Sarah Cantin | Long road to equality

Almost two weeks ago, many in this country stood up and chanted, "Yes we can!" The more accurate claim might have been, "Yes, some of us can."

Some of us can marry, that is. On Nov. 4, three states passed measures to ban same-sex marriage, and none has proved more controversial than California's Proposition 8. Both sides spent a combined $73 million campaigning - the most ever expended for a ballot measure on a social issue.

While news outlets celebrated Barack Obama's victory as a milestone for social equality, I couldn't help feeling that elation undercut by the passage of Proposition 8. Fifty-four years ago, the Supreme Court ruled that separate can never be equal, and yet even as we elect our first black president, we continue to invoke this rhetoric when talking about gay marriage.

Take Protectmarriage.com, the coalition Web site supporting California's ban, which claims, "Proposition 8 does not take away any rights from gay and lesbian domestic partners." Really? When you tell someone that they don't have the right to a basic human practice, it begs the conclusion Melissa Etheridge reached - "I am not a full citizen."

English professor Heather Love specializes in Queer Studies, and though she calls the ban in California a "setback," she also highlights how "the climate around gay issues has changed so radically in the past five or 10 years" and emphasizes that "it will keep changing."

Associate director of Penn's LGBT Center Erin Cross adds that Penn has been at the collegiate forefront of that change. She believes "students who identify as sexual or gendered minorities, on the whole, feel comfortable here." The Advocate College Guide for LGBT Students agrees, giving Penn a 20 out of 20 GPA (Gay Point Average).

While the LGBT Center dedicates its resources to on-campus programming, Cross acknowledges that "off-campus issues affect us, especially legal ones."

Just as the election of a black president does not guarantee the death of racism, a high "GPA" does not protect the civil liberties of our LGBT community, especially beyond the University's borders. And though we at Penn talk up equality in public, are we as nondiscriminatory behind closed doors - or behind voting-booth curtains?

I worry that both Penn and the nation could become complacent, reveling in our successes instead of questioning where we must improve. College senior and California native Alex Kwan believes Proposition 8 has only raised awareness of social justice issues, reminding me, "You can't win all of your battles in one day."

You can't. But in an election so marked by progress, by a fundamental belief in our country's ability to right its wrongs (both historical and current), I am disturbed by this insistence that the government should restrict how certain individuals solidify their relationships. Is the sanctity of marriage really more violated by a same-sex couple affirming their life-long commitment than by a drunk guy and girl saying "I do" at a tacky Las Vegas chapel - only to get an annulment days later?

Both Cross and Love suggest all legally recognized partnerships be termed civil unions, leaving marriage to the jurisdiction of faith communities, not the law. Given that religious groups were the most fervent supporters of Proposition 8 - and that we are a nation founded upon a separation of church and state - such a solution makes logical sense.

But as Obama's campaign taught us, words matter. However flawed, marriage - as a word, a practice and an institution - carries unbelievable symbolic weight. Tell a married heterosexual couple that their bond is now a civil union, and they'll probably feel like they've been downgraded.

Separate is still not equal. Fifty years ago, the color of our skin determined our civil rights. Today, it's who and how we love. That's not change - that's more of the same.

Sarah Cantin is a College senior from Boston, Mass. Her e-mail is cantin@dailypennsylvanian.com. Candid Cantin appears on alternating Mondays.

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