Sunday, 2009-11-08; 03:43:03

Recently, there was a minor kerfluffle between some Twitter-folk that I follow, regarding smoking bans.

It started when Fred Priese tweeted about a St. Louis County public smoking ban that passed. Geoff Pado, who I follow, expressed his dissatisfaction in response.

Since Twitter is terrible for these discussions, Pado wisely moved this to a weblog post once he got some pushback on his disapproval of the smoking ban.

I’d like to pick apart Pado’s argument.

Pado writes:

I don’t disagree that smoking is harmful to your health. I don’t disagree that secondhand smoke is harmful to the health of those who are around smokers. This is proven fact. But for the most part (I’ll talk about the exceptions later), exposing yourself to these are a personal choice. In effect, I disagree with smoking bans for the same reason I disagree with forcing McDonald’s to put “WARNING! HOT!” stickers on its coffee. If you’re dumb enough to constantly expose yourself to a smoking environment, that’s your fault. You should know better.

I’m glad that Pado recognizes the risk that secondhand smoke poses to other people.

But, seriously, he’s making the argument that exposing oneself to secondhand smoke is a personal choice? Did he really just say that? That’s like saying that it’s your fault when you get hit by a drunk driver, because you should totally know the dangers of being around drunk drivers.

It’s a completely ludicrous statement to make.

Disagreeing with smoking bans is completely different from disagreeing with “warning hot coffee” stickers. Completely different. When you smoke, you affect others. When you drink hot coffee, the only person that you can harm is yourself.

Pado continues:

However, the amount of people that smoke is large, which means that businesses have a financial incentive to support people who smoke. Many people who smoke enjoy the company of other smokers, leading them to places where they can smoke together. Bowling alleys, bars, and restaurants are just a handful of places where smokers are allowed to assemble and smoke together. Why should they not be allowed that right?

Because when a person smokes, it amounts to a de facto ban on non-smokers who don’t want to damage their health. I want to be able to enjoy going to a restaurant, too! Why should I not be allowed the right to go to a restaurant and eat some delicious food without having to worry about harming my health due to smoke?

The point is, your smoking habit affects others. It affects others in an adverse way. Your rights stop when you start harming other people.

But let’s get to a more pernicious myth. Pado says, “businesses have a financial incentive to support people who smoke”. Actually, smoke free ordinances have no effect on restaurant or bar revenues. The Centers for Disease Control did a study on smoking bans in restaurants and bars in El Paso, Texas, in 2002. The conclusion? “No decline in total restaurant or bar revenues occurred in El Paso, Texas, after the city’s smoking ban was implemented on January 2, 2002.” Read it for yourself. The WHO reached a similar conclusion in a study of California restaurants and bars between 1992 and 2001.

Pado:

The counter-argument to that, of course, is that non-smokers are then unable to assemble in places that are free of secondhand smoke. But is legislation the right way to make more smoke-free places? Businesses are already free to set “no smoking” policies on their property, but many have chosen not to, because they don’t wish to alienate potential customers. If non-smokers want more smoke-free zones, they should reverse the incentive: boycott businesses that are too smoky, and (more importantly) make it known that that’s why you’re boycotting that business.

I’ve already shown that smoking bans don’t have an effect on business revenue, so “no smoking” policies won’t either.

But, more importantly, why is it that non-smokers have to stage a boycott in order to protect their own health?! It doesn’t make sense! Why should non-smokers have to actively protect themselves? Shouldn’t the health of citizens be protected by default?

The argument that we should somehow protect smokers’ rights to smoke in public places is disingenuous. Smokers are the ones with an unhealthy habit, one which affects others. You’re welcome to go inside your home and smoke it up all you want. You’re also welcome to go eat at a restaurant without smoking. But when you smoke in public places, you actively encroach into other people’s space and health. So you should be prohibited from doing that, just like you’re prohibited from doing other things that affect others, like harassment or physical altercations or theft.

Plenty of businesses have already made the decision to go smoke-free without a ban. For example, smoking is rarely allowed in movie theaters, a practice which was once common. Other businesses have limited the amount of crossover between smoking and non-smoking sections. A restaurant in my hometown of Union, MO has the two separated by most of the building. The entire kitchen is between the two sections. The only experience of smoky air by non-smokers is during payment, a process which takes less than a few minutes.

Citations desperately needed. Pado’s claim that “plenty of businesses have already made the decision to go smoke-free without a ban” is not supported by any actual data. Same with his statement that “smoking is rarely allowed in movie theaters, a practice which was once common”.

Besides, smoking bans are not there only to protect customers. They’re also there to protect workers. Are the waiters in that restaurant allowed to refuse to serve smoking customers? If not, then you’re still exposing some non-smoking workers to secondhand smoke. And don’t give me any crap about, “oh, well, then they can go work someplace else!” That’s called “discrimination”.

I’ll cite some actual data about smoking habits and smoking bans in the United States.

First: per capita consumption of cigarettes, from the CDC. Per capita consumption peaks in 1973. By 2004, per capita consumption has dropped to 1937 levels.

The CDC also has data on actual smoking among high school students and adults in general. Cigarette use has been falling among all adults since 1965, when ~43% of all adults were “current cigarette smokers”. In 2007, the adult smoking rate was ~20%. In contrast, cigarette use among high school students increased from 1990 (~25%) to a peak in 1997 (~35%), and has declined to a rate of 20% by 2007.

When were smoking bans enacted? I can’t find data on theaters specifically, but the American Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation (I know, consider the source) has a comprehensive list (PDF) of when 100% smokefree state or local laws were enacted for workplaces, restaurants, and bars, and the list starts in 1990. By 2009, they estimate that ~70% of the population of the United States is now covered by 100% smokefree laws.

Finally, UCSF researchers found that in communities where smoking bans were enacted, heart attack rates dropped by 17% after one year and by 36% after three.

From what I can tell, it’s true that smoking was on the decline well before smoking bans started to be enacted. But there’s evidence that smoking bans do help protect the health of citizens, and they have no effect on business revenues.

More importantly, cigarette use was still at a rate of 20% by 2007. That means 1 in 5 adults in the United States smokes. Without public smoking bans, there’d be a very high probability that I would be exposed to second-hand smoke every time I went out of my apartment. I shouldn’t need to have worry about my health when I go outside in public.

Pado (almost) ends with this statement:

But an outright [smoking] ban is bad for local business, and a slap in the face to personal liberty.

Bullshit. It’s not bad for local business, and it’s a slap in the face of people with unhealthy habits who have ridiculous expectations of others tolerating their harmful smoke. We’re talking about “personal liberty”, emphasis on “personal”. Your liberty is no longer personal when you start harming the health of others in public.

I honestly don’t understand why this is so hard to grasp.

Sunday, 2009-02-08; 02:21:03

“Write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you.”

Usually, I hate weblog memes. They’re meaningless, trite, and almost always reveal nothing about yourself. This, on the other hand, is the first weblog meme that intrigues me. Maybe because it’s freeform writing instead of just answering questions, or maybe it’s because the first time I saw it, the result was compelling. Either way, I’m breaking the rules and doing it anyway even though nobody has tagged me. Take that, internets!

Speaking of the internets, I have a conscious habit of making them plural, both in speaking and in writing, just to make sure that people remember how illiterate our former president was. Other than that, I’m a pedantic grammar nazi.

I love cooking, I think because I like eating. I would just as much prefer making something at home than going out to eat, if I am skilled enough in making the food in question. I have this nasty habit, though, of not wanting to use recipes, so I rarely end up broadening my cooking repertoire. I don’t know, using recipes feels like cheating somehow, like you didn’t take the time to actually figure out that certain flavors and textures go together. It’s psychologically easier for me to learn from someone than from a recipe book, like from my dad. I guess I need a cooking partner with whom I can share techniques and dishes.

On the other hand, it occurs to me that I have no problem at all with using recipes for baking. Weird.

One strange habit I have involves my hands and feet when listening to music. I like to walk in sync with the beat that’s playing on my iPod. It’s not the end of the world if I can’t (because some beats are too fast or slow), but it’s desirable. Similarly, I like to tap or drum my fingers on my pants or my bike handles along with the notes of the song’s melody. I do it with both hands, too, and I try to randomize the fingers I use between successive notes; sadly, I usually fail, because my hands inevitably become mirror images of each other while I’m tapping. Annoying.

If someone says they’re an audiophile, I tend to think they’re a liar until proven otherwise. Most people who claim to be “audiophiles” claim to be able to tell the difference between 192 kbps MP3 files and those of higher bitrate. I doubt their ears or their sound equipment are good enough to do so. And even if they can, they can’t tell unless they’re intently listening for subtle differences, which they would do in no other situation other than one in which they’re trying to prove they’re an audiophile.

I have two general areas of interest that currently dominate my life: geology, and Cocoa programming. I’ve chosen to pursue geology in school and programming as a hobby. There have been times in my life where I’ve considered if I made the right choice, since I write very little about geology and a lot about programming. Recent years have also seen a drop in motivation in my geology projects, as well.

I have concluded, perhaps not 100% to my own satisfaction, that both are in the right places. I have spurts of insight in programming, but they are not nearly enough in number to sustain me in a career. I sometimes go weeks and months at a time without writing a single line code. That means that I actually enjoy coding when I am actually coding.

I do have other interests, though, and it depresses me that I don’t have time to pursue them. I think I have some talent in both technical (i.e.: architecture) and freeform drawing, I’m passionate about politics, and I have a lot of experience in music and wouldn’t mind singing for people other than myself. I’ve also participated in a couple plays and enjoyed acting a lot. I wish I could get paid to do all these things.

I’m pretty sure “meme” (as in “weblog meme”) is pronounced mehm, not meem. It makes me cringe when people say meem. It’s probably because I took French in high school and “même” is pronounced mehm. Also, “memetic” is definitely pronounced mehm. But does “meme” derive from the French word “même”?

And more importantly, where did people get the idea that it was pronounced “meem”?

I’m an approval junkie, I admit it. Don’t get me wrong, I derive a great amount of self-satisfaction from finishing a project, like getting some code to finally work, or sieving and abrading rock grains to the correct size and shape for analysis, or even just cleaning the dishes. But I like it even more when someone else acknowledges my work somehow. I hate it when people patronize me, or say anything beyond a simple “thank you” or “good work”. It’s much more meaningful to me for someone to simply use my code as a foundation for a more complex product, or to link to my writing, or to mention work I’ve done in a presentation, and I appreciate it.

I am very conscious about judging people by their actions, not by their words. It irks me when people do little things like not being observant enough to tell the difference between unmarked recycling and garbage bins in the apartment, or don’t move a lane to the right while driving when someone faster is coming up behind you. Big things, like constantly changing what you want out of somebody, or not being open and honest about how you feel about a situation, will make me very much dislike you.

I don’t hate people. I rarely hold a grudge against people, either. It takes a lot to push me to the point where I will avoid any interaction with someone. It’s possible to get back on my good side, but extremely unlikely, because it’s usually not you, per se, that I dislike, but your actions. I will not hesitate to tell you what I dislike about your actions if you ask, either. But I will continue to dislike you until you change your actions.

No one who’s ever gotten on my bad side has yet done so.

I need a clothes shopping buddy in addition to a cooking buddy. I hate clothes shopping. It takes so long to look for clothes and try them on. And you’re likely to not find everything you want at one store, so you have to go to another.

The problem is, I do like to have clothes that look good, and I tend to keep clothes way past their shelf life. I need someone to make the shopping experience fun so I’ll do it more often.

My room is very spartan. I have few things on the walls; when I lived at home, my mom usually put up various works of art for me. Currently, I have a life poster and my M.C. Escher print enlargement that I made years ago and are waiting to be put up. The latter is too big to put up in my room.

I wish TV would die. Not the shows themselves, but the concept of you having to submit to the TV’s schedule, rather than the other way around. I suspect 24-hour cable news programs wouldn’t have much of an audience if people had to choose to watch them on their own time. Darn.

I am passionate about the little things, and passionate about the big things. Things of medium importance? Meh.

I frequently wonder whether the lack of genuine, long-term relationships in my life is a big factor in my recent lack of motivation and slight bout of depression. Then it occurs to me that it might not be, and that scares me even more.

Recently, I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re boring if you only talk about your career (± partying). I frequently find that conversation with other graduate students often gravitates toward their area of study or last weekend’s greatest drinking event. Yawn. Talk to me about the model rockets and trains you used to build as a kid with your uncle, or the trips around Europe that you used to have every summer including that one to the former Czechoslovakia, or the ridiculous props that Of Montreal used at the last concert of theirs you went to.

But for god’s sake, I really don’t give a flying fuck about how many people attended the event at the on-campus pub that other night.

There’s a difference between being smart, and being intelligent. The vast majority of Stanford students are smart, probably much higher than the proportion of the general population. Stanford students however, by and large, are not more intelligent than everybody else. Just in my experience. I’ve only met a few people every year with whom I enjoyed spending time and would like to keep in touch.

Yes, I sometimes come off as arrogant. Well, it’s usually after-the-fact that I realize I’m acting above everybody else. It happens less often among people I genuinely like hanging out with.

I’ve been happier as of late having succeeded at widening my circle of friends. Previously, I used to hang out exclusively with fellow graduate students. Now, in addition, I have a circle of old high school friends, friends from Boston, friends from Twitter who often happen to work at Apple and live in San Francisco, and then the person I’m dating who doesn’t really fit into any of those categories. I’m finding the group I least like to spend time with is other graduate students.

I like San Francisco. I think I would like to live in the city, but it’s infeasible to do so while I’m a student at Stanford. I’ve been going up more often, recently, though, and it’s been fun. I need to make more friends with people who live up there.

I’ve been considering moving out of the Bay Area once I’m done with Stanford. I’ve become increasingly impatient to do so, but it’s more that I’ve become increasingly dissatisfied with Stanford rather than being dissatisfied with the entire Bay Area. I guess it depends on where I end up working or going to school after I graduate from Stanford.

Having a car puts a bad taste in my mouth. It’s very convenient to have one, and the one I have is a beater car so I’m not too concerned about it being stolen or wrecked or anything like that. (It has a gash in the right side; both right side doors won’t open.)

However, I’ve noticed that it’s taken the place of my bike. I used to bike to the grocery store. I used to bike to downtown Palo Alto if I needed to get something. I used to bike to Mountain View. Now, more often than not, I drive. It’s possible it’s because I inherited the car during the winter, when it’s much less hospitable to bike. I’ll see what happens when spring and summer roll around.

Twitter has become an outlet for random observations and thoughts that I would otherwise not write down, and exaggerated outrage that lets off steam about real issues. I like it.

Socks can often make or break an outfit. Black socks look terrible with tennis shoes and shorts. White socks don’t go well with more formal pants and dressier shoes.

Everyone judges people on first glance. It’s impossible not to. Don’t feel bad that you’ve made a judgment about someone just by how they look. Oftentimes that judgment can be spot on. Just be aware and open to the possibility that some people are a lot different than the first impression that they make.

You have reached the end of this entry. Consider yourself tagged to make your own.

Monday, 2008-12-22; 19:13:23

In the aftermath of the passage of Proposition 8 in California, I’ve been reading a lot of articles dissecting the reasons why it passed, who’s responsible for its passage, and continuing discussions about the merits of gay marriage.

As I’ve said before, ideological convictions are next to impossible (if not outright impossible) to change. A political campaign takes place in a moment compared to how long it takes to convince people that their long-held opinions are wrong. So while it sucks that Proposition 8 passed, it’s good that people are talking about it. In that vein, I’d like to address some of the various fallacies keep popping up in many of the articles that I’ve read on Proposition 8.

On Blacks Handing Proposition 8 the Victory

In an article entitled “Is gay the new black? Marriage ban spurs debate”, Jesse Washington writes for the San Francisco Chronicle:

In the vote on Proposition 8 in California, which repealed gay marriage, about 70 percent of blacks favored the ban, according to an exit poll; Latinos’ close vote may have favored it, though the poll’s small sample left some uncertainty. In Florida, 71 percent of blacks and 64 percent of Latinos favored a similar ban.

And in a transcript of a discussion between Dan Savage and D. L. Hughley on CNN, Savage states:

Well, there is a lot of outreach that has to be done — that falls to the gay community, to do outreach to voters of color. But voters of color also have to step up and take some responsibility. It’s the responsibility of white people not to be racist. It’s the responsibility of men not to be sexist. And it is a responsibility of all of us not to be homophobic.

It strikes me as rather odd that in an election that resulted in the first African-American president, everybody would turn around and blame the same old scapegoat for the passage of Proposition 8: blacks. This isn’t blame coming exclusively from the gay rights activists, it’s coming from everybody. It’s practically “common knowledge” that blacks doomed the efforts against Proposition 8.

Only it’s completely false. Nate Silver from FiveThirtyEight.com writes:

Now, it’s true that if new voters had voted against Prop 8 at the same rates that they voted for Obama, the measure probably would have failed. But that does not mean that the new voters were harmful on balance — they were helpful on balance. If California’s electorate had been the same as it was in 2004, Prop 8 would have passed by a wider margin.

Furthermore, it would be premature to say that new Latino and black voters were responsible for Prop 8’s passage. Latinos aged 18-29 (not strictly the same as ‘new’ voters, but the closest available proxy) voted against Prop 8 by a 59-41 margin. These figures are not available for young black voters, but it would surprise me if their votes weren’t fairly close to the 50-50 mark.

At the end of the day, Prop 8’s passage was more a generational matter than a racial one. If nobody over the age of 65 had voted, Prop 8 would have failed by a point or two. It appears that the generational splits may be larger within minority communities than among whites, although the data on this is sketchy.

Gay rights has always been a generational issue. Older people generally grew up during a time when gay rights wasn’t at the forefront of social issues, and when discrimination against gays (and blacks, for that matter) was more commonplace and didn’t spark as much outrage as it does today. So it’s unsurprising that people who grew up during times intolerant to gays are more likely to be intolerant themselves.

It’s not even really intolerance, per se, that breeds intolerance. It’s personal contact that breeds tolerance. When people have a family member or close friend who comes out, or has more personal experience with homosexuals, they’re more likely to realize that, hey, gays are often just like everybody else. That’s not to say that there aren’t gays who are flamboyant or quite in-your-face about being homosexual (which is fine, too, by the way), but that gays as a whole have the same desires, needs, emotions, and differences as the general population. And that realization, in turn, leads to the realization that you know, there are some pretty out-there heterosexual people, too.

Looking at Proposition 8 in this light, it’s unsurprising that it passed in California. There seems to be a myth that all of California is a radically liberal set of Democrats who are far out of touch with mainstream American politics. As a Californian, myself, that idea is just laughable. Outside of the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles, most of the rest of California is just like the rest of America. The reason that the San Francisco and Los Angeles communities are more tolerant to gays is simply because there’s a higher likelihood of people in these places to have had personal contact with gays. And when that happens, people see that the world doesn’t come crashing down.

On Homosexuality Being a Choice

Washington in the Chronicle continues:

“I do not consider (gays) to be a minority in legal and adjudicated terms, the same way people who only like to eat broccoli with butter aren’t a minority,” said the Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference. “We can’t categorize things according to behavior. It’s based on ethnicity, on who we are rather than what we do.”

And D.L. Hughley has this to say:

I have to say, honestly, I don’t — I’m not particularly homophobic. But when I read the bill the way it was written, it was a little confusing. When I read it, it asked me to make a decision that didn’t — that I couldn’t quantify on the ballot. I can’t, for whatever reason, is it my religious upbringing, I don’t condone a gay lifestyle, but I also don’t condone the government being involved in two people’s affairs. So there was no place for me to vote. And I think a lot of black people I talked to found themselves in the same quandary. Had I been more religious, maybe I would have voted yes to ban.

If you’re straight and you’re still questioning whether being gay is a choice or not, ask yourself this question: when did you choose to be attracted to the opposite sex?

No, seriously, think about it. If you’re a guy, can you remember a time when you said to yourself, “You know, I’ve decided that I’m not attracted to guys.” Wouldn’t that be a pretty significant milestone in your life? You might say you’re not attracted to guys because you prefer looking at girls with smooth skin and long hair and smaller features as opposed to guys with muscles and facial hair. But that’s not because of you being attracted to girls, that’s an effect. You prefer some features over others not because you simply chose to favor them, but because you were intrinsically attracted to them in the first place.

My brother’s response to the question was, “It never really occurred to me to like guys.” And that’s the response that most people have when they really think about the question. They don’t know why they’re attracted to a certain sex, they just are. Because it’s not a choice.

So it’s ridiculous for Rodriguez to say that gays aren’t a minority because they choose to have same sex relations. That’s akin to saying that writing isn’t a legitimate profession simply because people choose to write. No, some people have an intrinsic affinity for writing and so they pursue that path, just like gays have an intrinsic attraction to the same sex and so they have sexual relations with the same sex. The “decision” to actually have sexual relations with the same sex isn’t the same as the purported “decision” to actually be attracted to the same sex in the first place.

And if you subscribe to the idea that being attracted to the same sex isn’t a decision, but that it’s a choice to actually pursue that path (i.e.: “gays do have the same rights as heterosexuals; they can marry people of the opposite sex just like heterosexuals can!”), think about it in the reverse. Wouldn’t it be ludicrous to suggest that heterosexuals should act against their own nature and pursue homosexual relationships, just because laws were framed in a certain way?

There’s nothing to “condone” about a gay lifestyle, as Hughley says. That implies that there’s something morally wrong or offensive about gay lifestyles, which (as far as I can tell) usually means that being gay is a choice. I think that most of those who don’t “condone” gay lifestyles perceive being gay as going against nature, since nature “obviously” intended for opposite-sex relations since that’s the only way to propagate the species.

But there’s a whole litany of assumptions that go along with that line of reasoning. One has to assume that being gay is a different sort of “defect” than being impotent, or being sterile, or having another genetic problem that precludes you from finding an opposite-sex mate and having offspring. If propagating the species is the ultimate goal of sexual relations, then shouldn’t marriages between seniors not be “condoned” either?

And gays being unnatural also implies that nature has an obvious end-goal, that species (and, in particular, humans) should propagate and continue to multiply. But nature has no such end-goal in mind at all. Species have died off all the time, genetic defects have existed in animals far before humans ever existed on the planet, and homosexual behavior in animals has been observed for decades even though evolution might predict that homosexuals should die off because they aren’t nearly as likely to pass on their genes.

The point is that homosexuality is a natural expression of diversity among a single species. That this particular difference happens to reduce the likelihood of that individual to pass on his genes doesn’t mean that the difference is “unnatural”, nor does it mean that this difference needs to be condoned or corrected.

On Obama’s Place in the Gay Rights Movement

Washington, in the San Francisco Chronicle:

And in some ways, gays see Obama himself as a symbol of gay progress — even though he opposes gay marriage.

Obama is in favor of civil unions, and during his victory speech, when he included gays in his description of America, it made them feel part of the historic racial milestone.

Let’s get this myth out of the way: Obama is not a progressive, not by any means. His positions on gay rights are decidedly centrist, just like his positions on many other issues. You’d be forgiven if you did think Obama is a progressive, simply because the last eight years have been dominated by such far-right politics that it’s easy to think that slightly left-of-center policies are radically liberal.

John Hodgman (linked from the Daring Fireball Linked List) does a good job of dissecting Obama’s positions:

BOTH WARREN AND OBAMA believe in a fallacy: that one can support equal rights for “everybody” (Warren) and for gay folks specifically (Obama), and yet not support a gay person having the same access as a straight person to the governmental special status known as “marriage.”

I KNOW HOW TEMPTING this fallacy can be: I am ashamed to admit that I half-fell for it myself until Massachusetts proved that the world would not end, and the semantic difference between “domestic partnerships” and “marriage” was so meaningless as to be offensive. I was wrong, I am sorry.

Hodgman continues:

THOSE OF US, however, who foolishly refused to take Obama at his word when he told us he didn’t support gay marriage OVER AND OVER AGAIN must now take him at his deed. He really, really doesn’t want gays to get married. SRSLY.

LOOK: my gut tells me that Obama likes and respects gay people and wants them to thrive in this country. I think he is tolerant by nature, as his patience with Wright and his embrace of Warren shows.

BUT AFTER MCCLURKIN and now Warren, it is hard not to conclude that Barack Obama is somewhat tone deaf when it comes to gay issues. And at this point, if he is interested in convincing us otherwise (and I’m not presuming he is), it will take more than a few words or a second pastor or some other symbolic gesture. It will take deeds.

On Proposition 8 Protests

Allysia Finley, in an opinion article for the Stanford Daily, writes:

Raucous rallies and vandalism at Mormon and Catholic churches have shrouded gay rights activists’ calls for tolerance. White powder was even sent mysteriously to Mormon temples in Los Angeles and Salt Lake City. Many Prop. 8 backers have complained that their houses and Yes on Prop. 8 signs have been vandalized. The backlash against Prop. 8 supporters is becoming nearly as radical as that of the far-left animal rights movement, which bombs clinics and houses of researchers who experiment on animals. My mom was even concerned about my publishing this article because she thought a violent backlash might ensue.

Really?

It’s incredible that Finley thinks that vandalism and white powder letters are indicative of the gay rights movement as a whole. All movements have their own extremists that carry out their agenda in radical and violent ways. Should we represent the all anti-gay rights activists by the Klu Klux Klan? Or how about the civil rights movement for African-Americans — anybody remember Malcolm X?

It’s disingenuous to suggest that only the gay rights movement has its radical factions, and that somehow all gays are radical anthrax mailers because of it. It’s also disingenuous to suggest that those who are pro-gay rights should somehow be “tolerant” of anti-gay rights activists, when anti-gay rights activists often don’t extend the same courtesy.

Finley:

The same could be said of a Web site called Californians Against Hate, which posts a “dishonor roll” listing over 800 people and businesses who donated $5,000 or more to the Yes on 8 campaign. The Web site encourages people to boycott these businesses. Now imagine if pro-lifers decided to post a list of businesses and individuals who supported abortion clinics and Planned Parenthood and encouraged people to boycott businesses that hired women who had abortions. The horror! The horror of the liberal double standard.

Bahahaha. One simple Google search for “abortion clinic boycotts” turns up this CNN article as the top result: contractors in Texas refusing to do work to build an abortion clinic.

NEWS FLASH: conservatives have staged boycotts against abortion clinics and Planned Parenthood.

And, yes, “liberals” are “outraged” because of it since, again, it’s conservatives injecting their own personal views into other peoples’ business. How does someone getting an abortion personally affect you? Every time there’s an abortion in the world, do you personally feel a pain that shoots up your back? It’s just like the gay rights movement; how does two gays getting married personally affect you?

NEWS FLASH: it doesn’t.

Finley:

Prop. 8 opponents need to take the high road instead of irrationally lashing out against those with whom they disagree. Discuss, debate, protest, challenge the decision in court. But don’t resort to barbed epithets, vandalism and bullying.

That’s what the gay rights movement has been doing! Discussions, check (this very article). Debates, check. Protests, check. Court challenges, check.

The gay rights movement is just like any other civil rights movement, and yet somehow Proposition 8 supporters charge detractors as being somehow intolerant. It boggles the mind.

On Invoking The Civil Rights Movement (Capital “T”, Capital “C”, Capital “R”, Capital “M”)

Washington:

Yet even some gay leaders are reluctant to directly tie their fight to the African-American legacy. They acknowledge significant differences in the experiences of gays and blacks, ranging from slavery to the relative affluence of white gay men to the choice made by some gays to conceal their sexual orientation, which is not an option for those with darker skin.

Later:

“The gay fight for marriage has its own integrity, its own background,” said Andrew Cherlin, a professor of sociology and public policy at Johns Hopkins University. “The experience of blacks in the United States is very different. … I don’t think it helps the fight for equality to make that claim.”

Nobody denies the fact that The Civil Rights Movement for African-Americans has a different history than the gay rights movement. Nobody claims the experiences that blacks had are equal to the experiences that gays have had. Nobody denies that blacks were enslaved for hundreds of years in the United States.

But that doesn’t mean The Civil Rights Movement can’t be invoked to support the gay rights movement. The larger experience is the same: a group of people is persecuted for who they are.

Finley:

It is nearly impossible to engage in a rational discussion with staunch Prop. 8 opponents without being called a bigot. According to gay rights activists, Prop. 8 supporters want to deny homosexuals “civil rights” and make them second-class citizens. They equate the ban on gay marriage to a ban on interracial marriage and the civil rights struggle of the 1960s. Strangely, most blacks who struggled as true second-class citizens for hundreds of years don’t see it that way. Unlike blacks prior to the civil rights movement, gays can vote and are not discriminated against in employment and education. Most Californians and blacks agree that gay marriage is a personal and religious issue, not a civil rights issue.

How is the ban on gay marriage not the same as a ban on interracial marriage? What is the difference? Two people who are capable of giving consent and agreeing to contracts are being denied the right to do so simply because of who they are. Does that not describe the situation before a ban on interracial marriage was struck down? Does that not describe the push for gay marriage equality as well?

And, by the way, “most” doesn’t mean “61%” anymore. It means “52%”. I think 48% of Californians would disagree with that statement; they probably believe that gay marriage is a civil rights issue. It’s pretty disingenuous to suggest that California as a whole supports a ban on gay marriage, when in fact almost half of Californians don’t.

Hughley and Savage:

Hughley: Here’s what I think. I’ve seen a lot of people, gay activists, make the comparison of basically equating their struggle with the struggle of black people throughout the civil rights era. And that hits me even me kind of wrong.

Savage: And me too.

Hughley: Because historically, millions of people died and they were disenfranchised. Some of them couldn’t have a name. This is about one segment, like to be married. And I think that that is none of my business. But I also think that what you asked — I’ve never met a black atheist. I never have, because we are so rooted in theology, we are so rooted in all these things, that even me, who — I’m not a regular churchgoer — had a hard time going, this is — this goes against what I was taught.

Saying that gays can’t invoke The Civil Rights Movement in support of their cause is fucking bullshit. No, gays weren’t enslaved for hundreds of years, but it doesn’t negate any of the struggles that gays have had. Gays have been murdered too. Gays have been persecuted around the world and in the United States, too.

And you know what? It enrages me when it’s suggested that The Civil Rights Movement somehow “belongs” only to blacks, as Hughley does here. It’s one of the worst things you could say about The Civil Rights Movement, because it completely throws the lesson of the movement out the window.

The Civil Rights Movement “belongs” to all Americans. It’s American history, not black history. All Americans bear the burden of having a country whose history is tainted with hundreds of years of slavery, with Presidents that owned slaves and widespread persecution of blacks. All Americans are taught about The Civil Rights Movement in school, not just blacks.

Because the lesson of The Civil Rights Movement is not that we should be tolerant of other races. The lesson is that we should be tolerant, period, full stop. The legacy of The Civil Rights Movement extends far beyond the bounds of racism. It extends to the persecution of anybody because of who they are, not just because of the color of their skin.

On Marching a Little Longer

Hughley concludes the interview with this choice statement:

Well I’ll tell you what, being black, I can tell you, you got to march a little while longer and then it might happen. I promise. Look how long it took us to get a president. I hope it works out for you. One thing I don’t understand is the government involvement in our bedroom. They can’t even deliver my mail.

Seriously? It’s a requirement to march in order to get equal civil rights? That’s the lesson that Hughley gets from The Civil Rights Movement? And you automatically know what it’s like to be persecuted just because you’re black?

And really, this whole “the government can’t even deliver my mail” thing is nonsense. I don’t think I’ve ever failed to receive a letter. Ever.

Wednesday, 2008-11-05; 20:56:38

Dear California:

Today is bittersweet. The majority of the nation, including you, celebrates the election of President Obama, and it’s hard not to feel a sigh of relief that the national policies of the last eight years will be put behind us in a few short months. I have to admit that even I stopped to watch Obama’s acceptance speech.

But while you helped elect President Obama yesterday, California, you also approved Proposition 8.

It’s hard not to take this as a blow to the stomach. It makes me bitter. It makes me angry. It makes me sad. Just five months ago, I thought we struck a bellwether blow for the gay rights movement. But yesterday, you decided to take it away.

Proposition 8 in California is symbolic. California offers comprehensive benefits for domestic partnerships equal to those offered for marriages. And California law cannot affect federal law. But there are still many who take the symbolic rights afforded by marriage very personally, and to take them away is sending a powerful message to those people.

California, you approved a doctrine that we thought was long behind us. Yesterday, you approved the idea of “separate but equal”. You approved of the fact that it is OK to separate partnerships into two groups in the eyes of the law, based solely on gender. It is hard to see how this is anything but subtly implying that one kind of partnership is inferior to the other. If everyone is afforded equal rights, why separate us out? If our own United States history is any guide, “separate but equal” is never equal.

California, I realize that the passage of this proposition doesn’t tangibly affect anyone’s rights. But it does affect some people themselves. Today I was unable to hold back my tears for a few minutes because of the subtle message of inferiority that Proposition 8 projects to everybody in California.

Arkansas yesterday banned gay couples from adopting children. Yesterday, Arizona and Florida also voted to ban gay marriage, but their state laws do not provide for comprehensive domestic partnerships rights as does California. And in yet another 33 states, same-sex couples do not have the same rights as opposite-sex couples.

California, does this sit right with you? You are OK with “separate but equal”, but are you OK with “unequal”? Because that’s the situation in those other states.

California, if there is anything I want you to take away, it is this: your symbolic vote could have sent a message to the country that unequal rights are not OK. You could have stood up for same-sex couples to help argue for their rights in other states. You could have stopped the alarming trend of relegating same-sex couples to second-class status across this nation.

To those who helped attempt to defeat Proposition 8:

I know it’s hard. You’re angry, you’re bitter, you’re sad. And we were so, so close.

But take heart. A little under a decade ago, California was asked the same question, with Proposition 22. California approved Proposition 22 with 61% support. Yesterday, California approved Proposition 8 with 52% support. Progress.

Change does not come easily. Change comes slowly, over decades and even centuries. Almost a century and a half has passed since the abolishment of slavery, and over four decades have passed since the passage of the Voting Rights Act and the African-American civil rights movement. Only yesterday did we elect our first African-American president. And so must change come slowly to the gay rights movement as well.

It is easy to be hostile and lash out against California as bigots. It is easy to blame Californians as being susceptible to false advertisements fueled by money and the Yes on 8 campaign, by pointing to polls that put Proposition 8 as failing in the double-digits in June. But I suspect that we never really convinced California of the necessity of marriage equality in the first place.

We, in California, are not fighting against bigotry, we are not fighting against dirty money. We are fighting the status quo.

Real social progress — actually convincing people that long-held convictions are wrong — is never made in the space of a single campaign. Deep convictions are next to impossible to reverse, and when they are, it takes years if not decades to do so. Can we really expect people in California to change their minds in half a year? It’s unrealistic. People, including those who worked hard to elect Obama, are way past tired of the past two years of campaigning. Can we really expect a political campaign to turn deeply-held opinions around when people are tired of listening?

Yesterday, I worked the polls in California, because I wanted not only to be a part of an historic election through voting, but also by assisting others to vote. And there are three encounters that stand out in my mind.

On Monday, a team of election workers, including me, helped to set up our precinct the day before yesterday’s election. Afterwards, one of the other workers, an elderly lady, probably in her 70s or 80s, engaged in a discussion about Proposition 8 with another of the poll workers and I.

This elderly lady was for Obama. She was outraged about disenfranchisement of African-Americans in southern states, tired of the lies coming from the McCain campaign, and just as anxious about hearing voting results from other states in the Presidential election as any of the rest of us.

But on Proposition 8, she didn’t understand. She didn’t understand why same-sex couples cared about marriage. She said that two people can live together for seven years and be recognized as a partnership because of that mere fact (a common-law marriage). She didn’t understand why same-sex couples cared about “a piece of paper”.

This lady represents one of those voters that we are still trying to convince.

On Tuesday, while the California polls were open, an elderly man of Mexican descent hobbled into our precinct, wanting to vote. He was from Santa Clara county, but at the wrong precinct, so he had to fill out the paperwork to file a provisional ballot. He couldn’t walk very well, and his hand wasn’t steady, so he had difficulty writing down his name, address, and signature. And then there was the ballot itself: two pages, one double-sided, with so many things to decide on. We gave him his ballot and had him go to one of the privacy booths to cast his vote.

But a couple minutes later he came back, confused. He pointed to the ballot, and in a halting voice said, “Obama?”

This elderly man took thirty minutes to fill out the paperwork, just to cast a vote for Obama. He represents one of those voters that have been convinced, that one thing is so important that he will dare to overcome all obstacles to make sure that thing happens. Not defeating Proposition 8, but electing Obama.

One of the other poll workers who also helped out at my precinct was a 17-year-old high school student, one who’s currently attend the same high school that I started attending a decade ago.

In talking with him, it was clear that marriage equality was something that is just taken for granted, much like ensuring the same rights for all races is something that almost everybody in this nation already takes for granted. He told me he has a family that’s ideologically split, with half being pretty conservative. He’s a Christian who attends church and, from what I could tell, participates in a lot of events through his church.

But it was clear that he took Proposition 8 seriously, he knew people who organized the phone bank at Stanford in opposition to Proposition 8, and he was unwavering on where he stood on the issue.

He represents someone of my generation, people who have been growing up during the modern gay rights movement, one who needs little to no convincing that marriage equality is important.

A political campaign does not convince the elderly lady at the polling place. A political campaign does not convince an elderly man to get to the polling place at all costs. A political campaign does not produce new citizens that take certain ideological shifts for granted. A political campaign is useful, but only for convincing those voters who are on the fence, to make sure that those voters who have a weak opinion actually go to the polls.

But a political campaign doesn’t change someone’s ideology. And marriage equality requires that change.

So feel dejected, feel shitty, feel outraged. Then continue to hammer away at the ideology that still supports “separate but equal” in California. Challenge ignorance about same-sex couples when you overhear it, show others that same-sex couples have the same great aspects — and problems — that opposite-sex couples do. Prove to others that all members of the LGBT community have the same desires, wants, needs, and should have the same rights as everyone else.

This takes time. It takes patience. We’ll get there, eventually.

Thursday, 2008-10-23; 12:34:14

Yesterday, I attended a meeting of the Graduate Student Council at Stanford. I do this every week, even though I’m not an elected member, because I think it’s good to stay informed about what’s going on in the Stanford graduate student community.

Earlier in the week, the Undergraduate Senate at Stanford had approved a resolution opposing Proposition 8, and the same resolution was presented to the GSC at yesterday’s meeting, with the goal of having both bodies formally oppose Proposition 8.

Proposition 8, if you somehow haven’t heard of it, is a ballot initiative in California that will eliminate the right of same-sex couples to marry. The California Supreme Court recently ruled that a previous law on the books was unconstitutional, and Proposition 8 seeks to overturn that decision by enshrining a definition of marriage — as between one man and one woman — into the California state constitution.

I’ve been thinking about this for the past day or so, and I want to write down why I object to this. Not because I feel slighted by the final outcome of the vote or because I think people misunderstand my position, but just to formalize my views for future reference.

A Monopoly on Civil Rights

One of the main arguments that was brought up in support of the resolution was the fact that Proposition 8 deals with civil rights. I agree. But there are many other decisions to be made on the California ballot that deal with civil rights.

Civil rights, as defined by the Oxford English Dictionary, are “the rights of citizens to political and social freedom and equality”. Proposition 4 deals with a woman’s right to choose whether to have an abortion or not regardless of the feelings or positions of others. This is “social freedom”. The government should not be in the business of telling a woman what she can and can’t do with her own body.

Proposition 11 deals with how the state of California constructs its districts, which determine which areas contain the constituents of state representatives, state senators, and U.S. representatives. Proposition 11 seeks to reduce the possibility of gerrymandering, which draws political lines creating districts that can minimize the effects of a certain portion of the population — blacks or latinos, for example — such that their views are not accurately represented in the state legislature or the U.S. Congress. This is “political equality”, i.e.: civil rights.

In fact, I would argue that the choice between McCain, Obama, and the numerous other third party candidates on the ballot is also a civil rights issue. Obama supports a woman’s right to choose, support’s equal rights for same-sex couples (even though he is formally against “gay marriage”), and wants to help equalize pay between the genders. These are social freedom, social equality, political equality, respectively, all parts of what is called “civil rights”. McCain wants to leave all three of these issues up to the states.

Why isn’t the GSC endorsing positions on any of these other issues? Why aren’t they formally opposing Proposition 4? Why aren’t they passing a resolution on Proposition 11? Why not endorse Barack Obama? Why focus solely on Proposition 8 if their reason for doing so is because of civil rights?

It’s an inconsistent policy, and, arguably, they’re taking a stand on the least important issue on the ballot — and this brings me to my next point.

Proposition 8 is Symbolic

Of the four decisions on the November ballot that I have cited above, I’d argue that Proposition 8 is the least important civil rights issue, despite it getting the lion’s share of attention by the media and by citizens.

California is one of the most progressive states in the nation, and already has passed laws that give same-sex couples the same state rights as opposite-sex couples. Sure, it’s defined under the term “domestic partnership” and not “marriage”, but the rights are, for the most part, there.

Furthermore, whether or not California allows same-sex couples to marry can not affect policy on a federal level. The Defense of Marriage Act was passed in 1996 under the Clinton administration and a Republican-controlled Congress. Same-sex couples can not file their federal income taxes jointly, and are not afforded the same rights as opposite-sex couples on the federal level. Preventing Proposition 8 from passing does not change this fact.

So if same-sex couples in California will still have no rights at the federal level regardless of whether Proposition 8 passes, and they’ll still have rights at the state level regardless of whether Proposition 8 passes, what’s the point of Proposition 8?

Symbolism.

Separating same-sex couple rights (domestic partnerships) and opposite-sex couple rights (marriages) creates a situation similar to segregation in schools based on race that was prominent in the United States just a few decades ago. Plessy v. Ferguson, a decision made by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1896 supported the idea of “separate but equal”, in regards to racially segregated schools in Kansas. But in 1954, the Supreme Court reversed its previous position in the case Brown v. Board of Education; in Chief Justice Earl Warren’s own words, “We conclude that the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.”

The same thing applies to “domestic partnerships” vs. “marriages”. Practically, the state legislature must ensure that when it passes new laws, it needs to make sure that the language applies equally to domestic partnerships as it does to marriages, and inevitably a few laws will fall through the cracks. The execution of maintaining equality between the two will also not necessarily be ideal. Domestic partnerships will always slightly lag behind marriages if they are created as a separate category. (Yes Gov. Palin, I do know my Supreme Court cases.)

But this doesn’t change the fact that same-sex couples already enjoy the same rights that opposite-sex couples do, at the state level.

Proposition 4, in contrast, tangibly takes away the rights of many women across the entire state to have an abortion, without being pressured into a decision one way or another by anybody else. These are tangible rights that are being taken away.

Proposition 11 hopes to reduce gerrymandering, which typically reduces the voice of minorities by causing their votes to effect little change in their representatives. The most important right defined by the constitution of the United States is the right to vote, and Proposition 11 could materially impact the make-up of the state legislature or California’s group of U.S. representatives. These are people that will be able to materially effect change at a state and federal level, and accurate representation of the state is paramount.

And the candidate who gets elected to the office of the Presidency of the United States has enormous impact on how laws are enacted such that he will be able to protect the civil rights of all Americans, or not, if he chooses to drag his feet. This decision will strongly affect the rights and freedoms afforded to Americans.

Proposition 8? Not so much. It’s symbolic, and symbolic votes can have a material impact too, but in terms of actual rights and freedoms, Propositions 4, 11, and voting for President will actually affect things much more broadly and much more quickly.

So for the GSC to vote only on a resolution opposing Proposition 8 is actually pretty ridiculous. And now we come to the final, strongest point.

Citizens Elect Representatives, Representatives do not Elect Citizens

In our democracy, or representative republic, such that it is, citizens elect their representatives. Citizens tell their representatives if they approve or disapprove of their job by electing them or not. Representatives should not tell citizens how to vote.

Similarly, in partial direct democracies like California, where citizens can directly enact or reject bills proposed by both the legislature and by other citizens, representatives should not tell citizens how to vote either. Propositions on the ballot are decided by citizens, not by representatives.

Civil Disobedience

I know it sucks that 50% of the state can say whether same-sex couples can get married or not. I know it sucks that federal law does not recognize same-sex marriages. And I do not support Proposition 8, and am supportive of strong efforts to convince other citizens to vote against Proposition 8 as well.

Stand in public and make a case to passers-by about why they should vote against Proposition 8. Stage protests and events and invite everybody to come and learn about why Proposition 8 is a terrible thing. Make a line connecting the NO arrow for Proposition 8 on your mail-in ballot, and then convince others to do the same. Organize counter-protests at pro-Proposition 8 rallies. Publicly oppose Proposition 8 and talk to all your friends about why they should oppose it. Even elected representatives from the GSC can personally endorse a NO vote for Proposition 8.

But elected bodies should shut the fuck up. They’re not my mother, and they’re not anybody else’s mother, and they can’t (and shouldn’t) tell us what to do.

Thursday, 2008-06-26; 04:03:00

Monday, 2007-05-28; 04:06:00

Tuesday, 2006-11-07; 11:39:00

Tuesday, 2006-09-26; 12:46:00

Wednesday, 2006-09-20; 02:22:00