Connecticut ruling overturns ban on gay marriage.

In this ad, Mom’s not worried ’cause her kid aspires to marry a “princess” and not “the winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics.” She’s worried ’cause her kid is a girl. That, according to supporters of California’s Prop. 8 is what will happen if the anti-gay-marriage measure fails. Homos getting married! Your children going gay! Cats and dogs living together! Total chaos! (Nothing about what kids learn from growing up in a state where discrimination is written into the law.)

Palate-cleanser:  NoOnProp8.com.

YIKES. Seems Pitt’s pet cause — a deeply important one — is in trouble, according to SFGate.com (scroll down to second item):

A poll sponsored by CBS 5-TV indicates that California voters now favor passage of Proposition 8, the constitutional amendment to ban same sex “I do’s,” by 47 to 42 percent.

The poll of 670 registered voters taken by Survey USA is a big shift from one taken just last month by the Public Policy Institute of California. That one showed Prop. 8 losing, 55 to 41 percent.

Advocates of same-sex marriage over at the No on 8 campaign say their tracking polls show the same trend, with the ban now leading, 47 to 43 percent. The Yes on 8 campaign happily reports that it’s seeing a shift as well.

One explanation? Well, the latest poll was taken a few days after Prop. 8 proponents put commercials on the air featuring Newsom celebrating the state Supreme Court’s ruling legalizing same-sex marriage by half-yelling, half-growling to a City Hall crowd, “This door’s wide open now! It’s gonna happen – whether you like it or not!”

The same ads show a law professor warning that if the measure passes, it could jeopardize the tax-exempt status of churches and lead to “gay marriage taught in public schools.”

Same-sex marriage proponents dispute both arguments — but the ad does seem to be working.

Learn more — and take action — here. There’s even a wedding registry!

>heart!<

Brad Pitt announced Wednesday that he’s donating $100,000 to fight California’s Proposition 8, a November ballot initiative that would eliminate same-sex couples’ right to marry.

“Because no one has the right to deny another their life, even though they disagree with it, because everyone has the right to live the life they so desire if it doesn’t harm another and because discrimination has no place in America, my vote will be for equality and against Proposition 8,” the actor said in a statement.

Pitt’s donation marks the largest thus far to the anti-Prop. 8 campaign by an A-list celebrity.

Via LA Times.

cares enough to send the very gayest!

Send ’em a thank you card!

Courtney E. Martin had an interesting piece at The American Prospect the other day about the ways in which the legalization — here and there (but not there) — of gay marriage and has prompted her to reevaluate her own aversion to the tying of the knot. As a feminist wary of wedlock myself, I can’t help but nod along with her argument that historically, marriage is both heterosexist and just plain sexist. At the same time, it’s hard for a straight gal to condemn an institution that once considered women property at the same time that her gay friends are happily flocking to California to make their love public, official, and legit in the eyes of the very law that heretofore shut them out.

(more…)

Via Broadsheet:

Turns out there’s an old law on the books in Wisconsin that prohibits couples from leaving the state to marry and returning with a union that’s not valid in Wisconsin. Not sure this is what the drafters in 1915 had in mind, but this would apparently include going to California, say, to marry a partner of the same sex and then coming home to the Badger State. The offense: fraud, carrying a penalty of up to nine months of jail time and a fine of up to $10K.

Would anyone actually want to prosecute them? Ya, shore, you betcha. “Someone has to prosecute them,” Julaine Appling of the Wisconsin Anti-Fraud Family Council told CNN. “That’s a defrauding of the government.”

See you in court, say Wisconsin couple Kathy Cox and Kim Whalen, who, having been together for 20 years, plan to visit CA to tie the knot in August. “The pioneers get the arrows, and the settlers get the land,” they told CNN. “So we’ll take a few arrows.”

Break out the Barolo! According to Italy’s new minister for equal opportunities, gays in that country no longer suffer discrimination. Well then! What will she do for the rest of the day?

From yesterday’s International Herald Tribune:

Italy’s new minister for equal opportunities has angered rights groups by refusing to back a “gay pride” march because, she said, gays no longer suffer discrimination in Italy.

The appointment of Mara Carfagna, a 32-year-old former Miss Italy contestant and television showgirl, to the equal opportunities post was seen by some rights groups as a deliberate provocation by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

Carfagna said in comments published Monday that she would not back the June gay pride event in Bologna because “gay prides are pointless.”

“Homosexuality is no longer a problem, at least not the way the organizers of these demonstrations would have us believe,” Carfagna said. “Gay pride’s only aim is official recognition for homosexual couples, on the same level with marriage. I cannot agree to that.”

Riddle: What’s the opposite of a breakup?

Answer: Frequently married — to each other! — porn star Annie Sprinkle and butch multi-media artist Elizabeth Stephens.

Yep, the super-committed couple is at it again — for the fourth time, and they’re counting. Yesterday marked the momentous occasion of Annie and Beth’s wedding — their fourth annual, this one with a green eco-love theme.

As part of a seven-year project of their collaboration the Love Art Lab, Sprinkles and Stevens get married once a year for seven years. Each wedding corresponds to the color and properties of one of the seven chakras.

Just a few of the reasons Annie and Beth’s relationship might inspire the pants off you:

They met when they were younger but fell in love “later in life;” they are a successful collaborative team; they turn love and sex into art; they aren’t afraid of love or commitment, or at least do a bang-up job of overcoming those fears; the hell — the first three times – with the ban on gay marriage; Annie beat breast cancer in their first year of marriage; they are openly sex-positive; they tried to have a baby but when it didn’t work opted for a black lab; they encourage others by sharing their story; they are just cute as pie.

And now that gay marriage has been legalized in California (finally!) their lastest nuptial might spread love into the world with more than costumes and performance art. After all, what says “Congratulations on your continued connubiality” more than shared health benefits and hospital visitation rights?

You know you want to see pictures from weddings one, two and three….

Now, thanks to the California Supreme Court, you can — as you’ve likely heard by now — get married somewhere other than Massachusetts. Yes, there may be icky political repercussions down the line, but for now let us just say: mazal tov!