NOH8

[Doggie_Wood]

Singer Melissa Etheridge rails against the passage of the gay-marriage ban in California—and she won't be paying the state a dime.

Okay. So Prop 8 passed. Alright, I get it. 51% of you think that I am a second class citizen. Alright then. So my wife, uh I mean, roommate? Girlfriend? Special lady friend? You are gonna have to help me here because I am not sure what to call her now. Anyways, she and I are not allowed the same right under the state constitution as any other citizen. Okay, so I am taking that to mean I do not have to pay my state taxes because I am not a full citizen. I mean that would just be wrong, to make someone pay taxes and not give them the same rights, sounds sort of like that taxation without representation thing from the history books.

Okay, cool I don't mean to get too personal here but there is a lot I can do with the extra half a million dollars that I will be keeping instead of handing it over to the state of California. Oh, and I am sure Ellen will be a little excited to keep her bazillion bucks that she pays in taxes too. Wow, come to think of it, there are quite a few of us fortunate gay folks that will be having some extra cash this year. What recession? We're gay! I am sure there will be a little box on the tax forms now single, married, divorced, gay, check here if you are gay, yeah, that's not so bad. Of course all of the waiters and hairdressers and UPS workers and gym teachers and such, they won't have to pay their taxes either.

Gay people are born everyday. You will never legislate that away.

Oh and too bad California, I know you were looking forward to the revenue from all of those extra marriages. I guess you will have to find some other way to get out of the budget trouble you are in.

…Really?

When did it become okay to legislate morality? I try to envision someone reading that legislation "eliminates the right" and then clicking yes. What goes through their mind? Was it the frightening commercial where the little girl comes home and says, "Hi mom, we learned about gays in class today" and then the mother gets that awful worried look and the scary music plays? Do they not know anyone who is gay? If they do, can they look them in the face and say "I believe you do not deserve the same rights as me"? Do they think that their children will never encounter a gay person? Do they think they will never have to explain the 20% of us who are gay and living and working side by side with all the citizens of California?

I got news for them, someday your child is going to come home and ask you what a gay person is. Gay people are born everyday. You will never legislate that away.

I know when I grew up gay was a bad word. Homo, lezzie, faggot, dyke. Ignorance and fear ruled the day. There were so many "thems" back then. The blacks, the poor ... you know, "them". Then there was the immigrants. "Them.” Now the them is me.

I tell myself to take a breath, okay take another one, one of the thems made it to the top. Obama has been elected president. This crazy fearful insanity will end soon. This great state and this great country of ours will finally come to the understanding that there is no "them". We are one. We are united. What you do to someone else you do to yourself. That "judge not, lest ye yourself be judged" are truthful words and not Christian rhetoric.

Today the gay citizenry of this state will pick themselves up and dust themselves off and do what we have been doing for years. We will get back into it. We love this state, we love this country and we are not going to leave it. Even though we could be married in Mass. or Conn, Canada, Holland, Spain and a handful of other countries, this is our home. This is where we work and play and raise our families. We will not rest until we have the full rights of any other citizen. It is that simple, no fearful vote will ever stop us, that is not the American way.

Come to think of it, I should get a federal tax break too...

Melissa Etheridge is an Academy Award-winning and Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter.

reprinted from The Daily Beast
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-a...rget-my-taxes/

[BLCHGK777]

That's a good article and apparently it has gotten a LOT of attention but I think it will take more than just things like this to get rights LGBT wants. Some of those comments say a lot and it's sad that people still feel that way because they seem to have a mentality that it only matters that they have the rights they want. They make all these excuses and the majority is probably going to follow it. The states that have gay marriage only has it because it was passed through officials due to the fact the people have voted it down. It's going to take a long time but this seems like an awesome start.

[Cherokee_Mountaincat]

Standing O, Doggy. Good stuff Honey.
Cat

[onewhocares]

Standing O, Doggy. Good stuff Honey.
Cat

Ditto to the CAT................


Belle

[Long Duck Dong]

here in NZ with the civil union bill, one aspect that came up a lot, was that lgbt partners that were not legally recognized as a couple, were treated as single people.... and under NZ law, therefore entitled to full benefits.....

a unemployed married couple were entitled to a joint benefit of $312 a week to live on between two people..... but a unemployed LGBT couple were treated as single people... and therefore entitled to a income of $526 a week

when the dust settled and the law was changed to make same sex / lgbt unions legally recognized, the tax dept was able to reap a extra 1.8 bill a year in taxes and saved 3.2 bill a year in expenses..... strange how money was a deciding factor in the recognization of basic human rights....

incidently recently it was worked out that the average LGBT person is on average in a higher wage rate / tax bracket and contributing more in tax per year per person than a heterosexual person.....
something I found hilarious, considering that LGBT people were supposed to be bottom of the rung type folk that were leeching off the system.... according to the anti lgbt groups.....

[rissababynta]

So what happens when she gets in trouble for not paying her state taxes just because she does not want to in a pointless show of anger that's not going to do anything?

I was actually kind of wondering the same thing haha. I appreciate her efforts for standing up and doing such a thing, but in the end, will it amount to anything? And if not...what then haha.

[darkeyes]

That's a good article and apparently it has gotten a LOT of attention but I think it will take more than just things like this to get rights LGBT wants.

Yas rite babes... ifya take it in isolation...taken wiv everythin else thats goin on not jus in the US is an effective addition 2 the overall capaign a gay an bisexual peeps for true equality... its not "just things like this...". There a lot more goin on..

[MarieDelta]

Couple of items here:

Prop 8 is in the courts - as a result there may be no marriage in California, because according to the state constitution, if the state can not discriminate against a subset of citizens.

If Melisa Etheridge does end up in courts over this, she will have a ton of lawyers defending her. I doubt however that she will.

Lastly, while I agree that marriage is important its hardly the most important fight. We need to ensure that equal rights are equal, and this goes for the most basic of rights. The right to housing, fair chance at work, and the right to be treated as human. Many places in the US(28 out of 50 states) you can still be discriminated against for your sexual or gender identity. These are NOT special rights, these are basic rights, the right to life and liberty. Until recently, in many states, there were laws regarding what two consenting adults could do in private, sexually.

[wildwestgoob]

I say if she has enough money to do so, she (M.E.) should just pack her shtuff and move east.

Perhaps just a mile or two outside the state's hands.
Close enough to throw what ever proverbial stones she wishes to throw.

Just a thought.

When the local city here decided I was less than everyone else as a business owner, I moved outside the city limits.

But that's just me.

[darkeyes]

I say if she has enough money to do so, she (M.E.) should just pack her shtuff and move east.

Perhaps just a mile or two outside the state's hands.
Close enough to throw what ever proverbial stones she wishes to throw.

Just a thought.

When the local city here decided I was less than everyone else as a business owner, I moved outside the city limits.

But that's just me.

Uhuh.. an run way from ya home an everythin ya luff.. an run way from a fite wenyas mos needed..wow... that will get us equality if everybody jus sods off elsewer...

[12voltman59]

I am sure that when push comes to shove---Melissa will pay her taxes---but being a celeb---she can raise some publicity about this and maybe other rich and prominent gays/lesbians will join her effort for a time.

Her point is a good one---why should she have to pay all of her taxes when she only has "some of her rights" and not all of them we supposedly afford all of our citizens?

If I could waive some kind of magic wand----just to show all those right wing nutjob types who hate gays and hate migrant workers too----I would take away from the world all the things that GLBT people have created across the spectrum of human activity and throughout history-----from the beginnning of time--with our memories intact as to what things we lost that gays created--and that with this great power--it would be certain the sources of such things came from GLBT people. Current GLBT people would be gone for a bit too--everyone would be in some fun place--I assure you-----you'd all be in some cool places having all kinds of fun!!!! You might not want to come back here to have to suffer the fools!!

Without gays having ever been, the world would be without many of the things that make life worth living---like of course great creative works of all kinds--medicines and breakthroughs on that front----findings in other aspects of science and technology. You name it--if we never had any GLBT people----life would be far less interesting--it might not even be possible that society would have advanced to the level it has. Could be that many great sports stars would be gone--and hell--I am sure that some top religious figures of history--maybe even Jesus himself would be gone too!!

I mean--since GLBT people are so "evil and bad"---if you follow that logic to its natural extension--then any and everything they create or do is bad, evil, etc. and cannot be used by " the good people."

NEXT--- I would suddenly grant the right wingers wish that all migrant sorts of workers---those primarily from south of our border--- were suddenly gone.

The sound that you would hear would be the sound of our economy coming to a screeching, grinding, massive, train wreck halt!!

No more veggies and fruit in the grocery aisles; no more meats being processed of any sort from land, air or sea; few motel and hotels would be in operation; there are so many things that would stop if those people were actually gone---it would amaze you.

The stores of all sorts would be pretty well empty. Forget us being in a recession-----we would be in total economic collapse if those sort of workers were actually gone from the scene.

I would not leave both groups gone for long--just long enough to push the point--and I am sure that if all gays were gone----they would have found they have lost many of those they loved including sons and daughters, brothers and sisters--and even---just to show them--maybe even one of their parents or grandparents!!! (I am talking something totally fantastical here, of course)

I would hope that these two doses of reality would kill their myth making and help them see just the way the world really is instead of some idealized way they think it is or at least--should be!!!

Oh yeah--I would also bring back all of the heterosexual people who got aborted that would have become criminals and let them run amok for a time doing whatever the hell they want to do!!!!