Ten Reasons Why This Election Was Bittersweet

Last night, with the election of Barack Obama as our nation’s 44th President, history was made. Our country spoke – clearly – and for the first time ever an African American was voted into the highest political office. Additionally, LGBT voters everywhere celebrated the fact that an ally to our community will finally lead this country and fight for equality for all Americans. Barack Obama’s victory last night was wonderful, inspiring, invigorating, and will change the world for the better. Despite this great accomplishment, however, news out of Arizona, Florida, Arkansas, and California tells us that we still have a long way to go before there are truly equal rights in this country and changes what should have been overwhelming joy to something far more bittersweet.

Here are the Ten Reasons Why This Election Was Bittersweet:

10. Arkansas Initiative 1 Passed. This is a ban on gay couples adopting children. This measure prohibits unmarried “sexual partner[s]” from adopting children or from serving as foster parents.
9. Arizona Proposition 102 Passed. This was a ban on gay marriage. This measure is amending the state constitution so that only a union between one man and one woman would be valid or recognized as a marriage in the state.
8. Florida Amendment 2 Passed. This is a ban on gay marriage. This measure amends the state constitution to define marriage as a union between one man and one woman.
7. California Proposition 8 Passed. This is a ban on gay marriage. This measure will amend the state constitution to specify that only marriages between one man and one woman would be recognized as valid in the state. This trumps a May 2008 ruling by the California Supreme Court that legalized same-sex marriage.
6. Proposition 8 Could Affect Existing Gay Marriages. A personal loss for the thousands of couples from California and others states who got married in the brief window when they could, legal experts said courts will now have to resolve whether their unions still are valid.

But…

5. South Dakota Initiative 11 failed. In a women’s rights victory, this measure would have prohibited all abortions in the state except in cases where mother’s life or health is at risk or in cases of rape or incest for pregnancies of less than 20 weeks.
4. Colorado Amendment 48 failed. Another women’s rights victory, this ballot sought to define human life from moment of conception. This measure would have amended the state constitution to define the term “person” to include “any human being from the moment of fertilization.” This definition would have been applied to all aspects of the state constitution, including the provisions that ensure that no person has his or her life, liberty, or property taken away without due process of law. Thus, the measure would have essentially had the effect of banning abortion.
3. HRC-Endorsed Candidates Secured Victories Across the Country. Pro-LGBT candidates and openly gay and lesbian politicians won key races in various states. For a complete list of the winners who support our rights visit www.HRC.org.
2. Connecticut Voters Rejected a Plan for the State to Hold a Convention to Make Changes to its Constitution. Opponents of same-sex marriage had expressed hope that a convention could lead to a ballot initiative to ban the practice, which the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled legal last month.
1. With Barack Obama Comes Change. Clearly all of the election news has not been positive for the LGBT community. There have been some major losses. But, with the election of Barack Obama we now have hope that equality will come. With him as our President we have new strength, new passion for our rights, and a President that respects us as equals. He even included us in his amazing speech last night when he said:

If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.

It’s the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen; by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the very first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different; that their voice could be that difference.

It’s the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled – Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been a collection of Red States and Blue States: we are, and always will be, the United States of America.

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