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June 26, 2015 7:03 AM Subscribe

Jim Obergefell and John Arthur had been together nearly two decades when John was stricken by terminal ALS. With their union unconstitutional in Ohio, the couple turned to friends and family to fund a medical flight to Maryland, where they wed, tearfully, on the tarmac [prev.]. After John's death, however, Jim found himself embroiled in an ugly legal battle with his native state over the right to survivor status on John's death certificate -- a fight he eventually took all the way to the Supreme Court. And that's how this morning -- two years after U.S. v. Windsor, a dozen after Lawrence v. Texas, and at the crest of an unprecedented wave of social change -- the heartbreaking case of Obergefell v. Hodges has at long last rendered same-sex marriage legal nationwide in a 5-4 decision lead by Justice Anthony Kennedy.

A map of the status of same-sex marriage in the U.S. prior to the decision

SCOTUSblog case file: Obergefell v. Hodges, including a Plain English rundown of the oral arguments from April (which you can listen to here)

Katie Couric's interview with Jim Obergefell

The New Yorker relates the case to Griswold v. Connecticut's impact on reproductive choice

How Joe Biden forced Obama's hand on gay marriage in 2012. Candidate Clinton has experienced her own dramatic shift, while the Republican field remains circumspect.

The Atlantic asks: After Same-Sex Marriage, What's Next?

The Onion's view from the future: Future U.S. History Students: 'It's Pretty Embarrassing How Long You Guys Took To Legalize Gay Marriage'

From the "The Past Is A Foreign Country" department: The National Organization for Marriage's 2009 "Gathering Storm" ad (and withering parodies of it from Futurama, The Colbert Report, Funny or Die, and Wake Up World). Or palette cleanse with this moving 2011 ad from GetUp! Australia. [previously]

posted by Rhaomi (1210 comments total) 348 users marked this as a favorite

Woo!
posted by Captain_Science at 7:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

This is excellent news! For America!
posted by wikipedia brown boy detective at 7:04 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Holy shit dudes.
posted by shakespeherian at 7:04 AM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

Happy Marriage Equality Day!
posted by SkylitDrawl at 7:04 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

So much incoming WargleBargle.
posted by Lord_Pall at 7:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

This is such a relief. I was scared it could turn out some other way...
posted by Zalzidrax at 7:05 AM on June 26, 2015

Wow. Congratulations, America!
posted by two or three cars parked under the stars at 7:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Love wins!
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 7:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

!!!!
posted by Lutoslawski at 7:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

BOOM.
posted by dirtdirt at 7:06 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

The decision also requires the states to recognize a marriage between two people of the same sex when a marriage was lawfully licensed and performed out of state.
posted by Sangermaine at 7:06 AM on June 26, 2015 [92 favorites]

Also, Woot!
posted by Lord_Pall at 7:06 AM on June 26, 2015

YES! Happy tears and happy dances and marriage for all Americans! Let the bells ring out for joy!
posted by MonkeyToes at 7:06 AM on June 26, 2015

Yes!!
posted by marxchivist at 7:06 AM on June 26, 2015

Yay!
posted by ogooglebar at 7:06 AM on June 26, 2015

MANDATORY SAME SEX MARRIAGES FOR EVERYONE!
posted by zombieflanders at 7:06 AM on June 26, 2015 [176 favorites]

Oh man all four dissenting justices wrote a dissent. Get ready for more conservative SCOTUS saltiness!
posted by DynamiteToast at 7:07 AM on June 26, 2015 [34 favorites]

FINALLY
posted by schmod at 7:07 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Here's hoping Scalia complained about "jiggery-pokery" again.
posted by DynamiteToast at 7:07 AM on June 26, 2015 [103 favorites]

I ... I just ... I'm ...
posted by kyrademon at 7:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

I can't express how happy this makes me.
posted by Thorzdad at 7:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Someday soon Scalia is just going to collapse into a singularity from all the bitterness.
posted by Sangermaine at 7:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [55 favorites]

Woohoo!
posted by bondcliff at 7:08 AM on June 26, 2015

!!!!!
posted by lullaby at 7:08 AM on June 26, 2015

UGH I am planning to stay home tonight to make a blueberry pie for tomorrow's D&D game and now I want to go out and CELEBRATE! Really I should make the pie and go to bed early but...

If anyone knows of any crazy festivities in DC let me know. I won't attend because pie/D&D but I'd like to know anyway.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 7:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

If you'll just excuse me, I have a goblet of Scalia's tears to savour.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 7:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [104 favorites]

Go read the decision! It's up here (.pdf).
posted by MonkeyToes at 7:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

HAPS4LOVE2WIN!!1!
posted by The Vice Admiral of the Narrow Seas at 7:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Yesssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

*spikes a football, does a little dance in front of Scalia*
posted by kmz at 7:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

here is the full text of the opinion.

No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right.

The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is reversed.
posted by wikipedia brown boy detective at 7:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [192 favorites]

Yay! Cue the wailing and gnashing of teeth by the more conservative members of my family. I intended to just sit and s.m.i.l.e.
posted by theBigRedKittyPurrs at 7:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

I'm shocked and elated that the forces of light eked out a win. It's the end if the world as we know it. And we all feel fine.
posted by mondo dentro at 7:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

(Out of curiosity... did you also have a version of this post for if Kennedy decided to fuck up his legacy? :-P)
posted by kmz at 7:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

FUCKIN-A, USA!
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 7:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Oh man all four dissenting justices wrote a dissent. Get ready for more conservative SCOTUS saltiness!

Scalia's dissent begins: "I join THE CHIEF JUSTICE’s opinion in full. I write separately to call attention to this Court’s threat to American democracy." so that portends well, if your form of celebration is the "drinking tears" sort.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 7:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [43 favorites]

"Precedent protects the right of a married couple not to procreate, so the right to marry cannot be conditioned on the capacity or commitment to procreate." BOOM!
posted by Mogur at 7:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [80 favorites]

!!!
posted by Navelgazer at 7:11 AM on June 26, 2015

Also, you know, I grew up super conflicted and ashamed of my bisexuality, even with a very liberal family. It's amazing how much the world has changed since I was coping with this part of myself (I'm thirty-one now) and I am really, really hopeful that this will be easier for any of my future kids who happen not to be straight. This is really super amazing.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 7:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [62 favorites]

YAY! Congratulations everyone!
posted by triggerfinger at 7:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Helllllllllllll yesssssssssss!
posted by Ironmouth at 7:11 AM on June 26, 2015

Hooray from an office that is VERY VERY excited.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

June 26, 2003: Lawrence v Texas decided, making same-sex intercourse legal everywhere in the United States.

June 26, 2013: United States v Windsor decided, making the federal government's restriction of marriage to heterosexual couples invalid.

June 26, 2015: Obergefell v Hodges decided, making same-sex marriage legal everywhere in the United States.

...happy Pride, everyone.
posted by Lemurrhea at 7:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [120 favorites]

kmz: "(Out of curiosity... did you also have a version of this post for if Kennedy decided to fuck up his legacy? :-P)"

NOPE. Though I did add the margin in real time, hence the "lead" spelling screw-up.
posted by Rhaomi at 7:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

This is AMAZING. I'm crying, because I can't imagine the pain Jim has had to go through, and smiling so hard it hurts because this will spare so many others so much suffering.

Thank you, all those who fought. Thank you.
posted by harujion at 7:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

Would any kick my start to open a salt mine in DC? I'm seeing profit potential.
posted by Slackermagee at 7:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

A good couple days for the Constitution.
posted by shakespeherian at 7:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

Pretty good week for progressives!
posted by backseatpilot at 7:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
posted by Kitteh at 7:13 AM on June 26, 2015

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
posted by Avenger at 7:13 AM on June 26, 2015

here is the full text of the opinion.

That snippet you quoted is making me unexpectedly tear up.
posted by fatbird at 7:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

From SCOTUSBlog:

The Chief Justice has the principal dissent, which is 31 pages long. Toward the end of it, he says, "If you are among the many Americans--of whatever sexual orientation--who favor expanding same-sex marriage, by all means celebrate today's decision. Celebrate the achievement of a desired goal. Celebrate the opportunity for a new expression of commitment to a partner. Celebrate the availability of new benefits. But do not Celebrate the Constitution. It had nothing to do with it."

FUUUUUUUCK OOOOOFFFFFF.
posted by zombieflanders at 7:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [164 favorites]

If people don't mind, I'd like to repost again something I wrote a little more than 11 years ago:

Midnight. May 17th. Cambridge, MA.

Cambridge, MA, midnight on Monday. In the "People's Republic of Cambridge", everyone is eager for their city to be the first in the nation to issue unquestionably legal, inarguably legitimate marriage licenses to gay couples. So City Hall opens at the first possible minute it's allowed to do so.

Io and I timed our vacation back to our old hometown so that we could come help celebrate. What's the good of living out-of-state if we can't be out-of-state agitators, after all? We head straight from the airport to a party partly in honor of the occasion (there were also other reasons, including some head-shaving.) As midnight approaches, after the head shaving, people start making jokes as it begins to penetrate that this is really going to happen - we grin as we check the sky to see if it's falling; "No meteors yet!" "I'm beginning to think this isn't going to cause the end of the world after all!" It's actually a beautiful day. Surprisingly so for spring in Massachusetts - temperatures in the 70's, not a cloud in the sky, across the whole state.

Cell phone calls start coming in from people already at City Hall - they say the atmosphere is "electric". We hop in a taxi, and head down to Central Sqaure.

The streets have been blocked off for blocks around City Hall. So many people are there - thousands - that they've spilled out onto Mass. Ave., across the street, up the steps of the post office, the YMCA on the other side of the road. At City Hall itself, people are thronging the hillside, the steps. People are on the walls, people are standing in the window embrasures! Everywhere, there are cheering crowds.

There are policemen there, in riot gear, but all they're doing is keeping a pathway through the crowd clear for the happy couples. There is no violence, and no threat of violence. Instead, everyone is smiling, snapping photos, clapping. I can't remember when I've seen this many people this happy. It's infectious. People grin, and you grin back.

Earlier, there were protestors - a few sorry souls from the Fred Phelps organization carrying bizarre signs claiming that God destroyed the space shuttle. They parade for the cameras a bit, and then leave, outnumbered, overwhelmed, or simply not having the heart to keep going in the face of so much joy. They're gone by the time City Hall opens. Many of the anti-gay organizations that usually show up at rallies haven't bothered to come. Maybe they just think they'd get political backlash for it, but I like to think that even they realize just how gauche it would be to rain on this particular parade, to throw a protest sign in the face of people who only want to get married, and have waited so long for it. So by the time things get started, there are no protest signs.

Instead, there are Morris Dancers. Drummers. Guitarists. People throwing rice. People holding up signs about about equality, about rights, about love. By far the most popular sign of the evening, the one that captures the spirit of what's going on better than anything else, just says "YAY!" It passes hands throughout the night, until no one remembers who had it originally. It's everybody's sign now. A new round of cheering starts every time someone waves it around.

This is a crowd that wants to cheer. It cheers everything. It cheers every time a couple goes into the building. It cheers every time a couple comes out. It cheers a guy who comes out with a megaphone to announce how long you're going to have to wait if you go in to apply right now. He seems baffled by the response to what he thought was going to be a long boring announcement about long boring lines, but the crowd has picked up on some of the important facts buried in his words: "150 couples already in line"; "will take anyone else who wants to come in"; "will stay open for as long as it takes to get this done." So they cheer, and cheer some more.

Being a small person, I've become very skilled in manuvering myself to the front of a crowd so that I can see, so I lead Io up a hill, over a wall, under a dripping rain gutter, but it's worth it when we make it to the front and can see firsthand just who everybody's cheering for.

Many couples, who went in before there were so many people, seem taken aback, surprised by the huge, clapping, smiling throng that greets them as they emerge. After an initial hesitation, these couple smile back, swell with pride, walk tall down the walkway through the crowd. Some, beaming, hold up their licenses when they reach the top of the steps - tiny certificates, like an index card - and the crowd goes wild with applause and cheers. The applause gets thunderous whenever an elderly couple comes out, or a couple with children. Almost all of the couples are grinning from ear to ear (their children vary from tremendously excited to tremendously bored.) People ask them for their autographs. As they walk towards the street, people start chanting "Kiss! Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!" Many of them do, to redoubled cheering.

There are couples of all ages, all races, all mixes. You can't help but wonder how long the older ones have waited for this, how much they went through to finally get here, how much everyone else owes to them. About two-thirds of the couples are lesbians (which makes sense for the Boston area, where the lesbian population is pretty high), and maybe a quarter of the couples came with children. There are even a few straight couples, maybe ones who wanted to wait to get married until it was a right everyone else shared, too. They get cheered as well - this is a day for equality. Everyone has a right to their happiness here.

Although we moved away two years ago, Io and I see all kinds of people we recognize in the crowd. Friends, former co-workers. Io screams with surprised delight when her bellydance teacher comes out of city hall, another woman on her arm, happily waving a certificate.

The crowd starts singing. "Going to the Chapel" and "I'm Getting Married in the Morning" are the favorites, although the second verses tend to get a little ragged, the musical theater fans singing the words and the rest stumbling along. Someone plays a drum and the whole crowd begins clapping in rhythm, breaking into more spontaneous clapping whenever another couple comes out.

The crowd has thinned out considerably by the wee hours of the morning, only the die-hards now. We try to make up for it by being louder, although our hands hurt from clapping and our voices are hoarse from shouting. Eventually, Io and I have to go, stumbling down Mass. Ave. to find a taxi and a 7-11 that stocks anything vegan. Someone still was holding the "YAY!" sign aloft when we left, the evening's unfallen flag.

All through the next day, stories start circulating. A couple got a waiver on the post-license wait period from a judge and got married around 9:00 AM, the very first in MA, right there at Cambridge City Hall. A couple from Florida got turned away at Cambridge for admitting to being from out-of-state, but got quietly directed by another couple to go to Somerville, where they've publicly said they're not going to ask anyone where they're from. They get their certificate. In a small Massachusetts town, a woman, nervous that her marriage is going to be taken away by the government, asks how long it's really good for. "'Til you die", he replies. There are weddings on beaches, in parks, at City Halls, in churches. Walking through my old Davis Square neighborhood in Somerville, the church across the street from where I used to live is covered in hand made signs: "Open for Business!" "Gay weddings proudly performed here!"

I'm still shaking with the excitement of it. This is happening. The avalanche has started. It might be slowed, it might even be pushed back for a little while, but it will not be stopped. It is coming. One way or another, it will arrive.
posted by kyrademon at 7:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [263 favorites]

Hey, really well crafted post. Thanks for doing justice - to justice.
posted by latkes at 7:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

Fantastic news!

(And a great post title. The words of the pediment on the Supreme Court building have always evoked mixed emotions in me: the hope for equal justice and the disappointment at how often we fail to attain it, but not today in the case of marriage equality.)
posted by audi alteram partem at 7:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES

I'm not even American and I'm simultaneously bouncing around my apartment and crying.

HAPPY PRIDE

What's next

Treating our trans brothers and sisters like human beings, that's what.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 7:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [123 favorites]

Oh yes, here's the finest vintage Scalia-tears, at the end of his 30-page rant:

If you are among the many Americans--of whatever sexual orientation--who favor expanding same-sex marriage, by all means celebrate today's decision. Celebrate the achievement of a desired goal. Celebrate the opportunity for a new expression of commitment to a partner. Celebrate the availability of new benefits. But do not Celebrate the Constitution. It had nothing to do with it.

HA HA SCALIA U MAD, BRO?
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 7:15 AM on June 26, 2015 [42 favorites]

Yes!

〜(￣▽￣〜)
posted by Foosnark at 7:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

FUCK YEAH!
posted by Skorgu at 7:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I just became legally married in every state. We will now embark on a U.S. tour and make everyone call me Mrs.
posted by donnagirl at 7:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [208 favorites]

I've gotten a handful of text messages from [fairly conservative] family members, all to the effect of "Did you hear the awesome news yet!?!?!?"

I actually heard about the ruling from my mom (who called me while I was at work).

For me, the fact that any of these things happened is the biggest victory.
posted by schmod at 7:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [65 favorites]

I'm just disappointed Scalia didn't come out with "More like SCOTUS-SEX MARRIAGE, am I right‽"
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 7:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [52 favorites]

HA HA SCALIA U MAD, BRO?

I wish someone had prepared a bunch of shirts with that on it to toss into the crowds outside.
posted by Sangermaine at 7:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [28 favorites]

It is beyond heartening to watch this country living up to promises it has made to its people.
posted by griphus at 7:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

So it was, what, 11 years from Karl Rove using gay marriage as a wedge to drive conservative voters to gay marriage legalization across the country?
posted by drezdn at 7:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [25 favorites]

The fight for equality is far from over and we can't rest, but we can celebrate this. I am terribly heartbroken for those who didn't make it to today. Bittersweet.
posted by inturnaround at 7:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [21 favorites]

Scalia and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week.
posted by drezdn at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [118 favorites]

Congratulations, America!
posted by sukeban at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015

Lexica & I celebrate 17 years of marriage Saturday.

My marriage has never felt stronger than when I woke up & saw this FPP.

I will probably never do this again, but…

-AHEM-

USA!
USA!
USA!
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [43 favorites]

rum-soaked space hobo: "Oh yes, here's the finest vintage Scalia-tears, at the end of his 30-page rant"

Wasn't that actually what Roberts said? Scalia had a separate concurrence.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

My Facebook feed is full of rainbows and hearts.
posted by The corpse in the library at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

It is so fun to be on social media right now. Between this and yesterday's decisions, everyone is high-fiving each other all over Twitter & FB. YAY AMERICA!!!!
posted by aka burlap at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Oh yes, here's the finest vintage Scalia-tears, at the end of his 30-page rant

No, that's Roberts, here's Scalia (emphasis mine):

The opinion is couched in a style that is as pretentious as its content is egotistic. It is one thing for separate concurring or dissenting opinions to contain extravagances, even silly extravagances, of thought and expression; it is something else for the official opinion of the Court to do so. Of course the opinion’s showy profundities are often profoundly incoherent. “The nature of marriage is that, through its enduring bond, two persons together can find other freedoms, such as expression, intimacy, and spirituality.” (Really? Who ever thought that intimacy and spirituality [whatever that means] were freedoms? And if intimacy is, one would think Freedom of Intimacy is abridged rather than expanded by marriage. Ask the nearest hippie.

posted by zombieflanders at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [58 favorites]

The spread of marriage equality, in one GIF
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

Oh man. The text of the opinion deserves to be on a plaque somewhere. That might just be the most beautiful and poignant piece of legalese I've ever seen
posted by schmod at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Man the Pride Parade I'm going to this weekend just got a lot more exciting.
posted by DynamiteToast at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [22 favorites]

I'm sitting in my car almost crying I'm so happy about this, good job everyone who fought for this. America is a better place today.
posted by lepus at 7:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

HA HA SCALIA U MAD, BRO?

I wish someone had prepared a bunch of shirts with that on it to toss into the crowds outside.

I wasn't planning on going to the pride parade this weekend but now I feel like I must wearing this.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 7:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

Also kudos to Rhaomi for having an awesome post waiting in the wings for this announcement.
posted by schmod at 7:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [22 favorites]

Yesterday's decision made me happy. This one makes tears well up with joy.
posted by condour75 at 7:19 AM on June 26, 2015

Does anyone know/have an educated guess if this will affect any of the recent state laws letting magistrates refuse same sex marriages due to religious objections?
posted by marxchivist at 7:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I'm reading the dissent right now...I think it's Robert's dissent(?)....it's totally incoherent. "For all
those millennia, across all those civilizations, “marriage” referred to only one relationship: the union of a man and a woman."

No, that's objectively untrue. Marriage used to mean "One man, many wives" in the Bible itself, so I have no idea how he came to this conclusion??
posted by Avenger at 7:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [127 favorites]

zombieflanders beat me to posting the quote from Roberts' dissent:

"Celebrate the availability of new benefits. But do not Celebrate the Constitution. It had nothing to do with it."

What a sanctimonious prick! Yeah, it has nothing to do with the Constitution. The five justices who ruled in favor just totally made up this idea about equal rights for all.
posted by blairsyprofane at 7:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [30 favorites]

This is fantastic news! Congratulations America!
posted by Happy Dave at 7:20 AM on June 26, 2015

*asks the nearest hippie.*

Nah, breh.
posted by selfnoise at 7:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Happy Dance for the second day in a row!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
posted by caddis at 7:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I seriously doubt we would be celebrating if McCain had become president instead of Obama.
posted by notreally at 7:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [40 favorites]

Mock the dissenters all you want, but their prescience in Lawrence was proven exactly right in Obergefell today. I'd be especially interested to see what they prophecy as the natural result of this opinion.
posted by resurrexit at 7:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I'm surprisingly emotional about this (being a cynical old queer from the Smash Marriage days). Let's say for the record though, this didn't come from any president: every Democrat (to say nothing of the Republicans) has opposed gay marriage - including Clinton, including Obama. We got equal rights in the street, in our homes, and by fighting these things ourselves up the court ladder. No one handed this to us, we fought for it. Just like we're going to have to fight for fairness ourselves on any other issue.
posted by latkes at 7:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [182 favorites]

In this time, in this place, I am so happy to be here to share in celebration of this with all of you. Love wins!!!

And now it's time for me to listen to "Same Love" on repeat and sob. What a great Friday!

A certificate on paper isn't gonna solve it all
But it's a damn good place to start
No law's gonna change us, we have to change us
Whatever god you believe in, we come from the same one
Strip away the fear, underneath, it's all the same love
About time that we raised up!

posted by nicebookrack at 7:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

It's so weird to feel a little proud of this country.
posted by Lutoslawski at 7:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [36 favorites]

If this could have been 3 days ago it would have coincided with my anniversary. But I can't really complain. :)
posted by Foosnark at 7:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Awwwwwww yiss, now my partner has access to healthcare because Texas is forced to recognize our marriage! Suck it, state legislature! *fistpump*
posted by sciatrix at 7:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [161 favorites]

Dangit everyone's right, that was Roberts, who was playing the NIM NIM NIM CONSTITUTIONAL ANALYSIS ONLY PLEASE THAT WAS NOT A HAIR QUESTION card. I misread!
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 7:23 AM on June 26, 2015

It is one thing for separate concurring or dissenting opinions to contain extravagances, even silly extravagances, of thought and expression; it is something else for the official opinion of the Court to do so.

OH GO TO HELL. Traditionally, the point of a dissent is not to snark or whine, it's to create reasonable arguments that can be used in tangential cases in lower courts, or by the same court in future cases. It signals a path to walk for those who believe in the other side. Dissents are important and, conceptually, deserve to be treated with respect. You are the fucking problem, Scalia, by turning them into this gong show and still complaining when the majority uses flowery language.
posted by Lemurrhea at 7:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [76 favorites]

Mock the dissenters all you want, but their prescience in Lawrence was proven exactly right in Obergefell today. I'd be especially interested to see what they prophecy as the natural result of this opinion.

They prophesy the fall of American Democracy. I think they're going to go 1 for 2 on this.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 7:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Haven't read thread yet, just ran in to say that I'm so fucking happy and I eagerly await reading Scalia's latest tittybaby tantrum. Suck on it, Nino.

omg pride weekend is going to be so bonkers, you guys, wheeeeee
posted by palomar at 7:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

odinsdream, yeah, on marriage, we are done.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Yaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyy there are insufficient Kermit GIFs to adequately express my Muppet flails of sheer utter joy!
posted by skycrashesdown at 7:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [24 favorites]

Fantastic! It's about time.
posted by Gelatin at 7:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Between marriage equality, the ACA ruling and the housing discrimination ruling, I haven't been happier with SCOTUS or more proud of my country in a long time.
posted by reclusive_thousandaire at 7:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

3 thoughts.

1 - Holy Fuck. This is a day to mark down.

2- Presidential elections matter, if for no other reason than SC justices. Remember that if Clinton wins the nom and you are conflicted (as I sort of am) over aspects of her record.

3 - What's next

Trying to stem the blackslidding on women's and reproductive rights

PS Good Job America. 5-4 is close, but a win is a win
posted by edgeways at 7:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [34 favorites]

Now we are all going to die.

Because the dissents used up all the salt in the ocean.
posted by delfin at 7:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Never go with a hippie to a ~~second location~~ Constitutional convention - ~~Jack Donaghy~~ Antonin Scalia
posted by MCMikeNamara at 7:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Sometimes, I have hope for my country.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Mock the dissenters all you want, but their prescience in Lawrence was proven exactly right in Obergefell today. I'd be especially interested to see what they prophecy as the natural result of this opinion.
posted by resurrexit at 7:21 AM on June 26 [+] [!]

This decision will have one of two possible outcomes: the total destruction of Western Civilization or gay people can now get their relationships legally recognized.

I'm guessing #2 rather than #1.
posted by Avenger at 7:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [27 favorites]

There is whooping in my house today!

(I came here to make sure this had been posted—Rhaomi, you did a much better job than I would have. Nice one!)
posted by Songdog at 7:26 AM on June 26, 2015

Hold up. What? It's done? It's finally done?

It's done.

*Kermit flail*

\o/
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 7:26 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

Good.
posted by French Fry at 7:27 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I slept through it! I slept through it! I've been working on this issue for twelve years and I sleep in ONE WEEKDAY and I slept through it!

Fucking greatest way to wake up, though, my phone suddenly exploding with alerts and groggily looking at it with unfocused eyes ... "Gay marriage something something, not a tornado, I can go back to -- wait, the Supreme Court's in session, right? ... wait, they're supposed to decide marriage equality today or Monday ... come on, eyes, focus ... HOLY SHIT I SLEPT THROUGH MARRIAGE EQUALITY. HOLY SHIT! WE HAVE MARRIAGE EQUALITY!"

I'm still waking up, I'm sure the happy tears will come once I get all the way there and the caffeine kicks in!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:27 AM on June 26, 2015 [115 favorites]

Scalia cry-baby-itis: 22 If, even as the price to be paid for a fifth vote, I ever joined an opinion
for the Court that began: “The Constitution promises liberty to allwithin its reach, a liberty that includes certain specific rights that allow persons, within a lawful realm, to define and express their identity,” I would hide my head in a bag. The Supreme Court of theUnited States has descended from the disciplined legal reasoning ofJohn Marshall and Joseph Story to the mystical aphorisms of the fortune cookie.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

"The world has corrected the Bible. The church never corrects it" - Mark Twain.
posted by edgeways at 7:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [61 favorites]

Congratulations all! About damn time.
posted by sutt at 7:28 AM on June 26, 2015

YESSSS!!!

Holy shit, Pride in Seattle (tomorrow, 6/27) is going to be absolutely nuts.
posted by Axle at 7:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

Likewise, my partner stayed up late watching movies with our visiting nephew and neither one of them will answer their phones and I'm assuming they are still asleep and it is DRIVING ME CRAZY that I know this and he doesn't.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 7:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

So according to all the doomsayers, all the female-male marriages have to fall apart right now, right? That's how they said it would go, civilization collapsing and all?
posted by angeline at 7:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

It's a good day for justice. Hooray!
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Between marriage equality, the ACA ruling and the housing discrimination ruling, I haven't been happier with SCOTUS or more proud of my country in a long time.

For today, I agree. I reserve the right to be ashamed on Monday when the Clean Air Act, the lethal injection, and the redistricting decisions come down. Today, at least, there's unmitigated joy!
posted by gladly at 7:29 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

'Ask the nearest hippie' should totally be a newspaper column.
posted by ian1977 at 7:29 AM on June 26, 2015 [102 favorites]

It's my birthday! The guy who took my ID at a clinic in the Castro the other week was like "Omg you have the best birthday ever!" and now he is EVEN MORE RIGHT
posted by sunset in snow country at 7:30 AM on June 26, 2015 [59 favorites]

So according to all the doomsayers, all the female-male marriages have to fall apart right now, right? That's how they said it would go, civilization collapsing and all?

To be fair, the illegality of same-sex marriage was one of two things keeping my marriage intact. The fact that Queen Latifah has never agreed to marry my wife is the other, so I'll have to work on keeping them apart.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 7:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [96 favorites]

Someday soon Scalia is just going to collapse into a singularity from all the bitterness.

Hey, Nino, how does the wrong side of history look?
posted by Gelatin at 7:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

This is great news for the formal wear industry. And everyone else of course, USA!
posted by jonmc at 7:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

OH NO MY NON-GAY MARRIAGE HAS ENDED.

I"M GAY MARRIED NOW.
posted by French Fry at 7:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [32 favorites]

Conservatives rejoice! In the span of two days, the Supreme Court has ensured that the country will be healthier with fewer couples living out of wedlock!
posted by gwint at 7:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

I bet you could power a small country off of Justice Scalia's blood pressure this week.
posted by gauche at 7:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

Yub nub
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 7:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

I've read a lot of court cases in my life. I've never gotten weepy reading one. This changed all that (from Kennedy's opinion for the court):

"Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is reversed.
It is so ordered."

posted by mandolin conspiracy at 7:32 AM on June 26, 2015 [37 favorites]

Same-sex marriage destroyed, it's just "marriage" now
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 7:32 AM on June 26, 2015 [107 favorites]

Tears of purest joy. People I cherish can finally exercise a right many of us take for granted.
posted by MissySedai at 7:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Same sex marriage for some, tiny rainbow flags for others!
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 7:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [48 favorites]

This will be an interesting weekend, hearing all the strum-und-drang from conservatives across the country. And, I don't mean "interesting" as in "enjoying their hurt". It will be really interesting to see what the real response from the right will be.

Here, for instance, you have several of the current GOP leaders voicing support for outright disobedience of the SCOTUS ruling. So, I guess I'm wondering...Should a state actually disobey this ruling and openly bar gay marriage, will that require the President to do something forceful? Send in troops? Arrest Governors? How ugly might things get in the next few months? Or, will it?
posted by Thorzdad at 7:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Yesterday I peeled the "Love Is The Law" sticker off my iPad: two years after passage of the Freedom To Marry law in Minnesota, the sticker was finally illegible.

In 2013, the Minnesota rock band The Suburbs -- who are still awesome -- donated the use of their cool, 1983 New Wave song to the marriage equality fight there. Which, of course, was successful.

If you want to celebrate today, consider blasting this at least once. I know I will!
posted by wenestvedt at 7:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

Oh man, I'm gonna love seeing what my conservative Catholic aunt has to say about this on Facebook.
posted by Strange Interlude at 7:34 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

"Precedent protects the right of a married couple not to procreate, so the right to marry cannot be conditioned on the capacity or commitment to procreate." BOOM!

Hoody hoo -- as oral arguments showed, there really are no good arguments against gay marriage, but what a burn to have one of the few remaining bulwarks demolished in a single sentence.
posted by Gelatin at 7:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

Wow. I've been saying for years that it was only a matter of time before same-sex marriage was legal across the US, but even in my rosiest predictions I couldn't have expected it this quickly. Bravo to everyone that worked so hard for this, a moment of quiet remembrance for all the people who are no longer with us who never got the chance to enjoy this right, and a tear-filled and hearty congratulatory hug to everyone. My (old-fashioned two-sex) marriage is what has kept me sane and happy and safe for almost 20 years now, and I'm so glad everyone now has the opportunity to experience the joy that my wife and I do.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [27 favorites]

It's nice to cry over the news for a happy reason for a change!
posted by little mouth at 7:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Clarence Thomas: Slaves did not lose their dignity (any more than they lost their humanity) because the government allowed them to be enslaved. Those held in internment camps did not lose their dignity because the government confined them. And those denied governmental benefits certainly do not lose their dignity because the government denies them those benefits. The government cannot bestow dignity, and it cannot take it away.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

So happy!
posted by pointystick at 7:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I hope the court gets replaced so as to turn 8 to 1 against Scalia so I can continue to read his wacko rants. More jiggery-pokery hippies!
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 7:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

BREAKING NEWS: GAY MARRIAGE LEGALIZED, CIVILIZATION COLLAPSES. CANNIBAL MOTORCYCLE GANGS TAKE OVER HIGHWAYS. CITIZENS ADVISED TO WEAR SPIKES ON SHOULDER PADS.
posted by Avenger at 7:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [83 favorites]

yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee good work USA!

Australia how you feeling now???
posted by ominous_paws at 7:37 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Mazel Tov!!
posted by slapshot57 at 7:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

It just kind of hit me that it's legal in New Orleans now, and that I could get married at home if I wanted.

Anyway, so now I'm crying.
posted by a hat out of hell at 7:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [71 favorites]

Clarence Thomas: Slaves did not lose their dignity (any more than they lost their humanity) because the government allowed them to be enslaved. Those held in internment camps did not lose their dignity because the government confined them. And those denied governmental benefits certainly do not lose their dignity because the government denies them those benefits. The government cannot bestow dignity, and it cannot take it away.

Excellent point! Since everyone's dignity is fine, I guess I'll just hook 'em up to the Matrix brain-suckin' human farm machines!
posted by selfnoise at 7:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

No, that's Roberts, here's Scalia (emphasis mine):

The opinion is couched in a style that is as pretentious as its content is egotistic.

Some clerk is going to catch hell -- they left Scalia's notes in the final opinion.
posted by Gelatin at 7:39 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

Not to distract from the very justifiable drinking of Scalia tears, but it's worth noting that he did write today's other opinion, which struck a blow against "three strikes"/mandatory minimum laws.
posted by zombieflanders at 7:39 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

Such joyful, wonderful news.

Thinking about all of the people who worked so hard to make this happen, and all of those who didn't have a chance to make it to this wonderful day.
posted by Sreiny at 7:39 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

"Americans always do the right thing...after they've tried everything else." - Winston Churchill
posted by dry white toast at 7:39 AM on June 26, 2015 [65 favorites]

Meanwhile at RedState.com
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 7:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Wow, the level that my respect can drop for Clarence Thomas apparently has no minimum limit.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 7:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [33 favorites]

Scalia: Until the courts put a stop to it, public debate over same-sex marriage displayed American democracy at its best. Individuals on both sides of the issue passionately, but respectfully, attempted to persuade their fellow citizens to accept their views.

Scalia and I must have different cable TV packages.
posted by Adam_S at 7:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [47 favorites]

Stolen from Facebook: So: Dear Everybody-Who-Can-Now-Legally-Marry,
Try not to all get married at once because a year from now none of us are going to be able to get into a restaurant.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [61 favorites]

Also, a Key and Peele video to send to anyone in your family shocked by this.

posted by Lord_Pall at 7:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [30 favorites]

I love weddings. Looking forward to more joyous weeping soon!
posted by Devils Rancher at 7:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

PARTY IN THE CHAT ROOM, those of you who can't go to actual parties!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Sorry EMRJKC, but that's NOT Yub Nub! THIS IS YUB NUB.
posted by leotrotsky at 7:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Meanwhile at RedState.com

wow it takes some serious chutzpah to hold up Dred Scott as a terrible example of activist courts destroying the country

i shit you not
posted by sciatrix at 7:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

Well, shit. This is great.
posted by the lake is above, the water below at 7:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

People on FreeRepublic are already talking about "armed insurrection"....
posted by Avenger at 7:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

This may be the most moving and best articulated argument for same-sex marriage I've ever read:
As counsel for the respondents acknowledged at argument, if States are required by the Constitution to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, the justifications for refusing to recognize those marriages performed else where are undermined. See Tr. of Oral Arg. on Question 2, p. 44. The Court, in this decision, holds same-sex couples may exercise the fundamental right to marry in all States. It follows that the Court also must hold—and it now does hold—that there is no lawful basis for a State to refuse to recognize a lawful same-sex marriage performed in another State on the ground of its same-sex character.
* * *
No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice,
and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right. The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is reversed.

It is so ordered.
Tears of Joy. YES!
posted by zarq at 7:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [20 favorites]

ROBERTS, C. J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SCALIA and THOMAS, JJ., joined.
SCALIA, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which THOMAS, J., joined.
THOMAS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SCALIA, J., joined.
ALITO, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SCALIA and THOMAS, JJ., joined.

Guess eeeeeeverybody wanted to have their little say.
posted by showbiz_liz at 7:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

My son can now get married, if he wants, to his boyfriend, if he also wants.

This pleases me.

Conservatives can bite my shiny metal ass.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 7:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [78 favorites]

Two stories from the straight-but-an-ally camp, one of them funny:

* My cousin has always been something of an activist on the same-sex-marriage front; she actually found a way to use her engagement (to a guy, but still) as a way to raise awareness for the issue in Ohio. She just posted on Facebook that her two-year-old just asked her why she was acting so happy, and she was having trouble explaining why to her kid because a) the kid is two, and b) she realized her daughter is never going to know what it's even like to have been living in a country when same sex marriage wasn't legal, and she kept choking up.

* I'm working in the Human Resources office of a company currently, and when I told a couple co-workers about the ruling, I joked to the person in charge of benefits - "hey, I bet you're suddenly going to have to process a lot of people updating their status from 'single' to 'married' now, all of a sudden, huh?" She blinked, and then went very pale and said "oh, crap."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:43 AM on June 26, 2015 [147 favorites]

What a stupid thing to propose rebellion for.
posted by drezdn at 7:43 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

Yay!
posted by glhaynes at 7:43 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Wow. This is almost unbelievable. This is a great day for America.
posted by octothorpe at 7:44 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Such wonderful news.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:44 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Yes!
posted by Iridic at 7:44 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

So uh, where in the ceremony do we sing "Over the Rainbow?"

!!!
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:46 AM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

So happy for everyone! What a wonderful day - so glad I was here to see it!
posted by longdaysjourney at 7:46 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

guys help I can't not see Scalia as the villain from Metal Gear Rising

GAY NANOMACHINES, SON
posted by DoctorFedora at 7:46 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

I hate to be a downer, but it's still going to be a struggle to get every bigoted judge and clerk of court to obey the law. I fully expect many will be calling for new "religious exemptions" so bigots can continue to bigot behind their fig leaf of faith. I hope people continue to push equality forward instead of thinking same sex marriage is a done deal everywhere.
posted by peeedro at 7:46 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

A possible explanation for John Roberts votes.

I expect to see "Impeach John Roberts" signs popping up along the roadsides any day now.
posted by TedW at 7:47 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Yo people imma let you finish but running out of favourites here

Mods can we pretty pretty pretty please just this once have a gigantic rainbow flag or something in this post?
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 7:47 AM on June 26, 2015 [55 favorites]

What an amazing day to be alive.

Congratulations and best wishes to all.
posted by 1066 at 7:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

If Roberts was blackmail-able, why not use it for something that would cause a sea change, like overturning the Citizens United decision?
posted by drezdn at 7:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

This is the best news to wake up to. I'm so happy I'm crying. The majority opinion is just wonderful. Yay you guys!!
posted by chatongriffes at 7:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

yay! next up, dealing with the states where I could get married and then lose my job and apartment if I people don't like my choice of spouse!

I remember when I was a young queer chick in the 80's and first heard about people protesting at the IRS building in favor of marriage and just thought it an incredible crazy impossible idea. How could that even be a thing that could happen? And then when Hawaii nearly did it became something that might possibly happen in my life. And now, here we are, and I'm waiting for my partner to check a few tickyboxes in life so I can hurry up and fuckin propose to her already.
posted by rmd1023 at 7:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [55 favorites]

There are church bells ringing in my neighborhood. I think they're probably ringing for something else, but I'm going to pretend they're ringing for this.

Hooray!
posted by ocherdraco at 7:49 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

Thus tweeted Harvey Fierstein:

You never know how heavy your burden's been until you lay it down in the promised land.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:49 AM on June 26, 2015 [39 favorites]

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time by the tears of Antonin Scalia.
posted by dry white toast at 7:49 AM on June 26, 2015 [276 favorites]

Fuck yeah, America!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:49 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

The amount of happiness in the world just increased. This is a very good thing.
posted by tallmiddleagedgeek at 7:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Wow, Scalia's dissent reads like a fucking YouTube comment.
posted by echocollate at 7:51 AM on June 26, 2015 [71 favorites]

"It is so ordered."
posted by Fizz at 7:51 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

Finally.
posted by five fresh fish at 7:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

YAY!
posted by burnmp3s at 7:52 AM on June 26, 2015

Hot fucking damn! Genuine wins feel so good. I'm not even going to get into scheudenfreud yet, just the victory is enough for now. No halfway measures, no turning the boat two degrees, no compromising essential things to get something done halfway and in a manner that will turn into a full loss later, just a simple straight forward victory that leaves the good guys with everything and the bad guys with nothing.

Dang do I feel good, and I'm not even gay. I can't imagine how wonderful it must be for people who got a personal win out of this.
posted by sotonohito at 7:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

I've been weeping with joy pretty much non stop for, what, 50 minutes now.
posted by dnash at 7:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

I have not spontaneously burst into gay. Is this like a time-release thing?
posted by echocollate at 7:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [80 favorites]

If Roberts was blackmail-able, why not use it for something that would cause a sea change, like overturning the Citizens United decision?

You are attempting to apply logic to something on Glenn Beck's website.
posted by TedW at 7:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

Someone at my work place just made a reference to these being the end times. Please help me.
posted by marxchivist at 7:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

🌈
posted by fitnr at 7:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [31 favorites]

🌈
posted by Small Dollar at 7:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

So it was, what, 11 years from Karl Rove using gay marriage as a wedge to drive conservative voters to gay marriage legalization across the country?

Blowback: not just for foreign policy anymore
posted by stevis23 at 7:54 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

I have got to stop crying, I'm heading up a meeting in less than 10 minutes, but guys, I can't stop. This is so fucking huge.
posted by mittens at 7:54 AM on June 26, 2015 [26 favorites]

Mr. Fig and I had this statement in the opening part of our wedding ceremony:

As we are gathered here today to recognize this union, let us take a moment to remember that we live in a time when not all loving unions are officially sanctioned. It was Albert Einstein who said "not everything that counts can be counted." Had he lived longer, he might have said "it is not only those unions that are counted that count."' To those of you who cannot be legally married, Matt and Erica want to let you know that they are with you, that your commitments matter, and that no law can govern what you think and feel. That Erica and Matt are being joined in a legal sense is incidental; they would be lucky to honor each other as you have done before them.

THIS IS FIXED NOW.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(weep)
posted by Fig at 7:54 AM on June 26, 2015 [42 favorites]

FYI: best way to read is to read Scalia's dissent first. Coworker over cube wall: "What the heck? I have never heard you laugh so loud."
posted by asperity at 7:54 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

NPR was kinda mixed on this. They were explaining yes, hooray, good for Gay Marriage, but next up is a shitload of state's rights style "well what if I ehnt wan't make a gay cake?" type questions massaged on by various and sundry shadow groups.

But, hey, fuckem. I'll be happy to make anybody in Denver a sheet cake or pineapple upside down cake if you're getting married.
posted by boo_radley at 7:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Basically, the four dissenters have again resorted to "the Constitution has not explicitly said that the right to same sex marriage is established and we believe the equal protection clause is nonsense anyway."

Thankfully, the five who joined Kennedy - who is a justice I frequently disagree with but who is a strong proponent of the EPC -- say BS to that.

Basically, the dissenters said "We don't think EPC counts here" and the majority said 'We think you are wrong' and the precedent of the Equal Protection Clause grows that much stronger.

And I reject the argument of "Activist Judges." For the Supreme Court to function correctly, they HAVE to be activist. They HAVE to strike down laws that violate our rights. That is their job. If states and counties and cities can simply pass laws that violate our constitutional rights, then we simply do not have those rights.

So, glorious day.
posted by eriko at 7:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [28 favorites]

I'm so excited for my family and friends who get to marry the folks they love and receive full protection of that love under the law!
posted by ChuraChura at 7:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

What the hell, it's a special occasion.

posted by cortex at 7:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [1006 favorites]

I"M GAY MARRIED NOW.

Oh thank god, my pots and pans are really starting to show some wear and tear, and I could totally use a gay wedding registry right about now to fix that problem!

(But more seriously: fucking awesome!)
posted by tocts at 7:56 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

And, yes, while I've said I respect Scalia's legal mind, he's like 0-2 on opinions in the last couple of days. Jesus Christ, dude, you might as well have ended this one with MATLOCK!
posted by eriko at 7:56 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Yay! Now my colleagues and I don't have to go digging around for that stupid chart to check if passport applicants are "really" married or not!

BREAKING NEWS: GAY MARRIAGE LEGALIZED, CIVILIZATION COLLAPSES. CANNIBAL MOTORCYCLE GANGS TAKE OVER HIGHWAYS. CITIZENS ADVISED TO WEAR SPIKES ON SHOULDER PADS.
@ Avenger: I prefer suede. But thanks for the Pride outfit suggestion. SF will be Off. The. Hook.
posted by The Ardship of Cambry at 7:56 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

showbiz_liz: ROBERTS, C. J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SCALIA and THOMAS, JJ., joined.
SCALIA, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which THOMAS, J., joined.
THOMAS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SCALIA, J., joined.
ALITO, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SCALIA and THOMAS, JJ., joined.

Guess eeeeeeverybody wanted to have their little say.

SADDEST. GANGBANG. EVER.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 7:56 AM on June 26, 2015 [57 favorites]

I just realized that my daughter will grow up with the firm and unassailable knowledge that love is love and she can marry whoever her heart chooses.
posted by lydhre at 7:56 AM on June 26, 2015 [30 favorites]

What the hell, it's a special occasion.

Flagged, moderator abuse.

;-)
posted by eriko at 7:57 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

> What the hell, it's a special occasion

aaaaahhhh now I'm crying even more
posted by The corpse in the library at 7:57 AM on June 26, 2015 [33 favorites]

I'm so very happy for everyone positively affected by this decision.

I know it's spiking the football a bit, but I also get a ton of joy knowing the talking heads, policy makers, hate-spewers, and so forth who have caused so much personal anguish over the past so many years must now come to the realization that their 'good fight' they have fought for all these years has finally been put to rest and they (and their ideology) have been on the losing side since day 1. It's not just Scalia's tears that are sweetening my coffee this morning.

That said, I just spent 10 minutes searching for SantorumHeadSpinWithSmokeOutOfEars.gif to no avail.
posted by splen at 7:57 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

> What the hell, it's a special occasion

aaaaahhhh now I'm crying even more

That one tipped me over the edge too.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 7:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Oh my god the Alito dissent is affording me some of the most glorious schadenfreude I've ever experienced.

Today’s decision usurps the constitutional right of the people to decide whether to keep or alter the traditional understanding of marriage. The decision will also have other important consequences. It will be used to vilify Americans who are unwilling to assent to the new orthodoxy.

Those poor, hardworking Americans just want to go about their pursuit of life liberty and happiness, and here we social liberals are, imposing our new orthodoxy on them by not letting them enshrine their bigotry into law.
posted by Mayor West at 7:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [42 favorites]

Has Scalia dissolved into a pool of his own bile yet?
posted by tommasz at 7:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

marxchivist: "these being the end times. Please help me."

"I'M THROWING AN ARMAGEDDON PARTY WITH RAINBOW CAKE AND CHAMPAGNE IT'S THE BEST END TIMES EVER!"

(Then go buy donuts for the office but specify that they're GAY MARRIAGE donuts.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [24 favorites]

From Ben Rosen (@rosen): Here's a .gif for you, America. You fucking earned it this week.
posted by jokeefe at 7:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [22 favorites]

Jill Biden: Joe is running through the halls with a rainbow flagged tied on like a cape high fiving everyone. #MarriageEquaility #LoveWins #SCOTUS

PLEASE PLEASE LET THIS BE TRUE. OH MY GOD I WOULD GIVE EVERY LAST CENT IN MY NAME TO SEE VIDEO OF THIS.
posted by dry white toast at 7:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [167 favorites]

Flagged as flag.
posted by 256 at 7:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [28 favorites]

Prediction...Cortex will quickly have the most-favorited post in MeFi history.
posted by Thorzdad at 7:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

Finally.

Yes! My thoughts exactly. I'm ecstatic, of course -- literally crying with joy over this -- but it is astonishing to me that it took the country I love (yes I do, in spite of everything) this long to do something so basic and obvious.
posted by The Bellman at 7:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Mr. Fig and I had this statement in the opening part of our wedding ceremony:

Yeah, mrsozzy and I got married in 2010, in NY, before same-sex marriages were recognized here. We were conflicted over it, whether to do it at all or whether to do it out-of-state, but ultimately decided to go ahead with it. We included a similar passage, and our UU minister wore a rainbow stole. A close friend came up afterwards and told me how much he appreciated the gesture. I'm so happy this is happening now.
posted by uncleozzy at 7:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I"M GAY MARRIED NOW.

No. You're married now.

That's why today is so important.
posted by eriko at 8:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [65 favorites]

Yay! Congratulations, everyone, but especially to folks that have been waiting for a long ass time to have their love validated by the law.

Feeling a little proud to be masshole today, too. Thanks MA for being you, all the way back in 2004.
posted by likeatoaster at 8:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

dry white toast, that is a parody account that is, evidently, doing its job perfectly.
posted by acidic at 8:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

cortex: "What the hell, it's a special occasion."

Greetings from Colorado!
posted by boo_radley at 8:00 AM on June 26, 2015

If Roberts was blackmail-able, why not use it for something that would cause a sea change, like overturning the Citizens United decision?

This is a sea change for a damn lot of people. We have friends who moved to New York & got married, then had to move back to Texas for financial reasons. It's a pretty big deal for people like them.
posted by Devils Rancher at 8:01 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

dammit. But seriously, how awesome would that be.
posted by dry white toast at 8:01 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Someone I heard in the crowd outside SCOTUS said it best: "WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!"
posted by Room 641-A at 8:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Australia how you feeling now???

Not nearly ashamed enough of the current imbalance to force our elected leaders' hands, I fear. I hope I'm proven wrong before too long.
posted by Lesser Spotted Potoroo at 8:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Taking a break from happily uglycrying to share this.
posted by erstwhile ungulate at 8:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Have you seen the White House twitter account logo?
posted by kiltedtaco at 8:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [36 favorites]

What is this I'm feeling towards my country right now? It's... what's the opposite of shame?
posted by Aznable at 8:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [32 favorites]

Chicago Pride is tomorrow. I'm kind of glad I'm leaving town now, because I think there might be too much party.
posted by eriko at 8:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

From the decision: "In accordance with the judicial duty to base their decisions on principled reasons and neutral discussions, without scornful or disparaging commentary, courts have written a substantial body of law considering all sides of these issues."

BURN.
posted by MonkeyToes at 8:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

Obama's statement, "beginning shortly."
posted by The corpse in the library at 8:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Jill Biden: Joe is running through the halls with a rainbow flagged tied on like a cape high fiving everyone. #MarriageEquaility #LoveWins #SCOTUS

Well, @JillBidenVeep is a parody twitter account (possibly you know that already) but still a great mental image.
posted by aught at 8:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Okay, I spent a couple minutes being surprised/happy, then I spent a couple minutes giggling at the pics & comments, not I'm goddam tearing up. Who needs a wedding to get weepy? SO HAPPY
posted by Devils Rancher at 8:05 AM on June 26, 2015

This will be some pride weekend - I'm happy past me thought to take today and Monday off!
posted by rtha at 8:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

As with the ACA "Apocalypse" that never happened, I think it's going to be pretty deflating for the right when not only does this not bring about the end times, but it becomes self-evident fairly quickly that it was a net benefit to US society.

Also: YAY!
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:06 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Oh wow congratulations everyone! This is so awesome.
posted by greenish at 8:07 AM on June 26, 2015

Have you seen the White House twitter account logo?

Excellent. A tweet there says the President would be speaking on the ruling at 11 -- anyone watching?
posted by aught at 8:07 AM on June 26, 2015

Now it's our country too.
posted by MrVisible at 8:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

I reserve the right to be ashamed on Monday when the Clean Air Act, the lethal injection, and the redistricting decisions come down

Sure, but if those rulings go badly, that doesn't mean those fights are over. Elections matter, but so does the steady pressure of people's movements. Imagine how overwhelmingly bleak things looked to an abolitionist in 1859, or a suffragette in the election of 1916, or a person marching for the vote in Selma. Those men and women were up against the impossible: the law, entrenched business interests, systemic bigotry and personal prejudice and the weight of all that had come before. And yet, they won--even if some aspects of those victories were partial, and we're still working toward completion today.

So keep the pressure on. You never know when the wall's about to crumble.
posted by reclusive_thousandaire at 8:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [41 favorites]

HURRAH!
posted by doctornemo at 8:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Excellent. A tweet there says the President would be speaking on the ruling at 11 -- anyone watching?

Sorry, duh. The feed will be on Whitehouse.gov and it says will begin shortly.
posted by aught at 8:08 AM on June 26, 2015

> A tweet there says the President would be speaking on the ruling at 11 -- anyone watching

Yup, but it isn't showing up yet.
posted by The corpse in the library at 8:08 AM on June 26, 2015

Text to my gay best friend:

"You're not allowed to party until you finish destroying traditional marriage.

And after brunch."

Congrats, everyone!
posted by Fleebnork at 8:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

This is a truly great and momentous day.
posted by Jeff Morris at 8:09 AM on June 26, 2015

Someone at my work place just made a reference to these being the end times. Please help me.

Indeed, a man told me just this morning that legalization of gay marriage would lead to the end of the world, more or less immediately. And yet as I look out the window, I see that the sun remains in its customary position at the traditional level of brightness. I suppose it's possible the man was wrong, but he seemed so very sure about this.

Aside from the continued existence of the world, which, I feel, is a fairly strong counter-argument, I'm also not sure why legalization in one particular country would trigger armageddon after others have already done so (including the one the man and I are in). So you could try those points, I suppose, or merely note that time seems to be carrying on regardless.
posted by FishBike at 8:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

From Roberts dissent:

In his first American dic- tionary, Noah Webster defined marriage as “the legal union of a man and woman for life,”

Dude, really? When I was in high school debate & forensics, the "Webster's defines..." tactic was generally understood as cliche bullshit, and an obvious cover for "I got nuthin'..."
posted by dnash at 8:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [118 favorites]

Love wins.

Thank god.
posted by From Bklyn at 8:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I love that this has happened but I have a question or two. Sorry if I'm a bit uninformed.

I realize this is maybe a stupid question but what happens now? Does someone have a link to an article that explains how quickly this takes to happen? For those that challenge it, is that something that is struck down?
posted by Fizz at 8:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Just in time for Pride weekend, too.
posted by notyou at 8:10 AM on June 26, 2015

(Also I officiated a gay wedding on Sunday, and I'm only the slightest bit sad it was four days too early to include Kennedy's righteous smackdown of Bowers v. Hardwick, segueing into his pretty epic declaration that "No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. ")
posted by Mayor West at 8:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Hahaha the whitehouse.gov feed is backdropped by a giant Pride flag. Obama is such a troll and I fucking love it.
posted by dry white toast at 8:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [45 favorites]

This nearest hippie is also a justice of the peace and would be happy to perform a wedding for any of y'all in Vermont.
posted by jessamyn at 8:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [145 favorites]

Now, I have one request for God-Fearing Traditional Americans.

----

Take A Deep Breath, Do Not Blow Anything Up And Do Not Shoot _Anyone_.

Thank you.

~The Management~

----
posted by delfin at 8:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

Just checked -- world hasn't ended yet. Carry on.
posted by eriko at 8:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

BEST PRIDE EVER.
posted by splitpeasoup at 8:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

WH feed's up now at empty podium. Whee!
posted by deludingmyself at 8:12 AM on June 26, 2015

Look at the facts of the world. You see a continual and progressive triumph of the right. I do not pretend to understand the moral universe, the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways. I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. But from what I see I am sure it bends towards justice.

-- T. Parker, 1857
posted by sourcequench at 8:13 AM on June 26, 2015 [29 favorites]

I just had a thought.

David is an actor I've known for 15+ years now; I worked with him through a shit-ton of shows. And he was referring to his best beloved as his "husband" even in 1998, even though the rest of the world hadn't caught up.

And over the past 15 years I've watched as first New York City created a civil partnership and he and his husband first signed up with that; then watched the video a few years back, after New York State legalized gay marriage and his husband's co-workers surprised the both of them with a "flash mob wedding" (his husband is a dresser on Broadway, and they got the cast to stay late one night and brought a justice of the peace in, and they did a wedding right there on the stage after the audience had gone home).

They've been the couple I point to whenever I had to explain why I thought same sex marriage should be legal - "if any couple was well and truly married, these two guys are."

....It just so happens to be David's birthday today.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:13 AM on June 26, 2015 [97 favorites]

I can't believe this is the year I came to SF for Pride. I'm so exciiiiiiiiited. Tears of joy.
posted by saveyoursanity at 8:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

"Justice that arrives like a thunderbolt."
Thanks Obama!
posted by The Bellman at 8:15 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time by the tears of Antonin Scalia.

this is perfection
posted by showbiz_liz at 8:15 AM on June 26, 2015 [26 favorites]

Very exciting times! Justice always prevails.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 8:15 AM on June 26, 2015

YAY YAY YAY!
posted by craven_morhead at 8:16 AM on June 26, 2015

Opportunistic :-) Justice of the Peace offers her services for free.
posted by Wordshore at 8:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

Fizz: I realize this is maybe a stupid question but what happens now? Does someone have a link to an article that explains how quickly this takes to happen? For those that challenge it, is that something that is struck down?

More or less, it takes immediate effect. SCOTUSBlog is reporting that same sex marriage licenses are currently being issued at clerks' offices across the country (in areas where that was previously prohibited). However, per my Twitter feed, people are anticipating resistance in many areas of the country, and undoubtedly, people will need to go to court in some places to force the clerk to issue them a license.
posted by melissasaurus at 8:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

*GLOAT!*

"So, which political party was it who was horribly bigoted to gays and lesbians, tried to outlaw them having sex, and wouldn't even allow them to have families or visit each other in the hospital?"

"I don't remember, man. They never lived that sh*t down... broke up ages ago! I think they were, like, the Whigs or something..."
posted by markkraft at 8:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

People on FreeRepublic are already talking about "armed insurrection"....

To be fair they would talk about armed ressurection if McDonalds stopped selling McNuggets, so it's a pretty low bar.
posted by edgeways at 8:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [69 favorites]

(Reads up the thread) okay, JP is quick off the mark across all the social media :)
posted by Wordshore at 8:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Haha Obama totally just stumbled over the plaintiff's name. He seems a little subdued honestly, but he is going to Rev Pinckney's funeral in a few hours so I can understand how he might not be in a super celebrating mood.
posted by DynamiteToast at 8:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Jessamyn's note just reminded me: I should renew my notary commission and hang out the ol' shingle. I've officiated two weddings and this is a great reason to do some more! Tampa/St. Pete area. What a fantastic day.
posted by penduluum at 8:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

BREAKING: Picture of justice arriving like a thunderbolt today.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 8:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Fucking A. There are no words for how awesome this is.
posted by Existential Dread at 8:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Pretty sure that today's ruling included a statement that we get the rest of the day off to run around giddily with our hands in the air. I'm sure I saw that part...

\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/\o/
posted by Sophie1 at 8:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [26 favorites]

Haha Obama totally just stumbled over the plaintiffs name. He seems a little subdued honestly...

He honestly seems like he's trying to hold back tears. Those long pauses.
posted by Thorzdad at 8:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

This will always be one of the very best things I've done with my life.
posted by MrMoonPie at 8:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

I didn't think anything could make me happier than the last day of a very long school year, and then I got this news and burst into tears as my kids were cleaning out their cubbies. The fact that we could have a discussion about the news and that they were also happy and excited was the icing on the cake.
posted by coppermoss at 8:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

Does that fly on his shoulder have a Twitter account yet?
posted by The corpse in the library at 8:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Just now, I took this picture from the spot where I performed a same-sex wedding 5 years ago.
posted by MrMoonPie at 8:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

You know, after last week, this week has been full of good news. People distancing themselves from the confederate flag, the ACA decision, and now this. And on top of it all, Bristol Palin is pregnant again! I'm sure there will be plenty of bad news soon enough, but I am certainly going into this weekend in a good mood.
posted by TedW at 8:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

> He honestly seems like he's trying to hold back tears

Yeah, when he said "love is love" he choked up. Don't hold them back, Obama! Be a big snotty mess like the rest of us!
posted by The corpse in the library at 8:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [21 favorites]

This is wonderful, wonderful news.

I just want to add that 2 of the 5 Justices in that 5-4 majority, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, could instead have been John McCain / Sarah Palin appointees.

Elections matter. They change lives.
posted by RedOrGreen at 8:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [121 favorites]

I cried when it came over twitter. And then when my boss came into work, and I grinned at her, and she gave me a look like "what are you grinning at me like that for weirdo" and I told her and promptly burst into tears again.

THIS IS SUCH A GREAT DAY.
posted by bibliogrrl at 8:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

MANDATORY SAME SEX MARRIAGES FOR EVERYONE!

I GOT DIBS ON DAVE GROHL
posted by ZenMasterThis at 8:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

"Today we can say in no uncertain terms that our union is a little more perfect, not just as a consequence of the supreme court decision but millions of people across decades who stood up, who came out, who talked to parents, to parents who loved their children no matter what...." Obama just now (not an exact quote but close)
posted by MCMikeNamara at 8:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

I am just reeling with happiness. It's hard to imagine when I think back on how things were when I was in high school in the nineties--I never would have hoped things could change this much by this time (though I know we still have far to go...). So wonderful!
posted by ialwayscryatendings at 8:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

What is this I'm feeling towards my country right now? It's... what's the opposite of shame?
posted by Aznable at 11:02 AM on June 26 [5 favorites +] [!]

I believe there's a parade named after it. :D
posted by saturday_morning at 8:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [27 favorites]

"People on FreeRepublic are already talking about "armed insurrection"...."

Game on. They trued to pass tyrannical laws. They failed.

tyr·an·ny
ˈtirənē/
noun
noun: tyranny; plural noun: tyrannies

cruel and oppressive government or rule.
oppression, repression, subjugation, enslavement;
authoritarianism, bullying, severity, cruelty, brutality, ruthlessness
a nation under cruel and oppressive government.
cruel, unreasonable, or arbitrary use of power or control.

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." - Thomas Jefferson
posted by markkraft at 8:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Jesus Christ that Thomas Dissent is so fucked up I can't even
posted by likeatoaster at 8:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Hot damn. It's nice to find out that something has happened back him that I have reason to be really, really fucking proud of. It's an odd sensation, and it doesn't happen all that often, but this is fucking awesome.
posted by Ghidorah at 8:23 AM on June 26, 2015

But what about the bakeries?? Won't somebody think of the bakeries?!!
posted by monospace at 8:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Guess eeeeeeverybody wanted to have their little say.

Eager to be history's tailpipe.
posted by dirigibleman at 8:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

well.. a moment of thanks for Bden's "accidental" slip on marrage equality those years ago (2012) and so forcing the White House out of the "evolving" closet.
posted by edgeways at 8:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

My wife is 4.5 months pregnant with our first kid. This is going to be the only world our kid will know. The one where this chapter in the American History book ends with today.
posted by craven_morhead at 8:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [38 favorites]

But what about the bakeries?? Won't somebody think of the bakeries?!!

So much food coloring. So many skittles.
posted by dinty_moore at 8:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
posted by Going To Maine at 8:25 AM on June 26, 2015

Oh my God. I never thought this would happen so soon. I figured this would be years down the road.

I am ecstatic. What a day to be alive.
posted by Salieri at 8:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the tears of Antonin Scalia."
- some guy on Twitter
posted by MrMoonPie at 8:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [37 favorites]

"The Supreme Court has spoken with a very divided voice on something only the Supreme Being can do-redefine marriage,” Huckabee said in the statement. “I will not acquiesce to an imperial court any more than our Founders acquiesced to an imperial British monarch. We must resist and reject judicial tyranny, not retreat.”

Huckabee called the ruling “unconstitutional.”
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 8:26 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

likeatoaster - I CAN'T EVEN!!!!!!!! What happened to him?
posted by Sophie1 at 8:26 AM on June 26, 2015

And this day seemed so far away not so many years ago. Well done.
posted by ersatz at 8:26 AM on June 26, 2015

FYI: Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee announced he would be introducing tax legislation that would “recognize and protect [the dignity and equal treatment under the law of same sex marriages] in our nation's tax laws as one step further toward full equality for all Americans.” No further details released at this time.
posted by melissasaurus at 8:26 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

So, so happy.
posted by jaduncan at 8:27 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

As a European in the USA, finding it impossible (yet again) not to be swept up in the mixed and strong emotions of the struggle that is this country, have to ask: is *every* summer like this in the USA? Does it ever get boring here?
posted by Wordshore at 8:27 AM on June 26, 2015 [29 favorites]

People Who Are Going To Be Very Disappointed When They Get To Canada
posted by galvanized unicorn at 8:27 AM on June 26, 2015 [28 favorites]

"The Supreme Court has spoken with a very divided voice on something only the Supreme Being can do-redefine marriage,” Huckabee said in the statement. “I will not acquiesce to an imperial court any more than our Founders acquiesced to an imperial British monarch. We must resist and reject judicial tyranny, not retreat.”

Imperial Court, huh?
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 8:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

All 50 states, plus Riverdale.
posted by tocts at 8:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Also, am reading Scalia's text. Wow! This old dude is majorly, seriously, constipated. Get some fiber, dude. Clean out. Cheer up. Chill out.
posted by Wordshore at 8:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

And now to Rock and Roll!
posted by batfish at 8:28 AM on June 26, 2015

This is really inconvenient I have to get work done today.

Also, I'm having my wedding reception tomorrow and I'm trying to figure out if I should just rainbow it up. I've never been a rainbow kind of girl but this seems like a special occasion.
posted by dinty_moore at 8:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [30 favorites]

So far I have seen marriages starting in Mississippi and Texas. Rock on, red states.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:29 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

♪♪♪♪♪ *Thunderbolts of Justice dance* ♪♪♪♪♪

┗( ^o^)┛ ♪♪♪ ┏( ^o^)┓ ♪♪♪ ┗( ^o^)┛
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:29 AM on June 26, 2015 [20 favorites]

I posted a very extended "yay" well the hell upthread but this doesn't do my feelings justice. Today makes me incredibly happy because my best friends, The Matts, their marriage will be properly recognized. This is a gay couple who make their home in Atlanta and when they wanted to get married, they were asked why they just didn't move to a state that already allows gay marriage. "Because this is our home, and I'm not leaving without a fight to get Georgia to see our marriage."

So this is for all the gay couples who stood defiant in their home states despite it all.
posted by Kitteh at 8:29 AM on June 26, 2015 [54 favorites]

Huckabee said in the statement.

I've taken to referring to him as "Friend to many pedophiles Mike Huckabee".

See also "Convicted Felon Dinesh D'Souza".
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 8:29 AM on June 26, 2015 [24 favorites]

Scalia's dissent has nothing on the crazyness of Thomas'.
posted by craven_morhead at 8:30 AM on June 26, 2015

Oh - one more “!” for Washington D.C.
posted by Going To Maine at 8:30 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

🌈
posted by AwkwardPause at 8:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

To quote the Texas Democrats, Y'ALL MEANS ALL -- HOORAY FOR LOVE!
posted by Unicorn on the cob at 8:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

I picked a really good day to work from home. I can do all the crying, cheering, Scalia-mocking I want. Loudly. Fuckin' A.
posted by Stacey at 8:31 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Also, am reading Scalia's text. Wow! This old dude is majorly, seriously, constipated. Get some fiber, dude. Clean out. Cheer up. Chill out.

Scalia's final sentence suggests that maybe some ED treatment is in order, too:

"...we move one step closer to being reminded of our impotence."
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 8:32 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Finally! Great roundup, Rhaomi. Had this one on deck for awhile?
posted by Roger Dodger at 8:32 AM on June 26, 2015

Delurkifying to add my "Yay!" and "WOOHOO!" and 🌈 🌈 🌈!!!

Banner week, Supremes. Well done.
posted by Roommate at 8:32 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

I can barely even focus on the amazeballs good news of this, so I'll leave this picture of the first couple to fill out a ~~same sex~~ marriage application in New Orleans and then note that the word "hippie" hasn't been used in a Supreme court decision since 1973. Eat a bug Scalia.
posted by jessamyn at 8:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [88 favorites]

BTW, agree that the FPP is awesome. Nicely done, Rhaomi!
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 8:34 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

If anyone would like me to marry the hell out of them in Ohio, it's GAME ON. I will even include a reference to Scalia's BRINY MANBABY TEARS in your wedding toast as officiant. Later, we can drive by and egg Boehner's house if you want.
posted by bitter-girl.com at 8:34 AM on June 26, 2015 [41 favorites]

Pretty good way to wake up on my day off, I gotta say! Yay for equality!
posted by Caduceus at 8:34 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

What a weird niche Thomas has: the black Justice who stands against civil rights.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

This ruling comes two days shy of the 46th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. I wish to celebrate today with George Michael and a bunch of supermodels: Freedom!
posted by Quaversalis at 8:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

have to ask: is *every* summer like this in the USA? Does it ever get boring here?

Nope, never gets boring. If nothing is happening we all agree to freak out about shark attacks.

I hope the US can be a model to the world on this. I don't know what we can do as individuals besides speak out but marriage equality is still a long way away in many places in the world.
posted by Drinky Die at 8:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

Also, I'm having my wedding reception tomorrow and I'm trying to figure out if I should just rainbow it up. I've never been a rainbow kind of girl but this seems like a special occasion.

DO. IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
posted by Sophie1 at 8:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

... has anyone created an 'ask the nearest hippie' parody twitter or tumblr yet?
posted by dinty_moore at 8:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

"As a European in the USA, finding it impossible (yet again) not to be swept up in the mixed and strong emotions of the struggle that is this country, have to ask: is *every* summer like this in the USA? Does it ever get boring here?"

Yeah... pretty much. Same-old, same-old really.
posted by markkraft at 8:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

DirtyOldTown: "What a weird niche Thomas has: the black Justice who stands against civil rights."

aka, Darkest Timeline Thurgood Marshall

(who, I assume, powers turbines by spinning in his grave every time Thomas writes a dissent.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:37 AM on June 26, 2015 [31 favorites]

I have quit drinking until late November, but I am tempted to hoist at least one glass to this decision as a tribute to a momentous decision.
posted by Kitteh at 8:38 AM on June 26, 2015

This song just came on my Spotify shuffle. brb trying very hard not to cry some more.
posted by sciatrix at 8:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I wish someone had prepared a bunch of shirts with that on it to toss into the crowds outside.

my weird head fanfic has the Notorious RBG standing on the steps of the Supreme Court Building, all be-robed, with one of those stupid tshirt shooter things you see at like Red Bull Games, shooting them into the cheering crowd.
posted by lonefrontranger at 8:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [24 favorites]

What a weird niche Thomas has: the black Justice who stands against civil rights.

He replaced Thurgood Marshall. We replaced the Martin Luther King Jr of the Supreme Court with Uncle Tom. Fuck you Bush Sr.
posted by Talez at 8:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

Not even 2 years ago, my wife and I had to pick a neighboring state to get married in, because neither of our home states or any state we had particular ties to allowed gay marriage.

We were, even yesterday, both basing our possible future careers and moves based on which states we could be legally married in.

The 2nd anniversary is now officially GO WHEREVER THE FUCK YOU WANT, YOU'RE STILL MARRIED!!

:D
posted by nakedmolerats at 8:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [99 favorites]

DirtyOldTown: "What a weird niche Thomas has: the black Justice who stands against civil rights."

aka, Darkest Timeline Thurgood Marshall

I prefer Justice Uncle Ruckus, myself.
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:39 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

This gif though.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 8:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

I feel best when Antonin Scalia feels the worst. Mmm...delicious original constructionist tears...
posted by inturnaround at 8:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

dinty_moore: out of curiosity:

# whois askthenearesthippie.com

Domain Name: ASKTHENEARESTHIPPIE.COM
Registrar: 1 API GMBH
Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 1387
Whois Server: whois.1api.net
Referral URL: http://www.1api.net
Name Server: NS1.IWANTMYNAME.NET
Name Server: NS2.IWANTMYNAME.NET
Updated Date: 26-jun-2015
Creation Date: 26-jun-2015
Expiration Date: 26-jun-2016
posted by tomierna at 8:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [32 favorites]

Hell yes! It's a great day for America :-)
posted by KGMoney at 8:41 AM on June 26, 2015

Scalia's main argument seems to be "well that's just what the majority thinks, if they didn't constitute a majority, then the case would be decided a different way." Well, yes. That is quite literally how the Supreme Court works - and it only took you 28 years to figure it out!

Also, check out the disparagement of basically all non-folksy-small-town lawyers at footnote 18 of his dissent. And a "Putsch?" Really?! Yes, interpretation of a law in light of the US Constitution by the body appointed to do just that is definitely the same as a violent coup.

"The opinion is couched in a style that is as pretentious as its content is egotistic." Look in the mirror, buddy.

Is this the first time "Huh?" has been used in a SCOTUS opinion?
posted by melissasaurus at 8:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [29 favorites]

Oh man, I was recently asked to perform my first same-sex wedding and now we're going to have a lot more to talk about!
posted by psoas at 8:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Also, just made a couple of phone calls. Traditionally married friends are still happily married, so traditional marriage is also not yet destroyed!
posted by eriko at 8:44 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Apparently, I don't know how to be happy because instead of reading the majority opinion, I'm slogging through the dissents. Dude, using Dred Scott as an example of the Court's susbtantive due process overreach, of which you see Obergefell as another is....tacky, to say the least, Justice Roberts.
Further, Scalia thinks it was Putsch. A violent attempt to overthrow the government. Fuck you, dude.
posted by atomicstone at 8:44 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Mobile County in Alabama, still isn't issuing marriage licences at all since March and the first district court decision.

I wonder how many, if any, counties will stop issuing marriage licenses altogether as a last ditch "defense of marriage"?
posted by Talez at 8:45 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

beautiful, beautiful, beautiful
posted by ersatzkat at 8:45 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

dinty_moore: So much food coloring. So many skittles.

Don't worry, bigots: the vast wave of gay weddings, all held in so short a time, will spike all the gay peoples' system with toxic food dyes, and they'll end up like Violet Beauregarde!

Or, maybe not: maybe you'll just have to shut up?

(Nice to see our own VT JP demonstrating that this will be a big shot in America's economic arm, like quantitative easing for the Wedding-Industrial Complex. All the bakers, officiants, florists, musicians, limo companies, photographers, videographers, and assorted hangers-on should be shouting hallelujah! Say, maybe they'll even hire some people, and those gay unions will create jobs!)
posted by wenestvedt at 8:46 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

1) So, SO awesome.

2) I find it very hard to sympathize with the dissenting judges' warnings of constitutional overreach and impending democratic doom when these dissenting judges are the very same ones who gave us Citizens United.
posted by adamp88 at 8:47 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

Also, just made a couple of phone calls. Traditionally married friends are still happily married, so traditional marriage is also not yet destroyed!

Don't be too hasty. I just messed up brewing our hetero marriage's shared coffee this morning because I was too busy reading all the happy news about the SCOTUS decision.

End times may be upon us.
posted by deludingmyself at 8:47 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

As the family liberal, I generally try to quietly fly under my in-laws' radar, as they are staunch conservative Christians, and blah-blah-family-harmony-blah. But, I just had to replace the front page image on my Facebook page with the rainbow flag image Cortex used.

I eagerly await their comments as soon as Facebook dutifully informs them I changed my picture.
posted by Thorzdad at 8:47 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

From the decision: "Many who deem same-sex marriage to be wrong reach that conclusion based on decent and honorable religious or philosophical premises, and neither they nor their beliefs are disparaged here. But when that sincere, personal opposition becomes enacted law and public policy, the necessary consequence is to put the imprimatur of the State itself on an exclusion that soon demeans or stigmatizes those whose own liberty is then denied."

Wow!
posted by MonkeyToes at 8:47 AM on June 26, 2015 [36 favorites]

Glenn Greenwald retweeted
pourmecoffee ‏@pourmecoffee 58m58 minutes ago

@ggreenwald "What do we want?" "Strangers not to enter into committed, loving relationships!" "When do want it?" "Now, again!"
posted by Trochanter at 8:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Some highlights from Justice Kennedy's majority opinion:

It demeans gays and lesbians for the State to lock them out of a central institution of the Nation’s society. Same-sex couples, too, may aspire to the transcendent purposes of marriage and seek fulfillment in its highest meaning.

The limitation of marriage to opposite-sex couples may long have seemed natural and just, but its inconsistency with the central meaning of the fundamental right to marry is now manifest. With that knowledge must come the recognition that laws excluding same-sex couples from the marriage right impose stigma and injury of the kind prohibited by our basic charter.

...

If rights were defined by who exercised them in the past, then received practices could serve as their own continued justification and new groups could not invoke rights once denied. This Court has rejected that approach, both with respect to the right to marry and the rights of gays and lesbians. See Loving, 388 U. S., at 12; Lawrence, 539 U. S., at 566–567.

The right to marry is fundamental as a matter of history and tradition, but rights come not from ancient sources alone. They rise, too, from a better informed understanding of how constitutional imperatives define a liberty that remains urgent in our own era. Many who deem same-sex marriage to be wrong reach that conclusion based on decent and honorable religious or philosophical premises, and neither they nor their beliefs are disparaged here. But when that sincere, personal opposition becomes enacted law and public policy, the necessary consequence is to put the imprimatur of the State itself on an exclusion that soon demeans or stigmatizes those whose own liberty is then denied. Under the Constitution, same-sex couples seek in marriage the same legal treatment as opposite-sex couples, and it would disparage their choices and diminish their personhood to deny them this right.

...

It is now clear that the challenged laws burden the liberty of same-sex couples, and it must be further acknowledged that they abridge central precepts of equality. Here the marriage laws enforced by the respondents are in essence unequal: same-sex couples are denied all the benefits afforded to opposite-sex couples and are barred from exercising a fundamental right. Especially against a long history of disapproval of their relationships, this denial to same-sex couples of the right to marry works a grave and continuing harm. The imposition of this disability on gays and lesbians serves to disrespect and subordinate them. And the Equal Protection Clause, like the Due Process Clause, prohibits this unjustified infringement of the fundamental right to marry. See, e.g., Zablocki, supra, at 383–388; Skinner, 316 U. S., at 541.

These considerations lead to the conclusion that the right to marry is a fundamental right inherent in the liberty of the person, and under the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment couples of the same-sex may not be deprived of that right and that liberty. The Court now holds that same-sex couples may exercise the fundamental right to marry. No longer may this liberty be denied to them. Baker v. Nelson [a 1972 decision without an opinion, which dismissed an appeal claiming a right to same-sex marriage,] must be and now is overruled, and the State laws challenged by Petitioners in these cases are now held invalid to the extent they exclude same-sex couples from civil marriage on the same terms and conditions as opposite-sex couples.

posted by John Cohen at 8:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [20 favorites]

The Onion: Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito Suddenly Realize They Will Be Villains In Oscar-Winning Movie One Day
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 8:49 AM on June 26, 2015 [55 favorites]

Amazing, joyous news!!! Huzzah! Finally!

Also, that moment when you realize that you're going into NYC for the Del Close Marathon and it's also Pride weekend... #packalltherainbows
posted by booksherpa at 8:49 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I was born in a decade when the Supreme Court had upheld the right for states to prosecute people for sodomy, gay marriage was a hobbyhorse of the furthest fringes of the left and when Reagan's press room broke out into homophobic lulz multiple times during a conversation about AIDS. We have come so fucking far in just 26 years. Never let them tell you change is impossible. But we can't rest on our laurels. Reproductive rights are being aggressively eroded nationwide. Wikipedia tells me 14 trans people have been murdered in hate crimes this year alone. Confederate flags still fly, we're more segregated than before brown vs. board of ed, and cops murder brown and black people with impunity in the streets. We still drown Israel in foreign aid so they can kill Palestinian children and we still terrorize civilians in Muslim countries with fiery death rained down from the sky. We're still determined to destroy the planet in about 8 different ways. BUT. We won this one. Marriage is a patriarchal and transactional institution, but I woke up today with civil rights I didn't have when I went to sleep. Now I just need $20,000 for my dream wedding. ‪#‎kickstarter‬
posted by zeusianfog at 8:49 AM on June 26, 2015 [62 favorites]

There is apparently an actual rainbow over downtown DC right now.
posted by zombieflanders at 8:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [53 favorites]

I'm so happy to be here celebrating one of the many momentous events I have witnessed unfolding on Metafilter.

I'm even more excited to see what trouble I can get into during NYC Pride this weekend...
posted by rachaelfaith at 8:51 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Surely someone has said this already, but now I DEMAND a shirt that says ASK ME on the front, and THE NEAREST HIPPIE on the back.
posted by ersatzkat at 8:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [25 favorites]

I'm out of the country and straight as can straight be and I just teared up on seein the headlines. I've been drinking for a few hours already, but now I'm going to keep going because FINALLY.
posted by bonje at 8:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

> Mobile County in Alabama, still isn't issuing marriage licences at all

It's complicated. They have a federal court telling them to issue same-sex licenses, but their state Supreme Court telling them not to. They are taking an "all or nothing" position. So it's true that they are not issuing any marriage licenses but not (as I understand it) to "defend traditional marriage". They're basically telling the courts to sort their shit out before trying to order others around.

They *could* be more courageous, of course. But they could also be more anti-equality by using the state SC as cover to deny same-sex (but not different-sex) marriage licenses.
posted by dendrochronologizer at 8:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

This is so great. I didn't expect to get choked up by this, but kindness and decency seem to so often get lost as institutions get bigger, when The Government of The United States of America lands on their side it hits me right in the feels.

I'm just going to enjoy history having made a sharp turn towards justice for a while before I go harvesting schadenfreude. Heck, if this "doing the right thing" keeps up I might lose my appetite for it completely.

(And the biggest of kudos to the people who worked to make this happen. I don't know exactly who they are or exactly what they did, but advances like this don't happen purely through the zeitgeist changing — there was a lot of hard work and smart planning behind it. Whoever you are, you've amazed me, repeatedly.)
posted by benito.strauss at 8:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Schools Fear Impact Of Gay Marriage Ruling On Tax-Exempt Status
posted by the man of twists and turns at 8:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

# whois askthenearesthippie.com

I tweeted him and asked for a job.
posted by jessamyn at 8:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

....It just so happens to be David's birthday today.

Goddamn you I had just stopped crying!
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 8:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

\o/ STEVE HOLT!

Waking up my wife-to-be to tell her this news this morning was the most amazing feeling.
posted by komlord at 8:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

PS I shit you not, it's been cloudy and the sun has just broken through as soon as I found out the news.
posted by bonje at 8:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

So, I've been telling same sex people they are married "according to the laws of the State of Washington" since Washington became one of the first two states to recognize this right by popular vote. But this afternoon I am marrying two women and I am going to add, "and pursuant to the Constitution of the United States of America."

**Happy dancing!!!***
posted by bearwife at 8:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [70 favorites]

LOL at this -- Scalia's dissent
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 8:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

Knock Knock
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I demand a shirt that says TALL-BUILDING LAWYER.
posted by melissasaurus at 8:54 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

A more perfect union. At last.

And yes, props to Biden for forcing Obama's hand on this one.
posted by chicainthecity at 8:54 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Just a reminder about office etiquette:

Celebration Day? Yes. Equality Day? You betcha! Pride Day? Hell yeah!

Ask Your LGBT Co-Worker With Whom You Don't Really Have a Personal Friendship and With Whom You Never Speak About Your Personal Lives a Bunch of Probing Questions About Their Marital Status and Plans Day? NOPEnopenope.

I just overheard a session of that and it was excruciating.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:54 AM on June 26, 2015 [52 favorites]

Oh my god could Ian McKellen and Derek Jacobi get any more adorable
posted by dorque at 8:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [44 favorites]

I feel like "ask the nearest hippie" should go down in history as the sum total of Scalia's jurisprudence.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Does it seem weird to anyone that 6 of the 9 Supreme Court Justices are Catholic? (Only 22 percent of Americans are)
posted by drezdn at 8:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

zombieflanders: "There is apparently an actual rainbow over downtown DC right now."

https://twitter.com/samsteinhp/status/614459217647403008
posted by boo_radley at 8:57 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

There is not a Protestant white male on the Supreme Court right now. In the first 150 years of US Supreme Court history there were only PWMs.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 8:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

drezdn: It's weirder that only 3 of 9 are women, when about 50% of Americans are.
posted by fitnr at 8:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [40 favorites]

I'm so happy for EVERYONE!
posted by librosegretti at 8:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Do we need Mefi Meetups to set up all our new mandatory gay marriages?
posted by emjaybee at 8:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

This GIF seems apropos.
posted by Rumple at 8:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Wait, how did you do that with the title, Rhaomi?
posted by Rock Steady at 9:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Woah. My kid isn't going to remember a time when it wasn't okay to get married to whoever you wanted.

So rad. Good job SCOTUS, Good job citizens.
posted by furnace.heart at 9:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Marriage Equality Facts
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Does it seem weird to anyone that 6 of the 9 Supreme Court Justices are Catholic? (Only 22 percent of Americans are)

Yes it does. And like I said to someone on Twitter, re: Scalia complaining about the lack of diversity on the Court -- if the Supreme Court accurately matched the rest of the country, Scalia would flip the fuck out.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 9:01 AM on June 26, 2015 [22 favorites]

I saw the news here, turned on the TV (CNN)--and it was a commercial for "ChristianMingle".
Nice timing.
posted by librosegretti at 9:01 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I'll read all the comments in a minute, but I'm here to offer my services as an ordained marriage officiant in the state of Ohio to anyone who wants them. I'm so thrilled to FINALLY be able to offer my services to same-sex couples!

I'll marry you for free! I'll probably cry, though, so you'll have to be okay with that.
posted by cooker girl at 9:01 AM on June 26, 2015 [39 favorites]

Also, just made a couple of phone calls. Traditionally married friends are still happily married, so traditional marriage is also not yet destroyed!

More happily than ever. My wife & I have been celebrating via Facebook chat all morning.

I'm a little surprised as a middle-aged SWM how much this is affecting me right now, but I guess it's having lived through so much history. From being a kid in the Castro in the 70's & seeing the original gay revolution first-hand & realizing that these people were just my neighbors, living the way they should be allowed to, to the outright exuberance when Milk got elected, which I shared in because that was a historic moment for this country, then moving in '78 to back-asswards Texas where teh gay was a disease...

Then Milk's assassination coming in over the news, followed by the long, dark years of the Reagan administration & the Aids epidemic, which took friends, and is still sickening others, the intervening 40 years have been pretty painful when I think about gay rights, and now all of that has kind of come crashing down at once and I feel that exuberance again.

What a great damn day.
posted by Devils Rancher at 9:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [31 favorites]

Take, for example, this Court, which consists of only nine men and women, all of them successful lawyers who studied at Harvard or Yale Law School. Four of the nine are natives of New York City. Eight of them grew up in east- and west-coast States. Only one hails from the vast expanse in-between. Not a single Southwesterner or even, to tell the truth, a genuine Westerner (California does not count). Not a single evangelical Christian (a group that comprises about one quarter of Americans), or even a Protestant of any denomination.

You know, if Scalia is so unhappy about a lack of midwestern protestants...I think Obama would be happy to agree to nominate one if Scalia resigned. Seems like a win-win for everybody.
posted by Drinky Die at 9:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [29 favorites]

When can I get video of Sir Patrick Stewart reading the last paragraph of the decision, with a resounding "Make it so!" at the end?
posted by jferg at 9:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [34 favorites]

Something about basic sanity prevailing makes my pessimistic skepticism flare up.

1) Can states wriggle out of it? Many are going to try. Many already have been.

2) Does this mean we as a culture can/will start caring about more vital things now? Or does it mean we're going to pretend that We Won and It Gets Better and U-S-A even though many like me have no viable path to employment/healthcare/housing/safety/etc.?

I mean, hooray and all, but it should not have taken this long with this much effort to achieve something non-essential, and that it did is one reason why I have no hope of positive change within my lifetime.
posted by byanyothername at 9:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Hell mu'fuckin' yes.
posted by grubi at 9:03 AM on June 26, 2015

""[I]f you OK gay marriage, then you have to do plural marriage, which is now -- has a name, triads. Three people getting married."
- Bill O'Reilly

Really, it's very progressive of him!
posted by markkraft at 9:04 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

if only there was a Minion image macro to describe how happy I feel right now
posted by xbonesgt at 9:04 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

zombieflanders: "There is apparently an actual rainbow over downtown DC right now."

God has filed his concurrence with the majority.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 9:04 AM on June 26, 2015 [66 favorites]

I was sad about stuff at work earlier, but then I read the news and basically started crying happy tears instead.

What a victory! To all my friends that can finally get married now, hooray! I feel a little better, preparing for my own wedding in two years, knowing that anyone can get married just because they want to. It's a beautiful thing.
posted by PearlRose at 9:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

MANDATORY SAME SEX MARRIAGES FOR EVERYONE!

Kang: Same sex marriage for all.

[crowd boos]

Kang: Very well, no same sex marriage for anyone.

[crowd boos]

Kang: Hmm... Same sex marriage for some, miniature American flags for others.

[crowd cheers and waves miniature flags]
posted by Doktor Zed at 9:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

Jill Lepore, To Have And To Hold: Reproduction, marriage, and the Constitution. New Yorker

This spring marks the fiftieth anniversary of the case that went forward instead: Griswold v. Connecticut. (“We became the footnote to the footnote,” Trubek told me.) In Griswold, decided in June, 1965, the Supreme Court ruled 7–2 that Connecticut’s ban on contraception was unconstitutional, not on the ground of a woman’s right to determine the timing and the number of her pregnancies but on the ground of a married couple’s right to privacy. “We deal with a right of privacy older than the Bill of Rights,” Justice William O. Douglas wrote in the majority opinion. “Marriage is a coming together for better or for worse, hopefully enduring, and intimate to the degree of being sacred.”

In the half century since Griswold, Douglas’s arguments about privacy and marriage have been the signal influence on a series of landmark Supreme Court decisions. In 1972, Eisenstadt v. Baird extended Griswold’s notion of privacy from married couples to individuals. “If the right of privacy means anything,” Justice William Brennan wrote, “it is the right of the individual, married or single, to be free from unwarranted governmental intrusion into matters so fundamentally affecting a person as the decision whether to bear or beget a child.” Griswold informed Roe v. Wade, in 1973, the Court finding that the “right of privacy . . . is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.” And in Lawrence v. Texas, in 2003, Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing a 6–3 decision overturning a ban on sodomy, described Griswold as “the most pertinent beginning point” for the Court’s line of reasoning: the generative case.

Griswold v. Connecticut: The Start of the Revolution

The legacy of a Supreme Court ruling is often clear and immediate. When the Supreme Court struck down Virginia’s ban on interracial marriage in the 1967 case of Loving v. Virginia, it ended an era rather than began one. (For my ruminations on the cultural and legal legacies of Loving, read here and here.) But Griswold v. Connecticut can fairly claim a different role in history, as the launch pad for some of the most important and well-known cases on constitutional rights. In those cases lie some of our most significant constitutional rights, as well as some of our most significant social controversies—abortion and same-sex marriage, to take just the most obvious examples.

posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

LOL at this -- Scalia's dissent

I am just dumbfounded that Scalia used the creepy and pathetic angle, "Har har, ask us bitter old married guys, sex is over once yer married kid, the old lady ain't put out for years and years, why would the gays want in on that?" in an actual legal dissent that will be on record for fucking ever. What is he, someone's unbearable jackass uncle at a tedious family picnic? (I mean, I guess he is, basically.) Whatever, dude, keep your sad personal life to yourself and don't use it as justification to try to fuck up millions of other people's lives.
posted by aught at 9:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [52 favorites]

it should not have taken this long with this much effort to achieve something non-essential, and that it did is one reason why I have no hope of positive change within my lifetime

So the fact that positive change has occurred is evidence to you that positive change will not happen? Um, okay.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 9:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [25 favorites]

it should not have taken this long with this much effort to achieve something non-essential, and that it did is one reason why I have no hope of positive change within my lifetime.

yes it took far too long but I mean... positive change JUST HAPPENED

like two hours ago
posted by saturday_morning at 9:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

Well technically plural marriage is what biblical marriage is sooooooo...
posted by angeline at 9:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

I'm so slow. My comment was in response to markkraft. I typed as fast as I could!
posted by angeline at 9:06 AM on June 26, 2015

Metafilter: I mean, hooray and all, but
posted by Xavier Xavier at 9:07 AM on June 26, 2015 [37 favorites]

This is a wonderful day.
posted by Xavier Xavier at 9:07 AM on June 26, 2015

God has filed his concurrence with the majority.

Scalia feels God has spent too much time as a tall-building deity, probably on the coast somewhere.
posted by drezdn at 9:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

When I heard, I called my best friend to be the first to congratulate him on finally having full rights of citizenship. It's about goddamn time. And someone needs to hand me a kleenex.
posted by janey47 at 9:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

We're sitting here still drinking coffee and gingerbeer quoted the Alito stupidity ("The decision will also have other important consequences. It will be used to vilify Americans who are unwilling to assent to the new orthodoxy.") and I was like, but it's not like we were waiting for this decision - we're trend-setters, we were vilifying bigots way before this came down.
posted by rtha at 9:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [60 favorites]

I issue driver licenses in a thoroughly red state. When I get in to work this afternoon, I'll have to ask my branch manager if we are accepting ssm certificates as proof of identity/name-change. This should be a very interesting day! Wish me luck.
posted by Groundhog Week at 9:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [36 favorites]

I've lost track of the number of my friends this morning who have announced/reminded people that they are licensed to perform marriage ceremonies.
posted by MexicanYenta at 9:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I have to work today? Fuck that!
posted by Annika Cicada at 9:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

“A prime part of the history of our Constitution is the story of the extension of constitutional rights to people once ignored or excluded.” - Ruth Bader Ginsburg, United States v. Virginia.

And, apropos Kennedy:
“We have all known the long loneliness and we have learned that the only solution is love and that love comes with community.” - Dorothea Day, The Long Loneliness
posted by Going To Maine at 9:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

Also, someone has hidden chopped onions all over my house.
posted by MexicanYenta at 9:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

I JUST WOKE UP WHAT IS HAPPEN

I FELT A GAY DISTURBANCE IN THE FORCE
posted by poffin boffin at 9:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [74 favorites]

YAY
posted by everybody had matching towels at 9:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

No--the fact that it took decades to do something this obvious is fuel for my pessimism. Maybe read the rest of my comment to understand my bitterness: even though many like me have no viable path to employment/healthcare/housing/safety/etc.?

This does shit for me, except make it legal for me to marry, where before my state could nullify any marriage I was involved in because my gender is apparently legally malleable and unreal. That's great, for what it is, but there is so much more to do, and I've seen more important issues thrown under the bus too many times in favor of promoting gay marriage for me to get fully on board with an It Gets Better party.

So, I'm glad! But this isn't a major victory for LGBT people; it's something that should have taken about ten minutes' consideration, with a unanimous, "Yes, of course people who want to should be legally able to marry. Next?" Now that it's passed, I wonder if we will start caring about those under-bus issues, or if we'll just throw up our hands and move on, because people can get married We Won etc.
posted by byanyothername at 9:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I FELT A GAY DISTURBANCE IN THE FORCE

As if millions of voices suddenly cried out in joy and were suddenly fabulous!
posted by Talez at 9:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [48 favorites]

"It will be used to vilify Americans who are unwilling to assent to the new orthodoxy."

This is like the worst slam poetry fed through the intolerance machine three times
posted by Dr-Baa at 9:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

it should not have taken this long with this much effort to achieve something non-essential, and that it did is one reason why I have no hope of positive change within my lifetime.

This is maybe not the right thread to call marriage something non-essential.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:13 AM on June 26, 2015 [39 favorites]

Even though I don't speak Dutch, I just bought all of the staff a round. When I explained why, the bartender smiled and said that was a reason to celebrate.
posted by bonje at 9:13 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

IT'S AS IF MILLIONS OF VOICES SUDDENLY CRIED OUT AND THEN KEPT ON CRYING BECAUSE THEY GET THE SAME RIGHTS AS EVERYONE ELSE

It's a good day.
posted by cmfletcher at 9:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

This does shit for me

I'm sincerely sorry to hear that.

It, however, does a great deal for my family, friends, co-workers, and fellow Americans. We can celebrate a major victory ("non-essential"?!) without assuming the broader fight is over. A lot of people worked very hard to see this day and moment realized. They -- and we -- deserve a moment to celebrate, in my opinion.
posted by Xavier Xavier at 9:15 AM on June 26, 2015 [44 favorites]

Ahhhh I was waiting for 10 am and then I got sucked into a project for two hours and all of a sudden my Twitter was all rainbows HURRAY HURRAY HURRAY
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 9:15 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

So, I'm glad! But this isn't a major victory for LGBT people; it's something that should have taken about ten minutes' consideration, with a unanimous, "Yes, of course people who want to should be legally able to marry. Next?" Now that it's passed, I wonder if we will start caring about those under-bus issues, or if we'll just throw up our hands and move on, because people can get married We Won etc.

I understand that you believe this was obvious, but I'd like to point to most of the history of civilization as a counterargument. Things go from not-obvious to obvious once they've been achieved.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:15 AM on June 26, 2015 [28 favorites]

From Scalia's truly insane FN 18: The predominant attitude of tall-building lawyers with respect to the questions presented in these cases is suggested by the fact that the American Bar Association deemed it in accord with the wishes of its members to file a brief in support of the petitioners.

Thanks, Nino, I have updated my profile.
posted by The Bellman at 9:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

Oh, wow. Just wow. Fantastic!
posted by barnacles at 9:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Alito is just the worst. At least the other dissenters have the shame to couch their arguments in "states rights" nonsense. Alito's like everyone's embarrassing bigot uncle:

"I assume that those who cling to old beliefs will be able to whisper their thoughts in the recesses of their homes, but if they repeat those views in public, they will risk being labeled as bigots and treated as such by governments, employers, and schools."

Ick, old man. Just ick.
posted by gurple at 9:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

Heya, maybe let's leave the is-marriage-essential thing for another time.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

Yayyyyyy! It is about time! As a liberal Catholic, I am especially enjoying the sound of the Council of Catholic Bishops wailing and gnashing their teeth. Congratulations all couple now legally able to marry, and as other have said, love wins.
posted by mermayd at 9:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

This is a fantastic day. I can't think of anything that hasn't been said before, but I had to say something.
posted by bolda at 9:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

What an incredible presidency Obama's has turned out to be.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [24 favorites]

it's something that should have taken about ten minutes' consideration, with a unanimous, "Yes, of course people who want to should be legally able to marry. Next?"

Should have? Sure. And it didn't work out that way. A lot of people had to fight to make this happen.

In the same way that the rights of anyone who is trans or otherwise non-cis should be a no brainer, and now that's where the fight needs to go.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 9:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

Hey, as a totally gender queer trans woman I am beyond thrilled today. My girlfriend and I are beside ourselves and FUCK yeah I'll be changing my gender marker and FUCK NO gay marriage can't be used against me as a reason to not allow me my gender that I am. This is huge for all gay and trans people across the U.S. and I am not bitter right now. Maybe next year I will be if the HRC is still jacking me around, but today I am happy for all my friends who can now get married. Seriously fucking rad.
posted by Annika Cicada at 9:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [63 favorites]

byanyothername, I do get your point and I think absolutely the call for the LGBT community should be "this is just the beginning". A lot of LGBT people have thought that the movement is too focused on marriage. I didn't necessarily agree, but I got the point.

I hope that there will be both celebration and a call to continue important work, especially to those in the LGBT community that were, relatively, privileged enough that marriage was the "big fight".
posted by nakedmolerats at 9:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

1) Can states wriggle out of it? Many are going to try. Many already have been.

Just as a reassurance (and I hope not continuing a derail), the answer is that states cannot wriggle out of it; nor can Congress. They can briefly delay the inevitable by openly defying the law, but it's not going to get them anywhere. This really is the final word as far as government treating marriage differently based on gender.
posted by jhc at 9:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

I assume that those who cling to old beliefs will be able to whisper their thoughts in the recesses of their homes, but if they repeat those views in public, they will risk being labeled as bigots and treated as such by governments, employers, and schools.

So? Alito should try coming out as an anti-religious left-wing communitarian.
posted by mondo dentro at 9:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Yay!

I'm shocked to see this and the ACA being upheld in the same week. I'll reiterate what other's have said above, even a middle right non-crazy candidate (Clinton/Obama) is far far better for progressive causes than the crazy right (Nearly all the GOP candidates). There really is a difference between the major parties and voting does matter.
posted by jclarkin at 9:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [29 favorites]

drezdn: It's weirder that only 3 or 9 are women, when about 50% of Americans are.

Actually, given the massive repression of women in law until the 1970s, that's not surprising at all. And SCOTUS is the absolute acme in the profession, so with the very few women who were allowed in even at the very lowest courts in the 1970s, it's taken time just to get that many there -- they have to work up through the bench.

It's wrong, of course, but 4.5 would be exactly half, so one more is close. When we get all the federal courts near to at parity, we'll have it solved, and we have in fact been getting closer to that. But for SCOUTS, you had to fix the problem at the lower courts first, you don't just throw people onto the very top court. They need to be proven justices at the senior appellate level to be effective.

And the women who have made it have been very effective justices, even when I disagree with them, (O'Conner) and the idea that women could not be effective Supreme Court justices has been utterly shattered. Ruth Bader Ginsburg is considered every bit the intellectual equal of Antonin Scalia, and they have a very strong mutual respect for each other*. Kagan, accused of being a lightweight and obviously there to fill a quota when she was nominated, has proven to be more than a match for anybody on the court and Roberts, in particular, has a great deal of respect for her.

But with lifetime appointments, change comes slow to the Supreme Court. I don't think this is a bad thing, actually, other things in our system of government do change quickly. I do hope the next appointment does bring the bench to a 5-4 male-female ratio, which is as close to gender parity as the bench can ever get without some form of asexual or hermaphrodite sitting on the bench, never mind the question of cis/trans or gender fluidity, and when we start going there, we're dealing with fractional sexuality and the math gets harder. :-)

But, you know, when I was born, it was 9 guys, and it had been that way for damn close to 200 years. It's not perfect, but it's a hell of lot better than it was. When I was born? Blacks couldn't marry whites. Gays couldn't get married. They can now.

Is it a perfect world? No. Do we have more to do? YES.

But is a better world? Yes! One step at a time, and don't forget to celebrate the successes, and do not forget the victories that still need to be won. It is a different world today, it is a better world. We need to get back to work soon and keep winning, yes, absolutely.

But today? Let's celebrate the thing we won today, okay? Let's not let perfect be the enemy of the good today. And we'll work on that next step tomorrow. We don't have to stop striving just because we won a battle -- and we shouldn't not celebrate because we haven't won all of them yet.

Today, let's just look at that flag, and smile, and cry a bit for those who can finally get married.

And make a resolution for tomorrow to win the next battle for others, so we can all smile and cry again.

(* And, you might be surprised to learn, a very close personal friendship. They're completely opposites in both their political beliefs and their basic legal theories, but still close friends and, FWIW, huge opera nuts.)
posted by eriko at 9:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [29 favorites]

SCALIA: "Argle bargle, tall building lawyers, jiggery pokery."

I have a neurologist he should consider seeing.
posted by Sophie1 at 9:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

"I assume that those who cling to old beliefs will be able to whisper their thoughts in the recesses of their homes, but if they repeat those views in public, they will risk being labeled as bigots and treated as such by governments, employers, and schools."

What a horrible way to live, Alito, I'm sure homosexuals have never had to experience anything like that
posted by nakedmolerats at 9:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [125 favorites]

So, I'm glad! But this isn't a major victory for LGBT people; it's something that should have taken about ten minutes' consideration, with a unanimous, "Yes, of course people who want to should be legally able to marry. Next?" Now that it's passed, I wonder if we will start caring about those under-bus issues, or if we'll just throw up our hands and move on, because people can get married We Won etc.
posted by byanyothername at 9:11 AM on June 26 [+] [!]

I hope we don't shut down this comment or others like it here. I don't want to let the most mainstream gays (white, powerful men) rule the agenda on what is a queer issue. Nor do I want to see straight "allies" define what is a valid comment in this thread.
posted by latkes at 9:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

But this isn't a major victory for LGBT people; it's something that should have taken about ten minutes' consideration....

It is a very visible stepping stone down the right path. It opens doors for other rights cases. The fight will move on. I'm personally hopeful that trans* rights are going to become the next high profile fight -- something else that should have taken about ten minutes' consideration.
posted by Foosnark at 9:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

Maybe next year I will be if the HRC is still jacking me around, but today I am happy for all my friends who can now get married

Seriously. I, as I'm sure many others here too, have huge issues with the HRC. But they are a big organization with a lot of power and now that marriage equality is in some definitions "out of the way" there are a lot of people still employed by them that are going to need somewhere to focus. I look forward to the big mainstream guns of the movement focusing their considerable power elsewhere, and that's a reason to celebrate too.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 9:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I'm now deeply concerned about whether I'm a tall building lawyer or not. I work on the seventh floor, but the building is taller than that. Is this tall enough? I need to know how Scalia feels about me!
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 9:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [24 favorites]

And it occurs to me that now we can retire the silly and divisive phrase "Gay Marriage". We are all just married or legally able marry who we choose now. Hurray for equality!
posted by jclarkin at 9:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

If you haven't read Kennedy's opinion for the majority, it's definitely worth a read. Emotionally moving and jurisprudentially interesting: Obergefell v. Hodges (PDF)
posted by Xavier Xavier at 9:25 AM on June 26, 2015

So has that dude from Texas set himself on fire yet? Yeah, didn't think so.
posted by holborne at 9:26 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Sorry EMRJKC, but that's NOT Yub Nub! THIS IS YUB NUB.

[300]THIS! IS! YUBNUB![/300]
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 9:27 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

So has that dude from Texas set himself on fire yet? Yeah, didn't think so.

Maybe he's sharing a prison cell with Ted Nugent.
posted by drezdn at 9:27 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAS
posted by brecc at 9:29 AM on June 26, 2015

It's about damn time. I am glad I have lived long enough to see this day. WooHoo!
posted by Lynsey at 9:30 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

A (soon-to-be-ex) social media friend is quoting Scalia's passage:

A system of government that makes the people subordinate to a committee of nine unelected lawyers does not deserve to be called a democracy.

That bullshit offends me as an American.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 9:32 AM on June 26, 2015 [43 favorites]

Canada, Mexico, United States....

Getting there
posted by edgeways at 9:32 AM on June 26, 2015

Meanwhile, Kennedy and Roberts alternate nights being woken at 3am by the ghost of Roger Taney.

posted by Sequence at 5:51 AM on July 29, 2014 [6 favorites +] [!]

And one of them will now be sleeping a little easier than the other.
posted by Sequence at 9:33 AM on June 26, 2015

Today is our wedding anniversary. And a lot of very happy couples will now be sharing it with us. Hooray!
posted by zsazsa at 9:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

Is this the first time "Huh?" has been used in a SCOTUS opinion?

"Huh? Bluh? Whu?" sputters Antonin into his pillow. "Guh?"
posted by naju at 9:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

This decision defiles the sanctity of Newt Gingrich's 3rd marriage!
posted by PenDevil at 9:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [31 favorites]

Awesome news. It puts the 2016 presidential race into perspective in terms of importance. The political balance in the high court seems to be of paramount importance in today's political climate to achieve any sort of goal commonly held by progressives.
posted by codacorolla at 9:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Cortex's flag post actually made me a little weepy for a second there.
Heartfelt congrats for this happy day, USA!
posted by chococat at 9:35 AM on June 26, 2015

Oh, for fuck's sake. Last ill-conceived comment, in which coherence has dropped to "borderline-stream-of-vitriol" because the privileged, patronizing tones here are incredibly frustrating to respond to. Emotions are strong and I'm not writing this eloquently. I am asking, genuinely but more for personal reflection than public debate: will you give a fuck about more pressing issues now that gay marriage is no longer something to hide behind? I did not expect that to be answered so quickly in the negative. This does fuck all for me, and for many trans people struggling for essential survival--it's great that it happened, but now will you care or will it always continue to be a "bad time" to speak up about it? Do you really care about LGB and trans and umbrella* issues, or do you want to pretend that you always secretly did after far too many other people have died to advance the real work?

Basically, America, look to Ireland. After gay marriage got a positive vote, there was a bit of criticism from trans people stepping up to say, "What about us?" And Ireland actually thought about it and said, "Yeah, okay, you lot deserve rights, too!" Do you want to do that, or do you want to continue telling trans people to sit down and shut the fuck up and suffer abuse for another half-century to obtain basic human rights the polite and proper way? Don't get drunk and complacent and pat yourself on the back for doing fuck all--get fucking angry that too many people in your country are still struggling for more important basic rights.

Celebrate like a proper SJW. Is there really ever going to be a better time than right now? How is this question not of vital relevance right at this moment?
posted by byanyothername at 9:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [24 favorites]

I think this is an important moment in the same way that the election of Obama as America's first black president was an important moment, as the culmination and crowning achievement of "difference-blindness" as a philosophy against discrimination. Just as people in 2008 said, "why should it matter if Obama is black?" the most important idea that drove marriage inequality to national prominence and acceptance was the question "why should it matter if the person you want to marry is of the same sex as you?" Of course, we learned that racism didn't just suddenly end once Obama was in the White House--that differences *do* matter. I think, soon enough, we're going to learn that lesson again.

But for now, let's celebrate.
posted by J.K. Seazer at 9:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

/opens Twitter
posted by longdaysjourney at 9:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

MetaFilter: ask the nearest hippie
posted by brundlefly at 9:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

now that gay marriage is no longer something to hide behind

I find this deeply offensive.
posted by Xavier Xavier at 9:37 AM on June 26, 2015 [20 favorites]

Not getting any work done, 'cause all I want to do is read the comments of so many happy people. Gone through oodles of tissues already today. It does nothing for me personally either, but it's still a victory for equality. 10 years ago I would never have believed it would ever happen. Very happy.
posted by gemmy at 9:37 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

It's truly awesome we're all taking time out to celebrate this momentous day.

But it will also be awesome when someone makes a new FPP, so that each time I call up MeFi at work, the top of the page won't say, "Titty, Cock, Intercourse and Ejaculation."
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:37 AM on June 26, 2015 [20 favorites]

A system of government that makes the people subordinate to a committee of nine unelected lawyers does not deserve to be called a democracy.

Why is he on the SC then? That quote makes as much sense as the 'drowning government in the bathtub' congressmen.

and really, given that justices are confirmed by the Senate, in a very real way they are elected. Not directly elected "by the people". However, becasue of the Electorial college neither is the President and Vice President.

Can someone please reiterate Scalia's supposided brilliance-despite-duchery argument again? I was almost believing it yesterday.
posted by edgeways at 9:37 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I was trying not to cry tears of joy in class as my students finished their midterms and tried not to cry for very different reasons. I failed, and cried all over the place. Marriage equality in the US. It's about time. Love wins.

This is just a blur of happiness everywhere I go. Mawwaige, apparently, is what brings us togethah today. As it should.
posted by ilana at 9:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

It's interesting. If you'd asked me to bet everything I have on the outcomes of yesterday's Obamacare ruling and today's SSM ruling I'd have bet on the positive outcomes in both cases--and yet the news still feels like a totally unexpected jolt of joyful news. I guess the part of the brain that rationally predicts likely outcomes is pretty divorced from the part that lives in dread of the next dose of crappy news. Right now I feel soooooooo good. I can't even get too invested in the pointing-and-laughing at Scalia and Thomas etc. It just feels like the world is expanding a little bit. Yay for happiness.
posted by yoink at 9:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

So many happy tears. So hard to not call in sick for the rest of the day to go celebrate.
posted by Bacon Bit at 9:39 AM on June 26, 2015

Live footage of Kennedy turning reporters away from Scalia's office.
posted by Slackermagee at 9:39 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

I was refreshing and refreshing SCOTUSblog as I sat on the light rail in bright sunlight. As I emerged from a tunnel, my signal returned, the page refreshed and... YES and YES. Same-sex marriage legal in every state, all states must recognize same-sex marriages performed elsewhere.

And I cried, not for myself, but for all my friends who didn't live to this day. For all their relationships, unrecognized and often betrayed by institutions and families alike. I don't know exactly how nationwide marriage equality will change my queer communities, but it was about time for some good news.

I'll consider RFAs and similar legal bigotry excuses on Monday.
posted by Dreidl at 9:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

But this isn't a major victory for LGBT people;

This is a major victory for everyone in the USA. Now we can all live with fewer bigoted laws and (eventually) culture.
posted by sineater at 9:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

This is great news! For Jeff Gannon!
posted by drezdn at 9:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I haven't tried to explain my grinning to my colleagues here. I think they all come from countries where same sex marriage has been legal for years and sort of assume they'd look at me like "yeah congrats your country is finally joining the 21st century".

The very first country to legalize gay marriage was the Netherlands back in 2001. The first US state to legalize gay marriage was Massachusetts in 2004. This isn't really an issue on which the US has been massively out of step with the rest of the world, interestingly. The massive cultural shift we've seen on the issue has been a worldwide one that has happened pretty consistently and in a remarkably similar time-frame in Western nations worldwide.
posted by yoink at 9:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

And Ireland actually thought about it and said, "Yeah, okay, you lot deserve rights, too!" Do you want to do that

Not just yes but HELL ASS YES WITH KNOBS ON. And I will drag fellow cis-LGB folks along kicking and screaming if necessary.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 9:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

I keep stop tearing up and then stuff like this happens:

Police closed off Christopher Street. "So you can have a nice big party!" one cop says.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 9:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [48 favorites]

Is there really ever going to be a better time than right now? How is this question not of vital relevance right at this moment?

I don't know, man, it's Friday afternoon. Can't everyone just knock off until Monday at least?
posted by Going To Maine at 9:43 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Excellent timing. Now Operation JADE HELM can force Texans to get gay married at howitzer-point.
posted by dr_dank at 9:44 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

Can states wriggle out of it? Many are going to try. Many already have been.

Well, yeah. Remember, legal abortion is still the law of the land, and it's been put under massive assault. I have no doubt the same thing will occur with this ruling.

It's time for a culture war counter-offensive. The enemies of liberty are in disarray, scattered, and shrieking.

It's time to start EXPLICITLY drawing the parallels between the white supremacists, "traditional values" conservatives, corporate/oligarchic economics and right-wing Christian theology. It's all the same defence of dominance hierarchy (presented as a perverted notion of "liberty"), using the same stupid, dishonest and deeply self-serving interpretive stance (some form of "originalism"). Most if it tracks back to the apologetics of the defeated slave-holding South and the overlords of the first Gilded age--both of which had a psychic need to justify dominance hierarchies as The Natural Order of Things.

If we can articulate that, and keep hammering on it, then the fall of the stars and bars will pull down a lot of other odious stuff with it.

But can we just celebrate (and ridicule the losers) for today? Can we just do that for a week before we get back to the struggle?
posted by mondo dentro at 9:45 AM on June 26, 2015 [24 favorites]

I find this deeply offensive.

May I ask why? It has been used to silence trans people for, I think, as long as I've been alive. It is something people have hidden behind to obstruct trans rights. I care about gay marriage, too. I'm glad it's here. I'm glad bigoted states cannot wriggle out of it. But it's a drop in the bucket of social issues. I am not some opponent of gay marriage that you seem to want me to be. This is how I am celebrating: by passionately reminding you that there are still many people fighting for more essential rights, and you can choose in this moment to join them or to renounce them, and you do not get to call yourself an LGB/T ally if you choose the latter.
posted by byanyothername at 9:45 AM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

NPR was kinda mixed on this.

That's because NPR is a piece of shit.

Wha? Not sure that this is all about.

KQED in San Francisco has, of course, been covering this a lot this morning. Twice they've had the same guy on from I-forget-where who opposes gay marriage. Sure, they have him a lot of airtime. But the guy was TERRIBLE. NPR basically gave the dude some rope and dared him to make a noose. You have never heard such tortured logic in your life.

"This decision is undemocratic and takes away freedom"

Really? How can anyone say that with a straight face. Please just say you don't like homosexuality and let's all just be honest here.

Anyway, congratulations to everyone whose marriage is now recognized across the USA.
posted by GuyZero at 9:46 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Transcript of the Obama's remarks.

THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. Our nation was founded on a bedrock principle that we are all created equal. The project of each generation is to bridge the meaning of those founding words with the realities of changing times -- a never-ending quest to ensure those words ring true for every single American.

Progress on this journey often comes in small increments, sometimes two steps forward, one step back, propelled by the persistent effort of dedicated citizens. And then sometimes, there are days like this when that slow, steady effort is rewarded with justice that arrives like a thunderbolt.

posted by kiltedtaco at 9:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [29 favorites]

OMG! I'm having trouble containing myself:

@BryanJFischer: June 26, 2015: the day the twin towers of truth and righteousness were blown up by moral jihadists.

@BryanJFischer:From a moral standpoint, 6/26 is now our 9/11.

I just ... I don't even ...
posted by RedOrGreen at 9:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

But this isn't a major victory for LGBT people

Why is that every time there's a Supreme Court decision that Metafilter unanimously (rightly) agrees with, there always has to be that one person who says it's not a big deal? If you'd say that about today's decision, you'd say it about any case! I mean, what are you trying to prove? This is just mind-boggling.
posted by John Cohen at 9:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

now that gay marriage is no longer something to hide behind

I find this deeply offensive.

Offensive because it's true? In that case, I agree with you; it is deeply offensive that there have been more or less overt statements that we can't work on trans issues right now because marriage.

Great! Marriage is largely taken care of (though we must remain vigilant, pace Roe v Wade), now we turn all that machinery and fundraising and person power and legislative and lobbying clout to help our trans friends.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 9:49 AM on June 26, 2015 [20 favorites]

Zzzzzap
posted by The Whelk at 9:49 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I get what you're saying, byanyothername, I do. But I don't think by celebrating this landmark decision today, we are renouncing the struggle. Trans rights was a huge part of the Pride march I walked in a few weeks ago (because someone on the committee revealed his disgusting transphobia and it backfired on him by it becoming essentially the entire march) and I fight and believe in it passionately. But I can cry tears of joy at my best friends' marriage FINALLY being legally recognized no matter where they go in the US as well as understand and realize the fight continues.
posted by Kitteh at 9:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

I'm not trying to white knight here, and am perfectly fine with being told that I am, but I think that's the point, is that (often) trans people have been at the bottom of the list, and it is difficult to watch trans women die for being women and being asked "can't we just celebrate" when for a lot of trans people, the "we" is pretty strained and has been for awhile. I can see that. I think there are ways to be happy and acknowledge the deep pain and anger that still exists.
posted by nakedmolerats at 9:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

February 12, 2004

I am still moved to tears every time I see this photo. All the love and joy in that room. Who could find it in their heart to tell those amazing women than they were not entitled to equal dignity in the eyes of the law?

Congrats to all of us, but here's a

.

in rememberance of Del Martin and John Arthur and all the other partners, husbands, and wives who did not live to see this great day.
posted by anastasiav at 9:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [51 favorites]

Finally some good news! Congratulations to the world!
posted by saulgoodman at 9:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Don't get drunk and complacent and pat yourself on the back for doing fuck all--get fucking angry that too many people in your country are still struggling for more important basic rights.

The wonderful thing about being human is that I can be enraged by some things and delighted by others at the same time. I don't think that this is important because marriage is the most important thing. I think it's important because this kind of Supreme Court precedent is going to play very, very heavily into everything that comes afterwards, and I think it's important because fifteen years ago I would not have believed that I would be living in this world this soon. Those things are fantastic. Lots of things are still terrible. These states coexist. There's still a very long way to go for trans people. There's also a very long way to go for disability rights, for black people especially with regard to law enforcement, all sorts of things. There are also places on the internet where you can go to livestream kittens. We are not obligated to ignore that you can livestream kittens in order to be enraged by the world's problems. I would go so far as to say that without some things to take actual joy in, all you end up with is a morass of depression and hopelessness.

I'm not reading into this that you're an opponent of this having happened, but I am reading into this that you're assuming a hell of a lot of bad faith on the part of people who want to take a moment to be happy about something, by saying that it represents complacency and self-rewarding for having done nothing--who exactly are you to say which strangers on the internet have done nothing?--and maybe you don't get the kitten feeling out of this, but please don't suggest lack of fervent enough support of other causes of those of us who do.
posted by Sequence at 9:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [75 favorites]

I mean, what are you trying to prove? This is just mind-boggling.

If you had a post about oxygen, some Metafilter contrarian would show up saying it's not as important as, say, ARGON. Someone on Metafilter will argue anything.
posted by GuyZero at 9:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

Jesus Christ this is the most significant day in the history of gay rights in America. Be happy.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:51 AM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

now that gay marriage is no longer something to hide behind

Can you and others please stop trying to derail the thread with your GRAR? There are plenty of other threads you can go be fighty in. Today is too important not to celebrate a major civil rights victory.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 9:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

What the hell am I crying for? Ober guh fell?
posted by infini at 9:52 AM on June 26, 2015

Working from this principle, Thomas insists that the petitioners in the case “have in no way been deprived” of their liberty. “They have been able to travel freely around the country, making their homes where they please. Far from being incarcerated or physically restrained, petitioners have been left alone to order their lives as they see fit.”

What. The. Fuck ...

By this standard, Thomas would've upheld "miscegenation" laws which WOULD'VE INVALIDATED HIS OWN FUCKING MARRIAGE.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 9:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [38 favorites]

Huckabee said in the statement. “I will not acquiesce[...]

well lucky for us he's not the governor of arkansas any longer and marriages are already happening here.
posted by nadawi at 9:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Some thought it was impossible, but I knew -- just had a feeling -- that this day would come, where people on Metafilter could find the equal protection of marriage an opportunity to scold each other and pick a fight.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 9:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

From a moral standpoint, 6/26 is now our 9/11

So, if I understand the analogy correctly, he's exhorting us to invade the Vatican?
posted by yoink at 9:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

@JamesUrbaniak: OLD MAN YELLS AT RAINBOW
posted by Going To Maine at 9:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

Well, yeah. Remember, legal abortion is still the law of the land, and it's been put under massive assault. I have no doubt the same thing will occur with this ruling.

Maybe, but I don't think this issue has the same traction on the right that abortion had (plus any of the people against gay marriage are probably already on Team Republican). Just look at how fast we've changed from 2004 to now in support of gay marriage. As more time passes, more people will realize it's not something to be worried about.

In fact, if the Republicans were smarter they wouldn't even bother to fight it anymore. No more talk about taking marriage out of the hands of government or constitutional amendments. If the right took gay marriage off the table as an issue, they could be welcoming to the surprisingly large number of gay Republicans.
posted by drezdn at 9:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Good news, good news, good news!
posted by mixedmetaphors at 9:54 AM on June 26, 2015

At long last.
posted by Space Kitty at 9:54 AM on June 26, 2015

some Metafilter contrarian would show up saying it's not as important as, say, ARGON

Metafilter: gotta get your ARRGH on.
posted by yoink at 9:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Really thought-provoking passage of Scalia's dissent.
posted by brundlefly at 9:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

But can we just celebrate (and ridicule the losers) for today?

I'm working today in an office full of ultra-conservative co-workers, and they are just losing their minds. Like, right now they have a picture of the local courthouse up and they're whiteboarding the right way to barricade it in order to "protect the Constitution". *eye roll*

I'm a sarcastic asshole, though, so I made popcorn, pulled up a chair, and am sitting here eating it while I watch them. But! I also anticipated this decision this morning and ate a triple helping of oatmeal for breakfast. So every time they say something vile I lift up a buttcheek and fart.

It's the ultimate in ridicule. It's so satisfactory. Never in my life have I wanted to fart on a Supreme Court Justice as badly as I do now.
posted by barchan at 9:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [80 favorites]

Well, yeah. Remember, legal abortion is still the law of the land, and it's been put under massive assault. I have no doubt the same thing will occur with this ruling.

I can't see that happening with this ruling. Roe was decided fairly narrowly, and the court has allowed restrictions placed on abortion so long as it isn't outright outlawed.

This decision, on the other hand, is pretty blunt and all-in. It's legal. Everywhere. Period. There isn't any wiggle room in this decision.
posted by Thorzdad at 9:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

At long last.

Love.
posted by yoink at 9:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I'm at work but I aint working, and I got to greet my boss this morning with "HAVE YOU FELT YOUR STRAIGHT MARRIAGE CRUMBLE" and she jumped up and down in joy
posted by alycoop at 9:56 AM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

I am asking, genuinely but more for personal reflection than public debate: will you give a fuck about more pressing issues now that gay marriage is no longer something to hide behind?

I do think marriage rights are essential. We're still living in a country where marriage is one of the most effective ways of sharing insurance with someone, for instance. We're still living in a country where if you are not legally recognized as family, medical, childcare, and financial decision-making is difficult. And, of course, where it is the basic expression of commitment to someone you love. So absolutely, this is a great step forward, and I will not stop celebrating what it means both concretely and symbolically.

But hell yes, we would be immoral fucking psychopaths if we were to say, "Job done, we can all get married, let's have a party and then stop the fight." It has to keep going. Rights have to keep expanding, both law and public opinion must continually be reminded that there is still someone being left out. And that "left out" means death. Every victory like this that doesn't get to be shared, should have a bitter tinge, should have that reminder, that there are more people to include, more and harder issues to tackle, more pain to face as we are confronted with the continued suffering of people who need more than marriage.

It's a great day but it's not the end.
posted by mittens at 9:57 AM on June 26, 2015 [32 favorites]

This is a good day.
posted by theora55 at 9:57 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

So many happy pictures here. Happy Days!
posted by Beti at 9:57 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I am tempted to turn on both local conservabot AM stations, as someday I may need a transfusion and I expect that blood will be shooting out of my speakers like a fire hose.
posted by delfin at 9:57 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Guys, it's probably counter productive and demonstrates exactly the kind of behavior they're trying to call attention to, to tell someone that they should shut up and get out of the thread if they're going to post about legit and reasonable trans issues because they're not talking about it the way we want.
posted by nakedmolerats at 9:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [21 favorites]

"I am certainly not an advocate for frequent and untried changes in laws and constitutions. I think moderate imperfections had better be borne with; because, when once known, we accommodate ourselves to them, and find practical means of correcting their ill effects.

But I know also, that laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths disclosed, and manners and opinions change with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also, and keep pace with the times.

We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy, as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors."

Thomas Jefferson to H. Tompkinson (AKA Samuel Kercheval), July 12, 1816 [Source]
posted by gemmy at 9:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [26 favorites]

if you don't like the topics a trans person brings up in a gay rights thread, especially if you aren't trans, the best option is probably ignore it, not berate the person. this isn't a case of being offended for kicks. most of us can celebrate today and get back to work on other issues monday - but for many trans people the fight can never be paused.
posted by nadawi at 9:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [44 favorites]

REVENGE OF THE RAINBOW DRAGONS
posted by GuyZero at 9:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Yesterday I tweeted:

"Jiggery-pokery," Justice Scalia
Declared in his usual angry dissent.
"Damn the majority and its opinion,
I'm the interpreter of all intent!”

(Delfin apparently had the same idea.)

So today, I've added another stanza:

"Silly extravagances," yawps Scalia.
"Showy profundities," too, he laments.
"Those don't belong in major'ty decisions.
I reserve all of them for my dissents!"

I do have to wonder if this is what he means to have happen.
posted by fedward at 9:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

Antonin Scalia Dissent In Marriage Equality Case Is Even More Unhinged Than You'd Think

HuffPost went to look for the first hippie we could find, per Scalia's instructions. Neil Cousins, a 61-year-old man from Alexandria protesting nuclear weapons outside the White House, said he had come to this very park in the 1970s for pot smoke-ins, but added that there really haven't been hippies around since the Grateful Dead stopped touring. He was nonetheless willing to offer a judgment on Scalia's assertion that marriage abridges rather than expands intimacy. "I've known it to have both reactions," he ruled. "Scalia is a big knucklehead."

posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 9:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [51 favorites]

we need the people who shrug this victory off and put their heads down and keep working.

we also need the celebration.

we can have both.
posted by M Edward at 10:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Just saw this one:

Supreme Court On Gay Marriage: 'Sure, Who Cares'

Thanks, the onion. :)
posted by narwhal at 10:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

This Supreme Court decision is so gay.

(Yes I went there.)
posted by monospace at 10:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

The (formerly Jewish Daily) Forward - All three Jewish justices, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagen, and Steven Breyer, voted in favor of the ruling.
posted by rosswald at 10:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

Graham On Gay Marriage: Opposing SCOTUS Ruling Is ‘Doomed To Fail’

Have there been any conservatives that have come out in favor of the decision. It seems like there should be.
posted by drezdn at 10:03 AM on June 26, 2015

hippybear, DOMA was previously invalidated by SCOTUS.
posted by Xavier Xavier at 10:03 AM on June 26, 2015

Huh. I've never encountered the "please allow page to load before favoriting" warning before.

Whatever, can't slow my roll! Crying and favoriting, crying and favoriting.
posted by rewil at 10:04 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

!
posted by grumpybear69 at 10:04 AM on June 26, 2015

aaaaaaaand crying again
posted by kyrademon at 10:04 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Doesn't happen as often as I'd wish, but today I'm proud to be an American! What wonderful news to wake up to!!
posted by k8bot at 10:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Has anyone compiled in one place the best (by which I mean worst) quotes from the dissents? This is important for snarking purposes.
posted by gingerbeer at 10:06 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

drezdn, there's this kind of surreal group.
posted by Beti at 10:06 AM on June 26, 2015

Literally nobody in this thread even hinted at the idea that this is the end of the fight for LGBT rights and dignity.

I just need, like, thirty minutes to be happy and celebrate. I swear I'll be back on the barricades by 2:00 pm.

be happy. celebrate. realize that others will celebrate differently than you. take your time. stop arguing with a trans person who has a different take. just be happy if that's what you're looking for.
posted by nadawi at 10:06 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

Congratulations, America.

It's about fucking time.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 10:06 AM on June 26, 2015

Fair point! This invalidates Section 3, I believe.
posted by Xavier Xavier at 10:07 AM on June 26, 2015

Wow, it finally really happened. Huzzah!
posted by homunculus at 10:07 AM on June 26, 2015

(In response to hippybear.)
posted by Xavier Xavier at 10:07 AM on June 26, 2015

When can I get video of Sir Patrick Stewart reading the last paragraph of the decision, with a resounding "Make it so!" at the end?

Best I can do right now is Sirs Ian McKellen and Derek Jacobi being awfully cute for six seconds.
posted by zombieflanders at 10:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

Why is he on the SC then? That quote makes as much sense as the 'drowning government in the bathtub' congressmen

Yeah, you know, given Scalia's boundless contempt for his brethren and, apparently, for the body on which he sits, seems to me that it would be a good time for him to retire. Punishment enough for the likes of them, wouldn't you say?
posted by holborne at 10:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

<3 <3 <3
posted by droplet at 10:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts in this thread, byanyothername.
posted by sunset in snow country at 10:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

gingerbeer: "Has anyone compiled in one place the best (by which I mean worst) quotes from the dissents? This is important for snarking purposes."

Scalia's: "today’s judicial Putsch"; "I would hide my head in a bag"; "Ask the nearest hippie"
posted by exogenous at 10:10 AM on June 26, 2015

The (formerly Jewish Daily) Forward - All three Jewish justices, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagen, and Steven Breyer, voted in favor of the ruling.

Good!

Countdown to antisemitic backlash in 3... 2....
posted by zarq at 10:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

askthenearesthippybear.com
posted by bitter-girl.com at 10:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [25 favorites]

I will be in the Toronto Trans March tonight as an ally to my sister and can't wait to see how excited the crowd is. And as byanyothername notes, I will also keep in mind how much the Trans March is needed not just as a celebration of trans* members but as a protest march for trans* rights.
posted by biggreenplant at 10:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

crissle - a lesbian, and half of "this is the read" podcast - has tweeted her mom's reaction.

it makes me think back to coming out to my dad about 15 years ago - and his movement from rush supporting ultra-con to super duper liberal who started voting specifically over lgbt rights. coming out matters.
posted by nadawi at 10:13 AM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

How historic is it to have your last name, Obergefell, forever enshrined as the lead in an important SCOTUS decision? On the flip side, how shameful is it to be [Richard] Hodges, whose name will forever be linked to the losing side of this significant civil rights case?
posted by Quaversalis at 10:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

Sections 1 and 3 were left to stand, previously

No. Section 3 was the one overturned directly by the Supreme Court in US v Windsor. Section 2 was implicitly overthrown in Obergefell v. Hodges. So DOMA was a dead duck before today's ruling.
posted by yoink at 10:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

buzzfeed better be working on the super duper long listicle of every first marriage pic in every county where marriage was previously curtailed. i need more happy crying smiling joyous couples.
posted by nadawi at 10:17 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

Scalia is like if Pixar made a anthropomorphic character of prostate cancer.
posted by lattiboy at 10:18 AM on June 26, 2015 [52 favorites]

and so it begins...columbia county in arkansas has denied a marriage license.
posted by nadawi at 10:19 AM on June 26, 2015

I have returned from the grocery store with rainbow cake, skittles, and champagne, PARTY AT MY HOUSE!

I am literally going to let my children eat rainbow cake for dinner, it is a day of celebration!

If you're grumpy, you probably need to go get a rainbow cake.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 10:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [41 favorites]

By the way - if any Republican gets elected president he (or she) will likely reverse this by making one or two appointments to the Supreme Court. There may still be a bumpy time ahead.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 10:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I'm not going to tell someone else what to believe but I don't know how anyone could sit through this and still say "Nope. Not legit."

And apparently, I need to dust my house. sniffle
posted by Beti at 10:20 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

columbia county in arkansas has denied a marriage license

I'm sorry for whatever couple or couples is having a shitty day because of some jerk in that county--but there's also a pretty nice feeling in thinking of the fact that that jerk is not just on the wrong side of history, but is going to have history slap him/her upside the head pretty firmly.
posted by yoink at 10:21 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

how shameful is it to be [Richard] Hodges, whose name will forever be linked to the losing side of this significant civil rights case?

Let's ask the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas.
posted by Atom Eyes at 10:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

... aaand I'm out of favorites. Well-played, everyone. The fight (obvs) continues, but savor this. History happened.

Off to update syllabus so that I'll teach Loving v. Virginia the same week as Obergefell.
posted by Xavier Xavier at 10:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

From a straight friend on FB: My marriage just became more legitimate. Congratulations to everyone!
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

By the way - if any Republican gets elected president he (or she) will likely reverse this by making one or two appointments to the Supreme Court. There may still be a bumpy time ahead

I'll buy into the "bumpy time ahead" bit, but I don't think that this is just going to get flipped. What would that argument look like? You're going to cause an immense amount of suffering by de-legitimizing folks who have been married. Taking rights away is hard.
posted by Going To Maine at 10:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I'm so happy for my friends whose marriages are now legal in Texas.

And yeah, "more legitimate" nicely sums up how I'm feeling about my own marriage today.
posted by scatter gather at 10:24 AM on June 26, 2015

goddamnit. sebastian and crawford county in arkansas are also denying marriage certificates. at least washington county (home of the duggars) are doing the right thing. here's hoping by monday everyone will get the memo that they can't stall any longer.
posted by nadawi at 10:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

dances_with_sneetches: if any Republican gets elected president he (or she) will likely reverse this by making one or two appointments to the Supreme Court.

Sorry, no, not buying this. What would the Justices say, Oops, we were wrong last time, never mind?

More importantly, who would even have standing to challenge a fundamental right? (Not snarking, I'm dead serious. Someone would need to show actual harm due to everyone being able to marry so that they have standing to bring a suit. Who? How?)
posted by RedOrGreen at 10:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

By the way - if any Republican gets elected president he (or she) will likely reverse this by making one or two appointments to the Supreme Court. There may still be a bumpy time ahead

This is extremely unlikely to happen, if for the sole reason that literally thousands of people are going to be married now. And we don't invalidate marriages in this country.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:26 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

What a long, long road. So many struggles, so many sacrifices, so much pain. It's been nearly 44 years since Baker and McConnell managed to get legally hitched in Minnesota on a technicality. Now everyone in the US can do so.

Bitterness and amazement.

This NYTimes article includes a 12m video on Jim and John's story.
posted by Twang at 10:26 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

I just saw this thread, and my first thought after "Holy shit this is awesome!" was "Pride in SF is going to be insane this weekend."

What incredible news. Thanks, Anthony, for not fucking this one up.

Also, this is my last day at work at my current job and I have nothing to do, so I think the rest of my day is just going to be staring at this picture from the NYT and smiling like an idiot at my desk.
posted by Aizkolari at 10:27 AM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

Also... I wonder if the (mumble mumble) gay justice will now finally marry their partner, should they have one? Or even come out? The stench of mothballs must annoy everyone else in the room.
posted by Dreidl at 10:27 AM on June 26, 2015

Considering how truly jiggery-pokery Scalia is with the Court and its last two decisions, he should resign immediately (for the trifecta).
posted by jabo at 10:27 AM on June 26, 2015

and so it begins...columbia county in arkansas has denied a marriage license.

The clerk is in for a surprise when they find themselves on the front end of a lawsuit that will be won at summary judgement and that they're personally liable.
posted by Talez at 10:27 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

NYTimes: JACKSON, Miss. — The Hinds County application form currently contains lines for the name of the groom and bride. Barbara Dunn, the circuit clerk, thought the form might best be modified to read “Applicant 1” and “Applicant 2” following Friday’s decision.

The same form has been used in the circuit clerk’s office since before Mrs. Dunn, 77, was elected to her first term in 1984.

Two times in the past, gay couples have come to Mrs. Dunn’s office and attempted to have licenses issued. The applicants completed the paperwork, and the deputy assisting them asked Mrs. Dunn to be the one to turn them down.

“She didn’t want to tell them,” Mrs. Dunn recalled. “I said, ‘You know as well as I do the law will not let me issue this license.’”

When asked her personal opinion on the ruling, Mrs. Dunn said, “That’s them and their life.” She said, “I’m going to try to live by the Golden Rule.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

The clerk is in for a surprise when they find themselves on the front end of a lawsuit that will be won at summary judgement and that they're personally liable.

Another possibility, of course, is the National Guard. We've done that before when ignorant bigots refused to listen to the Court.
posted by The Bellman at 10:30 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I think the rest of my day is just going to be staring at this picture from the NYT and smiling like an idiot at my desk.

Hah--that is a lovely shot.
posted by yoink at 10:30 AM on June 26, 2015

my first thought after "Holy shit this is awesome!" was "Pride in SF is going to be insane this weekend."

New York as well. Stonewall was already made a landmark a few days ago, and people have been gathering outside since 10:30 this morning.

(Incidentally - I recommend doing a search on Google to see how they've decorated the page of search results.)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:30 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

My guess would be people trying to over-turn it would be more likely to try to seek a constitutional amendment, or in the even weirder tact they seem to be taking, attempting to take government out of the marriage process.
posted by drezdn at 10:31 AM on June 26, 2015

Broadway's It Shoulda Been You Offers Marriage-Equality Discount
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:32 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Another possibility, of course, is the National Guard. We've done that before when ignorant bigots refused to listen to the Court.

in arkansas, no less.
posted by nadawi at 10:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I kind of want to frame my, like, quaint and archaic domestic partnership certificate now. It's a freaking dinosaur, which I never would have expected.
posted by mudpuppie at 10:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [27 favorites]

ghosts
posted by alycoop at 10:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

It's wrong, of course, but 4.5 would be exactly half,

Finding that 0.5 of a judge is going to be tough.

I'm with RBG: it will be equal when there's been 9 women on there for a good long time.
posted by emjaybee at 10:34 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

"And we don't invalidate marriages in this country."

Be aware that the Texas Attorney General has been trying to do exactly that.
posted by scatter gather at 10:34 AM on June 26, 2015

I asked the mods to do a little back tagging for all the U.S. state marriage equality posts. Follow along, one domino at a time.
posted by zamboni at 10:34 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

(Incidentally - I recommend doing a search on Google to see how they've decorated the page of search results.)

Confined to mobile for the day, can someone screencap this?
posted by devinemissk at 10:35 AM on June 26, 2015

Congratulations, USA! I'm Canadian, but I feel so much joy for my fellow queer folk south.

I have seen some negative reactions. While some of them were actually scary, in general the wailing and gnashing of teeth of old white right-wing Christians this week has made my twisted little gay heart sing with happiness. I'd like to be able to say that I'm above it, but honestly it just gets so tiring to watch my basic humanity being argued that the veneer of courtesy is well eroded.

So go ahead, American traditionalists. Get divorced in protest, set yourself on fire, cry more. It only gives me sustenance.
posted by one of these days at 10:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

My partner is finally awake and talking to him on the phone he raises a very valid point: Nearly all the hippies we know are married or partnered in super-long-term-traditionally partnerships.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 10:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

ALL DAY, ERRY DAY
posted by Asparagirl at 10:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I don't see anything different on Google.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:36 AM on June 26, 2015

Has anyone updated the gif that shows the spread of same sex marriage in the US?
posted by drezdn at 10:36 AM on June 26, 2015

Definitely a victory for Big Wedding Cake.

(And everybody else, too.)
posted by LastOfHisKind at 10:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

This is good stuff. The world needs more good stuff.
posted by Mooski at 10:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

A system of government that makes the people subordinate to a committee of nine unelected lawyers does not deserve to be called a democracy.

Wait, what? A system that he's part of? A system that's been in place for hundreds of years? Am I missing something here?
posted by Melismata at 10:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

At 11:53 a.m., 82yr old George Harris & 85yr old Jack Evans were married in Dallas
posted by nadawi at 10:37 AM on June 26, 2015 [57 favorites]

Scalia cry-baby-itis: 22 If, even as the price to be paid for a fifth vote, I ever joined an opinion
for the Court that began: “The Constitution promises liberty to allwithin its reach, a liberty that includes certain specific rights that allow persons, within a lawful realm, to define and express their identity,” I would hide my head in a bag. — roomthreeseventeen

I would pay money to see Scalia hide his head in a bag. Perhaps they can cast him as Scarecrow in the next Batman movie.
posted by Mad_Carew at 10:37 AM on June 26, 2015

So: if this is the new this, I for one am very happy.
posted by The Bellman at 10:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

I don't see anything different on Google.

It shows up when you search for 'gay' or 'stonewall' or 'marriage equality' or whatever.
posted by showbiz_liz at 10:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

At 11:53 a.m., 82yr old George Harris & 85yr old Jack Evans were married in Dallas

GROSSEST OF SOBBINGS
posted by poffin boffin at 10:38 AM on June 26, 2015 [30 favorites]

I don't actually think Pride's going to be that much bigger or different in San Francisco this year. Marriage has been legal in California for a while now -- this doesn't change anything for those of us legally married here and still living here. If people want to get married, they're already getting married. It's already the biggest event the city hosts each year. I'm not sure what would be different this year, in terms of the attendance.

There's a big celebration today at 6 pm in the Castro. Which is now in direct conflict with the Trans March, which is always on the Friday, and steps off from Dolores Park at 6 pm. It will unfortunately be a pretty literal demonstration of the split in focus and priorities. I'm taking my cisgender, gay-married ass to the Trans March, and encourage any mefites in the Bay Area to join me.
posted by gingerbeer at 10:39 AM on June 26, 2015 [36 favorites]

Seconding ByAnyOtherName, here (more or less): Marriage equality was something that was going to happen. It's something a majority of the country supports. Sure, it's awesome that it's been recognised by the Supreme Court and individual states are no longer free to come up with bigoted justifications for denying equal rights under the law to same-sex couples. But at the same time? Trans rights are about where gay rights were something like 20 years ago. Sexual orientation was made a protected class under equal employment opportunity laws in 1998; gender identity? Nope. Access to healthcare and counselling services in many states is difficult if not imposible (with many therapists in a lot of areas being focused on the sort of "conversion therapy" that killed Leelah Alcorn); legal gender recognition is also difficult if not impossible in many states (several states outright refuse to change gender markers on identification; many others require not just HRT/living as one's gender but GRS, which is expensive, and which few urologists are qualified to do, especially if you live in East Armpit, Arkansas, or wherever). Honestly I'm kind of tired of the attitude that a victory for specifically gay and lesbian rights should be recognised as a victory for the "LGBT community" (yes, it's awesome, and a significant percentage of trans people are queer, but at the same time if two trans women can now legally marry, but the state they're marrying in refuses to recognise them as women and they have to resort to self-treatment with grey-market hormones bought off the Internet? There's still a ways to go before we start patting ourselves on the back about having achieved equality.)
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 10:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

Has anyone updated the gif that shows the spread of same sex marriage in the US?
posted by drezdn at 1:36 PM on 6/26
[+] [!]

here you go
posted by devinemissk at 10:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

arkansas's governor doesn't want a stand off with the national guard it looks like.

"Today the Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision requires the State of Arkansas to recognize same-sex marriage. This decision goes against the expressed view of Arkansans and my personal beliefs and convictions. While my personal convictions will not change, as Governor I recognize the responsibility of the state to follow the direction of the U.S. Supreme Court. As a result of this ruling, I will direct all state agencies to comply with the decision.

“It is also important to note that the Supreme Court decision is directed at the states to allow and recognize marriage between two people of the same sex. It is not a directive for churches or pastors to recognize same-sex marriage. The decision for churches, pastors and individuals is a choice that should be left to the convictions of conscience."

(sorry for so many arkansas posts! i'd love to see how this is going down in your states!!)
posted by nadawi at 10:40 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

Re Google: It's not on the main page, you have to search for something. When you do, the results page has a rainbow heart to the left and a rainbow row of people across the top on the right.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

At 11:53 a.m., 82yr old George Harris & 85yr old Jack Evans were married in Dallas

55 years!

And here I was, thinking I was done tearing up at my desk today.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 10:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

ALL DAY, ERRY DAY
posted by Asparagirl

I was so happy to see this I just posted this to Facebook and if people don't get I shared it because it was about LOTS of people getting married and not about me specifically, I am willing to take 97% of the blame, but 3% will go to Asparagirl.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 10:41 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

@gingerbeer.... I will be at the Trans Day of Action here in NYC.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Wait, what's going on in Louisiana? "Same-sex marriage banned even though the Supreme Court of the United States has found similar bans unconstitutional"
posted by desjardins at 10:42 AM on June 26, 2015

This is extremely unlikely to happen, if for the sole reason that literally thousands of people are going to be married now. And we don't invalidate marriages in this country.

They did in Oregon. The couple whose wedding I performed on the Supreme Court steps had their Oregon marriage invalidated, which is why they got (re)married in DC.
posted by MrMoonPie at 10:42 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Re Google: It's not on the main page, you have to search for something. When you do, the results page has a rainbow heart to the left and a rainbow row of people across the top on the right.

It's also only for things like "gay marriage" or "gay pride"; I think it's been like that for a lot of June -- it was like that earlier this week at least.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 10:43 AM on June 26, 2015

Great, now frogs and pigs are marrying each other. See what happens, people?
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 10:44 AM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

The Texas governor just issued a directive to state agencies that reads as follows: "All state agency heads should ensure that no one acting on behalf of their agency takes any adverse action against any person, as defined in Chapter 311 of the Texas Government Code, on account of the person’s act or refusal to act that is substantially motivated by sincere religious belief. This order applies to any agency decision, including but not limited to granting or denying benefits, managing agency employees, entering or enforcing agency contracts, licensing and permitting decisions, or enforcing state laws and regulations." Person, as defined by that law, "includes corporation, organization, government or governmental subdivision or agency, business trust, estate, trust, partnership, association, and any other legal entity."

I feel like I'm taking crazy pills, but I can't interpret this any other way than Greg Abbott is ordering state agencies to look the other way when their employees discriminate based on sexual orientation. Please tell me I'm misunderstanding?
posted by marshmallow peep at 10:45 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

devinemissk: Works on mobile too, at least in Chrome on Android: go to google.com and search for “marriage equality".

Also, copy-pasting from my comments elsewhere, earlier:

/0/ \0\ \0/ /0\
/0/ \0\ \0/ /0\
/0/ \0\ \0/ /0\
/0/ \0\ \0/ /0\

(happy little dance-in-chair)
posted by seyirci at 10:45 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Got it, its search-specific. Which makes sense.
posted by devinemissk at 10:47 AM on June 26, 2015

Some clarification on DOMA:
Section 1 - The title of the act. This has not been held to be unconstitutional. Good job Congress.

Section 2 - States are not required to recognize same sex marriages legally performed in other states. Held unconstitutional with today's ruling.

Section 3 - Federal gov't does not recognize same sex marriages even if recognized by the state. Held unconstitutional in Windsor.
posted by melissasaurus at 10:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I believe a side-effect of this ruling is that you are now empowered to point and laugh for up to three minutes at anyone who whines about "Adam and Steve."

To quote the late, great David Rakoff, "Of course it's not Adam and Steve, it's Adam and Stephen."

Great day. Trying hard to focus at work but "trying" is the key word there.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 10:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Please tell me I'm misunderstanding?

It's texas, of course you're not misunderstanding lawful protection of potential bigotry.
posted by poffin boffin at 10:49 AM on June 26, 2015

At 11:53 a.m., 82yr old George Harris & 85yr old Jack Evans were married in Dallas

here's the video
posted by nadawi at 10:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

Remember, legal abortion is still the law of the land, and it's been put under massive assault. I have no doubt the same thing will occur with this ruling.

The same thing will be attempted with this ruling, but it won't work, and it will backfire.

Americans' belief that abortion should be legal has been stagnant for decades, or possibly drifted less liberal if you squint.

Americans' belief that gay marriage should be legal is no less divided right now, but it's not stagnant, it's skyrocketing. 54% vs 39% in favor, as opposed to 27% vs 65% just two decades ago, and the climb shows no signs of showing. It's possible the climb will even accelerate as predictions of doom get falsified.

Opposition to gay marriage is going away with breathtaking speed, and only the most dogmatic or stupid Republicans (which isn't an entirely redundant phrase...) are going to want to lash themselves to the mast of that sinking ship.
posted by roystgnr at 10:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Good job Congress.

And President Clinton.
posted by Drinky Die at 10:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

The Louisiana AG should get a refund on his law degree.

In addition, the Attorney General's Office said that it has found nothing in today’s decision that makes the Court’s order effective immediately. Therefore, there is not yet a legal requirement for officials to issue marriage licenses or perform marriages for same-sex couples in Louisiana.

Or can he get a refund if he already ate the crackerjacks ?
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 10:51 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

My girlfriend and I just met for coffee and the first thing she said to me was "So, this means you're gonna be my wife someday" and I said "yes it does" and we shared the sweetest kiss I think I've ever had.
posted by Annika Cicada at 10:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [235 favorites]

I didn't cry all morning. Then NASA posted this tweet and I thought of Sally Ride and Tam O'Shaughnessy and I have lost it.

I'm happy, I'm happy, but thinking of those who got us where we are today but didn't make it? I'm crying like a baby.

As Google recently reminded, Sally Ride would have been 64 this year.

And on the topic of equality, national hero and first US astronaut in space Sally Ride's surviving partner of 27 years Tam O'Shaughnessy has yet to receive federal, military, or social security death benefits so yeah let's get on that stat. The hard part is over but the work has just begun.
posted by Mike Mongo at 10:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [44 favorites]

So awesome. Now will someone who is more talented in mixology than I pleeease make a cocktail named Scalia's Tears?
posted by romakimmy at 10:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [32 favorites]

update George Harris & Jack Evans are together for 55 years. George says he's having a martini then a nap. @CBSDFW
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

Well, now I kinda wish I'd gone to ALA this year.
posted by box at 10:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

My regional UUs are straight-out pimping our gay-friendly wedding facilities.
posted by emjaybee at 10:54 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Texas says as long as you are a sincere religious bigot you don't need to follow the law.

In regards to what I said about this being reversed. If two more Scalias are appointed does anyone doubt there will be a rationalization for reversing? And, of course, it wasn't just Scalia. This decision was 5 to 4.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 10:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

!
posted by OHenryPacey at 10:55 AM on June 26, 2015

arkansas's governor doesn't want a stand off with the national guard it looks like

Just because we should put the honor where it belongs:

Back in the day, the National Guard weren't the good guys in Arkansas. Faubus had been using the AR National Guard to prevent the Little Rock Nine from attending school. The unit protecting the Nine was the 101st Airborne.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 10:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [28 favorites]

@DaveHolmes: "As we celebrate today, let's spare a warm thought for our opponents, who have lost absolutely nothing."
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 10:56 AM on June 26, 2015 [56 favorites]

romakimmy: "So awesome. Now will someone who is more talented in mixology than I pleeease make a cocktail named Scalia's Tears?"

1 part vinegar
1 part salt
garnished with a tissue
posted by boo_radley at 10:56 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

This hit me like a ton of bricks this morning, wow. I've been sobbing all day. I remember giving a presentation on DOMA in middle school, right when I started having Confusing Feelings for my (female) best friend, and shortly before my mom caught us making out in the library and told me that she didn't think any less of me, exactly (right...) but that my life would be miserable if I liked girls because I'd get the shit beat out of me, nobody would like me, and most importantly I could never get married. And don't I want to get married to the person I love someday? She just wants to see me happy! And we considered ourselves a decent liberal family...

This matters so much. My life would have been so different if I hadn't gotten so many terrible messages about what it meant for me to be bi/pan, and a lot of those messages came straight from the Democratic party circa the 1990s from the mouths of 'well-meaning' liberals. This is an incredible victory for every queer kid that gets to grow up knowing that the state will respect their choice of who to love, that it's officially a socially acceptable way to live your life. It's not just about marriage - although that's huge! - it's also about what it signals to young queer kids and their families about how society is going to treat them throughout their lives. We absolutely need to do more to live up to that promise, to make sure that everyone is treated well - but this is still an incredible victory that will affect countless lives.

Anyway, I'm so, so happy today, but also grieving a little over the way my life might have been different if this had happened when I was younger. It fucking matters.
posted by dialetheia at 10:57 AM on June 26, 2015 [78 favorites]

So awesome. Now will someone who is more talented in mixology than I pleeease make a cocktail named Scalia's Tears?

"Scalia's Tears"

1 part grenadine
2 parts vodka
1 part bitters

Serve in a warm, salt-rimmed highball.
posted by fifthrider at 10:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [35 favorites]

So awesome. Now will someone who is more talented in mixology than I pleeease make a cocktail named Scalia's Tears?

It's just a Margarita but the salt isn't kosher.
posted by Talez at 10:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Just because we should put the honor where it belongs:

ah yes, sorry, i always forget that detail. as you might imagine, in state history class they get past that part as quickly as possible.
posted by nadawi at 10:58 AM on June 26, 2015

First SSM in Nashville is in the books!
posted by ghharr at 10:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

And yes that drink would be super gross; that's deliberate.
posted by fifthrider at 10:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Came here to share in the celebration -- thanks for all the joy!

I agree that there is a long way to go, but taking a moment to appreciate our successes makes the continued struggle easier, and gives us momentum and strength for the road ahead.

Also , Greg Abbott is a cancer on the state of Texas.
posted by blurker at 10:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

So awesome. Now will someone who is more talented in mixology than I pleeease make a cocktail named Scalia's Tears?

1 parts simple syrup, 1 part triple sec, 1 part elderflower liquor, top with sprite. It doesn't taste great, but there's nothing sweeter.
posted by codacorolla at 10:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [34 favorites]

Andrew Sullivan: It Is Accomplished I think of the gay kids in the future who, when they figure out they are different, will never know the deep psychic wound my generation – and every one before mine – lived through: the pain of knowing they could never be fully part of their own family, never be fully a citizen of their own country. I think, more acutely, of the decades and centuries of human shame and darkness and waste and terror that defined gay people’s lives for so long. And I think of all those who supported this movement who never lived to see this day., who died in the ashes from which this phoenix of a movement emerged. This momentous achievement is their victory too – for marriage, as Kennedy argued, endures past death.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:59 AM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

I'm a childfree person, and this part of the ruling was a nice bonus:

That is not to say the right to marry is less meaningful for those who do not or cannot have children. An ability, desire, or promise to procreate is not and has not been a prerequisite for a valid marriage in any State. In light of precedent protecting the right of a married couple not to procreate, it cannot be said the Court or the States have conditioned the right to marry on the capacity or commitment to procreate. The constitutional marriage right has many aspects, of which childbearing is only one.

posted by almostmanda at 11:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [55 favorites]

I've been crying on and off all morning and Annika Cicada's comment above just made me burst into tears again. Knowing that everyone will finally be allowed access to this right that I already enjoy (as a non-straight person who is nonetheless in a hetero marriage) fills me with uncontainable joy and it utterly baffles me that anyone could feel differently.
posted by skycrashesdown at 11:00 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

1 part vinegar
1 part salt
garnished with a tissue

And a twist of bile.
posted by Thorzdad at 11:01 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I think it's unlikely to be reversed by a future Supreme court, because the court would have to hear an entirely new case. Meaning some lawyers would have to bring a case that gay marriage somehow caused some harm or was depriving someone of their own constitutional right to.... live in a world where gays can't marry.
posted by nakedmolerats at 11:01 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

fifthrider: Serve in a warm, ~~salt-rimmed highball~~ liberally-rimmed highball.

My suggestion. Gives it a certain je ne sais quoi.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 11:01 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

First couples in Oakland County and Detroit Warning: video.
posted by palindromic at 11:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

If two more Scalias are appointed does anyone doubt there will be a rationalization for reversing?

I doubt it. Reversals don't often come that fast, and in five years SSM will be so normal that no one will bother trying to legislate against it (see Loving v. Virginia).
posted by Etrigan at 11:02 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

And yes that drink would be super gross; that's deliberate.

wrong! conservative tears are delicious
posted by poffin boffin at 11:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

A Scalia's Tears is just a negroni sbagliato measured out in a jigger and poked, not stirred
posted by prize bull octorok at 11:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [37 favorites]

Let us not forget that today's concurrent Johnson v. United States decision means that not only are gay weddings legal, gay shotgun weddings are legal too.
posted by Palindromedary at 11:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Clearly Scalia's Tears drinks would need to be a) delicious and b) rainbow-colored. I'm sure there's an existing drink we could rename.
posted by emjaybee at 11:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

If you do, then I do too.
posted by roll truck roll at 11:03 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

1 part vinegar
1 part salt
garnished with a tissue

And a twist of bile.

Horseradish may be substituted if bile is not available.
posted by Existential Dread at 11:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I love the Arkansas posts.

P. S. So tempted to change my username to Not a Genuine Westerner.
posted by wintersweet at 11:05 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Scalia's Tears: anything that makes you feel happy and free and accepted, optionally garnished with glitter.
posted by nickmark at 11:06 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Any of y'all who are in SF and surrounding areas this weekend, we are having a meetup on Monday at 6pm. Join us!
posted by rtha at 11:07 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I feel like I'm taking crazy pills, but I can't interpret this any other way than Greg Abbott is ordering state agencies to look the other way when their employees discriminate based on sexual orientation. Please tell me I'm misunderstanding?

You're not misunderstanding, though it would be fun if Texas state employees developed deep religious convictions for all sorts of dumb shit.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 11:07 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Also... I wonder if the (mumble mumble) gay justice will now finally marry their partner, should they have one? Or even come out?

Wait what
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

The Onion: Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito Realize They Will Be Villains In Oscar-Winning Movie One Day

Dustin Lance Black: Good idea. I'm on it.
posted by LastOfHisKind at 11:08 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

A Scalia's Tears would have to be a pickleback with, like, grappa instead of Jameson.
posted by fedward at 11:08 AM on June 26, 2015

A glass of Scalia's Tears would be pure applesauce.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 11:09 AM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

I look forward to finding out how equality will cheapen and destroy my god-endorsed hetero breeder marriage! So far, I got nothin' - it's almost as if this court decision has NO IMPACT WHATSOEVER on my own relationship with my spouse. Crazy, huh? Fox has been insisting this will destroy marriage like a nuclear bomb. Because Jesus. Imagine the surprise of everyone when it doesn't.

(I did note that the decision has apparently adversely affected the air quality though. Stirred up a lot of dust or somethin' ... my eyes, they keep watering...)
posted by caution live frogs at 11:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Wait what

Kagan is not married.

...though perhaps that will change now...
posted by Asparagirl at 11:10 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Southern Poverty Law Center
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 11:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I have a deep religious conviction to punch Greg Abbott in the balls.
posted by cmfletcher at 11:11 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

I am so happy. I have been ashamed of our national stance on this issue and am thrilled that justice was done.
posted by hilaryjade at 11:12 AM on June 26, 2015

A system of government that makes the people subordinate to a committee of nine unelected lawyers does not deserve to be called a democracy.

Didn't realize when I woke up this morning that the forecast called for cloudy with a chance of hurricane-force WTF.

You can leave your badge on your desk, Antonin.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 11:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I'm a childfree person, and this part of the ruling was a nice bonus

I had not seen that, but as a happily hetero childfree person, I'm glad to know that my marriage is also affirmed. Arguments against same-sex marriage centering on children have always felt like a threat to my marriage.
posted by immlass at 11:12 AM on June 26, 2015 [18 favorites]

A glass of Scalia's Tears would be pure applesauce.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates

Sour cream!
posted by rosswald at 11:13 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

RGB out there like...
posted by nadawi at 11:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

“A happy ending was imperative. I shouldn't have bothered to write otherwise. I was determined that in fiction anyway two men should fall in love and remain in it for the ever and ever that fiction allows, and in this sense, Maurice and Alec still roam the greenwood.”
― E.M. Forster, Maurice

For the ever and ever that our Constitution allows. Everyone to the greenwood!
posted by a fiendish thingy at 11:14 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

YAY!

I've been following this news all morning and at the edge of tearing up the whole time. As someone with somewhat of an insider's perspective, (married to someone at the first foundation to support marriage equality) I can't believe how far the movement has come in such short time. And then, as a person who believes we should treat everyone fairly, I'm amazed that it took us so long to get over this whole ridiculous travesty.

Barkeep! One Scalia's Tears to pour out for the homies. And the fruitiest drink you got, for me.
posted by HE Amb. T. S. L. DuVal at 11:16 AM on June 26, 2015

for your enjoyment
posted by devinemissk at 11:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I've been engaged to my fiancée for a month on the 30th. A month into our engagement and we can legally get married wherever we want.

I don't think I will ever fully understand or respect the power of this decision. There have been people who died for this cause, who have been waiting for this decision for decades. I am so grateful for all of them and all that they did. I am grateful that I can look at this, at 24 years old, and not break down into tears because it's just another 'obvious win' and not something that I have spent decades wondering if I'll ever see.

This is an amazing day.
posted by motioncityshakespeare at 11:16 AM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

Many feels out to Scalia. He's just oh so hurt by his colleagues. The victory dance will be devastating.
posted by 2N2222 at 11:16 AM on June 26, 2015

for your enjoyment

I mean, it's so obvious:

"“One would think that Amanda Huginkiss's sentiments are mystical jiggery pokery. This wolf comes as a wolf.”"
posted by Existential Dread at 11:18 AM on June 26, 2015

Actually, that one works on multiple levels
posted by Existential Dread at 11:19 AM on June 26, 2015

People Who Are Going To Be Very Disappointed When They Get To Canada [SLbuzzfeed]
posted by T.D. Strange at 11:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

jay smooth ‏@jsmooth995
Scalia's next dissent will consist of him singing "Daisy" over and over while he slowly winds down into nothingness.
posted by boo_radley at 11:19 AM on June 26, 2015 [40 favorites]

“It is also important to note that the Supreme Court decision is directed at the states to allow and recognize marriage between two people of the same sex. It is not a directive for churches or pastors to recognize same-sex marriage. The decision for churches, pastors and individuals is a choice that should be left to the convictions of conscience."

Maybe so, but what happens when a church refuses to marry a gay couple, on religious grounds? Should be interesting...
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 11:19 AM on June 26, 2015

Maybe so, but what happens when a church refuses to marry a gay couple, on religious grounds?

Nothing? Clergy are not agents of the state.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 11:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [49 favorites]

Headin' to the Great White North! Lol
posted by a lungful of dragon at 11:22 AM on June 26, 2015

Maybe so, but what happens when a church refuses to marry a gay couple, on religious grounds? Should be interesting...

Churches refuse to marry couples all the time - the most typical reason is the couple not being a member of that church.
posted by dinty_moore at 11:22 AM on June 26, 2015 [22 favorites]

What happens when a church refuses to marry a gay couple, on religious grounds?

Nothing! They are not required to, by any means. They get to do what they want to do, and gay people get to be married just like other people who don't belong to that church.
posted by RedOrGreen at 11:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

So so so happy! A great victory for civil rights and American families!
posted by persona au gratin at 11:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Maybe so, but what happens when a church refuses to marry a gay couple, on religious grounds? Should be interesting...

Non sequitur. Ordained religious leaders already have the freedom to not marry a couple for any reason they choose.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 11:23 AM on June 26, 2015 [21 favorites]

The first song I heard after hearing the news was "Courage" by Villagers. The coffee I was drinking was Kayumas Taman Dadar from Nomadic Grounds, out of my 15 year old Golden acrylics mug. Sitting at my kitchen table working from home, with the window open because it's such a nice, sunny day in San Francisco. Chuck left early for work, but we texted. My dog Chan keeps giving me concerned looks and reassuring tail wags when I make noises or sniffle a little. The brugmansias are blooming in the yard, and so is the jasmine. I still need to pack before going to Arkansas tomorrow--mom and dad's 50th anniversary and my 35th birthday are next Thursday and we'll be up in the Ozarks--and hopefully there's time to fix the binding on the quilt I made for Megan's birthday. And it all happened on pay day.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 11:24 AM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

Scalia, quoting foreboding Proverbs at supporters of equal treatment under the law:

"Hubris is sometimes defined as o’erweening pride; and pride, we know, goeth before a fall."

Fuck you, Scalia. Confine your backwards scriptural warnings to your private life, we don't want to read that shit in our secular government's court documents.
posted by airing nerdy laundry at 11:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [21 favorites]

What happens when a church refuses to marry a gay couple, on religious grounds?

Luckily, one never has to step foot in a church in order to be legally married.
posted by Thorzdad at 11:25 AM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

If refusing to marry people was illegal, the Mormon church (sorry, the Church of Latter-Day Saints) would have been shut down ages ago. They won't marry non-Mormons of any orientation.
posted by GuyZero at 11:26 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

hell, some churches refuse to perform interracial marriages still - all that happens is people wag their fingers at the church when it gets made public. that's it. i can't imagine why it would be different for gay marriage. here's hoping in 10, 20, 40 years churches refusing to perform same sex marriages will look just as silly to every one else.

if anything, i hope this can lead to getting rid of the religious requirements for people performing marriages in certain states - just unbind that knot all together.
posted by nadawi at 11:26 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

From Scalia's opinion:

This is a naked judicial claim to legislative—indeed, super-legislative—power; a claim fundamentally at odds with our system of government. Except as limited by a constitutional prohibition agreed to by the People, the States are free to adopt whatever laws they like, even those that offend the esteemed Justices’ “reasoned judgment.” A system of government that makes the People subordinate to a committee of nine unelected lawyers does not deserve to be called a democracy..

Ever since Article III of the Constitution and Marbury vs. Madison, it's been one long downhill slide for democracy.
posted by fremen at 11:26 AM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

Am curious, as I know nothing about the law...is anything that Scalia is saying considered treasonous?
posted by Melismata at 11:28 AM on June 26, 2015

Maybe so, but what happens when a church refuses to marry a gay couple, on religious grounds? Should be interesting...

Non sequitur. Ordained religious leaders already have the freedom to not marry a couple for any reason they choose.

Actually, just to note - even where you can be married by a notary, that notary (as I am one) has the right to refuse to marry you for any reason or no reason. My bet is that pretty much anyone who can marry people anywhere has the right to say "yes, I'll do it" or "No, sorry, can't today." (Not that I would, in this case.) But in my state you have to turn up with a licence before I can conduct your wedding, and that's what this is about.

This ruling is totally about the licence, not the officiant.
posted by anastasiav at 11:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

They won't marry non-Mormons of any orientation.

tiny point...that's not strictly true. they refuse to perform temple sealings for anyone besides worthy mormons (so not even all mormons can get that type of marriage). having said that i've attended quite a few marriages performed by lds priesthood holders outside of the temple which weren't bound by membership
posted by nadawi at 11:28 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

At 11:53 a.m., 82yr old George Harris & 85yr old Jack Evans were married in Dallas

Damn it. Why is it so dusty in here all of a sudden?
posted by brundlefly at 11:30 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I have indirectly heard that here in Lincoln Nebraska we are issuing marriage certificates regardless of gender, and that a couple my wife knows were first in line.

I was a little worried, as the governor is an asshat, but then I remembered that months ago it was announced that Lancaster County re-did the marriage license to remove gendered wording (in anticipation of a ruling that was then put on hold when the Supreme Court agreed to hear Obergefell). I won't be surprised to hear if it goes otherwise somewhere in our fine state, but Lincoln and Lancaster County are pretty liberal by comparison to the rest of the state.

Also, n'th-ing those above who say that the recognition of childless marriages is personally heartening.
posted by jepler at 11:30 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

if anything, i hope this can lead to getting rid of the religious requirements for people performing marriages in certain states - just unbind that knot all together.

For real. The ordination requirement was a huge pain for me - my first choice for officiant eventually backed out because of it. It's a civil proceeding, have people sign up for a license to officiate and be done with it.
posted by dinty_moore at 11:32 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

dinty_moore - yeah, my husband and i actually got married in a different state because our chosen officiant wasn't able to perform our marriage in our state.
posted by nadawi at 11:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Thinking of Gavin Newsom throwing conservatives into a tizzy after he said "It's coming" when San Francisco briefly issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Today shows he was right, though it was much longer road than it needed to be. (Though what I really wonder is if that awesome slide show that captured that brief moment is still up anywhere, there were some really good wedding photos from that...)
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 11:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

i've attended quite a few marriages performed by lds priesthood holders outside of the temple which weren't bound by membership

Ah. My apologies. I meant in-templer marriages and hadn't even thought about LDS officiants doing a wedding outside of a temple. My wedding trivia knowledge increases ever more.
posted by GuyZero at 11:33 AM on June 26, 2015

Am curious, as I know nothing about the law...is anything that Scalia is saying considered treasonous?

IANAL, but my understanding is that treason in the US is a pretty high bar, limited to citizens either actively waging war against the US, or aiding those who do.

If expressing dissatisfaction with the American system of government were treasonous, 98% of Americans would be guilty of treason.

Still, if Scalia is dissatisfied by decisions being made by "nine unelected lawyers," then perhaps as the longest-serving of those nine unelected lawyers, he should lead by example.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 11:33 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

To the trans and other marginalized groups feeling left out of today's victory, I just want to say this...

I'm a hetero white male in a monogamous marriage, and I hear what you're saying. This battle may be won, but the fight continues. I for one will continue to fight to have your rights recognized, your existence protected, and your identity treated with equal respect. Progress doesn't always happen on every front at the same time. Sometimes you have to secure other positions first. But the war isn't over until we all move forward together.

And we will all move forward together.
posted by GhostintheMachine at 11:34 AM on June 26, 2015 [44 favorites]

if tom cotton isn't guilty of treason, neither is scalia
posted by nadawi at 11:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Scott Lemieux: Does the same-sex marriage ruling mean trouble for other LGBT rights cases?

Much worse than its aesthetic problems, however, is where Kennedy leaves equal protection law as it pertains to LGBT rights more generally. As with Kennedy's DOMA opinion - about which I wrote that he "flirt[ed] awkwardly with federalism, due process and equal protection rationales without ever quite summoning up the courage to invite one to the prom" - he maddeningly continued in this opinion to vaguely invoke both equal protection and due process theories without clarifying the applicable standard when it comes to LGBT rights more generally. "Each concept - liberty and equal protection - leads to a stronger understanding of the other," asserted Kennedy.

The problem with Kennedy's judicial vagueness is that public officials and lower courts need to know whether classifications based on sexual orientation should be subject to heightened scrutiny, like those based on race or gender, or whether such classifications require only a "rational basis", like economic regulation. If heightened scrutiny applies, states can only use sexual orientation classifications in law if it they are closely related to a compelling state interest - a test states usually fail. If states need only a "rational basis," courts are generally very deferential to the state. After Friday's opinion, it seems obvious that heightened scrutiny is being applied in practice, but Kennedy inexplicably refuses to say so. The refusal to define sexual orientation as subject to heightened scrutiny will lead to unnecessary confusion, and possibly permit federal and state judges to deny LBGT rights claims that even Kennedy might think should be upheld.

Now is definitely a time for celebration, but I do hope Kennedy's sloppiness doesn't leave the door open for more injury to same-sex partners down the road.
posted by tonycpsu at 11:35 AM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Sangermaine, I'm wearing my hastily-sharpied HA HA SCALIA U MAD BRO? t-shirt at work.
posted by alycoop at 11:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

I know I'm a broken record on this, but this decision isn't just important because LGBT* people deserve marriage.

It's important because marriage was the conservative legal rationalization for discrimination against LGBT* people for over 25 years.

Power of attorney? That's respecting a relationship similar to marriage and must be forbidden.

Discrimination law? That's respecting a relationship similar to marriage and must be forbidden.

Same-sex partners on television? That's respecting a relationship similar to marriage and must be boycotted.

Education that mentions sexual orientation? That's respecting a relationship similar to marriage and must be banned.

The history of "defense of marriage" is filled with examples of conservative discrimination not just denying marriage, but denying the relationships and needs of LGBT* people in any shape, any form, any manner, including people who were not married in states that didn't offer marriage.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 11:36 AM on June 26, 2015 [57 favorites]

Nothing! They are not required to, by any means. They get to do what they want to do, and gay people get to be married just like other people who don't belong to that church.

Ok, was wondering, seemed like a fight to come.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 11:37 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Williamson County, Texas -- basically the northern suburbs of Austin -- is apparently not issuing any marriage licenses.
posted by bradf at 11:43 AM on June 26, 2015

Current status of licenses/marriages in various states:
Texas: Marriages happening; but also some denials
Mississippi: On hold, pending some procedural stuff
Louisiana: On hold - blaming the software
Kansas and Missouri: varying by county
Nebraska: issuing licenses
North Dakota: issuing licenses, but they won't have gender neutral terms for a few weeks
Ohio: issuing licenses
Michigan: marriages happening
Kentucky: issuing licenses
Tennessee: issuing licenses
Georgia: marriages happening
South Dakota: issuing licenses
Arkansas: issuing licenses

apologies that this is not in alphabetical order

If you run into issues obtaining a license, contact your state's ACLU affiliate. The Alabama ACLU and the SPLC have a joint hotline: 334-265-2754. The Texas hotline is 1-888-503-6838.
posted by melissasaurus at 11:43 AM on June 26, 2015 [49 favorites]

Now is definitely a time for celebration, but I do hope Kennedy's sloppiness doesn't leave the door open for more injury to same-sex partners down the road.

I expect the rational basis vs. heightened scrutiny vs. strict scrutiny issue is going to be the next battleground on this issue. The 9th Cir has applied heightened scrutiny to gay rights issues, but most of the federal decisions seem to say that the discriminatory laws fail to pass rational basis review. Which is kind of a double-edged sword if you think about it; its good that they're saying there's no rational basis to discriminate, but it's also a standard that is generally more deferential to the government.
posted by craven_morhead at 11:44 AM on June 26, 2015

Rock on, Stack Overflow. So long as technology is put together and used by humans, human interests will be relevant.
posted by CrystalDave at 11:45 AM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

Williamson County, Texas -- basically the northern suburbs of Austin -- is apparently not issuing any marriage licenses.

What do you want us to think you're reviewing? There's nothing to review beyond "you have to give these to couples regardless of sex." Idiots.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 11:46 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

i just made the mistake of watching the video to "same love" here at work and now I may need to go to another room and compose myself.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 11:46 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Twelve years ago, previously.
posted by fifthrider at 11:46 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Sign posted outside of Red Pegasus Games & Comics in Dallas.
posted by Atom Eyes at 11:47 AM on June 26, 2015 [25 favorites]

bradf: Williamson County has issued at least one license today to a straight couple, and is now basically saying they will disobey the ruling.
posted by scatter gather at 11:48 AM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

B. Blatcher: Ok, was wondering, seemed like a fight to come.

The next fight will be over whether religious institutions and organizations can have additional exemptions carved into existing discrimination laws that will allow them to refuse to extend equality to same sex couples.

This could mean, for example, an request that they be shielded from punitive damages if they refuse to hire those in same sex marriages, or to extend spousal benefits to same-sex spouses of employees. Or if they refuse to make their property or services available for same-sex marriage ceremonies or other events affirming same-sex marriage. Etc.
posted by zarq at 11:50 AM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Progress doesn't always happen on every front at the same time.

For anyone else prepared to spew platitudes, realize that these exact things you are saying--"I get what you're saying, but," "Can't we just celebrate for a day? A week?" "We'll care about your rights later, be patient"--are the exact arguments that have been used to silence trans people for as long as I've been alive. You're not helping.

Want to be an ally? Adopt an attitude like fffm's way up above--something like "Awesome. What's next on the list?" Knock off the "Inequality is Over," ""Victory for Humanity" grandstanding and show some self-awareness. Be aware that LGB rights globally have largely diminished outside of the white, affluent nations where they're moving forward (and where the US is just reluctantly following the other kids, rather than being a global leader), and that even within the US, cisgender LGB people are still fighting against tides of discrimination likely to intensify in response to this. Be aware that there are huge gulfs between LGB rights along lines of race and class. Be aware that trans rights in the US have largely been diminished--or have been under direct threat--within the US, where they are largely nonexistent. Globally, trans rights are actively toxic/abusive in most of the world, even including affluent white nations increasingly cool with gay marriage.

Lastly, be honest with yourself and with me. Don't tell me you care when you don't. Your actions speak louder. Many of you probably contributed to the obstruction of LGB rights in the past, and many of you do contribute to the obstruction of trans rights now. That's not you being a bigot or a bad person; that's you just doing whatever everybody else is doing. Be aware of that. If you're not aware of it and you want people who are to just sit down and be quiet, you do not get to keep your Ally Cookie, sorry. There is no better time than right now, while there's a groundswell of positive energy in the US, for America to start talking about broader injustices it perpetuates--against trans people, against LGB people, against racial and ethnic minorities, against immigrants, whatever. You're part of the problem if your attitude is, "Shut up and party." Have your party, but make sure your party doesn't intrude on somebody else's real work, and use this as an opportunity to talk about greater injustices, not shut people down because they're making you uncomfortable.
posted by byanyothername at 11:52 AM on June 26, 2015 [33 favorites]

""[I]f you OK gay marriage, then you have to do plural marriage, which is now -- has a name, triads. Three people getting married."
- Bill O'Reilly

Well I, for one, will be god-damned before I recognize any sort of Triad marriage. It's unnatural, what with them walking on their root-stalks, and those clacking noises they make, and trying to blind us with their stingers...

Wait...I mean Triffids. Those are Triffids.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 11:53 AM on June 26, 2015 [36 favorites]

Just realized that my kids will live their whole lives in a society where same sex marriage is legal. They'll never even think twice about it. It will be normal. That's so. fucking. great!
posted by that's candlepin at 11:55 AM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I would like to clarify that I can hold "okay, what's next" and "VICTORY KERMIT FLAIL CELEBRATE" in my head at the same time. And I'd be willing to bet that goes for the majority of people in this thread.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:56 AM on June 26, 2015 [61 favorites]

Let's ban guns real quick while everyone is in a good mood
posted by growabrain at 11:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

Take a Spin on the Antonin Scalia Insult Generator!

"The obfuscator of last resort is interpretive jiggery-pokery."
posted by the man of twists and turns at 11:58 AM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Heya, byanyothername, I 100% appreciate that you are coming from a place of extremely justifiable passion and frustration with this and I doubt there are many people in this thread who really disagree with you at all about the importance of doing more work rather than just saying "hey everything's great now, problems solved", but it also feels like you're unleashing a lot of kind of speculative aggression on people who haven't done anything in here other than express happiness about one specific good thing that happened today. I think this is stuff very much worth talking about but this just isn't really a super great way to go about it.
posted by cortex (staff) at 12:01 PM on June 26, 2015 [81 favorites]

can.imarrygay.com finally gives the result I've been waiting to see for years.
posted by ocherdraco at 12:01 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

TheWhiteSkull: "Wait...I mean Triffids. Those are Triffids."

Yeah, he was talking about those alien walkers with the capping ceremony...no, no, those are *Tripods*.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:01 PM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

A song for Antonin and Samuel and Clarence.
posted by Existential Dread at 12:02 PM on June 26, 2015

Justice Roberts' dissent attempts a reductio ad absurdum, saying that the same arguments used to legalize gay marriage would also apply to polyamorous relationships. Frankly, I don't see the problem: if more than two people are living stably together and would mutually benefit from the legal rights granted by marriage (not to mention recognition of their personal relationship), then why not let them?

One immediate question invited by the majority’s position is whether States may retain the definition of mar-
riage as a union of two people. Although the majority randomly inserts the adjective “two” in various places, it offers no reason at all why the two-person element of the core definition of marriage may be preserved while the man-woman element may not. Indeed, from the standpoint of history and tradition, a leap from opposite-sex marriage to same-sex marriage is much greater than one from a two-person union to plural unions, which have deep roots in some cultures around the world. If the majority is willing to take the big leap, it is hard to see how it can say no to the shorter one.

It is striking how much of the majority’s reasoning would apply with equal force to the claim of a fundamental right to plural marriage. If “[t]here is dignity in the bond between two men or two women who seek to marry and in their autonomy to make such profound choices,” ante, at 13, why would there be any less dignity in the bond between three people who, in exercising their autonomy, seek to make the profound choice to marry? If a same-sex couple has the constitutional right to marry because their children would otherwise “suffer the stigma of knowing their families are somehow lesser,” ante, at 15, why wouldn’t the same reasoning apply to a family of three or more persons raising children? If not having the opportunity to marry “serves to disrespect and subordinate” gay and lesbian couples, why wouldn’t the same “imposition of this disability,” ante, at 22, serve to disrespect and subordinate people who find fulfillment in polyamorous relationships?

(Oh, I see people mentioned that Bill O'Reilly brought up the same point about plural marriages, albeit not argued nearly as well.)
posted by Rangi at 12:03 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Pitchfork has aggregated a bunch of tweets: Artists React to Supreme Court Ruling Legalizing Same Sex Marriage
posted by Going To Maine at 12:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Yo people imma let you finish

- Polite Kanye
posted by sidereal at 12:04 PM on June 26, 2015

Well I, for one, will be god-damned before I recognize any sort of Triad marriage.

I, too, object to weddings perpetuating Hong Kong mafia organizations.
posted by Going To Maine at 12:08 PM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

man seriously that's as good as a majority opinion in the inevitable poly case to come.
posted by alycoop at 12:08 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I'm not sure I'm unhappy about that in this case. #poly

That case will be interesting when it arrives; the lines in the country will not at all be the same as they are now.
posted by Going To Maine at 12:11 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

This is a bit of a digression, but since it's come up: Elena Kagan is unmarried, but quick googling will find you plenty of people who've known her for a long time saying she's had relationships with men that, get this, haven't resulted in marriage. This is a woman who, as a tween, argued and negotiated with her Orthodox rabbi to become the first Bat Mitzvah at her synagogue; it seems very unlikely to me that this is a woman who would feel compelled to keep her sexual orientation a secret, especially once appointed to a lifetime position at the Supreme Court (ie, you really can't beat that tenure.) She happens to be unmarried; there is absolutely nothing wrong with that and it's a bit rude, at the very least, to assume that a middle-aged woman who has never married must be a lesbian.
posted by Tomorrowful at 12:12 PM on June 26, 2015 [85 favorites]

We now take you live to Mike Huckabee's office for his reaction to today's historic ruling.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 12:14 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Haha so fun story. From Roberts' dissent:

As a result, the Court invalidates the marriage laws of more than half the States and orders the transformation of a social institution that has formed the basis of human society for millennia, for the Kalahari Bushmen and the Han Chinese, the Carthaginians and the Aztecs. Just who do we think we are?

Now, I'm not totally sure about the rest of these groups, but the mention of the Aztecs jumped out at me, because:

The penalties for male homosexual intercourse were severe. Mexica law punished sodomy with the gallows, impalement for the active homosexual, extraction of the entrails through the anal orifice for the passive homosexual, and death by garrote for the lesbians. In Tenochtitlan, they hanged homosexuals. In nearby Texcoco, the active partner was "bound to a stake, completely covered with ashes and so left to die; the entrails of the passive agent were drawn out through his anus, he was then covered with ashes, and wood being added, the pile was ignited."

YES, LET'S GO BACK TO THOSE TRADITIONAL VALUES

(Also, it appears from that page that the Mayans, Toltecs, Zapotecs, and many other indigenous groups were basically cool with gay people, and the Aztecs were outliers.)
posted by showbiz_liz at 12:15 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Remember, legal abortion is still the law of the land, and it's been put under massive assault. I have no doubt the same thing will occur with this ruling.

No. Stop and think about how the two are very different. It's not simply true that "legal abortion is ... the law of the land." Abortion is legal sometimes and illegal sometimes. It depends on the circumstances — how far along the pregnancy is, what kinds of exemptions there are to the prohibition, how substantially the law burdens access to abortion, etc. Ever since Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court has always left the door wide-open for opponents to prohibit abortion in many situations.

Today's decision is different: it is absolute and universal. It says that no same-sex couple can ever be denied the right to marriage under the exact same terms and conditions as opposite-sex couples.
posted by John Cohen at 12:15 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I read this entire thread, with happyness, before venturing elsewhere on the internet to get reactions.

It's true, I've had a bit of glee as I've seen people flout their misery and bigotry... Knowing they are on the losing end of history today.

But I'm so glad there is a place on the internet I could come and find nothing but joy in this decision.
posted by el io at 12:16 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

if more than two people are living stably together and would mutually benefit from the legal rights granted by marriage (not to mention recognition of their personal relationship), then why not let them?

I think there are some interesting conversations to have around that, but probably not today. Polygamy has been used as an excuse and a dog whistle to deny rights to gay people for so long that it just makes it really difficult to discuss in this context.
posted by Drinky Die at 12:16 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I think you wanted this video.
posted by Going To Maine at 12:16 PM on June 26, 2015

Oh!!! My "favorite" Hucks moment came here, when he "joked" that it would have been so great to identify as a woman in high school, so he could shower with girls
....

which I love because he's admitting that if he were a woman he would be a lesbian.
posted by nakedmolerats at 12:17 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

man seriously that's as good as a majority opinion in the inevitable poly case to come.

That's how I feel too, that Roberts has actually ended up making a good argument for the exact opposite position he was trying to advocate for. And the same argument could have been made independently from today's case, too: if marriage between one man and one woman is OK, why not two men and two women? The "slippery slope" argument isn't needed to get to the point of asking that question.

And if the answer is, "because we haven't defined marriage that way" then doesn't the same reasoning apply as to why today's decision doesn't require N-way marriage to be legalized? And doesn't the same argument apply to today's decision itself, in support of it, e.g. "we didn't define marriage that way before, but now we are."

There doesn't seem to be a logically consistent place to stand in opposition to marriage equality while invoking the argument that it must inevitably lead to further expansion of the definition of marriage. (Not that I think it would be a bad thing, to be clear.)
posted by FishBike at 12:18 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

showbiz_liz: "Just who do we think we are?"

AMERICA, FUCK YEAH!

The worst rhetorical question in the world is, "Americans, do you really think you're THAT SPECIAL?" because the answer is always going to be "YES! Yes we do!"
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 12:19 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Under The Rainbow -- Black, Queer And Not in The Mood For Pride

Out of respect for byanyothername's frustration, I just wanted to point out this article from today that expresses some similar exhaustion from another intersectional voice:

Call me perpetually under the rainbow, but I just can't vibe with one aspect of my existence being uplifted while another piece is reminded of its inhumanity every single day. I'm sure it's been said before by many others on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum, specifically those of color. Those who constantly have to deal with being erased, ignored and killed because of living intersectional existences plagued by racism. To watch black lives across the board get plagued by so much violence, institutional and through other means, is exhausting.

...I'm probably not alone in my exasperation, but I'm just tired of being expected to celebrate Pride when there are so many efforts to erase people of color from its origins and present.

Black lives matter, black LGBTQIA+ lives matter, the lives of those who live in between the lines matter. I refuse to remain content and quiet about the silence in one of my communities, when that really should never be so. I can't focus on something like marriage, or living boldly and proudly, when I need to focus on keeping myself and those like me alive. It's just too much work.

Thanks to this author (Joseph Coco), Jennicet Gutiérrez, byanyothername, and others, people who might otherwise be thinking "WE DID IT! Everybody go home, pack up, happy ending" are instead thinking "WE DID IT! Now on to the next battle for human dignity," and that's important.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 12:19 PM on June 26, 2015 [36 favorites]

I've basically been weeping and smiling all day so far. It's a great day for America. We've still got work to do, but today? Today's a great day.
posted by yasaman at 12:19 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Yeah, Obama hit that sentiment perfectly on the head:

"There’s so much more work to be done to extend the full promise of America to every American. But today, we can say in no uncertain terms that we’ve made our union a little more perfect.

That’s the consequence of a decision from the Supreme Court, but, more importantly, it is a consequence of the countless small acts of courage of millions of people across decades who stood up, who came out, who talked to parents -- parents who loved their children no matter what. Folks who were willing to endure bullying and taunts, and stayed strong, and came to believe in themselves and who they were, and slowly made an entire country realize that love is love.

What an extraordinary achievement. What a vindication of the belief that ordinary people can do extraordinary things. What a reminder of what Bobby Kennedy once said about how small actions can be like pebbles being thrown into a still lake, and ripples of hope cascade outwards and change the world.

Those countless, often anonymous heroes -- they deserve our thanks. They should be very proud. America should be very proud."
posted by craven_morhead at 12:20 PM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

She happens to be unmarried; there is absolutely nothing wrong with that and it's a bit rude, at the very least, to assume that a middle-aged woman who has never married must be a lesbian.

Sometimes a confirmed bachelorette is just a confirmed bachelorette.
posted by Going To Maine at 12:20 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

byanyothername, just so we're clear... yes, I truly do care. Directly, because my wife's cousin is trans so I'm aware of a tiny fraction of the problems she's encountered in her life. And indirectly, because I have two sons, not yet in their teen years, and I have no idea what the future holds for them. I want to make sure that they will be free to safely express themselves, period full stop. I've actively supported my wife's cousin, and I'm actively teaching my sons to understand and respect everyone.

Please, don't sit down, and don't shut up. It's OK if you don't feel like cheering this particular moment, but keep speaking up and speaking out so the rest of us know what is still left to be done. What a small victory this would be if we stopped here.
posted by GhostintheMachine at 12:21 PM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

Y'all please maybe consider skipping the "let's speculate about the sexual orientation of public figures" thing, it's kinda not great even when meant relatively well.
posted by cortex (staff) at 12:23 PM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

No, byanyothername, I share your anger at the treatment we have gotten. It has SUCKED. FUCKING SUCKED. The things we could go on and on about. The HRC got what they wanted, this is done. As a trans woman I get two things that help me live in the love I share with my partner, but there is SO MUCH MORE to be done and I share your cynicism. Today, however, I celebrate a major victory while keeping my eyes askance at the hard realities we face that have been willfully ignored for over a decade. The piper is at the gate, and now they show if they are full of shit or full of honor.

But today I celebrate.
posted by Annika Cicada at 12:24 PM on June 26, 2015 [37 favorites]

Just watching Obama's eulogy for Reverend Clementa Pinckney at whitehouse.gov and it ties in so powerfully with the SCOTUS decision and our longing for progress for equality and justice. Now he's singing Amazing Grace. I didn't realise he had such a nice voice. But I don't want to derail feel free to check out Slate's Justice Scalia insult generator.
posted by Bella Donna at 12:27 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

oh, i can't read through all this now

but congratulations to all those who will now be allowed to marry
posted by pyramid termite at 12:27 PM on June 26, 2015

Sometimes activists deserve some time off to celebrate their victories. It doesn't mean they have retired from fighting or decided things are all cake and beer forever. C'mon now.
posted by emjaybee at 12:27 PM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

Can we stop calling it Gay Marrige now and just call it Marriage?
posted by SLC Mom at 12:28 PM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

I have to admit, after the Obamacare subsidies decision turned out so well, I was scared that the other shoe was going to drop here, like the SCOTUS was buttering us up or something. Happy to see that this went as predicted and almost as it should have (with "as it should have" meaning a 9-0 decision in which all justices just wrote "Duh, of course everyone should have basic civil rights").
posted by IAmUnaware at 12:30 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Yay!
posted by various at 12:30 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I didn't realise he had such a nice voice.

You must have missed the improptu Al Green snippet from a while back.
posted by aught at 12:32 PM on June 26, 2015

The next fight will be over whether religious institutions and organizations can have additional exemptions carved into existing discrimination laws that will allow them to refuse to extend equality to same sex couples.

Ah, thanks for that. Lots of joy today, but was wondering how conservative religious types were going to deal. Should have known the answer would be "stubborn as usual".
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 12:32 PM on June 26, 2015

Ctrl-F "NOM". Nothing. Good.
posted by Going To Maine at 12:33 PM on June 26, 2015

Thanks to this author (Joseph Coco), Jennicet Gutiérrez, byanyothername, and others, people who might otherwise be thinking "WE DID IT! Everybody go home, pack up, happy ending" are instead thinking "WE DID IT! Now on to the next battle for human dignity," and that's important.

Nobody anywhere was thinking "WE DID IT! Everybody go home, pack up, happy ending". Literally nobody.
posted by IAmUnaware at 12:34 PM on June 26, 2015 [23 favorites]

I think there are some interesting conversations to have around that, but probably not today. Polygamy has been used as an excuse and a dog whistle to deny rights to gay people for so long that it just makes it really difficult to discuss in this context.

That's true. For now I'm happy that we've gone from constitutional same-sex marriage bans in most states to nation-wide marriage equality, in just one decade.

Still, it'll be nice in the future, when we have legal line marriages on the moon officiated by sentient AI. Basically take Heinlein's fiction as a good point to aim for in reality.
posted by Rangi at 12:34 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Uh-oh, you guys. My dog just married a cat. MAYBE THE NAYSAYERS WERE ONTO SOMETHING
posted by town of cats at 12:35 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

-No one has said this. Why keep repeating this lie?

-Nobody anywhere was thinking "WE DID IT! Everybody go home, pack up, happy ending". Literally nobody.

I haven't seen it on metafilter, but I have absolutely seen the sentiment of "we did it! MISSION ACCOMPLISHED EQUALITY ACHIEVED" expressed elsewhere today, and I'm betting others have as well.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 12:36 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Maybe you should move out of the town of cats?
posted by almostmanda at 12:36 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Posting Joel Spolsky's comment from CrystalDave's Stack Overflow link above since it's so great. And yep they changed the logo! If you aren't a programmer, you may not know that this is one of the most popular programming sites on the web (like AskMe for coding):

(about changing their logo today)
I am in favor of this.

We wouldn't be doing it to promote social causes, nor would we be doing it to hitch our brand-wagon onto a popular cause. We're just doing it to celebrate how fast the world is moving towards acceptance of gay people.

I'm the CEO, co-founder, and inventor of Stack Overflow. I'm gay, American, and married, and have taken a lot of crap over the years for all three of those things, so this is a big day for me.

When I was a kid, gay marriage was impossible to imagine. I remember reading a bestselling book about sex when I was a teenager that was in favor of all kinds of sexual practices but drew the line at gay marriage, which it presented as the most ridiculous kind of clownishness possible. A whole chapter on homosexuals was morbidly obsessed with how they were always showing up in the hospital with hilarious inappropriate things stuck in inappropriate places. After I read that I thought I would have to keep my preferences secret forever.

Thankfully, braver people than I realized that if enough people know somebody who is gay, they will understand that being gay is not some kind of freak-show threat to society -- it's perfectly normal and entirely harmless. So as more and more people came out of the closet, society became slowly more and more accepting of homosexuality.

I've been in a long committed relationship with the same man for a couple of decades now, and there have been many times where the next thing that relationship really needed was a formal, state-recognized commitment ceremony, but until recently, that was not a legal option.

One night I tuned into a cable tv channel and watched the incompetent, criminally corrupt, venal New York state legislature somehow manage to eke out a law allowing gay marriage and suddenly I was a real citizen for the first time. Despite my normal calm nature I couldn't help but cry tears of joy.

Today's Supreme Court decision is monumental. It reflects a distinct change in American society, from being nearly universally against allowing gay people to marry, to having a solid majority in favor. It's a great moment.

Very few people here would dispute this. Almost everyone arguing against changing the Stack Overflow logo to the rainbow logo for a day or two are just saying "this is not the place" or that somehow Stack Overflow should be seen as neutral on social issues, not taking a stand on what could be a controversial issue.

That's missing the point.

The point is that allowing EVERYONE to marry IS the neutral position.

On Stack Overflow we don't care if you're black, white, brown, or purple, as long as you know the answer to a programming question, you'll get the upvote. We don't care if you're straight, gay, trans, queer, asexual, intersexual, questioning, poly, or a sandwich, we only care if you're right. That's a fundamental, core value of Stack Overflow. Whoever you are, you are equal in our eyes.

That's what the Supreme Court just ruled.

Couldn't be more relevant to Stack Overflow.

posted by freecellwizard at 12:36 PM on June 26, 2015 [56 favorites]

The next fight will be over whether religious institutions and organizations can have additional exemptions carved into existing discrimination laws that will allow them to refuse to extend equality to same sex couples.

That, and whether those exemptions can be extended to bakers.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 12:38 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

One would think, after Lawrence V Texas, that dissenting Justices would have learned by now not to make a slippery slope argument if they are going to write the dissent, because REPEATEDLY those slippery slope arguments are used as justification for majority opinions issued in the future.

I'm curious, is there a word for this so very "social conservative" conversation tactic? Where someone's like "But if we allow A, then we'll have to allow B!", where "B" is clearly supposed to cause you to react in horror and disgust, but is in actuality something totally reasonable?

It seems like there should be a word for this. "Scalia-ing?"
posted by tocts at 12:38 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I pray, pray this week gives Thomas and Scalia/lito screaming bloody ulcers.
posted by gottabefunky at 12:40 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

When you're still standing outside in the rain, it's got to be hard to join in any celebration for the folks ahead of you in line who finally got admitted into a warm and cozy room and who are now drying off next to a toasty fire. This isn't meant to trivialise the genuine reasons people have to celebrate. I'm totally celebrating! I texted my daughter in Sweden to give her the news. I'll never forget when we were staying in Brooklyn with friends when she was little and she asked why the friends we were staying with weren't married. I had to explain that they weren't allowed to marry. "But why not?" she kept asking, and I had no good answer except that bigoted, fearful people refused to grant them equal rights. So yes, I am celebrating today. That said, I understand why byanyothername and others might want people of privilege (in my case as a white, cis woman) to acknowledge the tragic, nightmarish bigotry that endangers the lives of trans people (and black people and some others) every day. So yes, much work remains to be done. Still, I am hella happy right now. I'll take every victory I can.
posted by Bella Donna at 12:41 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

So I went to the NOM ('national organization for marriage' bigotry) website...

So, they quoted MLK, they quoted Lincoln, they cited the Dred Scott case (there should be a bingo board for the homophobes, because these guys probably nailed all the squares)...

And then they said something I agree with...

"We call on the American people to make the definition of marriage a pivotal issue in the 2016 presidential contest and to elect a president who will be a true champion for marriage, one who is committed to taking specific steps to restoring true marriage in the law including appointing new justices to the Supreme Court who will have the opportunity to reverse this decision."

Yes, please do this Republicans, please stake your presidential race on your opposition to equality in marriage. Please please.
posted by el io at 12:42 PM on June 26, 2015 [25 favorites]

I was just plain old happy and proud until I see Cortex's flag and that was the thing that made me weep. Well played, Cortex.

I am so, so happy for everyone who now can marry where they could not and whose marriages are valid where they were not. Love marches on.

Let's work even harder towards equal work place protections on a national level.
posted by Joey Michaels at 12:43 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

This is so awesome. I cannot wait for all the weddings that are going to happen in my friend circle. Goddamn Supremes, I'm pretty much loving you today. Love. All. The. Things. Love For All The Peoples. I'm so happy about this. So happy.
posted by dejah420 at 12:43 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I pray, pray this week gives Thomas and Scalia/lito screaming bloody ulcers

Hemorrhoids.

Also regarding HRC, it's not like they're suddenly going to downsize. They have a huge machine in place and it's up to us to get them to set trans rights as a target.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 12:44 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Frankly, I don't see the problem: if more than two people are living stably together...

Yeah, Roberts' reductio argument doesn't work the way he thinks it does. Quite the opposite. Exactly, John, why shouldn't all truly consensual, loving, mutually beneficial relationships be valid?

The key thing right-wingers don't seem to ever get, being so focused on, and even terrified of any changes to, The Existing Order of Things, is the idea of consent. That's why the idiots who say "well then why not children or animals" are... well, idiots. Neither of those categories are capable of consent.
posted by mondo dentro at 12:44 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

The slippery slope argument is bullshit 99% of the time; it's a hook that intellectually lazy people love to hang their hat on. Always has been. Humans are able to draw distinctions and see shades of grey and meaningfully differentiate one situation from another; it's why we have prefrontal cortexes. Someone who starts screaming "slippery slope!" every time an equal protection argument comes up is someone I know I shouldn't waste my time engaging in conversation about, well, anything, pretty much.
posted by holborne at 12:45 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

So this week marriage equity was approved, the Confederate flag came down, the White House said clinicians can study the benefits of marijuana, Bristol Palin fell off her abstinence only moral high ground, healthcare will continue to be accessible, the Pope said there was global warming and people needed to take their heads out of their asses (and he not only recognized Palestine as a state, but signed a treaty with them). Rough week for the Tea party set.
posted by cjorgensen at 12:47 PM on June 26, 2015 [79 favorites]

I'm pretty sure it's called the slippery-slope argument.

Sort of? But it's a slippery slope argument where the claimed eventuality is not a thing anyone should have a problem with. Like, "but if we do that, we'll all get to have an ice cream sundae!". Um. OK, and the problem is ... ?

(But I will cease, as I don't want to derail into a total semantics thing when really, let's just be happy :))
posted by tocts at 12:47 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Congrats you guys! This is a win for us straight non-Americans as well, as happiness is not a zero-sum game. I believe this will increase the net amount of happiness in the world, benefiting us all!
posted by Harald74 at 12:48 PM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

I'm amused by the little celebrations breaking out in niche places. E.g., r/comicbooks is currently full of "SUPER gay" posts of gay comic book characters.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 12:49 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

Maybe a Slip'N Slide argument? Yes, you are slipping, but also having fun and traveling in the intended direction.
posted by Drinky Die at 12:49 PM on June 26, 2015 [30 favorites]

The long Slip 'n Slide of history slides towards justice.
posted by fifthrider at 12:52 PM on June 26, 2015 [26 favorites]

I'm kind of at a loss for words. Love conquers all, I guess!
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 12:53 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Are you guys posting actual quotes from Scalia's dissent, or Onion quotes? 'Cause I'm having a hard time telling the difference.
posted by kirkaracha at 12:54 PM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

I'm gay, American, and married, and have taken a lot of crap over the years for all three of those things, so this is a big day for me.

Myself, as well! As a SO contributor, thanks for doing your part to make this a special day, Joel!
posted by a lungful of dragon at 12:54 PM on June 26, 2015

So awesome. Now will someone who is more talented in mixology than I pleeease make a cocktail named Scalia's Tears?

2 ounces rye whiskey
1/4 ounce Fernet Branca
1/4 ounce Grand Marnier or Cointreau
A few splashes of water or soda
Serve on the rocks, garnished with a miniature rainbow flag

It's a bitter, Italian Old Fashioned made with sweet, spicy American whiskey.
posted by KathrynT at 12:54 PM on June 26, 2015 [104 favorites]

The generational wheel keeps turning: S.E. Cupp tears up talking about today's ruling.

“Sorry,” the conservative commentator told Wolf Blitzer, her voice quivering as footage of a celebratory scene outside the Supreme Court aired on-screen, saying, “it’s hard to watch that and, um, not get emotional.”

"Those people there,” Cupp, referring to the gay-marriage supporters, “are not pariahs. They are patriots."

posted by mondo dentro at 12:56 PM on June 26, 2015 [25 favorites]

What do you know, freedom in the land of the free. About fucking time.
posted by dbiedny at 12:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

It is soooooo ordered. *three finger snaps*
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 1:00 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I'm getting ZERO work done today! I can't stop being swept up with all the happy feels, especially with you guys posting these amazing, touching and personal stories. RIDICULOUSLY HAPPY!!

I also really really want to seize the momentum of this all and push onward, to extend even more rights and recognition to people still left behind. Let's extend basic human decency to everyone, damn it! Let's keep arguing with our bigoted family members. Let's continue to stick our necks out in front of discriminatory employers. Let's make everyone in our personal lives aware that they are on the wrong side of history, that we are not going to tolerate abuse and hate thrown at our friends and neighbors and loved ones for simply being themselves.

We can do this, I really believe it. There's a long road ahead of us when it comes to many human rights issues, but we can use this as fuel along the way.

I have some mad fierce pride in everyone who fought, in big or small ways, to make today possible.
posted by erratic meatsack at 1:02 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

President Obama on gay marriage: Justice arrived 'like a thunderbolt'

Barack, I believe the term is "came in like a wrecking ball."
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 1:02 PM on June 26, 2015 [25 favorites]

I don't get enough days to be this proud of my country.
posted by WidgetAlley at 1:02 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Friends post on FB:

Only God is right. Period. Your arguments, for or against something, are with Him. He will sort everything out and judge righteously in favor of His will and against those things that are not. In the meantime, pray for our country and its leaders to do the right thing, not necessarily what is popular or in vogue.
I’d rather be on God’s side and have the world condemn me than be on the world’s side and have God condemn me.

My reply:

Yes Yes and more Yes! And thanks be to God for today's SCOTUS ruling! See?! He is already working His will against those who would oppress and deprive the liberty of the least of these!!!
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 1:02 PM on June 26, 2015 [142 favorites]

Beautiful, quonsar.
posted by mondo dentro at 1:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I had no idea the judgement was expected today. About damn time, though.
It's been a long, arduous battle and I hope to learn more about the people that were part of this fight since the 90s. I'm waiting for some documentaries profiling them. Mad props!

In other news - Scalia.. you scumbag sack of shit!
posted by savitarka at 1:06 PM on June 26, 2015

Rough week for the Tea party set.

Here's hoping it gets rougher
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 1:06 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

Thanks, quonsar!
posted by a lungful of dragon at 1:07 PM on June 26, 2015

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!

I might even go and get married to celebrate.
posted by Dashy at 1:08 PM on June 26, 2015

Some links to build on the excellent Joseph Coco piece that a fiendish thingy linked to:

Gay and lesbian Americans can still be fired for their sexual orientation in 28 states. Includes a handy map.

According to the American Civil Liberties Union, 22 states and the District of Columbia have passed legislation that prevents workers from being fired because they are gay or lesbian. (Nineteen of those states and D.C. also include language protecting against gender identity bias.)
Congress has failed to pass federal legislation that bans discrimination in the workplace based on sexual orientation and transgender identity outright. Politicians in Washington have introduced legislation known as the Employment Non-Discrimination Act for two decades. And, for two decades, it has failed to pass.

Chelsea Manning also wrote a thing for the Guardian: Same-sex marriage isn't equality for all LGBT people. Our movement can't end

But I worry that, with full marriage equality, much of the queer community will be left wondering how else to engage with a society that still wants to define who we are – and who in our community will be left to push for full equality for all transgender and queer people, now that this one fight has been won. I fear that our precious movements for social justice and all the remarkable advancements we have made are now vulnerable to being taken over by monied people and institutions, and that those of us for whom same-sex marriage rights brings no equality will be slowly erased from our movement and our history...
...Transgender folks have been part of the push for LGBT equality from the beginning, and we’ve spoken with loud and intelligent voices, and have found political and personal success and advancement all over the world. We fought police discrimination during the riots of Compton Cafeteria in San Francisco in 1966, the Stonewall Inn in 1963 and the White Night in San Francisco in 1979. We have been inspired by leaders from Sylvia Rivera and Miss Major, and from Janet Mock to Laverne Cox. We have created political organizations for ourselves, like the Street Transvestites Action Revolutionaries (Star) to Sylvia Rivera Law Project and Black & Pink.

But despite our successes and our participation in the struggle for LGBT equality, there are still queer and trans folks who struggle every single day for the right to define themselves, to access gender-appropriate healthcare and to live without harassment by other people, the police or the government. Many queer and trans people live – and lived – in our prison and jails, in our homeless shelters, in run-down houses and apartment buildings, and on the corners of every major city. Marriage equality doesn’t help them; and the potential loss of momentum for trans/queer rights after this win could well hurt them.

And, it was posted in the relevant thread, which is where further conversation should probably go, but Jennicet Gutiérrez's protest is also a part of the wider conversation: You Can't Cheer for Laverne and Boo Jennicet

As soon as Gutiérrez proceeded to speak truth and ask the President as to why he is not releasing our trans detainees who face violence, the crowd began to jeer, boo, and hiss. As she continued, the crowd then began to drown her and chant, "OBAMA! OBAMA!"

A transgender woman of color and undocumented leader in the immigrant rights and LGBT movement was booed and silenced by not only the state, but by the very same movement that purports to uplift and celebrate the transgender community.

As her voice, filled with passion and conviction, broke through the White House room, she was met by negativity, intolerance, and stares of disapproval from her peers. Her voice was carried by the thousands of transgender women considered disposable by the nation, facing deportation, detention, and brutal transphobic violence.

Her voice and visibility in that moment was shunned and shamed as inappropriate by a roomful of leaders who then applauded as the President lamented violence against transgender women of color, violence that his actions have contributed to by not taking action against the detention centers. Her voice is one of few transgender women of color immigrants who are bringing national visibility to this issue of the detention centers. Her voice carried the weight of the communities who are screaming inside detention centers demanding to be freed. Her voice was heard and ridiculed by many who claim to fight for transgender communities and also are involved in LGBT immigrant rights issues.
posted by byanyothername at 1:09 PM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

Rough week for the Tea party set.

Here's hoping it gets rougher

Well! Obama's managed to work up a coalition with that RINO Paul Ryan against the Dems in order to pass his free trade agreement, so they're probably rather cheesed about that. Though, of course, so are some other folks…
posted by Going To Maine at 1:09 PM on June 26, 2015

thanks obamacare
posted by klangklangston at 1:16 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Many of you probably contributed to the obstruction of LGB rights in the past, and many of you do contribute to the obstruction of trans rights now.

In what way? I would honestly like to know whether I'm shooting myself in the foot somehow. I expect more MeFites consider themselves trans* allies than not, and would also like to know if they're inadvertently harming the cause.
posted by Foosnark at 1:18 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

For what I think is only the second time, I've run out of my day's allotment of favorites. I am also full of delicious rainbow cake from the kosher bakery down the street.

Marriage equality is only one small step, but it's a step nonetheless, and it's a good step. Everybody treat yourselves to a pat on the back, and then get back in the fight!
posted by Faint of Butt at 1:21 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Feeling relieved and happy, but mindful of the work left to do. This piece is a great analysis of the opportunity cost this fight has had on other important struggles. The Price of Gay Marriage.
posted by likeatoaster at 1:24 PM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Today has gotten a little weird as a queer lady who's also poly. "No, K and I aren't getting married. No, J is actually married to a man and as such we will not be getting married. What are my plans? Um, to go to the farmer's market?"
posted by a hat out of hell at 1:27 PM on June 26, 2015 [27 favorites]

To add to the linking of thoughtful reaction pieces from elsewhere, a friend of mine from college posted her thoughts on the decision from a trans perspective earlier this morning:

It’s great, but as I’m a trans woman and activist, my focus has changed. I would be lying if I said marriage was the first thing on my mind. In fact, I’m regularly worried about adequate health care and doctors who know what’s up with my body. I’m lucky now, but there was also a time when I was worried I’d be outed and lose my job. Then I’d be in the spiral of homelessness that consumes much of my community. It’s true. Trans folk often have much more urgent things to worry about, like finding restrooms, validating educational spaces, housing, and more. As well, I can’t help but think about all of the trans women my community has lost this year.

It’s difficult when the larger queer community, which arguably has more social power and influence, ignores the fact that we can multitask. We can carry marriage equality as an issue alongside helping homeless and disowned queer and trans youth. We can rally behind the numerous trans people who are discriminated against and attacked every day. We can be more that a single-issue movement.

With all this in mind, I know the impact that marriage equality will inevitably have on all of us. While it will help cis queer people, no longer will trans people have to worry if their birth certificates have the “right” gender on them so they can marry the one they love. No longer will queer trans people have to worry about a conversation that largely ignores their existence.
posted by sciatrix at 1:29 PM on June 26, 2015 [28 favorites]

This is awesome, awesome news.
posted by nubs at 1:31 PM on June 26, 2015

The next fight will be over whether religious institutions and organizations can have additional exemptions carved into existing discrimination laws that will allow them to refuse to extend equality to same sex couples.

Because that went so well here in Indiana...
posted by Gelatin at 1:31 PM on June 26, 2015

Oh, hey, I just got more favorites allotted! ::goes back to review thread::
posted by Faint of Butt at 1:34 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Ctrl+f Trump

no results

I'm afraid to check my news feeds
posted by sidereal at 1:35 PM on June 26, 2015

Love seeing these gigantic headlines on every news website imaginable.

Meanwhile on FOXNews.com...
posted by mcstayinskool at 1:39 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Ctrl+f Trump

no results

I'm afraid to check my news feeds

I took a quick dive into Google news for you. It appears he's too busy fighting with Univision to have said anything on this yet. Emphasis on the yet.
posted by nubs at 1:40 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

byanyothername, You're absolutely right. The fight for social justice for ALL people in America and the rest of the world is an ongoing struggle, and I (sadly) doubt very much that I will live to see a true "win" in that column. The struggle doesn't end with this or any of the small victories that have been won over the years, and we need not to forget that fact even as we celebrate. But celebrate I will, for every blow we strike against bigotry and hate. We must allow ourselves these moments of joy, else the way forward becomes too dark to bear.
posted by TheCoug at 1:40 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

<3 = <3 = <3 = <3 = <3 = <3
posted by Stewriffic at 1:41 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

B. Blatcher: Ah, thanks for that.

You're welcome.
posted by zarq at 1:41 PM on June 26, 2015

I feel like kissing somebody
posted by Unicorn on the cob at 1:42 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I really liked this Daily Beast article on what else needs to be done for our rights. Lots and lots of links to organizations dealing with other forms of gender and sexuality discrimination, lots of issues that don't get talked about frequently.
posted by mittens at 1:49 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Congrats, sciatrix and NotATailor! Your marriage is now valid in Texas no matter how much it whines.
posted by halifix at 1:51 PM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

The Onion: Only 47,000 Social Justice Milestones To Go Before U.S. Achieves Full Equality
posted by Peach at 1:52 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

OMG. The BBC Home Page currently shows a photo of one of my friends in the process of telling another friend "Don't even think about pretending that we're a couple to attract attention."

Hehe. oops.
posted by schmod at 1:55 PM on June 26, 2015 [38 favorites]

Oh man, I'm gonna love seeing what my conservative Catholic aunt has to say about this on Facebook.

SIX HOURS LATER...

Ugh, never mind. My initial schadenfreude has officially devolved into fremdschamen. I honestly wish there was something I could say (as her atheist-leaning agnostic humanist nephew) that would change her heart and mind.
posted by Strange Interlude at 1:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

It's a bitter, Italian Old Fashioned made with sweet, spicy American whiskey.

UGLY WILD CACKLING
posted by poffin boffin at 2:03 PM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

I don't have anyone being a total dumbass on my facebook feed and I want somebody to throw sparkly rainbows at. *whine*
posted by erratic meatsack at 2:05 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Aaaand here's Gawker, comparing Scalia to a Twitter egg: "It’s time to stop treating Scalia as a brilliant jurist fighting the good fight against a culture that has left him behind. Instead, he should be treated like the ignorant buffoon he is more than happy to play in high profile cases."
posted by fedward at 2:06 PM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

Meanwhile, at Politico: It’s Time to Legalize Polygamy
posted by Going To Maine at 2:07 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Man, that was quick, eh?
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 2:09 PM on June 26, 2015

oh, Freddie.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 2:14 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I deactivated my Facebook account eleven months ago (stupid self-imposed yearlong moratorium on just deleting it outright) but my Dad basically agrees 100% with Scalia on everything. I can't not call him due to his terminal cancer diagnosis, but yesterday's call was … awkward. I just try to let him get his rants out without actually saying anything myself. Neither one of us needs the increased blood pressure.

He'll probably write at least one crackpot letter to the local paper, though. The editor is a close friend of my sister and he's been able to come up with reasons to spike a couple of Dad's letters, but he also ran at least one on the justification that it was well enough written and many people there think the same way.
posted by fedward at 2:15 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I don't have anyone being a total dumbass on my facebook feed and I want somebody to throw sparkly rainbows at. *whine*

I FEEL YOUR PAIN. My Facebook friends list is in desperate need of trimming, so I've been stalking my feed all morning for bigotry as an easy reason to cut people. But nooooo, everyone's being all excited and happy.
posted by nicebookrack at 2:20 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Apparently this also means that people can now legally get married to their guns, or something
posted by Ratio at 2:23 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

A buddy on Facebook: "I think America is in an abusive relationship with the Supreme Court. They get drunk and do shit like Citizens United, then bring us rainbow colored flowers with promises to be better."
posted by scaryblackdeath at 2:23 PM on June 26, 2015 [30 favorites]

poffin boffin: "UGLY WILD CACKLING"

we already have one Scalia cocktail, thanks
posted by boo_radley at 2:26 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Apparently this also means that people can now legally get married to their guns, or something

He's jumping the gun a little on his interpretation, but it's a tad less unreasonable an argument than that; Kennedy's unspeakably flowery (implicit!) treatment of the Full Faith and Credit clause actually does kinda imply that further Court decisions could expand other rights with state-by-state variances nationwide.

On the one hand it's a nice precedent for cleaning up inconsistencies; on the other, it's maddeningly vague and can be plausibly contorted into stupid shapes like is happening there.
posted by fifthrider at 2:29 PM on June 26, 2015

The Big Picture. Lotta dust in this room.

I for one felt the foundations of my traditional marriage were shaken deeply today. But it was mainly from the amount of joyous laughter.
posted by Happy Dave at 2:31 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I've been looking through random twitter feeds, following various rabbit holes, and it's been very amusing to see some people say what basically boils down to: "C'mon, try to have some compassion for the people who were against other people marry their partners of decades." Because all this partying might hurt people's feelings.

RAINBOW SPARKLIES FOR EVERYONE.
posted by erratic meatsack at 2:32 PM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

oh, Freddie.

lol how did I know which Freddie this was gonna be
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 2:37 PM on June 26, 2015

Apparently this also means that people can now legally get married to their guns, or something

And have bb's.
posted by jonmc at 2:39 PM on June 26, 2015 [40 favorites]

I'm happily, legally, gay-married to another mefite, and have been so since 2008 (or 2004, depending on how you count it). I'm happy that our marriage is now recognized in all 50 states. I'm very glad that this decision went the right way.

AND I'm having a really hard time with some of the unexamined congratulations. While it may in fact be true that the broader LGBT movement CAN work on marriage equality and trans rights at the same time, the fact is that we have not done that work. We have by and large left our trans siblings in the dust, as a movement. Yes, we can be happy about this court decision, but much like what happened at the White House earlier this week, some of us are drinking champagne, while others of us are crying out for the most basic of rights and recognition, and being told "this isn't for you".

I want to echo byanyothername's concerns, and encourage people to listen to those comments and not say "today isn't the day". Today is very much the day to hear voices saying what more needs to be done and to hear from those who are feeling left out. Yes, we can celebrate and organize at the same time, so let's do that.

Here in California, we're potentially facing an anti-trans ballot initiative next year. The Transgender Law Center is starting to fundraise to oppose it. Nothing would bring me greater joy that to see their efforts funded as the opposition to Prop 8 was.
posted by gingerbeer at 2:40 PM on June 26, 2015 [52 favorites]

Apparently this also means that people can now legally get married to their guns, or something

but but but but STATES RIGHTS
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 2:42 PM on June 26, 2015

Locally here, you can also drink Scalia's Tears ( Malort, Combier, apple bitters, and a bit of salt)

I think I prefer KathrynT's recipe though.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 2:42 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Seems relevant
posted by Ratio at 2:44 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Quaversalis: "How historic is it to have your last name, Obergefell, forever enshrined as the lead in an important SCOTUS decision? On the flip side, how shameful is it to be [Richard] Hodges, whose name will forever be linked to the losing side of this significant civil rights case?"

My last name is the appellant in a moderately important case involving governmental regulation of private business. Ask Me Anything.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:46 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Well sure. Marriage equality is just another step. Since I've been in an apparently straight relationship for 20-odd years, my primary interests in marriage equality have more been about basic fairness rather than discrimination.

The big thing I've been wrestling with this month is that I need therapy. I need therapy because of a history of anti-gay and anti-bisexual harassment and violence. But I can't trust therapy because bisexual and "gender-variant" people are at high risk for medical and psychological discrimination. Internalized homophobia kills more of us than hate crimes, possibly more of us than HIV. That's my battle. Today's JONAH decision is an equally important front from my perspective.

It's all connected indirectly with marriage because the religious right has screamed that anti-bullying devalues marriage, ethical health care devalues marriage, not being bashed in restrooms undermines marriage, and positive role models in media devalue marriage. (I really don't want to know what the Rabid Puppies think of Steven Universe this summer, given how they flipped their shit over Korra.) Loving was a milestone also, but it didn't "fix" racism either.

But I'm coming in on Monday with a bag of skittles.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 2:48 PM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

It's a good day and I want to be a part of this thread. :)
posted by mazola at 2:48 PM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Ah, the things the USA will do to get an automatic entry into the next Eurovision Song Contest.
posted by Wordshore at 2:51 PM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

I want to echo byanyothername's concerns, and encourage people to listen to those comments and not say "today isn't the day". Today is very much the day to hear voices saying what more needs to be done and to hear from those who are feeling left out. Yes, we can celebrate and organize at the same time, so let's do that.

And I think it's incumbent upon people who, before today, were feeling left out to think long and hard about working with people who still are.

And that in no way takes away from the celebration. People should be thinking "If THIS is possible, what's next?"
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 2:52 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I know this is a joke Wordshore but if this also happened today, I don't even know what I would do with myself.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 2:53 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

It's a good day and I want to be a part of this thread. :)

You know what? Me too. :)
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 2:53 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I am really, really excited that the Big Gay Issues have been taken care of and now there are far less excuses to continue throwing trans and nonbinary people under the fucking bus all the time, especially by big organizations like the HRC. Thanks, byanyothername, for sharing your thoughts on this, and anyone who is mad at trans people for interrupting the "I've got mine" party with their demands for basic rights is welcome to kiss my queer ass.

The last few times I've been stopped on the street by HRC people, it's been about supporting ENDA. So I'm not sure they're ready to move onto those issues quite yet.
posted by Going To Maine at 2:54 PM on June 26, 2015

It appears the earlier reports that I exhausted my daily allotment of favorites were erroneous.

If you haven't received yours yet, give me time to work back through the thread :D

What a wonderful day.
posted by Xavier Xavier at 2:56 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Create a google spreadsheet and type P R I D E in the first 5 columns.
via
posted by bleary at 2:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [12 favorites]

Yesterday I peeled the "Love Is The Law" sticker off my iPad: two years after passage of the Freedom To Marry law in Minnesota, the sticker was finally illegible.

Chan Poling, the songwriter of "Love Is The Law," was the husband of Eleanor Mondale at the time she passed away from cancer. I think his father-in-law, Walter Mondale, is probably happy for this day and proud of his son-in-law's role in helping the cause of marriage equality in Minnesota.
posted by jonp72 at 3:00 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

From the New York Times: In a First, New Jersey Jury Says Group Selling Gay Cure Committed Fraud
posted by Going To Maine at 3:02 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Hey, any Seattleites... don't forget that tonight is Trans Pride. If you can, show up, show some support. Let's celebrate by making connections, building relationships, and figuring out how best to keep the fight going.
posted by palomar at 3:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

so happy for you america
posted by 404 Not Found at 3:05 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

This is the first time I'll be going to the San Francisco gay pride parade, since I only recently moved here.

hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
posted by shmegegge at 3:11 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Xavier², FYI the limit on Favorites isn't daily, but a rolling 24 hour window.
posted by benito.strauss at 3:12 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

My mistake, JONAH was yesterday. I've been in training the last few days watching someone click in web browser windows.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 3:14 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Xavier2, FYI the limit on Favorites isn't daily, but a rolling 24 hour window.
posted by benito.strauss at 6:12 PM on June 26

Favorite added!
posted by Xavier Xavier at 3:17 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

i'm really proud of my little arkansas town. we passed an anti-discrimination ordinance last year - and then, as some of you might have heard, thanks in no small part to the duggars it was repealed. the opponents had two main complaints 1) it was written by out of towners (maybe by the hrc, actually?) and 2) the explicit support of trans people and their rights. it was a horrifically ugly battle that was transphobic at its core.

so, two of our city councilpeople - one a fairly young up and comer and one a seasoned well respected lawyer - went to work with other legal experts, local civil rights groups, and business leaders to write a new ordinance. they've finished recently, and to my delight, the trans protections are still there, just as clear as they were before, and maybe even a little stronger. our local civil rights groups got the message loud and clear that trans people were the issue for many and instead of folding, instead of throwing our trans citizens under the bus, they rallied around and are taking another shot - one i really think we can win.

and today on facebook the group most responsible for driving this ordinance through gave a few sentences to celebration and then reminded everyone that we have work to do, that this isn't a destination but rather a pit stop, that not everyone under the umbrella can take the time to party, that we're all in this together and we have to keep fighting.

so from arkansas, i'm excited. i'm celebrating. i'm joyous. and i'm listening to those still fighting to see where i can lend my help.
posted by nadawi at 3:19 PM on June 26, 2015 [55 favorites]

From Gavin Newsom's speech today in San Francisco:

"What an extraordinary moment in time, and in closing, it's a reminder of this: today is the antidote to cynicism, it's an antidote to any kind of despair that you may have, your frustration, your sense of powerlessness - that should - do away with that. Each and every one of you has remarkable capacity to do extraordinary things. You got to exercise your voice! You got to stand on principle. You got to step up and step in. And if you do that, extraordinary things can happen. Don't ever despair. Don't ever give up. Don't ever believe a challenge is too big. Don't ever believe a hill is too tall to climb. Today is about an affirmation of all of us and our unique captacity to do extraordinary things, folks the best is yet to come in this country. Thank you all very much for being here."

"It's gonna happen - whether you like it or not." Indeed.
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 3:19 PM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

Ctrl+f Trump

no results

I'm afraid to check my news feeds

I'm afraid that the Supreme Court continues to hold that that "hair" is an abomination in the sight of both God and man.
posted by yoink at 3:21 PM on June 26, 2015

(my own transcription - mistakes are mine! Also, a bit of background on the "It's gonna happen" quote. "As California goes, so goes the country..." :))
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 3:21 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

My local news just asked the executive director of the Milwaukee LGBT Center for her reaction to the marriage ruling, and her very first words were about transgender rights. A++
posted by desjardins at 3:22 PM on June 26, 2015 [20 favorites]

I weep for joy.
posted by key_of_z at 3:28 PM on June 26, 2015

A friend of mine actually ordered a Scalia's Tears made to the recipe I posted above and says it's delicious. "A good aperitif -- whets the appetite for further work!"
posted by KathrynT at 3:29 PM on June 26, 2015 [28 favorites]

But much remains to be done.
posted by key_of_z at 3:29 PM on June 26, 2015

A friend of mine actually ordered a Scalia's Tears made to the recipe I posted above and says it's delicious. "A good aperitif -- whets the appetite for further work!"

Now have them try an Old Spanish.
posted by Drinky Die at 3:30 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

WOOT WOOT WOOT!

Stolen from my Facebook feed: Now, onto the next item on the Gay Agenda: not being fired in 29 states for being gay.

Equality for everyone, everywhere.
posted by filthy light thief at 3:31 PM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

Maybe this is a stupid question: but don't a lot of states still have laws against gay sex (along with certain forms of sex)? Have those laws been overturned, too?

And while I say this may be stupid, I know for a number of years the official Catholic stance was it is okay to be gay, but not to have gay sex. (gay virginity was okay)
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 3:39 PM on June 26, 2015

Maybe this is a stupid question: but don't a lot of states still have laws against gay sex (along with certain forms of sex)? Have those laws been overturned, too?

That was struck down wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy back in 2003 with Lawrence v. Texas.
posted by Talez at 3:42 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

those laws were overturned in lawrence v texas in 2003.
posted by nadawi at 3:42 PM on June 26, 2015

IIRC, they were overturned in 2004 by Laurence v. Oklahoma.
posted by Drinky Die at 3:43 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

That was struck down wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy back in 2003 with Lawrence v. Texas.

Yet another one of Scalia's hits, too!
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 3:44 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Hi everyone, it's a bit late for the east coast, but reminder that there are many celebratory events going on today. You can search this list here for ones nearby your US area.
posted by halifix at 3:45 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

the mormons also explicitly believe in gay celibacy. benji schwimmer (best known as a contestant on so you think you can dance) talked about how soul destroying that stance is and the difficulties with trying to accept it as a life path in his visit to the mormon stories podcast
posted by nadawi at 3:45 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

OH WOW

I was just playing Splatoon, and after a few round dipped out to the lobby, which shows Miiverse text and art posts. And right now:

#LOVEWINS -- several of these. SQUID LOVE. GAYS OKAY. #LOVEWINS 2015. A well-drawn picture of two female squid people with hearts around them.

The kids are all right.
posted by JHarris at 3:51 PM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

(Also, the squids.)
posted by JHarris at 3:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Congrats all around! (Also, suck it, Nino.)
posted by Zonker at 3:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

okay ack I just realized Trans march is also often held today. There's one in SF which I'm looking up that gingerbeer referenced. Take your pick.
posted by halifix at 3:58 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Speaking of local celebrations, am now sitting in a church to hear two of the plaintiffs from Texas' most recent federal case speak. Everyone is terribly delighted and welcoming and it is all rather wonderful.
posted by sciatrix at 3:59 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Also, if anyone in Oklahoma wants to get married before the end of the summer, I will personally perform the ceremony.
posted by brecc at 4:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Well, now I'm in conservative Ohio and the world STILL hasn't ended!
posted by eriko at 4:06 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I even drove through Indiana. Still there! And gays are getting married all over the place. By now surely the world would have ended? Or at least Indiana? Right?
posted by eriko at 4:07 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I wish I was in San Francisco for this weekend. There's roughly 20,000 librarians in the city now for the annual American Library Association conference plus it's the annual Pride parade and celebration. Perfect timing. Perfect party.
posted by Wordshore at 4:10 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I'm from South Dakota, and can only so far find one story of a couple getting a certificate in Rapid City, so I'm disappointed either by the courthouses or the media. Not sure which yet. But South Dakota has Gayville, so I'm hoping things come into play nice and soon.
posted by lauranesson at 4:11 PM on June 26, 2015

My fundamentalist cousin (the one who homeschooled all 5 or 6 of her children until they hit high school age and whose family has a group NRA discount and who is an incredibly sweet individual) posted a "God forgive them, they know not what they do" biblical quote on FB early yesterday. So I'm wondering if that was an Obamacare thing or she really does have the gift of prophecy. I wasn't planning on going to the SF parade this year (cause I'm an oldster, I've done that) but now I really, really, really wanna be there. Ideally not alone. Guess it's too late for a MeFi float. We should totally do that one year. For the Trans Parades. In multiple cities!
posted by Bella Donna at 4:13 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

On a lighter note...The 16 Best Cat Reactions to the SCOTUS Marriage Equality Decision.
posted by MonkeyToes at 4:19 PM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

You guys, one of my friends just announced her pregnancy with a photo with her wife in front of the Supreme Court saying that their child is going to be born into a world where his/her moms have the right to be married anywhere in the country and I'm crying again
posted by ilana at 4:21 PM on June 26, 2015 [39 favorites]

From the Stonewall rally
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 4:24 PM on June 26, 2015

~~his/her~~ xer moms
posted by Going To Maine at 4:26 PM on June 26, 2015

And while I say this may be stupid, I know for a number of years the official Catholic stance was it is okay to be gay, but not to have gay sex. (gay virginity was okay)

I wish I could come up with a nice, snarky comment about how gay bars in Rome are excellent places to discuss theological issues, and how convenient it is that the sacrament of penance can be performed anywhere, but feel like I'm missing a punch line that ties it all together.

If anyone's interested in the predictable responses from the US Catholic church's leadership, Whispers in the Loggia is, as always, the place to go.
posted by clorox at 4:27 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Well there's the old joke...
Q: What did the drag queen say to the priest?
A: Oh, honey, I love the dress but your purse is on fire.
posted by Going To Maine at 4:35 PM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

🎉🌹🎉
posted by clavdivs at 4:38 PM on June 26, 2015

CNN Forced to Go to Commercial After "About Fucking Time!" Invasion
posted by kirkaracha at 4:38 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

I feel a little bad for the perfectly worthwhile FPPs that went up adjacent to this one. That's the Metafilter equivalent of opening the same day as a new Star Wars movie.
posted by echocollate at 4:42 PM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

Already making the rounds
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 4:42 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

I am shocked to discover Canada legalized gay marriage in 2005. I could have sworn it was in the nineties. I am very disappointed that it happened so late.

The great thing about today's decision is that it signifies a sea change in American culture. The whipsaw from anti- to support has been astoundingly quick. Major social change has taken place over a few years time. I do not believe any other change has taken place so quickly.

And I think that spells great hope for the future. Social progress is avalanching. I truly believe we are going to see more significant changes toward greater equality, greater personal freedom, and greater justice, faster.

The ruling today proves that social justice is achievable. Press on and take it all!
posted by five fresh fish at 4:44 PM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

Although Joe Biden may not actually be running through the halls wearing a rainbow flag as a cape, we can dream!
posted by Faint of Butt at 4:51 PM on June 26, 2015

I am still making my way through the dissents, but is Roberts asserting that he has a fundamentally different idea than five of his colleagues do about the Court's purpose? I would like to read smart commentary on all of the dissents; suggestions? Scalia's is, um, I don't even know what.
posted by MonkeyToes at 4:53 PM on June 26, 2015

I haven't read all thousand+ comments here yet (still trying), but I just want to say yay along with everyone else. Gay marriage, I had a quiet day at work, I got some SUPER GOOD NEWS that I can't tell the world but am super chuffed about anyway, and selfie sticks got banned at Disney! It is an overall Good Day Today!

Also, DOUBLE RAINBOW WHOA.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:54 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

"As the State itself makes marriage all the more precious by the significance it attaches to it,
exclusion from that status has the effect of teaching that gays and lesbians are unequal in important respects."

reading this decision is making me tear up again
posted by alycoop at 4:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I hope the slower of my fellow Hoosiers can finally get over it, and maybe throw way the confederate flags while they're at it.

I'm glad to hear the news.
posted by MikeWarot at 4:58 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Big Gay Issues

are you saying Big Gay bought off the SCOTUS?

*cackles maniacally*
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 4:59 PM on June 26, 2015

!!!!!!!!!!!!
posted by ubersturm at 5:02 PM on June 26, 2015

Sitting in my house, drinking Scalia's Tears!
posted by Lemurrhea at 5:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

My hometown of Cincinnati has a pretty conservative reputation. Obergefell, the first plaintiff in the case, is from here, and is riding in our Pride parade tomorrow.

I expect it will be incredible. And this is a city that had explicitly sanctioned employment discrimination in the city charter only 10 years ago.
posted by mostly vowels at 5:09 PM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

It was a 5-4 ruling: Men 4-2 against, Women 3-0 for. Another reminder of benefits of women in leadership positions
posted by growabrain at 5:10 PM on June 26, 2015 [60 favorites]

By now surely the world would have ended? Or at least Indiana? Right?

To be fair, it's hard to tell in Indiana.
posted by Thorzdad at 5:13 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

On my way home from work I took a bit of a detour and stopped in at Stonewall Inn to see what was going on. I knew they'd blocked the streets off, and I was expecting more of just a random party thing, but instead there was a stage someone had set up; a jazz band was doing a set, and shortly after I got there they played their last number - the Wedding March.

There were a lot of speakers; politicians, people from the ACLU, Edith Windsor, and at some point a woman rabbi who opened her remarks by saying "Thank God for women and Jews in the Supreme Court!" There were a whole bunch of other people working the crowd and handing out flyers, stickers, and flags. Lots of flags. I had a guy shove three into my hand, and when I tried to hand him one back he urgently whispered "there are too many of us here, I'm trying to get rid of them!"

It's important to note that each and every one of the speakers all said that the struggle was not yet over - and that now the next step was equality for the transgender community. Celebrate today, they said - but tomorrow it's back to work.

The thing that choked me up, over and over, was every so often seeing an older couple - sometimes a pair of men, sometimes a pair of women - at some point just look at each other, eyes misting over, and then they'd kiss or hug or just sort of lean on each other, marveling that this was happening. Even before I got to the damn block, as I was waiting to cross the street, there were two women behind me and I heard one say to the other, "did you ever think we'd see this?....."

-- Oh, and I totally saw Sir Ian McKellen in the crowd, like six feet behind me. I was listening to one of the speakers, and glanced over my shoulder and saw him just edging up into the crowd behind me, wearing a straw hat with a rainbow hatband. Everyone else was trying to listen to the speaker and no one else noticed. I hesitated, then took one of the three flags I'd been given and leaned over - "Mr. McKellan, would you like a flag?" and I handed it to him. He smiled and took it, but I got a "I'm just trying to be a plain old guy" vibe and I left it at that. But I totally stood there with an inner spazzy "I totally gave Gandalf a marriage equality flag" thing going on.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:13 PM on June 26, 2015 [132 favorites]

So I was at my local grocery store earlier today in the express lane and this woman came up behind me with a big ole chocolate cake covered in mini M&M's in a rainbow pattern. She was on the phone: "Yes, I got the cake. Uh huh, I'm going home right now to change. Yes, he really wants you to be there."

I looked her straight in the eye and said, "That's a big ole rainbow cake ya got there!" She grinned and said, "It is, isn't it?" Then she burst into tears and I burst into tears and I grabbed her up in a bear hug.

I'm still crying. I'm still fucking crying.
posted by blessedlyndie at 5:15 PM on June 26, 2015 [129 favorites]

well great, now i'm crying again.
posted by nadawi at 5:15 PM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

My supermarket was sold out of rainbow sprinkles by the time I got there at about 3:00.
posted by lauranesson at 5:16 PM on June 26, 2015 [33 favorites]

My supermarket was sold out of rainbow sprinkles by the time I got there at about 3:00.

Shush or you'll give anti-equality types ideas for standing to have it overturned.
posted by Talez at 5:21 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I cried all through the speeches and I'm still getting wobbly at intervals.

The speakers at the rally I was at explicitly affirmed the need for trans rights and for employment protection, too. It made me happy to see so many honoring the distance we've got left at the same time we honor and celebrate how far we've come.
posted by sciatrix at 5:22 PM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

God help us all.
posted by Seekerofsplendor at 5:23 PM on June 26, 2015

The guys from Red Pegasus Games & Comics mentioned upthread did indeed get married (and also opened the store.)
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 5:27 PM on June 26, 2015 [16 favorites]

God help us all.

I know! All these cakes and party food? It's going straight to my thighs!
posted by Talez at 5:28 PM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

my weird head fanfic has the Notorious RBG standing on the steps of the Supreme Court Building, all be-robed, with one of those stupid tshirt shooter things you see at like Red Bull Games, shooting them into the cheering crowd.

@AdamParkhomenko: The Notorious RBG
posted by Golden Eternity at 5:29 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Talez: "I know! All these cakes and party food? It's going straight to my thighs!"

I'm having a ton of sweets today AND I HOLD ALL OF YOU RESPONSIBLE.

You magnificent human beings.
posted by erratic meatsack at 5:32 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

I was doing pretty well all day (SMILES!!! HAPPY!!! ONLY MINOR TEARING UP!!!) and then I read the actual text of the decision and burst into wracking sobs for a solid hour. at work.
posted by alycoop at 5:32 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” ― Martin Luther King Jr.
posted by Bonzai at 5:34 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Here is the top post on reddit right now
posted by growabrain at 5:34 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

In addition to forcing Obama's hand and looking really good in a shopped-on rainbow flag cape, Joe Biden also helped to lay the foundation of this thirty years ago by giving us Anthony Kennedy on the bench instead of Robert fucking Bork, as Bill Scher and Business Insider point out.
posted by strangely stunted trees at 5:37 PM on June 26, 2015 [32 favorites]

God help us all.

Yeah, I'm thinking I might need to buy a summer necktie and blazer.
posted by box at 5:38 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Someone on reddit who had gone out of state to marry but who lived in a state that didn't recognize that marriage called to update their insurance after today's decision, and the insurance company offered to backdate the married-couple discount to the original date of the wedding and credit them the difference. If any folks on Metafilter are in the same situation and have any insurance information you're updating, you might ask if your insurer can do the same for you!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 5:43 PM on June 26, 2015 [59 favorites]

Blue Jello Elf - that'd be a great thing to put in the metatalk thread
posted by nadawi at 5:45 PM on June 26, 2015

God help us all.

What makes you think this ruling is a sign that He didn't?
posted by The Master and Margarita Mix at 5:46 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I've posted that over in metatalk as well now! Thanks, nadawi!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 5:48 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Awesome!
posted by evilDoug at 5:50 PM on June 26, 2015

Congratulations from Ireland! I look forward to the day when I no longer have to celebrate marriage equality; I'm not sure my liver can stand it and this fucking glitter doesn't wash out of my good jeans, but búla fucking bás and welcome to the community of nations. We owe you guys a debt of honour; a lot of the most cogent arguments for marriage equality were originally made in the US. Fair play to youse, and lead on.
posted by Zeinab Badawi's Twenty Hotels at 5:52 PM on June 26, 2015 [25 favorites]

My wife and I travel by car a lot. When we travel at every state line we would proclaim our marriage or lack of marriage. When we were 'remarried' we would celebrate with lots of kisses. Now I just get to kiss her at every state line.

So happy!
posted by AlexiaSky at 5:56 PM on June 26, 2015 [43 favorites]

Now we can call same-sex marriage by its proper name: "marriage".
posted by double block and bleed at 5:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [19 favorites]

so i've been scoping out rightwingwatch.org, and i noted that most of the republican candidates, as well as non-candidates, keep emphasizing that the SCOTUS are unelected. i would refer them to Article 2 Section 2, as well as Article 3 Section 1 of the Constitution they are so fond of declaring they love.

Apparently, there is a lot of noise on conservative twitter about COS (Convention of States). This would involve calling a constitutional convention where Sarah Palin, Ted Cruz, and Mike Huckabee will rewrite the Constitution to save our democracy.
posted by Golden Eternity at 5:59 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Oh, I can't keep up with all the comments through my lachrymal expression of joy! Fantastic news! So much Love is in the Air!
posted by Thella at 6:00 PM on June 26, 2015

Now we can call same-sex marriage by its proper name: "marriage".

Oh, this is sooo good!
posted by Thella at 6:01 PM on June 26, 2015

Boulder's hippies would like a word with Antonin Scalia
posted by audi alteram partem at 6:03 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

tonight the white house is the rainbow house
posted by nadawi at 6:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

From audi alteram partem's link:

"I'll probably lose in the end," [Scalia] said, "but it's a fight worth soldiering on for. I feel like Frodo in 'Lord of the Rings.' I'm gonna get clobbered in the end."

Is Scalia aware that Frodo actually succeeded in taking the Ring to Mordor? Has he even read Lord of the Rings?
posted by Faint of Butt at 6:11 PM on June 26, 2015 [32 favorites]

I should add, on preview: this is small. This is a small thing. There are many other things that need fixing. But we are winning. The coming battles need their partisans, and those of us who are celebrating today need to continue to fight. But this: this is a victory. Observe the arc of history and keep kicking their arses.
posted by Zeinab Badawi's Twenty Hotels at 6:14 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Scalia's ignorance of LoTR is really making me start to question his judgement.
posted by el io at 6:14 PM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

I suspect Scalia misspoke - it wasn't Frodo he was referring to, it was Sauron.
posted by Death and Gravity at 6:14 PM on June 26, 2015 [20 favorites]

Excited for my pre-marital planning with a same-sex couple on Sunday. Kinda can't wait to see how the liturgy for the day turns out.
posted by Stynxno at 6:15 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

A straight, married friend of mine (in Arkansas, to keep that going!) wrote a beautiful note about how pleased she is that this may change our language a little bit, shedding some sexist baggage in favor of less loaded words like "spouse" and "parent." I hope she's right. That's an even smaller thing than the ruling is, but still lovely.
posted by wintersweet at 6:21 PM on June 26, 2015 [10 favorites]

I have mixed feelings about this.

I believe that marriage is a fundamental right and that the equal protection section of the constitution should grant all people, gay, straight, or otherwise, the right to enter into two person marriages. So I think, in a fundamental way, this decision was the correct one.

Nevertheless, I wish the Supreme Court had not decided this issue. Abortion is also a constitutionally protected right in the United States and I believe that by having the Supreme Court decide that abortion was legal a great deal of Americans were spared a lot of soul search and were able to put the issue away. I believe this lead to the people who are vehemently anti-abortion the field to themselves in a lot of way and has lead to the decades of anti-abortion protestors to try to chip away at the right, threaten, and kill doctors who preform abortions and created the condition for the current continuous backlash against abortion rights.

I believe that if abortion had not been granted constitutional protection that the great mass of American people would have eventually legalized it as the arguments over the harm that illegality were made more and more clear. This legalization by popular consent, I think, would have been much stronger than the rights today which are constantly being chipped away at.

I fear something similar may happen with same-sex marriage. Now people who, previously, would have been convinced that it was the right thing to do, are now going to chaff against the idea that they have been ignored and disrespected by the Federal government and their will overridden by "nine unelected people". They will, I believe, attempt to chip away at same-sex marriage rights bit by bit. At the same time I fear supporters of same-sex marriage rights will be complacent because "they have won".

And they/we have won. But I believe a greater, stronger victory was on the way as State by State the people declared that it marriage was their right. And I think that victory would change public opinion even more and cut away at the support those who would chip away at same-sex marriage rights.

I fear this decision, which I think was the right one, has placed grey clouds in what could have been a clear sky.
posted by bswinburn at 6:25 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

I ran out of favorites. I'll be back tomorrow!
posted by Fig at 6:26 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Photo from today's marriage equality rally (via the Denver subreddit).
posted by audi alteram partem at 6:28 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

As a transwoman, yeah, I agree with the people saying 'this is awesome but we're not done, there's so much left in this fight'. The fact that Obama also declared that any insurance company that wants to serve the vast government bureaucracy is going to have to cover trans-related stuff as of next year is a nice step in that direction.

But, you know what? Fuck being a scold. Fuck whining that things aren't perfect yet. Any pair of Americans can get married to each other, regardless of what's in their pants or on their birth certificates. And the legal stuff that comes with that marriage has to be respected by every state, not just the ones that already legalized it. That's a pretty good step.

I have painted all twenty of my nails in rainbow colors. I am pretty damn happy about this. I am going to celebrate the heck out of this victory.
posted by egypturnash at 6:28 PM on June 26, 2015 [46 favorites]

An emerging sport for some of my compatriots is finding Americans on Twitter or Facebook saying this is it, they're moving to New Zealand, and explaining that not only do we have marriage equality but also strict gun laws. It's kind of mean fun as their uptight little faces crumple.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 6:39 PM on June 26, 2015 [47 favorites]

I don't know what about the history of the USA would make you think that. If abortion had not been granted constitutional protection, it would remain illegal in certain parts of the USA forever. If the Supreme Court had not voted that marriage between any two adults is constitutional, some people would be denied that right forever.

Yup. You can't always reason people out of views they have taken because they believe they come from God. He works in mysterious ways, you know? If might seem irrational now, but he has a reason.
posted by Drinky Die at 6:41 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

Now people who, previously, would have been convinced that it was the right thing to do, are now going to chaff against the idea that they have been ignored and disrespected by the Federal government and their will overridden by "nine unelected people". They will, I believe, attempt to chip away at same-sex marriage rights bit by bit.

No offense to the poster intended, but as a person who lives in a liberal enclave in a state full of these folks, fuck 'em. I don't care if it makes them feel bad to have their heritage flag taken down and the statues of leaders of their (my) ancestors removed and streets and buildings named after them renamed, and to have to have gay people getting legally married around them. Their bigotry has been offensive to a bunch of people for a long time, and we've had to suck it up because TRADITION and JESUS (even though there are plenty of liberal Christians who aren't signed up for that) and so on. I'm sorry their feelings are hurt, but guess what? Y'all all live in a pluralistic society and those of us who don't share those bigoted views are tired of playing "don't offend the Calvinists who want to pretend it's an idealized version of 1952".

The thing about politics is, sometimes you lose. The haters and the folks who want to impose minority Christianity on the rest of lost on this one. Deal with it.
posted by immlass at 6:46 PM on June 26, 2015 [33 favorites]

More people in the US believe in ghosts and UFOs than know the earth orbits the sun.

To think that they'll naturally come to the right conclusion over time is not a wager I would care to make with the lives of so many at stake.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 6:48 PM on June 26, 2015 [15 favorites]

I fear something similar may happen with same-sex marriage. Now people who, previously, would have been convinced that it was the right thing to do, are now going to chaff against the idea that they have been ignored and disrespected by the Federal government and their will overridden by "nine unelected people".

I feel the opposite way. I mean, you're right that some people will distrust same-sex marriage because it was legalized by appointed judges and not elected legislators. But the Supreme Court publishes its reasoning for all to see, and makes it clear that the 14th Amendment already guaranteed equal protection under the law, which they are only now recognizing with regard to same-sex marriage. I respect their judgement of what's constitutional more than the whims of inexperienced legislators, representing whichever interest groups in their district are the loudest and/or richest, who can't even be bothered to think about whether their new laws are constitutional at all and just leave it for the courts to decide after the fact.
posted by Rangi at 6:52 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I've been both surprised and heartened by the lack of angry responses from my conservative relatives on Facebook. Even the ones that just post Bible quotes and Two Sets of Footprints style fables all day long have been completely silent about the ruling. They've either come around or just don't care as much anymore I guess. I'll accept either.
posted by downtohisturtles at 6:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

What Scalia's same-sex marriage dissent gets right about the Supreme Court

TL;DR Scalia is against handing too much power to the Court because it has people like Scalia on it.
posted by um at 6:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

The fact that Obama also declared that any insurance company that wants to serve the vast government bureaucracy is going to have to cover trans-related stuff as of next year is a nice step in that direction.

Well damn. He has been so, so problematic on so many matters, but every now and then I'm surprised.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:01 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Today is a happy and beautiful day. So many people fought so hard to see this, or even to live in a country where this would be possible.

I'm sad it took so long; I'm sad that many of those who fought for this aren't here to see it.
posted by inertia at 7:02 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Nevertheless, I wish the Supreme Court had not decided this issue. Abortion is also a constitutionally protected right in the United States and I believe thaNevertheless, I wish the Supreme Court had not decided this issue. Abortion is also a constitutionally protected right in the United States and I believe that by having the Supreme Court decide that abortion was legal a great deal of Americans were spared a lot of soul search and were able to put the issue Nevertheless, I wish the Supreme Court had not decided this issue. Abortion is also a constitutionally protected right in the United States and I believe that by having the Supreme Court decide that abortion was legal a great deal of Americans were spared a lot of soul search and were able to put the issue away.

Put the issue to rest? In my opinion things are worse than ever. I also believe that we are going to see a lot of ugliness in the run up to the election vis a vis the train wreck that is the Republican Party as they try to appeal to the tea party jihadists whose votes they need.
posted by futz at 7:02 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I'm so verklempt right now looking at all these buildings and wonders lit up with rainbows.

The White House
Niagara Falls
posted by longdaysjourney at 7:02 PM on June 26, 2015 [7 favorites]

What wonderful news to come home to! Nobody said a peep about this at work today, including my boss, who is gay and married. Which probably proves that my co-workers are all dorks first, and people of gender second. But I'm pretty sure we're all pleased as punch and celebrating in our own dorky way. It's just one battle in an ongoing war, but any victory is sweet.
Speaking of celebrating, I think I'll stay inside all weekend - SF Pride is going to be absolutely insane this year! An Avogadro number of people whooping it up in the streets just doesn't do it for this dork. I'll cheer for you quietly and maybe wave a hankie out the window.
posted by Quietgal at 7:09 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Some of us who are Christians have prayed for this day for a long time. And we rejoice in part because we believe God is rejoicing today.

Today, we rejoice. Tomorrow, back to work for justice!
posted by persona au gratin at 7:09 PM on June 26, 2015 [32 favorites]

As the Trans March, the opening event of SF Pride, just made its way past my apartment with its glorious blocks and blocks of marchers, it was beautiful and inspiring to see so many people, trans and allies alike, both celebrating this amazing day and reminding us how much more work we have to do.
posted by zachlipton at 7:20 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

I wish I was in San Francisco for this weekend. There's roughly 20,000 librarians in the city now for the annual American Library Association conference plus it's the annual Pride parade and celebration. Perfect timing. Perfect party.

And the Grateful Dead "Fare Thee Well" tour. Ask your nearest hippie!
posted by salvia at 7:21 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

Kacey Musgraves plz marry me (now that it's legal)
posted by casarkos at 7:23 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

ChurchHatesTucker: "Already making the rounds"

I would watch the SHIT out of this reboot in which, I imagine, Luke is gay and married to Cooter, and Bo is biracial, and they drive around Hazzard County delivering Uncle Jesse's homegrown illegal medical marijuana and a weekly smackdown on behalf of justice for, like, bullied teenagers, while Daisy is now a lawyer (who went to Duke Law so now it's a clever play on words) who bails them out of jail or does legal work for teens in trouble in between dating all available guest stars.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:26 PM on June 26, 2015 [32 favorites]

i don't really understand the repeated comparison of marriage equality to abortion. if anything, compare this to loving v virgina. if our nation waited for popular support, interracial marriage would have been illegal until the 90s (and i wager in some states it'd still be illegal). some things are too important to wait for popular support. the court is a far better place than the ballot box to work out fundamental rights. they should have done it sooner, quite frankly. i can't agree with an argument for waiting longer.
posted by nadawi at 7:30 PM on June 26, 2015 [43 favorites]

What strikes me most about this (in the vein of "There's still so much more to do" po-faced eeyoreism) is that it wasn't a dozen years ago that the very prospect of marriage equality was enough to swing a Presidential election to a guy whose approval rating had been trending downward for like 90 percent of his first term.

Is marriage equality the only issue? Of course not. Is it the most important civil rights issue of our time? Meh, probably not. But it got done. It got done in less than one cicada generation. Fucking anything is within the grasp of committed people.
posted by Etrigan at 7:35 PM on June 26, 2015 [22 favorites]

Meanwhile, 50 years after Loving, people who feel that interracial marriage should be criminal are generally considered to be bigoted cranks.

Ok, look at ACA and Hobby Lobby. The idea that the Supreme Court shouldn't be deciding issues of national law is a case of "do as I say, not as I do" for conservatives. Even without Obergefell, marriage equality would have ended up on the docket eventually.

"Wait for a better season" rhetoric? Really? This is the opening of an endgame for an activism need identified 32 years ago. We have an entire generation of widowers and widows who did not see equality with their partners. Not 12 years, not 17, 32. I have had nothing but contempt for the repeatedly stated lament that we've been pushing too hard for fundamental human rights.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 7:44 PM on June 26, 2015 [17 favorites]

WOOHOO! Have an amazing time at Pride this weekend, all! Celebrate this fantastic success and hang on to it during the continuing work!
posted by wiskunde at 7:47 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

But I believe a greater, stronger victory was on the way as State by State the people declared that it marriage was their right.

Deciding on fundamental civil rights by popular vote is a damn disgrace that we only resort to when we have to, because lawmakers are failing us or are moving too slowly. It's been wonderful to see the swelling popular support for marriage equality over the last decade via state decisions, but man I could not disagree with you more about them being a better or stickier way to address a question of basic equality.
posted by peachfuzz at 7:52 PM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

"We have to let people come around to the idea of you having the same rights we do" is a disgraceful and empty sentiment. Some people need to be hit very hard over the head with the fact that we ALL deserve the same benefits, and dragging your feet about it is unacceptable.
posted by erratic meatsack at 7:59 PM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

The whole reason this ended up in the Supreme Court's lap is that patchwork rights create conflicts of interpretation and jurisdiction.

And as one of the "eeyore's" (who is still celebrating, and wondering if bringing Skittles into the office will get me in trouble, and whether I give a shit), I see it as more of a teaching moment. People in my office didn't know the Supreme Court was even considering this issue. JOSHUA, ENDA, and the bathroom bills are even further from their attention.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 8:01 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Is marriage equality the only issue?

It is one that has repeatedly be used to silence and marginalize trans rights, and erase trans people of color, which is mostly whence the soreness. It is also, let's be real, not as important as across the board anti-discrimination laws or some non-gutted version of ENDA, workplace protections, access to education and employment and healthcare and housing, protection from violence and abuse and quite a lot of other things. It really is quite hurtful to put marriage equality before more basic rights, which is 1) totally unnecessary, as rights really don't need to be hierarchical and 2) totally something that has been done, again and again, by The LG Community for as long as I've been alive.

So now it's done (except for the lacunae resulting from a lack of anti-discrimination laws). Will the energy be used to push forward more human rights, or will it just fizzle out and the whole decades-long process of teeth-pulling be reset again? I would like to see the former, but am not witnessing much evidence that it won't be the latter. There are a lot of comments here and across the wider internet that are genuinely heartening and showing wider awareness and engagement--but they're in the minority. I am glad for people whose lives are made better by this; it's a complete no-brainer, and yes, it's obviously a historical moment. But some of us can't afford to celebrate with you.
posted by byanyothername at 8:01 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

peachfuzz: "Deciding on fundamental civil rights by popular vote is a damn disgrace that we only resort to when we have to, because lawmakers are failing us or are moving too slowly."

Also one of the major purposes of the Constitution is to protect "fundamental rights" from the tyranny of the majority -- for examples see James Madison (Federalist Papers #10, 1787), John Adams ( A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America, 1788), Alexis de Toqueville (Democracy in America 1835), John Stuart Mill (On Liberty, 1859), etc.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Fucking anything is within the grasp of committed people.

There's a good joke about a new collectivist porn series there, but I can't quite get a handle on it.
posted by Going To Maine at 8:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

I would watch the SHIT out of this reboot

This idea is so good I hope someone is writing a spec script based on this comment right now.
posted by ndfine at 8:10 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

It is also, let's be real, not as important as across the board anti-discrimination laws or some non-gutted version of ENDA, workplace protections, access to education and employment and healthcare and housing, protection from violence and abuse and quite a lot of other things.

Sure, let's be real: I totes disagree with this. The HRC has been pushing for ENDA for years. They were pushing for it when everyone said marriage equality was too big to ever happen, and they're still pushing for it today. It's insane. ENDA, while important, and while ostensibly more important than marriage equality, has actually been less achievable. Now that marriage equality - legitimate acknowledgement by the state that same-sex relationships are just as important as straight relationships -is here, workplace discrimination looks idiotic. "Wait, you're saying you're not going to hire someone because they're in a relationship that we all agree is legally regarded as equivalent to your own?" Really? You can't even pretend that you're objecting to something the state sort of considers deviant. No, you're objecting to something that the state says is grade-A okay, and that is a losing battle.
posted by Going To Maine at 8:14 PM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

I recognized a friend from high school getting married on the local news!
posted by Small Dollar at 8:18 PM on June 26, 2015 [9 favorites]

(I mean, my stakes in this are clearly waaaay lower than yours, but it just seems like marriage kind of cuts to the bone as a force multiplier.)
posted by Going To Maine at 8:20 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Buzzfeed has a nice little article with a couple perspectives from older gay activists
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 8:21 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Damn, what a week. No words for all the happies! Mazel tov, everyone.
posted by kinnakeet at 8:23 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I had the most bougie gay marriage moment, but I DON'T EVEN CARE! I was in the car and heard Nina Totenberg's clearly thrown-together, seconds-old story and then tore myself from the radio, ran into the yoga studio, threw myself on the mat and dedicated my practice to love and freedom. True story and I've spent the rest of the day with a Zenned-out smile on my face.
posted by mynameisluka at 8:29 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Now I really want a T-shirt saying "the nearest hippie."
posted by salvia at 8:31 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

My hometown of Cincinnati has a pretty conservative reputation. Obergefell, the first plaintiff in the case, is from here, and is riding in our Pride parade tomorrow.

I was on the fence about making the ~1.5 hour drive from Indy to Cincinnati...until I saw this. That's a once-in-a-lifetime, not-to-be-missed kind of thing.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 8:37 PM on June 26, 2015 [13 favorites]

So happy!
posted by FunkyHelix at 8:39 PM on June 26, 2015

This is such wonderful, wonderful news. I never expected the job would be done this soon.

Seen on Twitter: "Ironically, 'Antonin Scalia' anagrams to 'I sanction anal'."

I tweeted a picture of the White House with its rainbow lighting, and quipped that it hasn't been this well lit since that time the Canadians tried to burn it down.

I'm very heartened that I haven't gotten any negative feedback from the gay marriage-related posts I've made to my knitting blog's Facebook page. Just a few quiet "hide posts", and possibly some silent unlikes, but no screamy "KEEP YOUR POLITICAL OPINIONS TO YOURSELF" and/or flouncy "I UNFOLLOWED YOU" comments. Not yet, anyway.

Here's a prezzie for the knitting Ravelry members in the crowd. Be sure to check out Ravelry's logo while you're at it. (For non-Ravelers.)
posted by orange swan at 8:47 PM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

Gay marriage was basically the gateway drug to me getting interested in trans rights, where I did my little bit to make the world better and I managed to get a unanimous vote on including trans protections in our school district's anti-bullying policy by talking and talking and talking and talking at people until they agreed with me, and it was one of the first in the state to include that and it became a model for other school districts in the state.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:52 PM on June 26, 2015 [53 favorites]

As a straight New Orleanian I typically don't have any pressing need to venture to the French Quarter during Labor Day weekend to check out Southern Decadence but this year I think I'll make an exception, if only because I have a feeling it'll be extra decadent.

okay but for serious this morning I got an email from Freedom to Marry and instead of the usual "we're still fighting to change things" it said "BREAKING: Victory at the Supreme Court!" and I literally couldn't process it for a second or two. The idea that we'd finally reach this day, after what seemed like so long (and especially after Louisiana decided to be the first big setback in a string of victories) ... I dunno, I just maybe felt like we'd never get there.

So congratulations to everyone!, everyone who was already loving whoever they wanted and who can now get that recognized. I toasted to you at dinner, and managed to shock one progressive Luddite friend who somehow hadn't heard the news - and I feel like I'll be toasting more for a while yet. This is a happy happy day.
posted by komara at 9:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Coheed and Cambria Sing Justice Scalia's Dissenting Opinions
posted by keli at 9:07 PM on June 26, 2015 [14 favorites]

Looks like decent turnout for the SF trans march. I love seeing people fill the street like that.
posted by salvia at 9:16 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Cmd-F "Rand Paul"

Wow nothing? America's Foremost Champion of Civil Liberties™, who seems to have never met a camera or microphone he didn't like, is nowhere to be found on this momentous day?
posted by tonycpsu at 9:44 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

Wow. I spent all day off the internet and I've just found out about this here in my internet home and I'm so choked up and teary-eyed. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ :') Especially as I read comments

happy day~~ ty usa!
posted by one teak forest at 9:52 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

We had a mini mefi contingent, in the SF Trans March, with rtha, halifix, and Claudia center.
posted by gingerbeer at 9:55 PM on June 26, 2015 [27 favorites]

Sam Hughes wrote about marriage from a database engineering perspective back in 2008 (previously on Metafilter), and has now posted an update taking Obergefell v. Hodges into account (and also NoSQL).
posted by Rangi at 9:56 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

If only NPR could stop giving a fuck about the dissenting side of this, I mean come on, we've had the "hear both sides" shit for decades, now, they lost. So stop giving them air.

I've felt this way plenty over the years, but lately it seems more and more to me like NPR's quiet middle-of-the-roadist let-them-say-their bit approach to these things is... Maybe actually working, in the sense of somehow building a better discourse? I dunno. Like the other day when they talked to that actually white supremacist kid, I was like "how can they be calmly listening to this asshole", and then I thought ok, actually I bet a bunch of people right now are quietly going "what the fuck is wrong with this guy".
posted by brennen at 9:57 PM on June 26, 2015 [8 favorites]

Rangi: The impact on database programmers is the most coherent argument against gay marriage I've heard (ie: they have some work to do).
posted by el io at 10:01 PM on June 26, 2015

On a more general note this thread is beautiful.
posted by brennen at 10:01 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

Reading Rangi's "posted an update" link made me smile.

In fact, it's no longer necessary to store gender information for the purposes of this now-missing constraint, and the column people.gender, and all the data in it, could in theory be dropped entirely.

Discussion of coding an implementation of equality makes it all seem more real.
posted by el io at 10:04 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

The SF trans march was awesome, managing to be both old-school and cutting-edge simultaneously.
posted by rtha at 10:05 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Oh happy day. Oh happy day!
posted by kozad at 10:15 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I have been waiting all day for the government to send jackbooted thugs to force me into a same-sex marriage, and nothing.

See, this is precisely why we should privatize all jackbooted thugs.
posted by ckape at 10:17 PM on June 26, 2015 [4 favorites]

Conservatives don't care when weird readings lead to novel, undesirable things. Corporations are people, money is speech. They don't get to turn around and sputter like nothing means anything anymore about marriage, while at the same time also ignoring the pretty easy parsing of "equal protection of the motherfucking law" to boot.
posted by nom de poop at 10:29 PM on June 26, 2015 [2 favorites]

I have been waiting all day for the government to send jackbooted thugs to force me into a same-sex marriage, and nothing.

They have to wait for the database changes to be pushed into production, so they know who gets forcibly gay-married and who gets married off to a box turtle.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:37 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I am so amazed and so grateful that we saw this happen in our lifetime. IN OUR LIFETIME.
: )
posted by gt2 at 10:38 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

Mashing up the two recent Supreme Court decisions, if you get married, that is considered a qualifying life change event that makes you eligible to apply for a new Obamacare health insurance plan. The special enrollment period lasts 60 days from the date of marriage. Eligibility for subsidies may vary depending on whether you plan on filing taxes jointly and whether or not you are eligible for employer insurance.
posted by JackFlash at 10:39 PM on June 26, 2015 [6 favorites]

Jill Biden: Joe is running through the halls with a rainbow flagged tied on like a cape high fiving everyone. #MarriageEquaility #LoveWins #SCOTUS

PLEASE PLEASE LET THIS BE TRUE. OH MY GOD I WOULD GIVE EVERY LAST CENT IN MY NAME TO SEE VIDEO OF THIS.

Well, this is not video, but pretty darn close.
posted by JoeXIII007 at 10:46 PM on June 26, 2015 [11 favorites]

Just saw a time lapse of the White House. That is a big old' middle finger to the Republicans/haters. A big middle finger. Nice.
posted by five fresh fish at 10:46 PM on June 26, 2015

If the internet is not Photoshop-lying to me, the following things are lit up in rainbow colors tonight:

The White House
The Empire State Building
Niagara Falls
The London Eye
Disney World's Cinderella Castle
A bridge in the capital of Arkansas
San Francisco's City Hall
...possibly many others that I'm not aware of

My brain literally does not know how to process this. When I was hiding in the closet as a teenager in the 80s, I knew I would have to somehow make do with being an outsider. And I made my peace with that, like many my age and older, and I could've lived the rest of my life comfortable with my choices no matter what. To see this kind of affirmation of acceptance and respect is something I never bothered to imagine. And yet here it is.

"Freedom, you see
Has got our hearts singing so joyfully..."
posted by dnash at 10:47 PM on June 26, 2015 [41 favorites]

I held it together all day at work - verging on tears and also on yelps of triumph for eight hours in my very quiet little library - then got home and stood on my porch and looked at the sunset. I live in West Hollywood and know that people are celebrating just a few blocks away, and I'm going out to join them. But I was thinking about all the men I knew in the 70s and 80s and 90s who died and would never know this day. This day is amazing and wonderful and I love the good my country is capable of but oh wow, I wish some dead friends were here to experience it.
posted by goofyfoot at 10:48 PM on June 26, 2015 [46 favorites]

Today's events brought to mind the final, prophetic words from Angels in America, presciently written by Tony Kushner over two decades ago: "The world only spins forward. We will be citizens. The time has come. . . . You are fabulous creatures, each and every one. And I bless you: More Life. The Great Work Begins."
posted by Quaversalis at 10:51 PM on June 26, 2015 [22 favorites]

I'm tired as hell but I'm going to stay up a while; I want today to last a little longer. But tomorrow, we're gonna wake up in a finer world.
posted by jameaterblues at 11:14 PM on June 26, 2015 [1 favorite]

There was just a ridiculous fireworks display in San Francisco. I couldn't see it (goddamn trees!), but the fact that I could feel it in North Oakland told me all I needed to know. Have fun everybody!
posted by clorox at 11:21 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

This is a good day.
posted by LobsterMitten at 11:31 PM on June 26, 2015 [3 favorites]

clorox: “There was just a ridiculous fireworks display in San Francisco. I couldn't see it (goddamn trees!), but the fact that I could feel it in North Oakland told me all I needed to know. Have fun everybody!”

Partially obscured by a building but was the first video I found.

“And San Francisco ends this day as one should: with fireworks. pic.twitter.com/xCaPL23D0y”— jsgabel (@jsgabel) June 27, 2015
posted by ob1quixote at 11:41 PM on June 26, 2015 [5 favorites]

I don't drink booze, so I came up with the Scalia's Tears coffee drink instead.

Scalia's Tears - a decaf Americano. Bitter and pointless.
posted by spinifex23 at 12:00 AM on June 27, 2015 [40 favorites]

"Scalia's Tears" sounds like an obscure anatomical appellation regarding a ruptured tissue that appears only in the most comprehensive medical textbooks and on the TV show QI.
posted by clorox at 12:14 AM on June 27, 2015 [6 favorites]

...And members of Scalia's Tears.

Seriously, this is fantastic news! : ) Hooray!
posted by SisterHavana at 12:36 AM on June 27, 2015 [1 favorite]

\o/
posted by PROD_TPSL at 12:37 AM on June 27, 2015

Here's a (surely incomplete) list of major brands celebrating the decision on Twitter. Let the whiny, pathetic calls for boycotts begin!
posted by Faint of Butt at 3:06 AM on June 27, 2015 [3 favorites]

Scalia's Tears: The Shot
Rub rim of shot glasses with orange slice, coat in kosher salt (Thanks Kagen, Breyer and Bader-Ginsburg!!)
In a shaker with ice add equal(!!!!!!) parts Stoli Peach and Raspberry (Stoli is Ukrainian, not Russian)
Add equal dashes to taste of fresh lime juice and simple syrup
Shake the shit out of it
Strain into prepared shot glasses
Don't blame me if it sucks. I haven't tried it yet but I'm gonna make free ones tomorrow where I bartend till I figure it the fuck out.
posted by nestor_makhno at 3:10 AM on June 27, 2015 [8 favorites]

Scalia Shot #2
Equal parts Frangelico and Amaretto in a shaker with half a scoop of ice
Shake briefly
Strain into a shot glass
Place a lemon slice liberally splashed with Bacardi 151 over the top of the glass flatwise and light it on fire
Everyone scream "Fuck you Nino!"
Blow it out, make sure the rim of the glass is cool to the touch and drink
Don't set your house or bar on fire
posted by nestor_makhno at 3:25 AM on June 27, 2015 [8 favorites]

You did good, America.
posted by obiwanwasabi at 3:32 AM on June 27, 2015 [4 favorites]

Congratulations, USA! I hope this gives another boost to the cause here in Oz, the way the Irish decision did. Goodness knows we could use a little good news for progressives here.
posted by harriet vane at 3:37 AM on June 27, 2015 [5 favorites]

About to leave the house to run in a Pride race. other than the first race after the Boston marathon terrorism, I can't remember a day where hearing the national anthem has meant so much to me.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 3:43 AM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

If any of you know anyone who is resistant to the concept of gay marriage, please have them watch this:
Dallas County's first same-sex marriage ceremony.
posted by markkraft at 3:43 AM on June 27, 2015 [4 favorites]

I've been feeling pretty bad about the future my children have to face recently, but this gives me hope. In Australia marriage equality is still being debated (although LGBT people and their rights have been recognised in law (not everything, unfortunately) , thanks to Kevin Rudd and Labor in 2009) and there is still so much to be done but it makes me so happy to know that we are not just taking steps backwards, regardless of all the backlashes by people who are so scared of change.
posted by h00py at 4:51 AM on June 27, 2015 [3 favorites]

lalex --- thank you for that quote from Mildred Loving: if anybody's opinion on who can marry who matters, it'd be folks like her.
posted by easily confused at 5:06 AM on June 27, 2015 [4 favorites]

To all the folks saying that now LGBTQ couples have the right to be just as miserable as everyone else...

Getting married is amazing. It adds a shiny layer of joy to the top of an already deep, rich, meaningful relationship. Welcome to happiness. Welcome to the freedom to live in that happiness anywhere in this country that you damn well please. Get some marriage, y'all. It rocks.
posted by batbat at 5:27 AM on June 27, 2015 [10 favorites]

So the super conservative newspaper here in the 'Burgh printed this editorial this morning:

Lest there be any confusion, we do not support this decision as any kind of ode to “progressive” living constitutionalism. To the contrary, the ruling represents a welcome advance on the path to the right to be let alone, a decidedly libertarian philosophy.

For their own sake, I'm hoping that conservatives can start to come around to this editorial's view. Because what could be more libertarian than letting people marry who they want and what's more traditional than settling down in a household and sharing a life together?
posted by octothorpe at 5:44 AM on June 27, 2015 [17 favorites]

So, what's on the docket for today? Free university education? Livable wage? National police reform? Slash military spending? I bet we could get a bunch of stuff pushed through since we are on such a roll.
posted by Rock Steady at 5:47 AM on June 27, 2015 [13 favorites]

All I can say is

YUB NUB
posted by tigrrrlily at 5:57 AM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

I'm pretty late to this thread, but congratulations America! It's a great day.

The first time I read the "ask the nearest hippie" thing I assumed it was a joke added by the poster in this thread, because surely there is no way a Supreme Court justice would write something that juvenile in an official document? Right?
posted by The Card Cheat at 6:31 AM on June 27, 2015 [8 favorites]

Here in Edinburgh I dragged myself to the farmer's market this morning and asked for our customary two loaves of bread at the stall.

"How are you this morning?" the guy there asked as he wrapped them up. Someone I don't really know, never really talked to before beyond "good morning" / "I'll take two loaves" / "Have a nice day".

"Pretty tired, actually," I said.

"Oh, yeah? Late night?"

"Yeah, the U.S. Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage yesterday. I was up all night partying online with friends from back home."

"I heard! It's fantastic!"

"Isn't it?"

He handed me the loaves and I started to walk off, then immediately turned around.

"Oh," I said, "I'm sorry, I forgot to pay."

"I know," he said. "Take them. This morning, for you, it's free."

...

I have Pride Bread.

It is the best bread ever.
posted by kyrademon at 6:36 AM on June 27, 2015 [131 favorites]

Ah, Edinburgh such a beautiful city. I was just there a month ago. Enjoy the pride bread, and maybe go for a flat white at artisan roast?
posted by Annika Cicada at 6:49 AM on June 27, 2015 [3 favorites]

One comment deleted. If you've got links that are mainly relevant to a different thread, go ahead and put them in that thread. Thanks.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 7:11 AM on June 27, 2015

Geek Bar Chicago was offering a drink of Scalia's tears last night
posted by dinty_moore at 7:56 AM on June 27, 2015 [6 favorites]

Here's a (surely incomplete) list of major brands celebrating the decision on Twitter.

Marker's Mark?? Wow. Who'd have thought they'd join in?

a decidedly libertarian philosophy

See? It's so easy to reconcile the conservative philosophy of small government with marriage laws. They really should have been on board with this from the start. I suppose it's the power of the religious right that keeps so many from admitting it's sound governance.
posted by Beti at 8:01 AM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

I grew up in small town Indiana. Small enough that, when I ran track in high school, warm-up consisted of running four laps around the entire town, and you passed about eight churches in a single lap . One of my best male friends was closeted until junior year (so, around 2004), which put a pretty bright spotlight on the "politics" of gay marriage. When he came out, I was so afraid for him, because we'd heard about gay kids at the bigger high school in the county getting brutally beaten up. But, even Nowhere, Indiana, which gets so much shit for being backwards (and it is, in many ways), blew me away.

I vividly remember our government teacher telling us, in the middle of debates (where some of the jackass guys giggled through a presentation on how much semen the average gay man ingests in a lifetime and why that was a point against gay marriage, and I loudly asked how much semen the average woman ingests and why that's any different--that got me branded a lesbian for the rest of my high school career, oh well), that he had a lot of gay friends, and had lived in much bigger cities than we were used to, and gay people are the same as anyone else and were some of the best people he knew. I never expected that. Then the librarian, god love her, got involved in a friendly discussion I was having with a bunch of my classmates, and she tore in about, "Why does it matter if someone is gay? Does it change who they are? Why does it matter?" A lot of the teachers stepped up that way, and it was more than I ever thought possible from a public school that, one time my freshman year, had a prayer gathering in the middle of lunch. I mean, this public school was more religious and conservative than the private Catholic school I went to from K-8, and I couldn't believe that all these teachers were saying "gay people are the same as you and me!" I felt like the lone, sane voice, hugging my American Idiot CD, until almost the entire faculty stepped up, and I'm crying as I write this.

My friend didn't lose any of his friends, not even the super conservative ones. Most of the guys backed off--a few didn't, and they're the ones I still respect to this day--but the young women in our class mostly just didn't seem to care. He was the same exuberant, flashy, funny guy he'd always been. And, I thought, yeah, cool, we won! This is awesome! Gay rights! But then me and him went to our senior prom together, and on the way to church the next morning, he said that he didn't believe in gay marriage and didn't believe that gays should be able to adopt. Because his parents had instilled that in him, and he still thought being gay was a sin. I asked him where he thought that was going to stop--you know, where does that slippery slope of not being able to marry, and not being able to have kids, where does that end? Who decides what other rights he loses? Who decides what rights he has? And why were his human rights up for debate, just because god created him to be attracted to men instead of women? He told me to shut up and stop being so serious about stuff lol. He's a huge activist now--all over Facebook with pride parades and LGBT organizations and it's incredible to see that he went in that direction, because, at that time, I thought, "Wow, if he believes in that stuff, then it's done. It's over."

Back then, in 2004 and 2005, would I have thought that, just ten years later, before my class's ten year reunion has even been planned, gay marriage would be legal across the entire United States? No. Not at all. It's fucking incredible. It barely feels real. I'm so glad to be alive to see this tide turn. Onto the next fight.
posted by coast99 at 8:49 AM on June 27, 2015 [23 favorites]

The fact that Obama also declared that any insurance company that wants to serve the vast government bureaucracy is going to have to cover trans-related stuff as of next year is a nice step in that direction.

Well damn. He has been so, so problematic on so many matters, but every now and then I'm surprised.

Keep in mind that while he may be problematic on so many matters, he is the most socially progressive US president ever.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 8:51 AM on June 27, 2015 [13 favorites]

Scalia's Tears - a decaf Americano. Bitter and pointless.

This makes me happy because I didn't do any serious partying last night. But I did drink a decaf Americano, so I guess I did.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:13 AM on June 27, 2015 [7 favorites]

If any of you know anyone who is resistant to the concept of gay marriage, please have them watch this: Dallas County's first same-sex marriage ceremony.

Adorable same-sex couples in their 80s have basically turned out to be our secret weapon for acceptance!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:14 AM on June 27, 2015 [17 favorites]

I spent last night partying with a boy from Detroit. Kept running into overjoyed Americans.

Also a bunch of kinksters protected the trans march from some right wing assbags, leaving their own party to do so.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 9:26 AM on June 27, 2015 [13 favorites]

...possibly many others that I'm not aware of

From The Advocate: More Than A Dozen Landmarks You Won't Believe Were Turned Rainbow
posted by Going To Maine at 9:29 AM on June 27, 2015 [3 favorites]

Nina Simone's response to the Roberts argument "Indeed, however heartened the proponents of same-sex marriage might be on this day, it is worth acknowledging what they have lost, and lost forever: the opportunity to win the true acceptance that comes from persuading their fellow citizens of the justice of their cause..."

You keep on saying "Go slow!"
"Go slow!"

But that's just the trouble
"do it slow"
Desegregation
"do it slow"
Mass participation
"do it slow"
Reunification
"do it slow"
Do things gradually
"do it slow"
But bring more tragedy
"do it slow"
Why don't you see it
Why don't you feel it
I don't know
I don't know

You don't have to live next to me
Just give me my equality
posted by lathrop at 10:07 AM on June 27, 2015 [20 favorites]

Also a bunch of kinksters protected the trans march from some right wing assbags, leaving their own party to do so.

There were a bunch of Jesus/sodomy/etc. sign-wavers/loudspeaker preachers at Yonge and Wellesley during the Trans March. The surrounding crowd, of which I was a part, descended upon them like a Biblical plague and they gave up preaching and left after fifteen minutes, before the Trans March even started.

I think it had something to do with the halo effect of what's happened in the US. Usually these assholes get some gentle heckling and are otherwise ignored.

Last night, people Were Not Having It, and I think the celebratory mood was the reason why.

I'm a little hoarse today from chanting and screaming at them. Je ne regrette rien.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 10:07 AM on June 27, 2015 [20 favorites]

So has that dude from Texas set himself on fire yet?

Breaking:

Put away the marshmallows.....the fiery pastor issued a statement to KFYO News several hours after the high court issued its ruling Friday morning, walking back his remarks to clarify he was not planning a self-immolation.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 10:15 AM on June 27, 2015 [1 favorite]

Here's a (surely incomplete) list of major brands celebrating the decision on Twitter. Let the whiny, pathetic calls for boycotts begin!

From The Advocate: More Than A Dozen Landmarks You Won't Believe Were Turned Rainbow

I've been very pleasantly surprised by how many companies and institutions have publicly commemorated this moment. The ruling is a huge victory in and of itself, and it's only magnified by all these voices joining in to celebrate it.

Also, I think it's pretty amusing that opponents of this ruling would talk about running away to Canada. I remember that being a thing in liberal circles during the Bush years (lord knows I sometimes fantasized about it), but it doesn't work so well for the US tea party types.
posted by litera scripta manet at 10:23 AM on June 27, 2015

Russia is nice this time of year.
posted by tivalasvegas at 10:28 AM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

Also, I think it's pretty amusing that opponents of this ruling would talk about running away to Canada. I remember that being a thing in liberal circles during the Bush years (lord knows I sometimes fantasized about it), but it doesn't work so well for the US tea party types.

I've also seen threats to run away to New Zealand (which boasts public health care, same-sex marriage and strong gun control). Frankly, I'm not convinced the Tea Party types even know that "Canada" and "New Zealand" are real countries that exist. It's like they're threatening to run away to Narnia or Hogwarts.
posted by Faint of Butt at 10:29 AM on June 27, 2015 [33 favorites]

I would run away to Narnia or Hogwarts in a hot minute
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 10:54 AM on June 27, 2015 [11 favorites]

Also, I think it's pretty amusing that opponents of this ruling would talk about running away to Canada

Seriously. I guess we're not "Soviet Canuckistan" anymore?
There's a big, gay, gun-less, healthcarey surprise waiting for them when they get here.
posted by chococat at 10:57 AM on June 27, 2015 [15 favorites]

Daniela Lapidous, at McSweeney's Internet Tendency: The SCOTUS Marriage Decision, in Haiku.
posted by Going To Maine at 11:01 AM on June 27, 2015 [5 favorites]

The terminator himself replied and said "hasta la vista".
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 11:01 AM on June 27, 2015 [3 favorites]

Oh, and relatedly, from Bob Woodiwiss: Five People Just as Doctrinaire and Tiresome as Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia Speculate on How He Got That Way.
posted by Going To Maine at 11:03 AM on June 27, 2015 [1 favorite]

Schwarzenegger twice vetoed same-sex marriage bills in California, so I'm unimpressed with his sudden bandwagon-hopping.
posted by Jeanne at 11:05 AM on June 27, 2015 [8 favorites]

However I am impressed by the capacity and fortitude of this bandwagon.
posted by RobotHero at 11:08 AM on June 27, 2015 [7 favorites]

I was wondering... I know this applies to all 50 states, but does it affect the various U.S. territories as well? Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Virgin Islands, etc.
posted by downtohisturtles at 11:10 AM on June 27, 2015

It was absolutely delightful to walk into work on Friday and know that I was going to spend the morning working on our company's social media graphics celebrating marriage equality. It was even better to post the graphics and see the overwhelmingly positive response from our followers.

We've posted similar things in the past and there's always a handful of folks who vocalize their disappointment at our position, but this time there's only been grumbling from one solitary dude. My guess is that the sheer scope of online corporate acceptance has overwhelmed the haters, and they'll spend their weekend resting up for a marathon session of impotent angry letter writing.
posted by redsparkler at 11:21 AM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

I was wondering... I know this applies to all 50 states, but does it affect the various U.S. territories as well? Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Virgin Islands, etc.
posted by downtohisturtles at 11:10 AM on June 27 [+] [!]

The territories seem like a weird issue because they're part of the United States, but also not quite. It's legal in Guam, but there was an independent action there. It's legal in DC, and in Puerto Rico:

After the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry in Obergefell v. Hodges, Garcia Padilla said June 26, 2015, that he was issuing an executive order changing Puerto Rico's statutes to allow same-sex marriage in the territory.[11]

From what I've seen about the North Mariana Islands and the Virgin Islands, the ruling applies to them, but it's not clear if they're required to take any action. I couldn't find anything about American Samoa.

(edited to add comment to which this one refers to)
posted by gc at 11:26 AM on June 27, 2015 [1 favorite]

The march of marriage equality
posted by kyrademon at 11:31 AM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

Frankly, I'm not convinced the Tea Party types even know that "Canada" and "New Zealand" are real countries that exist. It's like they're threatening to run away to Narnia or Hogwarts.

“Where you been Homer? Entire New Zealand's gay. Yeah, Narnia, too. And the wizards. And you know what else? Broadway.”

(Hands down one of my favorite ever Simpson's episode)
posted by gc at 11:31 AM on June 27, 2015 [4 favorites]

I got drunk with a friend last night and wrote this on Facebook which uhhh isn't the most inspiring thing I've written but it felt good!!

"Tbh I told my mother and father that I may marry a man, like a few years ago, and they accepted it and it was awesome. I'm not the gayest person ever for sure, but my mom and dad were down and I can actually realize that now, and that's cool 😎 sorry y'all I love a lot of men just as much as much as I love women and I guess that's weird but that's how I roll"

I'm rly happy that I can marry a man if I meet the right guy and that I can go to my friends' weddings.
posted by gucci mane at 11:34 AM on June 27, 2015 [9 favorites]

Just got back from camping. What did I miss?

Oh! Congratulations!
posted by Poldo at 11:35 AM on June 27, 2015 [1 favorite]

> If the internet is not Photoshop-lying to me, the following things are lit up in rainbow colors tonight:
The White House

No lie!

The White House is lit with the colors of the rainbow in celebration of the Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage, June 26, 2015. (Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)

[Link goes to image gallery; here's just the official jpg.]
posted by Westringia F. at 12:15 PM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

Texas Governor trying to take his stand by saying you can't fire anyone for refusing to marry people for religious reasons.

Which initially made me shrug; there are plenty of clerks, and of course out-of-state marriage is a thing.

BUT then I realized this is the exact same approach they're taking to contraception (no one can stop your pharmacist from refusing to fill your slut pills prescription because God) and of course abortion and I wondered, given the momentum behind this, if he wasn't handing us an eventual tool to get rid of conscience clause bullshit down the road.

Given their history, maybe not with these SC judges. But, if conscience clauses become a thing that fucks up everyone's life, not just womens', then it will be easier to build a movement for getting rid of them.
posted by emjaybee at 12:24 PM on June 27, 2015 [6 favorites]

If
more weddings = more cake
then
weddings for everyone = cake for everyone
!
posted by filthy light thief at 12:26 PM on June 27, 2015 [9 favorites]

Okay...This is really cool...
My Santa Fe mom just forwarded to me a photo from one of her friends. The friend actually works at the White House in the West Wing. She and her partner were married in DC a year ago. Anyway...Late Friday afternoon, a small group of staff were invited to The Eisenhower Building for a toast, and they were told then that the White House would be rainbow lit. So, she and her partner walked over to the White House to watch as night fell and the colors became more pronounced. The photo shows the two of them standing in the portico drive next to the White House with the rainbow lit building directly behind them. It's an awesome picture. I'll ask if it's ok to share it.
posted by Thorzdad at 12:26 PM on June 27, 2015 [14 favorites]

so! to continue my over reporting of arkansas's reaction to the ruling - here is my town's pride parade - biggest turnout ever. i sadly had to miss it, but it looked like a hell of a good time. also, it's weirdly not in any of those pictures, but there was a wedding on a float with a giant gay wedding (fake) cake. i hear the church bells rang them down the street.
posted by nadawi at 12:48 PM on June 27, 2015 [5 favorites]

aw jeez, I'm getting misty-eyed over photos of Dickson Street. Never thought THAT would happen. Here's the tiny little rally nearest to me here in California.
posted by wintersweet at 12:57 PM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

On a down note, when we were having lunch at a fast food joint today, they had their tv's tuned to CNN, and the only thing the talking heads yammered about throughout lunch was some story about an ISIS flag being spotted at a pride celebration (New York, I think) All I could think was "Oh boy...here we go"
posted by Thorzdad at 1:10 PM on June 27, 2015 [1 favorite]

It turns out it was a flag with a bunch of dildos and butt plugs on it that they mistook for Arabic writing.

This is a thing that actually happened.
posted by The Whelk at 1:16 PM on June 27, 2015 [72 favorites]

CNN Mistakes Dildo-Covered Flag at Pride Parade for ISIS Flag

It is clearly designed to look like a Black Standard, but my God that is funny.
posted by Golden Eternity at 1:43 PM on June 27, 2015 [42 favorites]

If you are a civil servant working in an agency that issues marriage licenses and you object to issuing a legal marriage license to a couple who are the same sex, I fully support your right to quit your job.

I think a better response would be for lots and lots of Texas state employees to start doing all kinds of obviously stupid things because they have a can't-be-verified-as-insincere religious belief about them. I'm sorry sir, I can't help you with your CDL. Great Cthulhu forbids humans from driving them. No ma'am, I won't process your driver's license application. Vision correction is an abomination before my Lord Huitzilopochtli. Welcome to PSCI 1040, students! If you're wearing mixed cloth or have tattoos you'll need to choose another section.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 1:44 PM on June 27, 2015 [16 favorites]

Ha ha that's adorable you think asserting your right to any belief other than christian won't get you fired.
posted by phearlez at 1:53 PM on June 27, 2015 [6 favorites]

The best reaction for me so far is Angel Haze demanding wives in every state: "come on. give me volunteers. lets kiss."
posted by Kreiger at 1:57 PM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

My partner and I have been together for years (we're straight) but we're feeling super romantic today. It's a holiday!
posted by goofyfoot at 2:16 PM on June 27, 2015 [5 favorites]

Tyne Daly's curtain speech after last night's performance of It Shoulda Been You, recalling a time when her own marriage was illegal in 17 states.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 3:32 PM on June 27, 2015 [15 favorites]

It turns out it was a flag with a bunch of dildos and butt plugs on it that they mistook for Arabic writing.

Not to mention cock rings. In fact, they really tie the whole thing together.
posted by TedW at 4:46 PM on June 27, 2015 [12 favorites]

That's just, like, your opinion man.
posted by phearlez at 7:10 PM on June 27, 2015 [6 favorites]

Apparently this also means that people can now legally get married to their guns, or something.

One of the Husband's former coworkers was frothing about marriage now being meaningless, now people can even marry toasters if they want to.

The Husband gently pointed out that Cylons aren't real, which tipped the guy right the hell over. It was priceless.
posted by MissySedai at 7:57 PM on June 27, 2015 [32 favorites]

It turns out it was a flag with a bunch of dildos and butt plugs on it that they mistook for Arabic writing.

There is a great opportunity for an online quiz here: Is this a butt plug, a stylized arabic character, or both?
posted by Going To Maine at 8:24 PM on June 27, 2015 [1 favorite]

airing nerdy laundry: "Scalia, quoting foreboding Proverbs at supporters of equal treatment under the law:

"Hubris is sometimes defined as o’erweening pride; and pride, we know, goeth before a fall.""

Actually, he didn't even quote it correctly. It's (KJV): Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:36 PM on June 27, 2015 [4 favorites]

On the White House's Medium: “We reached out to [Jim Obergefell] to ask for his thoughts on this historic occasion, and this is the open letter he wanted us to share with you.”
posted by Going To Maine at 9:11 PM on June 27, 2015 [4 favorites]

On the "much remains to be done front":

NYT: Exhilarated by the Supreme Court’s endorsement of same-sex marriage, gay rights leaders have turned their sights to what they see as the next big battle: obtaining federal, state and local legal protections in employment, housing, commerce and other arenas, just like those barring discrimination based on race, religion, sex and national origin.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:23 PM on June 27, 2015 [4 favorites]

Obergefell letter: "Pam and Nicole never again have to fear for Grayden and Orion’s lives in a medical emergency because, in their panic, they forgot legal documents that prove both mothers have the right to approve care."

I feel pretty great that I can now judge Pam and Nicole not on their sexuality but on the same grounds I judge all other parents: The stupid-ass names they give their kids.

Grayden and Orion indeed. I SCOFF.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 9:31 PM on June 27, 2015 [36 favorites]

Lutheran pastor says Jews to blame for destroying Christian values after US approves gay marriage

YOU'RE WELCOME
posted by Joe in Australia at 10:03 PM on June 27, 2015 [32 favorites]

Because Old Testament traditional marriage is entirely outside the scope of Jewish people's understanding. Duh.
posted by jaguar at 10:30 PM on June 27, 2015 [2 favorites]

A question that occurred to me - how does this affect the various Indian Nations inside the US? If, for instance, the Navajo Nation had a ban against gay marriage, would that be overturned by this ruling? Or still upheld?
posted by spinifex23 at 10:31 PM on June 27, 2015 [1 favorite]

"It was 46 years ago this week that the queer community of New York City finally said "Enough!" For some historical perspective to this week's victory, I'm reposting the story that the New York Daily News ran one week after the Stonewall Riots. Note how the story drips with condescension and ridicule. We've come a long, long way in 46 years and we've still got some distance to cover, but today we should all offer up a shout and a snap to the people who started us down this road."
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:46 AM on June 28, 2015 [11 favorites]

Speaking to reporters from Iran's Press TV, Dankof insisted that Jewish influence and money were being used to destroy Christian culture and values globally.

"It should not be ignored that the victories for abortion on demand and LGBT rights are reflective of the disproportionate influence of Jewish power, money, and activism in the United States," he declared.

“The key Jewish role played in the mainstreaming of abortion, LGBT, and pornography in the United States may be documented in Google search, especially in looking at the Frankfurt School and its Institute for Social Research,” added Dankof.

Dankof declared that Russian President Vladamir Putin is one of few national leaders who recognize the threat of Jewish power.

No surprise that Iran's Official Press TV channel gave that asshole air time. They've been broadcasting incredibly vile antisemitic bullshit for the Ayatollah for years.
posted by zarq at 5:46 AM on June 28, 2015 [2 favorites]

YOU'RE WELCOME

Joe in Australia. Without gay marriage. What kind of Jew are you? Hurry up and destroy Christian values over there please!
posted by Talez at 7:29 AM on June 28, 2015 [5 favorites]

The week in a six second Vine video (via a tweet).
posted by Wordshore at 9:10 AM on June 28, 2015 [1 favorite]

Seven years ago, I voted no on Prop 8. My fellow Californians, despite our reputation as out on the forefront of progressive social issues, decided h8 was more important than love.

I moved to North Dakota, then Texas, and equality seemed to be further and further away with each move I made.

Today, I'm in San Francisco. It's Pride Weekend, though I'm actually here with the librarian cabal, and there are rainbow flags everywhere. Local branches of major corporations (Wells Fargo, T-Mobile) have little signs outside their shops standing for equality and rainbows in their windows. Right now, right outside the window I was overlooking yesterday, over a million people are waving and cheering for pride, for equality, and for love. I'll be there soon.

How far we've come. How far, I believe, we will yet go.
posted by librarylis at 9:29 AM on June 28, 2015 [20 favorites]

The OP link to a map of the legal landscape pre-decision doesn't work because Wikipedia updated the graphic. You can, however, enjoy the time-lapse effect of the history of the image file here by scrolling down a bit.
posted by clauclauclaudia at 9:57 AM on June 28, 2015 [1 favorite]

Stephen Colbert weighs in: June Is A Lovely Time For A Wedding
posted by ZeusHumms at 10:24 AM on June 28, 2015 [2 favorites]

I've had a major jaw infection all weekend, so I haven't gone to any Pride events (seeing a grimacing, groaning guy might give people the wrong idea). So reading all the wonderful stories here and around the web has kept me vicariously connected and brought tears to my eyes a number if times.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go reshare some more pics.
posted by happyroach at 11:51 AM on June 28, 2015 [2 favorites]

clauclauclaudia: "The OP link to a map of the legal landscape pre-decision doesn't work because Wikipedia updated the graphic. You can, however, enjoy the time-lapse effect of the history of the image file here by scrolling down a bit."

Yup, sorry -- I linked to a static version of the page from the night before, but didn't realize the images would continue to update.
posted by Rhaomi at 1:46 PM on June 28, 2015

Amazing couple days. I went to the Santa Fe Pride Parade yesterday afternoon and saw Cameron Esposito do stand-up last night. It's just been one big gay party all weekend.
posted by krinklyfig at 1:58 PM on June 28, 2015 [2 favorites]

"It was 46 years ago this week that the queer community of New York City finally said "Enough!" For some historical perspective to this week's victory, I'm reposting the story that the New York Daily News ran one week after the Stonewall Riots. Note how the story drips with condescension and ridicule. We've come a long, long way in 46 years and we've still got some distance to cover, but today we should all offer up a shout and a snap to the people who started us down this road."

Stonewall Inn - which as noted above just got historical landmark status - has this story framed in its entryway.

Note the last line: The police are sure of one thing. They haven't heard the last from the Girls of Christopher Street.
posted by showbiz_liz at 2:01 PM on June 28, 2015 [8 favorites]

I am so excited and thrilled by the outcome in this and have been celebrating all weekend. But Kennedy's sloppy, attention-seeking, ego-stroking legal writing strikes again. The due process and equal protection arguments at issue in these cases were not close calls; they were obvious to anyone not blinded by bigotry. He had years, YEARS of briefing on these arguments from some of the greatest legal minds of this generation to crib from and what he wrote instead was in parts a freaking Chicken Soup essay about the glories of marriage. For God's sakes when he eventually resigns from the Court can we please replace him with someone who doesn't transparently keep their ass on the fence for the personal glory and fame of being "the fifth vote." His and O'Connor's nonsensical and unnecessarily complicated opinions will go down in history as some of the most head-scratching, even when the ultimate outcome is correct. I know for a lot of people the outcome is what really matters, but for constitutional lawyers and people seeking to guard their rights in court, these poorly written opinions are awful.

Had Ginsburg written this opinion, it would have been cogent, simply reasoned, without an ounce of purple prose, and would have left ZERO opening for any reasonable critique.

(Scalia is bitter and cruel but the mean, personal jabs about Kennedy in his dissent were 100% on target.)

Oh well, back to the rainbow cake.
posted by sallybrown at 2:03 PM on June 28, 2015 [9 favorites]

Why we must continue: ISTANBUL: Police Attack Pride With Tear Gas, Water Cannons, Rubber Bullets
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 3:07 PM on June 28, 2015 [3 favorites]

Comment removed, quoting a bunch of shitty homophobic remarks you found isn't really a great idea.
posted by cortex (staff) at 4:20 PM on June 28, 2015 [4 favorites]

Very late to this thread due to various real life obstacles, but I want to be on the permanent record saying mazel tov my sisters and brothers, I give you a million hugs and smooches.
posted by Divine_Wino at 4:27 PM on June 28, 2015 [3 favorites]

We ended up way too worn out to do the parade or street festival today. Catching up on this thread has provoked some more tears.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 4:36 PM on June 28, 2015 [3 favorites]

Also from Turkey:

@KatiPiri: Don't let unacceptable police violence at #istanbulpride fade out this powerful image of respect for diversity #LGBT
posted by Golden Eternity at 4:50 PM on June 28, 2015 [2 favorites]

#BlackOutPride Action Disrupts Chicago Pride Parade
posted by desjardins at 5:44 PM on June 28, 2015 [4 favorites]

I've been celebrating by talking to people about what issues I want tackled next and how to use this decision to create more change. I really didn't expect to see marriage equality this soon!
posted by bile and syntax at 6:38 PM on June 28, 2015 [4 favorites]

I happened to be in SF this weekend for work and was able to attend about 2 hours of today's parade--I alternated between waving, cheering, and crying--sometimes all at once. The sight of so many same-sex couples in their 50s, 60s, 70s ... I just don't have the words. I feel blessed that I witnessed so much pure joy today!
posted by bookmammal at 8:34 PM on June 28, 2015 [3 favorites]

And would like to say that if your gender identity precludes the notion of being a sister or a brother at this or any particular point in time that you are my sibling and I hug and smooch you too.

And Scalia, really, Jiggery Pokery? Just gonna keep lobbing them softballs? Gonna be some state sanctioned Jiggery Pokery in the old town tonight buddy, tell you what. Biden's cranking La Roux in the Trans Am and doing donuts on your lawn, but he sends his love sweetie...
posted by Divine_Wino at 8:43 PM on June 28, 2015 [2 favorites]

After covering the marriage equality news at the top of the show, John Oliver dedicated the in-depth portion of Last Week Tonight to transgender issues. It was pretty great, and made me tear up all over again, because yes, we're not done yet, not by a long shot. And to see a fairly prominent media voice move straight from celebrating a victory to doing the equivalent of rolling up his sleeves and saying "there's still work to be done," that meant a lot to me.
posted by yasaman at 10:29 PM on June 28, 2015 [8 favorites]

Late to the party: YAY!

(My internet has been off for the past week. But I've been enjoying cackling at Republican Presidential candidates losing their shit on TV.)
posted by Jacqueline at 10:38 PM on June 28, 2015 [4 favorites]

I'm disappointed in the ongoing lack of apocalypse. It wasn't the ONLY reason I supported gay marriage in America...but I would be lying if I said it wasn't something I was looking forward to. *sigh* I guess we have to get it legal everywhere else first.
posted by Drinky Die at 10:41 PM on June 28, 2015 [3 favorites]

From India or Pakistan (I presume):

@DJWaseem: "how about this"
posted by Golden Eternity at 12:36 AM on June 29, 2015 [3 favorites]

Great pic, but I see street signs in English and a Salga NYC poster in the background, so most likely it's the US.
posted by taz at 1:02 AM on June 29, 2015 [1 favorite]

Turkish police spray LGBTI protestors with water cannon, create a rainbow
posted by Drinky Die at 1:08 AM on June 29, 2015 [2 favorites]

The rainbow is a nice irony but there's some really hard to watch videos out there of protestors getting knocked the fuck down in exactly the terrible manner you'd expect. Also pictures of people using pride flags as impromptu gas masks. Not fun.
posted by sparkletone at 1:27 AM on June 29, 2015 [3 favorites]

After covering the marriage equality news at the top of the show, John Oliver dedicated the in-depth portion of Last Week Tonight to transgender issues.

Just watched. If we can change that pesky constitution, I think I would vote for that man as President.
posted by Drinky Die at 1:56 AM on June 29, 2015 [1 favorite]

I have to half-agree, half-disagree, sallybrown. It is a bit annoying to wade through Kennedy's blather. I'd certainly prefer something tiny and laser-focused on the obvious lack of any good argument getting around the 14th amendment, like:

"The proffered rational bases are hopelessly unpersuasive. Judgment reversed."

And since I'm dreaming, maybe also add:

"Plus, how many times must a class of discrimination fail the rational basis test before qualifying for strict scrutiny? That many. From now on orientation is a protected class."

But Scalia's dissenting jabs at Kennedy were off-target, I think. This whole thing has had me skimming through Loving v Virginia, and its major cited cases, and their cited cases, and so on back a ways. And the tone of those older court decisions were far more florid and citations to precedent were much sparser. It would certainly annoy Scalia to no end how often those older courts appear to have received insight by telegram from their navels.

So for being such a supposed "originalist" Scalia's concerns about Kennedy's wandering writing are ahistorical. His attempt to reserve the privilege of "extravagances" and "mummeries" just to separate opinions is simply his own vanity.
posted by traveler_ at 3:33 AM on June 29, 2015 [3 favorites]

Philly Diner's 'Antonin
Scalia is a Douche' Brunch Special
Sells Out in Record Time
posted by ActionPopulated at 6:16 AM on June 29, 2015 [10 favorites]

Dang it, ActionPopulated, I just came in here to post that.
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:08 AM on June 29, 2015

A fun quip from the friend of a friend: "Seeing all the Conservative reactions to the marriage equality ruling is like watching a bunch of people flip you off as they board the Titanic."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:20 AM on June 29, 2015 [20 favorites]

Drinky Die: "After covering the marriage equality news at the top of the show, John Oliver dedicated the in-depth portion of Last Week Tonight to transgender issues.

Just watched. If we can change that pesky constitution, I think I would vote for that man as President."

Some of the show writers might be able to run!
posted by erratic meatsack at 9:37 AM on June 29, 2015 [1 favorite]

craven_morhead: Scalia's dissent has nothing on the crazyness of Thomas'.

Christ on a crutch. You weren't kidding.

I decided to hate-read all the dissents over the weekend, and I'll just leave this bit from Thomas' dissent here (emphasis mine).

Thomas:

Whether we define “liberty” as locomotion or freedom from governmental action more broadly, petitioners have in no way been deprived of it.

Petitioners cannot claim, under the most plausible definition of “liberty,” that they have been imprisoned or
physically restrained by the States for participating in same-sex relationships. To the contrary, they have been able to cohabitate and raise their children in peace. They have been able to hold civil marriage ceremonies in States that recognize same-sex marriages and private religious ceremonies in all States. They have been able to travel freely around the country, making their homes where they please. Far from being incarcerated or physically restrained, petitioners have been left alone to order their lives as they see fit.

posted by mandolin conspiracy at 11:26 AM on June 29, 2015 [1 favorite]

The Diane Rehm Show: Analysis Of The Supreme Court’s Landmark Decision On Same-Sex Marriage
posted by Going To Maine at 12:13 PM on June 29, 2015

Ilya Somin at The Volokh Conspiracy: Of marriage and liberty – some thoughts on Justice Thomas’ Obergefell dissent
posted by Going To Maine at 12:16 PM on June 29, 2015 [1 favorite]

Ben & Jerry rename an ice cream flavor.
posted by boo_radley at 1:14 PM on June 29, 2015 [2 favorites]

I dough love Ben & Jerry. Their ice cream is good too.
posted by Michele in California at 1:20 PM on June 29, 2015

I nearly broke my steering wheel this morning while listening to hack extraordinaire Stuart Taylor on that Diane Rehm panel concern trolling about how letting "unelected judges" (a phrase which identifies the speaker as a complete asshole with near 100% accuracy) decide the issue instead of states is somehow detrimental to the long-term welfare of same-sex couples, as if a "let the states decide" approach toward civil rights has ever shown itself to be effective in either the short or medium term. Considering that the granting of legal rights at the federal level is just the first step in a long process of ensuring equal treatment (c.f. Jim Crow, the glass ceiling, etc.) it's preposterous to suggest that we ought to pin all our hopes on the prospect of Texas and Mississippi some day coming around to allowing same-sex marriage based on popular support in those states rather than reminding them of their Constitutional obligations.

Yes, of course, we have much to fear if Republicans take the White House and install a bunch of Scalia clones who interpret the law with deference toward so-called "religious freedom" laws, etc. but it's not like this ruling changes those incentives in any way. It reminds me of how Democrats were warned not to get rid of the filibuster because then the GOP might try to use it, as if they weren't going to do that already.
posted by tonycpsu at 1:21 PM on June 29, 2015 [1 favorite]

Posner on a couple of the dissents, via Slate.
posted by craven_morhead at 1:26 PM on June 29, 2015 [2 favorites]

Rand Paul wrote (well, he's a Paul, so let's say he allowed it to be published under his name) an op-ed that tries to please both libertarians and churchy types.
posted by box at 1:38 PM on June 29, 2015

Asking Hate Groups About Marriage Equality Isn't Balance, It's Bad Journalism
posted by audi alteram partem at 2:40 PM on June 29, 2015 [6 favorites]

Rand Paul wrote (well, he's a Paul, so let's say he allowed it to be published under his name) an op-ed that tries to please both libertarians and churchy types.

In a lot of cultures, marriage is treated as a property transaction, where a man gains ownership of another man's daughter, with the decoration of religion to give the business transaction some kind of societal legitimacy. This is still also the case in some parts of the United States (see: purity rings, father-daughter balls, etc.).

Given the history of religions going along with treating women like chattel, I'm not so sure I'm comfortable with the notion of attorney generals from states like Texas, for instance, saying that organized religions should continue to decide what marriage is inside and outside of our courtrooms.

But I'm even less comfortable with the notion of "privatization" of marriage, where the whole basis of the relationship is to treat each other like property. This seems to exacerbate the current arrangement of exploitation that religion supports, one which we need to move away from.

It's a symptom of a culture where politicians like those in the Paul family ascribe personhood to corporations: every interaction of any kind between two parties gets reduced to a commercial exchange, like the premise of any Ayn Rand novel taken to its most ridiculous logical extreme. Can you imagine corporations or other private entities deciding whether or not we get to have hospital visitation rights based on, say, credit rating? Where, if you don't agree to the updated Terms of Service, your relationship and your rights become null and void?

We should keep religion out of our relationships, but especially keep corporatism ("privatization") out of our relationships, too.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 3:42 PM on June 29, 2015 [5 favorites]

26 million people changed their photos with the Facebook rainbow filter.
posted by mogget at 3:42 PM on June 29, 2015 [4 favorites]

tonycpsu: "[...] "unelected judges" (a phrase which identifies the speaker as a complete asshole with near 100% accuracy) [...]"

Oh god this. I got into it with an idiot on a friend's FB happy status update, lawyering like crazy with this phrase and treating the whole thing like an excuse for some stupid high school debate and it just drove me mad. (His personal religion didn't even have problems with the ruling! He spoke for the bigots for the bigots cannot speak!)
posted by erratic meatsack at 3:49 PM on June 29, 2015

One dispiriting effect of the Facebook rainbow filter is seeing racist Facebook comments about the confederate flag posted by people trumpeting their love of equality.
posted by sallybrown at 4:07 PM on June 29, 2015 [2 favorites]

or making snarky comments about trans rights with a rainbow icon attached. *sigh*
posted by alycoop at 4:08 PM on June 29, 2015 [6 favorites]

In his first American dictionary, Noah Webster defined marriage as “the legal union of a man and woman for life,”

Imagine being the sort of person who turns to a book published in 1806 to glean linguistic intelligence to apply to the world we live in today. Just imagine that for a moment. "American" isn't even a language!

"The literal dictionary definition of x" argument is something that even year 10 debate teams are told not to use.
posted by turbid dahlia at 4:09 PM on June 29, 2015 [9 favorites]

Scalia threw another Obergefell-related tantrum today, in a verbal dissent to the dissents in the death penalty case.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 4:45 PM on June 29, 2015 [1 favorite]

Scalia really hates having to treat other people like human beings, eh?
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 5:30 PM on June 29, 2015 [5 favorites]

I can take Scalia's snarky tone in almost any case. But it is repulsive in death penalty cases. He probably could have, on a whim, joined the four dissenters today and put a moratorium on our country's death penalty. He has lives in his hands. And it is disgusting that he makes a joke under those circumstances. I know other cases are serious and life-altering as well, but that's a line I just can't imagine any decent person crossing.
posted by sallybrown at 5:35 PM on June 29, 2015 [11 favorites]

It was a weird majority decision, too.
posted by Joe in Australia at 5:51 PM on June 29, 2015

Chief Justice Roberts’ Marriage Equality Dissent Has A Hidden Message For Conservatives
posted by homunculus at 6:35 PM on June 29, 2015 [2 favorites]

One comment deleted. I know it was a joke, but the ironic hate language thing is a problem here (as with "ironic racism," etc., this stuff is still a punch in the gut to the targeted and not terms we want to feature on the site, even though intentions are well meant).
posted by taz (staff) at 11:12 PM on June 29, 2015

(Roberts reminds me of the William Fichtner-portrayed Chief Justice from "The West Wing." I don't know if that's prescience or chance, but I'll take it either way. )
posted by From Bklyn at 1:25 AM on June 30, 2015

"The literal dictionary definition of x" argument is something that even year 10 debate teams are told not to use.

Also, in a sort of parallel with information security, this presents an interesting "attack surface" if that's how they want this to work. Rather than petitioning governments and courts for change, we should just have been going to the dictionary publishers.
posted by FishBike at 6:29 AM on June 30, 2015 [2 favorites]

(Roberts reminds me of the William Fichtner-portrayed Chief Justice from "The West Wing." I don't know if that's prescience or chance, but I'll take it either way. )

Glenn Close becomes the Chief Justice in that episode, Fichtner is the compromise to get her through.
posted by DynamiteToast at 6:48 AM on June 30, 2015

Also, in a sort of parallel with information security, this presents an interesting "attack surface" if that's how they want this to work. Rather than petitioning governments and courts for change, we should just have been going to the dictionary publishers.

Political power & societal change via redefining terms is less "interesting" and more "standard." See liberal and feminist.
posted by phearlez at 7:24 AM on June 30, 2015

(Right - about Glenn Close - I just remembered Fichtner portrayed as a 'conservative' who did not always hue to the political line... )
posted by From Bklyn at 7:49 AM on June 30, 2015

Political power & societal change via redefining terms is less "interesting" and more "standard." See liberal and feminist.

True, what I was going for was more that one of the dissenting opinions is basically making the claim that there's a single reference work from which the definition of a term like "marriage" must be used, which will guide the interpretation of any laws that use that term.

That leads to the obvious conclusion that rather than asking the court for a more current interpretation of those laws, one could just arrange to have a new edition of the dictionary published.

I wonder how that same reference work defines "person" and whether that definition includes corporations?

The key error is missing that the reference work just describes how words are used, so societal change (including supreme court rulings) would be expected to precede changes of word definitions in a book.
posted by FishBike at 8:09 AM on June 30, 2015

A piece of inspiring news from the "much more work to be done" front:

The Girl Scouts of Western Washington turned down a $100,000 donation after the donor made a startling request: “Please guarantee that our gift will not be used to support transgender girls. If you can’t, please return the money.” Despite the fact that the money could send 500 girls to Scout camp, CEO Megan Ferland told the donor that “Girl Scouts is for every girl” and returned the money.

posted by Atom Eyes at 9:31 AM on June 30, 2015 [21 favorites]

I believe it is the legal principle of "Neener Neener, you have to make me!" based on the rationale of "Gays are icky."
posted by rmd1023 at 9:37 AM on June 30, 2015 [7 favorites]

Mike Huckabee's Attack On The Supreme Court Could Work. Here's How.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:42 AM on June 30, 2015

As I understand it, state governments are protesting that demanding the issuance of same-sex marriage licenses would be an unreasonable imposition on the religious liberties of employees issuing the license. I think it's a bullshit rationale myself, but statehouses are not known for their sober judgement.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 9:49 AM on June 30, 2015

> ... someone provide a link to an article or interview where someone is discussing why some states seem to think they don't have to comply with a SCOTUS ruling?

TPM has a quick round up of the various strategies, but not much of the analysis you're looking for.
posted by benito.strauss at 10:20 AM on June 30, 2015

TPM has a quick round up of the various strategies, but not much of the analysis you're looking for.

6) The nuclear option

A 2016 election delivers a majority for the republicans in the house and senate along with the presidency. They then pass a law to expand the Supreme Court to 11 justices and confirm the most hard right wingnuts they possibly can. They then proceed to mount legal challenges to everything they don't like under the flimsiest of pretexts as standing.
posted by Talez at 10:36 AM on June 30, 2015 [2 favorites]

A 2016 election delivers a majority for the republicans in the house and senate along with the presidency.

I'm no pundit, but this scenario hardly sounds likely. For one thing, if memory serves me correctly the Republicans are defending more Senate seats this time; for another, well, look at the current field of Republican candidates -- all of whom will have to take positions well to the right of popular opinion on marriage equality (to say nothing of any number of other issues) for the benefits of the wingnuts in the primaries.
posted by Gelatin at 10:40 AM on June 30, 2015

sio42: "was there a link or can someone provide a link to an article or interview where someone is discussing why some states seem to think they don't have to comply with a SCOTUS ruling? "

Basically they all had a weekend-long temper tantrum. All states are now issuing licenses, although a few counties are holding out. Probably a couple states will slow-roll on forcing those counties into line ... whether they tell them "look just drop it and issue the licenses" or turn it into a big "BUT RELIGIOUS BELIEFS OF EMPLOYEES!!!!!" thing probably depends a lot on the local electoral calculus, whether it's better for the GOP in those states to just acquiesce and move on to a different issues, or whether there's something to be gained from loudly complaining and slow-walking a fight you know you'll lose.

Some states can semi-legitimately say they're waiting to have their federal district court hand down a decision or an order before forcing all counties to issue licenses, which is in the realm of "technically defensible but obviously splitting hairs to delay."

I think it's possible that, for at least the next few years, individual clerk's office employees will be allowed to refuse to issue the licenses on the grounds of conscience as long as there is another employee immediately available to issue the license. If all employees refuse to issue them, the duty will fall to the actual elected county clerk, who will probably be required (eventually in a court ruling) to issue the license or resign as being unable to fulfill the duties of the office. (As it will be in the job description for new hires, it will gradually quit being an issue.)

My read on the national political situation is that for the most part GOP politicians wanted to make a bunch of complaining noise about gay marriage, but don't actually want to engage in any substantive civil disobedience because they know it's a losing issue with everyone but the evangelical base, so they want to make noise to appease the evangelical base, but then do nothing about it so they don't alienate Chamber-of-Commerce Republicans or fiscal conservative Republicans or country club Republicans or whatever. I think the handful of holdouts you see at the end of this week will be actual genuine dickheads who are either crazy-religious (in the insane way, not in the super-religious way) or crazy anti-federal-government (who think the Army is invading Texas with Jade Helm) and who are not toeing the party line instructions they got from the state party. You won't really have holdouts who are just trying to score political points, or position themselves for further political battles.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 10:51 AM on June 30, 2015 [14 favorites]

if memory serves me correctly the Republicans are defending more Senate seats this time

They need to lose five to lose the senate assuming the VP is a republican.

Assuming you get Ron Johnson and Mark Kirk for free because Illinois and Wisconsin wake up from their 2010 "WE HATE A BLACK PRESIDENT!" mid-term republican senator hangovers, where do you get the other three? Toomey? Maybe if you got lucky. Rubio's old seat? Anything could happen. Ayotte? Not bloody likely. Burr? Portman? Now we're in god damned fantasy land.

If the Democrats somehow take the senate off this election it'll be a god damned miracle.
posted by Talez at 10:54 AM on June 30, 2015

I can understand most of the stuff coming from the right-wing as temper tantrum, especially Scalia's dissents. But I'm really having a hard time understanding how Thomas came to think that his dignity argument was worth anything:

Human dignity cannot be taken away by the government. Slaves did not lose their dignity (any more than they lost their humanity) because the government allowed them to be enslaved. Those held in internment camps did not lose their dignity because the government confined them. And those denied governmental benefits certainly do not lose their dignity because the government denies them those benefits. The government cannot bestow dignity, and it cannot take it away.

To me this sounds like saying that if someone pulls out a gun and demands your money, but you run away, then you weren't really robbed. Legal nerds, is there some actual sound basis behind this, or is Thomas the victim of epistemic closure?
posted by benito.strauss at 11:02 AM on June 30, 2015

Mike Huckabee's Attack On The Supreme Court Could Work. Here's How.

That article has some problems. Not least of which that, were Huckabee to ever ignore a SCOTUS ruling, we'd immediately be placed in a Constitutional crisis that only the Supreme Court could rule on. So unless he implemented a putsch and set up his dream theocracy, he'd get removed from office pretty fast, if he tried it. Evangelicals don't run the country any more.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 11:40 AM on June 30, 2015

Not only does the article have some problems, it hardly indicates an overwhelming swell of support for Huckabee's position. At best (meaning if NOT attributed to Huckabee), the poll the article discusses says:

In particular, it made evangelicals who supported same-sex marriage (26 percent of this sample) more likely to favor eliminating the Court’s ability to overturn the will of the people . . . and [o]verall, support for the president’s prerogative to ignore the Court increased by 25 percent.

Moreover, Huckabee's position didn't affect these folks if his name was used.

So even in a likely support base, this nullification argument has effects, but hardly indicates a real political threat to the court's supremacy.
posted by bearwife at 12:00 PM on June 30, 2015

> I think the handful of holdouts you see at the end of this week will be actual genuine dickheads who are either crazy-religious (in the insane way, not in the super-religious way) or crazy anti-federal-government (who think the Army is invading Texas with Jade Helm) and who are not toeing the party line instructions they got from the state party. You won't really have holdouts who are just trying to score political points, or position themselves for further political battles.

It's been pretty interesting these last few days looking at the more conservative stuff that passes through my feedreader. And, ok, the country, and the religious culture of the country, has shifted massively on this question in the last 10-15 years. But there is a conservative Christian contingent out there - not necessarily identical with evangelicals, though I'm sure it includes a lot of them, along with Catholics, Orthodox, the right-wing end of some mainline protestant denominations, etc. - that is deeply aggrieved and racked with something approaching existential terror at this decision.

I'm thinking of guys like Rod Dreher, who has been beating the drum for a sort of withdrawal by orthodox Christians from society, and a mindset geared towards creating some sort of sanctuary for their values and preferences, with a kind of survivor / persecution / whatever mindset, and is weaving SSM and the supposed totalitarian dominance of not-homophobic values into the narrative around this idea. You get a lot of titles like Democracy Is Dying; Persecution Is Coming.

Is Dreher a dickhead, and/or crazy? I mean, probably, yes, in effect. There's some kind of deep, ugly sickness in the shape and depth of his obsessions. His reasoning about what sexuality is and what marriage is and how democratic societies should function all seem profoundly wrong and grotesquely contorted in a lot of ways, even if he's more civilized in his articulation than coarser run-of-the-mill homophobes. But I think there's a group of people out there who are grappling with what they see as an entire civilization that has become intrinsically hostile to their values. And the thing is, they're kind of right, by their own lights. There's enough poison in their understanding that when the poison starts to leach out of society at large, there's not really any other way for them to read it but as hostility to their way of life. Not that this is a new strain of thought - I know it's a variation on one of the oldest memes Christianity has going - but it's going to be interesting where this goes, what they do with it and what kind of subcultural isolation they inflict on their children. Especially since there are people involved in that conversation with real intellectual pull, compelling rhetorical abilities, and enough cultural capital to generate movement energy.

Maybe this doesn't matter very much. Maybe this is a fringe that will marginalize itself out of existence in half a century or so, whatever the human cost of its attempts to maintain itself. But I can't help thinking about all the ugliness that spun out from embittered resistance to the midcentury struggles of desegregation / voting rights / etc., or the feminism of that moment and later, into the religious culture of right now.

We do still have a very long ways to go. Moments like the current one are valuable in part because of how much they throw that fact into relief.
posted by brennen at 12:49 PM on June 30, 2015

brennen: "Is Dreher a dickhead, and/or crazy? ... Not that this is a new strain of thought - I know it's a variation on one of the oldest memes Christianity has going - but it's going to be interesting where this goes, what they do with it and what kind of subcultural isolation they inflict on their children. Especially since there are people involved in that conversation with real intellectual pull, compelling rhetorical abilities, and enough cultural capital to generate movement energy."

Just to clarify, the "dickheads" comment was meant to refer to individuals who both refuse to issue same-sex marriage licenses for reasons of religious conscience (or anti-federalism conscience) AND insist on remaining in their jobs as a county clerk employee responsible for issuing same-sex marriage licenses. Someone who resigns their job rather than issue the licenses is obviously not someone who shares my beliefs, but I respect their right to their beliefs and their decision to live by them.

Most conservative Christians who feel very strongly about same-sex marriages and are employed in clerks' offices either 1) accept the authority of the Supreme Court and abide by its order, even if they don't like it; or 2) resign rather than comply. (I speak from the experience of my own state legalizing civil unions and then same-sex marriage; people who felt strongly it was wrong, but were employed in government jobs where they were required to facilitate it, either accepted it as properly-enacted law that they could internally disapprove of while still complying with, or they agonized over it and finally chose to resign. I do know people who made this choice.) The dickhead-ery is when you both refuse to accept the law AND refuse to resign. It's not like the gays are coming to your house and demanding to get married in your living room; they're just asking you to do your actual, and optional, job. It's not like you were drafted into the mandatory processing of government documents.

Dreher (while possibly a dickhead for other reasons) seems to advocate the withdrawal of Christians from political institutions with which they disagree, which is one of the oldest ideas going in Christianity, and totally well-developed in the United States among groups like the Amish, or some Peace Christians who live deliberately in poverty to avoid paying taxes to the military-industrial context, or others. "Opting out" of the surrounding society and avoiding doing more than the minimum necessary to comply with its laws is, to me, a totally fine moral choice that I have no beef with (even when I disagree with the beliefs underlying that decision).
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 2:49 PM on June 30, 2015 [10 favorites]

Just to clarify, the "dickheads" comment was meant to refer to individuals who both refuse to issue same-sex marriage licenses for reasons of religious conscience (or anti-federalism conscience) AND insist on remaining in their jobs as a county clerk employee responsible for issuing same-sex marriage licenses. Someone who resigns their job rather than issue the licenses is obviously not someone who shares my beliefs, but I respect their right to their beliefs and their decision to live by them.

Yeah, on re-read, sorry to interpret this overbroadly.
posted by brennen at 3:19 PM on June 30, 2015

Same-Sex Marriage Is Not Sexual Liberation
posted by the man of twists and turns at 7:42 PM on June 30, 2015 [1 favorite]

five fresh fish: "I am shocked to discover Canada legalized gay marriage in 2005. I could have sworn it was in the nineties. I am very disappointed that it happened so late.
"

Ya, we talked about it here in 2003 when things first started getting rolling. Too be fair Canada was the third country to legalize it so even though it came seemingly late we were still out at the front of the wave.
posted by Mitheral at 7:43 PM on June 30, 2015

Why should religious people be giving out marriage licenses in the first place? Didn't Paul write in the New Testament that the unmarried should stay unmarried?
posted by salvia at 7:43 PM on June 30, 2015 [1 favorite]

Ah, I see your mistake, salvia - you're actually reading the Bible rather than letting Glenn Beck or Rush Limbaugh tell you what it says.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:57 PM on June 30, 2015 [5 favorites]

Didn't Paul write in the New Testament that the unmarried should stay unmarried?

But if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn.

1 Corinthians 7:9

Which seems to apply to all marriages, so…
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:00 PM on June 30, 2015

benito.strauss: To me this sounds like saying that if someone pulls out a gun and demands your money, but you run away, then you weren't really robbed. Legal nerds, is there some actual sound basis behind this, or is Thomas the victim of epistemic closure?

Not the answer you're looking for, but this article goes into a bit more detail on Thomas's reasoning: Of marriage and liberty – some thoughts on Justice Thomas’ Obergefell dissent
posted by Going To Maine at 8:03 PM on June 30, 2015 [1 favorite]

Ah! I was wondering if Jonathan Rauch would have something to say, and I'm glad he did.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:59 PM on June 30, 2015

Why should religious people be giving out marriage licenses in the first place?

They don't, in Canada. The license is a government contract. You aren't married without it. The religious stuff is just ceremony, it doesn't count as a legal contract. That's why there's a brief interlude after the vows, where the couple go sign the document and the minister witnesses it. (AFAIK, having witnessed several weddings, but still living common law.)
posted by five fresh fish at 10:02 PM on June 30, 2015

The license is a government contract. You aren't married without it. The religious stuff is just ceremony, it doesn't count as a legal contract.

As far as I understand, it's the same in Italy. (Though I'd say the religious ceremony is not "just ceremony," but a separate ritual.) The legal ceremony and the religious ceremony are separate, and that's in the country that popularized Christianity. I think it's a good system.
posted by jaguar at 10:08 PM on June 30, 2015 [1 favorite]

Why should religious people be giving out marriage licenses in the first place?

All religious people are not Christians and most religious people have no difficulty doing their jobs because of their beliefs.
posted by zarq at 6:32 AM on July 1, 2015 [6 favorites]

Can any legal types weigh in on the possible relevance of Scalia's majority opinion in EMPLOYMENT DIV., ORE. DEPT. OF HUMAN RES. v. SMITH, (1990) to future cases involving state employees who don't want to grant same-sex marriage licenses? He even threw this in: ""Our cases do not at their farthest reach support the proposition that a stance of conscientious opposition relieves an objector from any colliding duty fixed by a democratic government." Gillette v. United States, supra, at 461. ... To make an individual's obligation to obey such a law contingent upon the law's coincidence with his religious beliefs, except where the State's interest is "compelling" - permitting him, by virtue of his beliefs, "to become a law unto himself," Reynolds v. United States, 98 U.S., at 167 - contradicts both constitutional tradition and common sense."
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:58 AM on July 1, 2015 [2 favorites]

They don't, in Canada. The license is a government contract. You aren't married without it. The religious stuff is just ceremony, it doesn't count as a legal contract. That's why there's a brief interlude after the vows, where the couple go sign the document and the minister witnesses it. (AFAIK, having witnessed several weddings, but still living common law.)

It's the same in the US. The government issues marriage licenses, not religious institutions. Officiants sign them to confirm they've joined two people in matrimony.
posted by zarq at 7:32 AM on July 1, 2015

It's the same in the US. The government issues marriage licenses, not religious institutions. Officiants sign them to confirm they've joined two people in matrimony.

Kind of. Depending on your state, your officiant may be required to file papers with the state proving that they have the power to marry within the bounds of a religious institution (IE, they have to be considered an ordained minister). That religious institution can be an online church whose one belief is that everyone should be able to officiate weddings, but it's still considered a church, and causes issues for people.
posted by dinty_moore at 7:42 AM on July 1, 2015

Wait, I was under the impression that judges, court clerks and justices of the peace could perform marriages in every US state. Am I wrong?
posted by zarq at 8:12 AM on July 1, 2015

Correct, there are civil marriage options in every state in the US. This may be different in other countries.
posted by jessamyn at 8:18 AM on July 1, 2015

That's what I thought. Thanks!
posted by zarq at 8:20 AM on July 1, 2015

Yey Canada! I wonder how long until the US follows suit?

*sits, holds breath*
posted by widdershins at 11:07 AM on June 18, 2003 [+] [!]

Has anyone checked on widdershins lately?
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:06 AM on July 1, 2015 [11 favorites]

Can any legal types weigh in on the possible relevance of Scalia's majority opinion in EMPLOYMENT DIV., ORE. DEPT. OF HUMAN RES. v. SMITH, (1990) to future cases involving state employees who don't want to grant same-sex marriage licenses?

Congress pretty much undid Smith with the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. RFRA requires courts to basically apply strict scrutiny, like they would have before Smith, even though the Constitution doesn't require them to do so.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 9:43 AM on July 1, 2015 [1 favorite]

From India or Pakistan (I presume):

@DJWaseem: "how about this"

About that photo:

@Vasheezy: Hey if you see that photo/buzzfeed article of the two gay men holding India and Pakistan flags kissing, PLEASE don't share it.
@Vasheezy: I know one of the men in that photo and he doesn't want it spreading for personal reasons. Don't out people like this.

posted by Lexica at 10:08 AM on July 1, 2015 [2 favorites]

hippybear is correct, and anti-gay marriage groups intentionally try to blur this distinction in order to somehow argue that gay marriage is an imposition on religious groups who are not in favor of it.

[...]

Conflating these two was an intentional choice by the anti-gay marriage crowd to confuse voters.

Very true. If the Canadian experience is any guide, you can look forward to a few more years of these jokers banging on about this.

To the limited extent it happens, whenever there's a case of someone discriminating against a same-sex couple in Canada, our relatively small Christian Right goes into overdrive trying to position it as a "religious freedom" issue, despite the matter being settled in Canadian law for a long time now. (pdf)

Given the relative size and power of the US Christian Right, forecasts call for continuing showers of bullshit with periods of asshattery.

It took a while to finish slapping down arguments from marriage commissioners who cited "religious beliefs" as justification for their refusal to marry same-sex couples.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 10:12 AM on July 1, 2015 [2 favorites]

I think it's deeper than that. "Protection of marriage," was a big bait and switch for conservatives, passed in response to a handful of strictly local initiatives and court cases where same-sex partnerships were given consideration in narrowly defined contexts such as adoption, custody, and power of attorney. Indiana has been a case example of this the last few years. Cultural Conservatives take their ball and go home rather than vote on a weakened amendment that would be limited to only marriage.

With marriage falling under the equal protection clause, conservatives are switching to a religious liberty argument. Which as before, isn't really about religious liberty but about preserving loopholes for discrimination.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 10:17 AM on July 1, 2015 [2 favorites]

It does vary from location to location, but I think the end result is pretty much the same nationwide -- marriage licenses are issued by the State, but someone (whether they be State officials or a recognized other party) has to actually "perform" the marriage

Well, it depends on what you mean by the end result.

All civil marriages have marriage licenses that are issued by the state. But depending on the state, you either have to get married by a justice of the peace (Zarq is correct on that), or by an ordained minister. (For example, here are the requirements for Minnesota for officiating/ordination credentials). So, unless you're getting married by a Judge or a court official, you're getting married by a religious authority, even if it's your cousin who was given the religious authority by the internet.

Another selection of states technically require you to be able to perform religious marriage in your religion in order to perform civil marriage, but they don't check anything. There's a map here.

This distinction is important because there are many, many people out there who belong to religions where being able to perform a religious wedding is not something just anyone in the religious community can do - so they also are not allowed to perform a civil ceremony unless they get ordained by another church in another religion.

Or: the bullshit reason why my first choice of officiant was unable to peform my marriage, since we're still working on the separation of church and state thing.
posted by dinty_moore at 10:20 AM on July 1, 2015

My (same-sex) wife and I were on vacation at a theme park with our 3 kids when this decision came out. My second thought (after YAY!!!) was crap, I can't believe I'm going to miss the real-life unfolding of a sure-to-be epic MetaFilter thread. I'm way late to the party here, but couldn't miss the opportunity to participate in this thread in my very small way.

When Obama was elected, I cried to think that my children (then 2 years and 6 months, respectively) would grow up in a world where the first president they knew was black - that in their lives, that would never be a hurdle to overcome. For this momentous decision, they were old enough to understand and whoop with joy that their parents' marriage would now be recognized in every state, not just the one we live in.

I have read almost all the comments in this thread today and have teared up, over and over again. Thank you to all the MeFites who shared their stories, their support and their joy!
posted by widdershins at 10:31 AM on July 1, 2015 [26 favorites]

As long as the government provides the option of having a JP or other officiant witness/authorize the marriage, it's all good. Any issues with getting a religious officiant to participate are between the couple and their church. The government need not and should not be involved in resolving that issue.

I agree - which is why the ordination requirement for civil ceremonies is bullshit. Why is it important to the state to have someone performing a civil ceremony have the power to perform a religious ceremony at all? Just change the ordination requirement to a license to officiate and separate the damn things.
posted by dinty_moore at 10:43 AM on July 1, 2015 [5 favorites]

Quebec has a pretty good system for this:

Some couples may wish to have their marriage or civil union solemnized by someone special to them [...] When this is the case, the person concerned must be authorized by the Minister of Justice to perform the ceremony. The intended spouses and the person they have chosen as officiant must complete the form entitled Request for the Designation of an Officiant of a Marriage or Civil Union (available in courthouses) and send it to the Direction générale des services de justice of the Ministère de la Justice, preferably three months before the date of the ceremony.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 11:00 AM on July 1, 2015 [3 favorites]

beyonce's pride video
posted by nadawi at 11:16 AM on July 1, 2015 [5 favorites]

Data points on officiants:

* My wife and I were married in Massachusetts by her brother, under MA's one-day officiant rules. No religion involved.
* Pennsylvania does not even require an officiant - just two witnesses - under our self-uniting marriage rules.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:19 PM on July 1, 2015 [2 favorites]

Why should religious people be giving out marriage licenses in the first place?

All religious people are not Christians and most religious people have no difficulty doing their jobs because of their beliefs.

Yeah, that was sloppily worded on my part, my bad. I didn't mean to imply either of those things.
posted by salvia at 12:42 PM on July 1, 2015 [1 favorite]

* My wife and I were married in Massachusetts by her brother, under MA's one-day officiant rules.

If I were your brother-in-law, I would go around telling people that I married my sister - legally!
posted by Joe in Australia at 4:33 PM on July 1, 2015 [1 favorite]

Episcopalians vote overwhelmingly to allow gay marriage.
posted by dirigibleman at 9:27 PM on July 1, 2015 [11 favorites]

I can't help but notice that that story was filed from Salt Lake City.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:42 PM on July 1, 2015

Congress pretty much undid Smith with the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

Congress and Bill Clinton. Don't forget it was ultimately Clinton's decision.

Their undoing of Scalia's Smith decision also led to Hobby Lobby.

Also note: the dissenters in Smith were Justices Blackmun, Brennan, and Marshall — all considered staunch liberals (Blackmun wrote the majority opinion in Roe v. Wade, Marshall won Brown v. Board of Education as a lawyer before joining the Court, etc.).
posted by John Cohen at 7:41 AM on July 6, 2015 [1 favorite]

Hm. Apparently these have been up for two months now. I'm sad I didn't look for them until today.

Obergefell v. Hodges (2015) Part 1 - US Supreme Court (put to John Oliver Dogs Clips)

Obergefell v. Hodges (2015) Part 2 / Recognition - US Supreme Court (put to John Oliver Dogs Clips)
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 11:22 AM on July 6, 2015 [2 favorites]

The Onion: Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito Realize They Will Be Villains In Oscar-Winning Movie One Day

Life may imitate satire.
posted by John Cohen at 10:06 PM on July 7, 2015

The Space for Grace and the Space for Neutrality After Obergefell v. Hodges
posted by the man of twists and turns at 11:09 AM on July 8, 2015

After gay marriage, expect conservative amnesia, Jonathan Merritt, via Same-Sex Marriage, America And You: A Reading List
posted by the man of twists and turns at 12:37 AM on July 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

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