(YADAME/RW) = Yet Another Diary about Marriage Equality/Rick Warren)
Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross introduced the world to the Five Stages of Grief in her 1969 book, On Death and Dying. This model has been used to model how people handle shock, grief, and tragedy. Most people who take a psychology course or two in college run across this model at some point or another, as do those who have experienced the loss of a loved one.
In the past 6-7 weeks, the gay community (which I'm part of) has been hit by blow after blow of events that have caused great grief to the majority of its members. For many, it started on November 4th, when California, Arizona, and Florida passed laws that banned marriage equality for gay and lesbian residents, and Arkansas passed a law banning unmarried and gay couples from adopting.
As a Californian, it was even more painful for me, as I'd only gotten married to my husband on the 1st, and now my marriage was up in the air. I was part of one of the 18,000+ couples whose marriages were now potentially invalidated, and I was in the process of grief.
The first stage, denial, I'd already been through in the days leading up to the vote. I refused to believe that the double-digit lead the proposition had had towards its defeat had evaporated, and that the possibility of things going south couldn't possibly exist. Then, anger hit. My husband, LeftOfArizona, can verify this. I was pissed at pretty much anything and everything that had anything to do with the Yes on 8 side, but also angry with myself for feeling like I'd not done enough to help.
November 4th brought stage 3, bargaining. Once the reality of the vote hit, I was looking around, trying to figure out a way to undo the damage that had been done. Visions of lawsuits danced through my head, as well as fantasies of taking every Mormon, African-American, and Republican voter that had voted for Proposition 8 I could find and smacking them in the face until they apologized for wrecking my honeymoon that had started on November 5th.
Fortunately, going to Canada helped speed me through stage 4, depression, and quickly pushed me into stage 5, acceptance. I realized that while Proposition 8 had passed, my ability to do something in response had not gone away. Rallies were being planned, and I found my voice and my way of making sure that I now could do the things that I hadn't done before.
People pass through these stages in different ways, at different speeds. It's entirely feasible that there are many who haven't yet finished the cycle after November 4th. So, when the notice came through on December 17th that Rick Warren was giving the invocation at President-Elect Barack Obama's inauguration, many of us who had finished reeling from November 4th were thrown right back into the swing of it again. This time around, our roller coaster ride was hampered further by those who felt that telling us "it's not a big deal" would somehow assist us, or knock us out of our process of feeling as though we'd suffered yet another loss.
For me, I was mourning the feeling that President-Elect Obama really failed to understand how much of a slap in the face it was. It was an insult to me, to invite a man who had campaigned and proclaimed that LOA and I, as one of the horde of gay couples, had a marriage that was equivalent to that of an incestuous relationship, among other things, to provide the inaugural invocation. I had jumped past denial pretty fast, and went straight to anger. Many of us did. Some were still in denial, and some had already moved on to bargaining and/or acceptance.
However, well-intended or not, understanding or not, saying "It's not a big deal" or "why are you so angry about this?" does not help a grieving person process faster. In many cases, it helps to stop the process cold in its tracks, or even backtrack. As a collective group, those of us who had been hurt needed to process the pain, and we were creating our own support forum through diaries and comments. The "get over it" comments just served as insensitive reminders of the pain we were feeling at this perceived betrayal, and for a number of us, this was the second time in as many months that we had to go through this feeling again.
Today, a third blow landed, with Ken Starr filing on behalf of Prop 8 supporters to nullify the same-sex marriages that had already been performed in California. A third process started, and more insensitive voices clamored: "Stop whining", "are you going to cry because he's been invited to the inauguration? Oh...", and others like those were stated on here.
If you're tired of reading about marriage-equality diaries, I implore you to think of this: those of us who feel keenly on this issue are hurting badly now. We're in emotional, and potentially spiritual, mental, and/or physical pain from all the hits we're taking. If you were made aware of someone who had lost their spouse a month ago, then found out in the space of two days they lost a grandparents, and then a parent, would you tell them to stop their crying? That it wasn't such a bad thing in the grand scheme of things because they're still alive? My thought is that you wouldn't, because that would be horribly insensitive, and most of us feel as though we're sufficiently capable of understanding another person's grief to be able to help them through it effectively.
Our diaries on here are our means of expressing our grief, our pain, our outrage. We will get past it, eventually. Some will pass through quickly, and come out the other end with concrete ideas quickly. Some will take longer, and require more sympathy and empathy to allow them the opportunity to sort through all of the myriad feelings they are having.
In my case, I'm on the anger stage, doubly so. I'm angry at Barack Obama for allowing Rick Warren to gain legitimacy in the eyes of the American people, and doubly so now that Ken Starr is pushing for something that I'm sure Mr. Warren supports, which is the dissolution of my marriage to my husband, against my will. I agree that it is entirely possible that President-Elect Obama is thinking further ahead than I am currently able to, and maybe in the long run his decision will do greater things than inviting someone such as Gene Robinson to provide the invocation.
I am just asking for the opportunity, for myself if not others, to grieve and process the shocks I've received. It's what I would like to think I could provide to you when your time of need arrives. Please, before you snark about the two minutes of invocation time, or how there are larger things to be concerned about, understand that many of us believe this issue is neither miniscule nor worthy of mockery.
In our time of need, provide us with something that will allow us to process. Even if that thing is a space which you might normally fill with a jab or a derisive comment.
Edit: Wow... rescued my first time out. That's just really cool. Thanks to mem from somerville for doing so, and for everyone who's commented so far. It's really an honor as a first-time diarist for this to happen.