Texas Governor Rick Perry signed a resolution last week to amend the Texas constitution by banning same-sex marriage. As the amendment must be approved by voters in November, the resolution was only ceremonial, but it represents Governor Perry's disregard for the rights and needs of GLBT Texans.
Upon signing the bill, he responded to a question about how he would tell gay and lesbian war veterans returning home from Iraq that they could not marry. He responded that "Texans made a decision about marriage and if there's a state that has more lenient views than Texas, then maybe that's a better place for them to live."
If you are gay and live in Texas, pretty soon you'll have to drink from the gays-only water fountain, it seems.
Now, I don't really care about gay marriage that much -- hardly at all, I think it's a non-starter -- but I do care about blatant discrimination and laws intended to make one targeted segment of the population so inequal and so uncomfortable that sum effect (and, in fact, stated intention) is to ride them out of town on a rail.
I take cold comfort in knowing that I didn't vote for these backward-thinking Taliban. But it pains me daily when I consider that people I work with, know, and love voted for them simply because they were Republicans.
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