we would share as much as we could find with our subscribers and visitors to our website: www.TheGLBT.com.
With all the above said, we welcome all who want to become more informed and who want to join the movement for equality, fairness, and justice. In this first issue, we are focusing on the issue of Marriage Equality and related topics. Therefore, we thought that we could help connect the dots not only with our own articles but also by including several references, excerpts, articles, and documents (with all credit due to each author) from various reliable and reputable sources. |
