It is difficult when facing an economic catastrophe to remember the social wrongs inflicted on disadvantaged and minority groups. Civil rights issues tend to take a predictable backseat at a time when unemployment numbers rivaling those of the Great Depression seem to be right around the corner.
Still, the issue of marriage equality remains extremely important to millions of LGBT Americans and their straight allies, and the battle for public opinion must be fought now in order to achieve electoral victories in the future.
With that in mind, the Courage Campaign has a new must-see video out called Fidelity:
"Fidelity": Don't Divorce... from Courage Campaign on Vimeo.
The issue here is that while Proposition 8 outlawed marriage equality across the state in the future, the legislation is not legally binding to nullify the marriages that took place between the CA Supreme Court's decision and the passage of Prop 8. Led by Ken Starr (yes, that Ken Starr), anti-equality groups have been pushing the CA Supreme Court to invalidate those marriages--to divorce those couples.
This is especially infuriating, as one of the primary critiques made by the rightists against the Home Invasion ad I helped create was that legally married couples would not be forcibly divorced post facto. Of course, that was entirely the point, and the battle in which we find ourselves currently engaged.
With this video, ArnoldBucks (also a blogger-inspired idea!), Camp Courage, and California Carol, Courage Campaign has, simply put, been on fire lately. But this is the best of the lot: there is no better way to communicate the pain caused by the passage of Proposition 8 than to show the real people whose lives, relationships and families were profoundly affected by this unconstitutional crap.
If you want to help give it some love, Reddit and Digg it! A YouTube version is also available. And don't forget to take a moment to sign the petition asking the Supreme Court to do the right thing by protecting these married couples.
The economic news is bad enough: we don't need to make things any worse by forcibly divorcing loving couples.
Full disclosure: my research consulting firm conducted a paid contract research project for the Courage Campaign campaign prior to the November election.