Breaking: Anti-Defamation League takes anti-defamation position
Here at Jewschool, we’ve been talking smack about the “Anti”-Defamation League, and justifiably so. So it’s only fair that we also give them credit when they come out on the good side.
Today, the ADL filed an amicus brief in Perry v. Schwarzenegger, the case in which California’s Proposition 8 (prohibiting same-sex marriage) was ruled unconstitutional in federal district court, which has been appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and will be argued on December 6. The ADL’s brief is in support of upholding the lower court’s decision. It focuses on a specific argument that I hadn’t heard before (and I’ve been following the case fairly closely): California currently has marriage exclusively for opposite-sex couples and domestic partnership exclusively for same-sex couples. California citizens in domestic partnerships have to indicate “domestic partner” as their marital status when filling out forms (and can’t mark “married” or “single”), and are therefore required to disclose their sexual orientation in all sorts of irrelevant circumstances, violating their right to privacy. Furthermore, “the segregated system required by Proposition 8 and the disclosure of sexual orientation that results from that system are particularly damaging because gays and lesbians are subject to invidious discrimination and violence based on their homosexuality.”
Kudos to the ADL for standing up against defamation!
that is actually a pretty interesting argument.
However, if gay marriage is legalized, their gay identities would also be revealed because marriage licenses are public documents. So in what way is a seperate civil marriage track any worse when it comes to disclosing sexual orientation?
Very interesting argument: An argument against discrimination based on the concept that discrimination exists.
Yerachmeil, here are some examples listed in the brief where someone might be required to disclose their sexual orientation in a situation where it would normally be irrelevant: Filling out payroll, applying for auto insurance, medical history surveys, public university enrollment applications, bank account forms, loan applications, serving on a jury, and serving as a court witness.
In addition, in CA the registry of domestic partners for the entire state is available on a CD for $20 and includes the couples addresses. Marriage licenses require going county by county and don’t include home addresses. So yes, there are very clear practical differences.
Dan writes:
Yerachmeil, here are some examples listed in the brief where someone might be required to disclose their sexual orientation in a situation where it would normally be irrelevant: Filling out payroll, applying for auto insurance, medical history surveys, public university enrollment applications, bank account forms, loan applications, serving on a jury, and serving as a court witness.
Of course, one could ask why it’s relevant in those situations to ask about marital status, period (though that’s not the issue before the court right now).
Yerachmiel, whatever the functional differences are or are not between civil unions and marriage, there’s an issue of semantics that is understandably important to some gay people.
They want to be married, not civilly unionized. Separate but equal is not, as we have learned in America, actually equal.
Let’s call a spade a spade and a marriage a marriage, not a civil union.
Yerachmiel – I may be naive, but I’m assuming it’s pretty rare for a business or agency who asks if you’re married or not to then follow up and actually check the public records on you. So yes, marriage records are public, but that doesn’t mean people are checking them very often.
Likewise, it’s considered rude for someone to ask how much I paid for my house, but if they really want to know, it’s a public record.
Just because something is a public record doesn’t mean it’s ethical or reasonable for it to be disclosed in all contexts at all times.
I would ask you how much you paid for your house. Then again, I might ask you if you’re gay. But I’d probably first try to look up your marriage license. ;-P
Every day, in lots of little, non-newsworthy ways, the ADL battles prejudice, extremisim and bigotry. They educate law enforcement about right-wing extremist groups, they educate public school teachers about the shoah, they launch anti-bullying initiatives and monitor online hate sites. They’ve been doing it since 1913.
Once in a long while a member of their leadership takes a lamentably right-leaning stand on a particular issue, and a blogosphere heretofore totally uninterested in the ADL or their work suddenly goes apeshit. And Jewschool in particular posts about it ad nauseum.
They blog about it so much, and tar the whole of the ADL so frequently, and so thoroughly disregard the ADL’s true mission and downplay the majority of the ADL’s day-to-day efforts, that a development such as this one re: gay marriage is deemed noteworthy by the Jewschool editors.
Forest, trees. Only a blog with as myopic a view of this venerable institution’s actual work as Jewschool would find it blogworthy that the ADL has taken a stand against anti-gay bigotry.
For the ADL itself, it’s just business as usual.
If they’ve been educating about the Shoah since 1913, why did no one listen before it was too late?
“Every day, in lots of little, non-newsworthy ways, the ADL battles prejudice, extremisim and bigotry….they’ve been doing it since 1913.”
Classy comment, though.