The passion
I'll warn you in advance this is a whining post, so skip it if you don't want to hear me bitch. There's plenty other stuff to read, just scroll down the page...
Anyway, the cost of a wedding license in Kansas is $50.00
Dave and I today got our powers of attorney updated. That cost us $600.00.
In return for that, we get a document that affords us perhaps 5% of the rights present in a marriage license.
Unlike a marriage license, the powers of attorney have to be re-drawn every few years to account for esoteric changes in state law, and they can in theory be ignored by a rogue judge in a way a marriage license cannot be ignored.
So we paid 1200% more for documents which are much weaker then what any heterosexual couple can get for half a c-note and 10 minutes at any country courthouse.
It is very frustrating. A committed gay couple can (if lucky) live their lives surrounded by supportive friends and family and almost -- just almost -- forget that they live in a society where they are not protected under the laws. But every now and then you are reminded -- bam! -- that you are separate and very much unequal. Sometimes it is a magazine article or a thoughtless action by a stranger or a bigot quoted on the TV news. It is seeing over and over again that, as the poem says, the worst are full of passionate intensity to strip away what rights we have gained over time.
Other times, it is the law smacking you in the face right where you live.
I pray Dave and I never actually need the meager legal protection of our powers of attorney, but that is still better then nothing. Perhaps we will live long enough to see the day down the road when American makes true her promise to us just as she has done in the past to so many others who have dreamed of liberty.
I'll warn you in advance this is a whining post, so skip it if you don't want to hear me bitch. There's plenty other stuff to read, just scroll down the page...
Anyway, the cost of a wedding license in Kansas is $50.00
Dave and I today got our powers of attorney updated. That cost us $600.00.
In return for that, we get a document that affords us perhaps 5% of the rights present in a marriage license.
Unlike a marriage license, the powers of attorney have to be re-drawn every few years to account for esoteric changes in state law, and they can in theory be ignored by a rogue judge in a way a marriage license cannot be ignored.
So we paid 1200% more for documents which are much weaker then what any heterosexual couple can get for half a c-note and 10 minutes at any country courthouse.
It is very frustrating. A committed gay couple can (if lucky) live their lives surrounded by supportive friends and family and almost -- just almost -- forget that they live in a society where they are not protected under the laws. But every now and then you are reminded -- bam! -- that you are separate and very much unequal. Sometimes it is a magazine article or a thoughtless action by a stranger or a bigot quoted on the TV news. It is seeing over and over again that, as the poem says, the worst are full of passionate intensity to strip away what rights we have gained over time.
Other times, it is the law smacking you in the face right where you live.
I pray Dave and I never actually need the meager legal protection of our powers of attorney, but that is still better then nothing. Perhaps we will live long enough to see the day down the road when American makes true her promise to us just as she has done in the past to so many others who have dreamed of liberty.
posted by Mike at
1:38 AM
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