Jon Stewart comments on the fact that the large African-American turnout for Obama in California also voted 70% for the ban on gay marriage, which helped it pass.
Also contributing to the irony, and definitely worth a read, is Robert Kirby’s column in the Salt Lake Tribune. Utah Mormons are estimated to have contributed 70% of the funds to pass the gay marriage ban in California, at the direct encouragement of the Mormon church. Even so, Kirby says “Not only do I not care if gays get married, it is none of my business.” But the last line of his column is the best one: “if you’re really serious about putting a stop to gay sex, let them get married.”
And finally, isn’t it ironic that the Mormon Church — famous for its early support of polygamy, and founded by a man who had 30 wives — now fights so hard to define marriage to be between one man and one woman?
UPDATE: Andrew Sullivan in The Atlantic (who is gay) has a very interesting piece pointing out the hypocrisy of gays attacking blacks because blacks voted for banning gay marriage in California, because there is evidence of racism among those same gays. More gays voted Republican in the 2008 presidential election (27%) than in the 2004 election (23%), even though Obama has a far better record on gay rights issues than McCain. As one of his readers puts it:
As a married gay man I’m upset about Prop 8, but I’m also upset about this blame-the-blacks line. The black vote in California simply wasn’t large enough to make a difference, so why are people focusing on that? The eagerness to jump on the black vote for Prop 8, together with the statistic above, points to a smoldering issue in the gay community.
More evidence supporting the old saw that victims of intolerance ironically sometimes learn to be more intolerant of others themselves?
