Marriage Equality: One Year Later

Joaquin Tenedora-Forte

June 28, 2016

As we know June 26 marks the historic decision of the Supreme Court, that brought down same sex marriage bans. Making it so Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual people have the same rights as every person does, in marriage. The question becomes, what’s next?

 

Do not get me wrong. the LGBT community had made their biggest strive. Marriage equality can not be change for now. But there is some smaller fights that needed to be won.

As we all probably know in twenty plus states had no protection, what so ever, for its gay and lesbian citizens. You can get married on Saturday, post on FaceBook on Sunday and get fired on Monday. That is why the passage of the employment and housing non discrimination is so important. So that gay and lesbian people, (and Bisexual people in a same sex relationship) will never go through discrimination.

After the US got marriage for gay, lesbian and bisexual citizens it became less acceptable to discriminate agains Gay and Bisexual people. It became okay to discriminate agains Transgender people in the bathroom. Conservatives states like North Carolina pass laws that state that people should go to the bathroom of their birth and not as they identify as. how will this be implemented. I DO NOT KNOW. What about the FTM or female to male transgender.

I will not finish this article without tackling the big elephant in the room, What happened in Orlando two weeks ago which killed 49 souls is one of the biggest thing that happened to the gay community, and one of the worst hate crimes in US history. What should the LGBT community need to do to combat hate is to come out of the closet, the more LGBT people the general population knows the less chance for the community to get attack.

Lastly, The LGBT community had injured a lot of things in the process of coming in to this point. Finally, lets combat hate by love, and loving everyone not just white gay men, but every buddy else.

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My Year end special: My top five favorite stories of the year and my person of the year

Joaquin Tenedora-Forte 

December 30, 2015
5. Donald Trump entering the race for the White House- Do not get me wrong I hate this person a lot because of what he is saying. He have said some of the nastiest stuff in this election cycle, but do not get me wrong it is so much fun to watch. My favorite is when he attacked Carly Fiorina and said he would not like to see that face in the White House. 

 
4. The Charlie Hebdo Attacks- this is not my favorite story at all but this informs how I write, before the Charlie Hebdo attacks I am really scared of speaking my mind out but after the attacks at Charlie Hebdo, I said to my self that I really need to write about the issues that I care mostly about, like equality.

  
3. The 2016 presidential elections specially the republican debates- this had been a weird year as far as election is concern, as i said, since Mr Trump had entered the race, America has been fixated on him but not talking about the issues at hand.

  
2. The Syrian Refugee Crisis- This is such a sad story that I could not even believe that I will be writing this on the blog, but it need to be talk about. The Syrian civil war have so many innocent lives taken from us. The best thing we can do is help people in need. Do not be scared of Muslim refugees. America has the most robust screening process of refugees In the world.  

  
My favorite story of the year is Marriage equality in the USA: On 26 June of this year the United States Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision, states that marriage is a right under the 14th Amendment of the constitution. I think that it will be a stepping stone for many countries to do the same.

  

My person of the year will be Donald Trump

Op-Ed:The effects of gay parenting on the child

Joaquin Tenedora-Forte November 4, 2015
In the decision by the United States Supreme Court last June that states that marriage is a fundamental human right. The decision meant that a family with same sex parents will not be look down by the government. It also meant that gay people will have a good family life, so what are the effects if any: positive or negative to their children. 

  
In the history of studying this subject from the 1980’s till this day, there have been three stages of studies. In the 1980’s, the impacts are negative, they said that gay people adopting children will lead to all of the societal ills. To the 90’s where in the scientific community is divided. To today that they are in perfect agreement, that the modern family is good for children. 

  
In a consolidation analysis done by Northwestern University that states that gay parents are no more loving and caring than a traditional family. Furthermore the researchers say that there are some advantages to LGBT parenting like empathy for others because of the prejudices towards them. And the rejections of gender norms, because in a same sex household there is no man and woman, there are only parents.

  
According to the same study kids that are raise by lesbians did the best on all this test, empathy, higher grades in school and more. The theory is that two woman raising children are better because women are more caring and loving, and that lesbians are more likely to not cheat on their spouses. We all know that kids do well if the parents stay together.

  
Lastly, it is not about the plumbing but the love that they have for their kids. The love that a parents have for their son or daughter is unconditional. Finally 99 percent of gay people need to plan to have children, either thru adoption or thru IVF so as a result they will love and cherish the kids that they have

LGBT Monday: Kim Davis is no Martin Luther King jr. She is more like Bull Conner

 Joaquin Tenedora Forte
If you follow the news this days, especially LGBT news blogs, you will recognize Kim Davis. Kim Davis is this woman who do not want to give out marrage licenses to all couples, not just LGBT couples in Kentucky because of her religious beliefs. Mind you she is married and divorced three different times. I would not mind the most hipocritical things about her and her life.

  
On June 26 2015, the Supreme Court of the United States in the grounds of the 14th Amendment. equal protection and due process clause: decided that the right to same sex marriage should not be denied. On June 29, Monday, the problems began when people like Kim Davis denied marriage licenses to people of the same gender because of their religious beliefs.

  
The problem is that it is illegal what she is doing because she is a representative of the state. The law of the land states that Marriage is a fondimental Hunan right. And even if she have a right to her own religious beliefs according to the first amendment religious freedom clause she need to put her beliefs in her sleeves. If She do not want to give out same sex marriage licenses, she should resign herself. She is violating the court order. It’s just right that she was jailed.
After she got out of jail, Presidential candidate and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee join Kim Davis on stage protesting her sentence, comparing her to all sorts of activist and president Abraham Lincoln, Rossa Parks and the great Martin Luther King jr. I believe the absurdity of governor Huckabee here, he is really dumb.

  
Lastly, I want to say this Kim Davis wants to be remembered as a civil rights hero. But she will not be, the trend is moving towards a liberal outcome. Finally Kim Davis is not Martin Luther King jr. She is more like Bull Conner (the governor who blocked the door of an elementary school during desegregation.)

The intersectionality of Loving vs Virginia and Obergafell vs Hodges

Joachim Tenedora-Forte    
      Did you know that in the recent marriage equality case (Obergafell vs Hodges) there have been multiple mentions of the Loving case. But why? Why do they invoke the Loving’s in to gay marriage cases. The answer is the two cases is about Love and marriage, the love that people have for their chosen spouse. 

        When we say intersectionality we mean the connection between different circumstances that intertwined. The binding force between this two cases is marriage rights. The right of people to live together in dignity. That right for same sex couples and for interracial couples are not always granted because of traditions.

    
          Marriage should be a legal contract between two consenting adults, regardless of its race, sex or sexual orientation. To form a marital union you need to have LOVE. In both the Loving case and Obergafell case love is involved. The love that Mr. and Mrs. Loving have for each other is reasonable, same as the love between Jim Obergafell and his deceased spouse John Arthur. 

         When you love another person you will fight for that love even in court. Like the Loving’s, Jim Obergafell’s love for John Arthur is unconditional and exceeded pass John’s death. That unconditional love at least in justice Anthony Kennedy’s eyes is a fundamental human right.

      Lastly, I want to eco justice Anthony Kennedy’s majority opinion in Obergafell vs Hodges. Marriage is about love, fidelity and family and that by fourteen states denying the right of marriage on the basis of sexual orientation is a violation of the fourteenth amendment; the equal protection and due process clause. It should not be denied. 

Have a happy safe Independence Day America

 Independence in the context of LGBT rights
   
 
  
 

Joaquin Tenedora-Forte

       Tomorrow is already 4th of July, U.S. Independence Day. It doesn’t mean fireworks and barbecues. It meant freedom. And the American Experience. Immigration and the American Dream. America is worth fighting for. Because..

    Last week, in the historic decision the Supreme Court said that gay marriage is a fundamental right it shouldn’t be denied. But while it was a momentous event but the fight is not over. Marriage is not the end of all the civil rights for the LGBT community. Although you can get married in all 50 states, but you can be fired in 30 or more states. So America should fix that too. 

   One of the untold story of the LGBT community is immigration, people in American now have marriage equality other countries don’t, since the Philippines or China or these Central American countries don’t even want to recognize gay marriages. The problem becomes when people want to petition their partners from other countries, they can’t because they are strangers in their laws back home.   

      The biggest disappointment in the community is HIV. People thought that after they got the medicine for AIDS, that people will just take the medicine and there will be no deaths due to AIDS. Today people are still dying. The biggest concentration are young black and Latino men, unlike the infections of the past, this young men of color came from conservative households where in people don’t teach their young how to adequately deal with unprotected sex.

       Independence Day mean that people who are young don’t even know what sacrifices that people need to do in order to for them to be happy and its okey: Happy 4th of July 

The history of the LGBT movement in America

Joaquin Tenedora-Forte
        On Friday June 26, 2015, the Supreme Court of the United States that said that the ban of gay marriage in America is unconstitutional. In a five to four decision the high court ruled in favor of James Obergefell sighting the fourteenth amendment; to the equal protection under the law. Today Let us reflect on the history of the wonderful and beautiful LGBT movement in the United States.

  
       In 1957, a 33 year old Frank Kemeny who was from fired as an astronomer because he was gay, he protest near the White House saying equal rights for homosexuals. (In the 1950’s it is illegal to be gay in America,) setting the tone for the modern Gay Rights movement. 

        In the 1960s there have been a rise of activism in the U.S. for black Americans. But in June 1969 there have been a raid at a bar in New York’s The unrest at the Stonewall inn happen this month 46 years ago, sends a signal to America that the gays are people too and you can’t do that to them.

         The 1970’s saw a lot of activism, gay activism, Specially in the San Francisco Bay Area. By 1977 a 40 year old openly gay man named Harvey Milk ran for office, and won. But by November of the next year Milk was assassinated by Dan White a former city supervisor. The out cry of the gay community in San Fransisco was vast, the anger they felt was huge. 

 

harvy milk

        In the 1980’s fueled by the death of Harvey Milk the activism continues for the LGBT community. But by the mid 1980’s there have been massive deaths in the community. It was cause by unprotected sex, it was AIDS. It meant that people are dying and vulnerable, partners, aren’t allowed by the families to be in their partners bedside during their dying hours. 

  
       By 1989 27 year old journalist and gay activists from England Andrew Sullivan argue for same sex marriage. He got laughs from the gay community, the idea is too new to the community. Sullivan is diagnosed with HIV two years later.

  
       A new administration came in 1993 the democratic president Bill Clinton gives a new hope, a new hope for LGBT Americans but aside from the medications for AIDS. President Clinton is hostile to the idea of Same Sex Marriage, and letting gay people to serve openly in the military, so he sign the Defense of Marriage Act the will not recognize gay marriages at the federal level. And the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell which prevents gay people from serving in the military openly.

  

      The new millennium came and just one state with civil unions, Vermont, in 1998 a men is arrested for sodomy, John Lawrence. Lawrence and his partner are making out, when a neighbor saw them, he called 9-1-1, the two guys were arrested accused of sodomy. In Texas sodomy is a crime so they put the two men in jail. But the two men fought. And in 2003 it reaches the Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision the court said that all sodomy laws are unconstitutional, basically reversing Boweers vs hardwick in 1986.

        Since sodomy is declared unconstitutional in 2003. The next year, in 2004 Massachusetts became the first state to have same sex marriage. That same year President Bush ran in anti gay campaign. Gay marriage is in the standstill. In 2009 gay marriage became legal in two different states Iowa and Vermont. (California is different because in 2008 they legalize but due to prop 8, it was stopped. the Supreme Court in 2013 decided it was unconstitutional.)      

Personal stories

            Edith and her partner Thea Spyre were married in Toronto Canada on 2007 on their fourteenth year together They were residents of New York so live there. but by 2009 Thea died. Because they are not married under the federal government, they are strangers. Edie needed to pay more than three hundred thousand dollars in estate taxes. So she fought for the right to marriage, it went to the federal court then the Supreme Court Which in 5 to 4 decision she won.

  
     James Obergefell and John Arthur were married in the airport of Maryland in 2013. John Arthur was diagnosed with ALS two years earlier, and died in their home state of Ohio. The problem becomes because Ohio don’t recognize gay marriages they can’t put Jim on John’s death certificate. Jim fought and it was a hard fight and in the 5-4 decision marriage was given in 50 states of the Union.
       50 years since Frank Kemeny was first fired from his job. 46 years since stonewall, 35 years since Harvey Milk ran for office. 27 years since AIDS first break out. 19 years since president Clinton sign DOMA. 12 years since Lawrence vs Texas. 11 years since Massachusetts. 5 years since Thea Spyre died. 2 years since DOMA was replied We are here. on June 26 2015 the Supreme Court said that love and liberty wins.