DEL.ICIO.USRallies in Atlanta, U.S. protest Proposition 8
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Gay rights supporters waving rainbow colors marched, chanted and danced in cities coast to coast Saturday to protest the California vote that banned gay marriage there.
At the Georgia Capitol, more than 1,500 opponents of California’s Proposition 8 crowded the plaza and steps, spilling onto Washington Street.
M. Spencer Green / AP
IN CHICAGO: Hundreds of protesters hold signs condemning Californians’ approval of a ban on marriage among gays and lesbians in the city’s Federal Plaza on Saturday, when supporters of gay marriage demonstrated in cities across the nation.
Rhonda Cook / rcook@ajc.com
IN ATLANTA: A rally organized by Georgia Equality drew more than 1,500 people to the State Capitol to protest California’s gay marriage ban. ‘I think that we have a long way to go with gay rights, and people need to realize it’s not just supported by gay people,’ one participant said.
Speakers led the crowd in chants during the Saturday afternoon protest.
“We support marriage equality,” said Carlton Eden, who attended the Atlanta rally with his wife, Claire, and three daughters. “We believe everyone should be able to marry.”
Another Atlanta demonstrator, Casey Calahan-Fitzgerald, said, “I
think that we have a long way to go with gay rights, and people need to realize it’s not just supported by gay people.”
Nationwide, demonstrators cast Prop 8 as a civil rights issue. One sign in Boston read, “Gay is the new black.”
“Civil marriages are a civil right, and we’re going to keep fighting until we get the rights we deserve as American citizens,” Karen Amico said in Philadelphia, holding up a sign reading “Don’t Spread H8.”
“We are the American family, we live next door to you, we teach your children, we take care of your elderly,” said Heather Baker, a special education teacher from Boston who addressed the crowd at Boston’s City Hall Plaza.
“We need equal rights across the country.”
Connecticut, which began same-sex weddings this past week, and Massachusetts are the only two states that allow gay marriage.
All 30 states that have voted on gay marriage have enacted bans.
The Los Angeles Police Department estimated that 40,000 people would attend the march there.
Both sides on the Proposition 8 debate made religious arguments at the demonstration outside Los Angeles City Hall.
Among about half a dozen Prop 8 supporters was Dan Burton, 50, a retired air traffic controller, who held a sign that said, “Gays hate God. Romans 1:18-32,” a reference to biblical passages denouncing wickedness and debauchery.
“There’s two sides to every story,” Burton said. “Most people in this country don’t want gay marriage, because it’s biologically, culturally and religiously perverse.”
Protests following the vote on Proposition 8 in California, which defines marriage as between a man and a woman, have sometimes been angry and even violent, and demonstrators have targeted faiths that supported the ban, including the Mormon Church.
However, representatives of Join the Impact, which organized Saturday’s demonstrations, asked supporters to be respectful and refrain from attacking other groups during the rallies.
Seattle blogger Amy Balliett, who started the planning for the protests when she set up a Web page three days after the
California vote, said persuasion is impossible without civility.
“If we can move anybody past anger and have a respectful conversation, then you can plant the seed of change,” she said.
The protests were widely reported to be peaceful, but anger over the ban and its backers was evident at the protests.
One sign in Chicago read: “Catholic Fascists Stay Out of Politics.”
“I just found out that my state doesn’t really think I’m a person,” said Rose Aplustill, 21, a Boston University student from Los Osos, Calif., who was one of thousands at the Boston rally.
In San Francisco, demonstrators vilified the Mormon Church and its abandoned practice of polygamy.
One sign read: “You have three wives; I want one husband.”
Contributing: Rhonda Cook, rcook@ajc.com; Associated Press writers in seven cities; and the Los Angeles Times.
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