I Want a Whole Milk Marriage, Not Skim

I can't help but feel so incredibly fired up while simultaneously frustrated by the news surrounding DOMA.  It makes me want to scream and pull my hair out and wonder why everyone in this country doesn't see what seems to be so obvious to me. Why is it so important to change DOMA?  Well, in case you weren't aware, there are more than 1,000 federal laws that confer benefits of one sort or another on married couples — everything from tax savings to Social Security benefits - but DOMA excludes those benefits for legally married same-sex couples, even at the state level for those states that have already legalized same-sex marriage.

The case that was heard at the Supreme Court today involves a New York couple, Edith Windsor and Thea Spyer, who had been together for 42 years prior to their marriage in 2007. When Spyer died, however, the federal government, acting under DOMA, required Windsor to pay $363,000 in estate taxes that she would not have owed if her spouse had been a man.

Ironically, the 14th Amendment guarantees all citizens equal protection of the law.  Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg argued today that DOMA creates a two-tier system or as she put it, "full marriage and skim-milk marriage" equating same-sex marriage to skim milk in that it's lacking in wholeness.  Supporters of DOMA argue that the traditional definition of marriage is "between a man and a woman" and it would be an abomination to god only knows who if that were to change. Imagine what would happen if we (as a people of "equal protection") redefined this definition to remove all references to gender.  Surely it would undermine the hundreds of thousands of heterosexual marriages that exist today.

At the end of the day, there is one thing for me that is certain; I will not ever get married to a man, it's simply not an option for me. Being gay is not a choice just as much as having green eyes is not a choice. Could I cover my eyes with colored contact lenses? Sure, just as I could pretend to act straight (well, I could certainly try).  But at the end of the day, my eyes are still going to be green and I'm still going to be as gay as a rainbow over San Francisco.  I do know that someday I will get married to a woman and I will call it marriage, regardless of what anyone thinks about the "traditional definition". And I will continue to fight for those 1,000 benefits that are not currently afforded to same-sex marriages.  And for the record, I really hate skim milk.  I want my milk whole just like I would want my marriage.