Census Shows Surge in Gay Couples in Virginia and Marryland

The census data has some bad news for the Christian Taliban crowd at The Family Foundation and for professional homophobes Bob Marshall and Ken Cuccinelli: the number of self-identifying same sex couples in Virginia has increased 49%. Thus, Marshall's admitted hope to drive gays from Virginia seems to be failing. Indeed, only one Virginia county in the far southwest of the state did not reveal any gay couples. Much of the increase stems from couples being more open about who they are in census returns. I predict that with the end of DADT next month, the census numbers will surge again in areas with heavy military populations such as Hampton Roads given that there are many gays and lesbians in the military who currently would never self-identify on census returns. Some are even couples where both are members of the military. And many couples have children to the likely horror of the Bible beaters. Here are highlights from the Washington Post:

The number of people who identify themselves as part of a same-sex couple has soared over the past decade in what demographers say is the product of an aggressive outreach effort by the Census Bureau and growing cultural acceptance.

In Virginia, the census counted 20,500 same-sex couples, a 49 percent increase that amounts to 1.2 percent of couples in the state. In both states [Maryland and Virginia], the number of heterosexual married couples increased only modestly.

In Maryland and Virginia, most of the same-sex couples live in urban neighborhoods. Baltimore and Richmond show the highest levels, and the Washington suburbs are close behind. In some Baltimore neighborhoods, as many as 14 percent of couples are gay and lesbian.

he census shows that gay and lesbian couples are present in every county in both states. And gay families with minor children were counted in every jurisdiction except for one sparsely-populated Virginia county near the West Virginia border.

Though their numbers are smaller, gay and lesbian couples with children show up at higher rates in many rural areas. Gates said that is because many of them had an earlier relationship and child with someone of the opposite sex.

Alison Page and her partner, Leanne Wells, left Virginia when they moved from Centreville to Laurel in 2004 after they decided to have children. Paige gave birth to twins in 2006, and Wells adopted them. “We knew we wanted to have children, so we moved before we started the process,” said Page, 37. “The state of Virginia would not allow second-parent adoptions for same-sex couples. Maryland gave us the legal protection we needed.

My views are Virginia are well known to regular readers and, if circumstances were different, I'd leave this backward state in a heartbeat.

New York Times: In Defense of Marriage for All

Today is a day noted for thoughts of love, sweethearts and romance. Yet for some of its citizens, the United States is a downright hostile place and only some sweethearts and some loves are afforded legal recognition. For those of in the LGBT community, outside of a handful of states are relationships are not recognized - indeed they are scorned under the laws of states like Virginia - while special deference continues to be given to ant-gay religious views which are written into the laws. In its main editorial today, the New York Times states that it is time for Barack Obama - our spineless faux advocate in the White House - to cease defending the federal Defense of Marriage Act. Rather, its time to cease the discrimination and prejudice that DOMA represents and seeks to maintain. Here are some editorial highlights:
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The 1996 Defense of Marriage Act is indefensible — officially sanctioned discrimination against one group of Americans imposed during an election year. President Obama seems to know that, or at least he has called on Congress to repeal it. So why do his government’s lawyers continue to defend the act in court?
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When December’s repeal of the noxious “don’t ask, don’t tell” law goes into effect, gay, lesbian and bisexual Americans will be able to serve openly in the military but may not be entitled to on-base housing or a spouse’s burial in a national cemetery. Attorney General Eric Holder and Justice Department lawyers have sought to distance the administration from Congress’s justifications for the marriage act, one of which was to “encourage responsible procreation.”
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But just last month, the department appealed two rulings by Joseph Tauro, a federal trial judge in Massachusetts, who found that the law’s denial of benefits to married same-sex couples could not pass constitutional muster.
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Two new lawsuits, filed in Connecticut and New York, challenging the Defense of Marriage Act now offer the president a chance to put the government on the side of justice. We urge him to seize it when the administration files its response, which is due by March 11. The executive branch’s duty to defend federal laws is not inviolate. This one’s affront to equal protection is egregious.
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On the merits, this should be an easy call. A law focusing on a group that has been subjected to unfair discrimination, as gay people have been, is supposed to get a hard test. It is presumed invalid unless the government proves that the officials’ purpose in adopting the law advances a real and compelling interest. That sort of heightened scrutiny would challenge the administration’s weak argument for upholding the act. It would also make it more difficult to sustain other forms of anti-gay discrimination, including state laws that deny same-sex couples the right to marry.
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By now, such blatant discrimination should be presumed to be unconstitutional, and the Justice Department should finally say so. If conservatives in Congress want to enter the case to argue otherwise, so be it.

‘Family Ties’ Mom: ‘I am a Lesbian’

Some have reacted with a shrug to the coming out of Meredith Baxter at age 62. She hasn't been in the Hollywood lime light for years, but she is still well known to many and overall, I congratulate her on taking this action. The reality is that the more that we all come out, the more the lies and stereotypes are destroyed. Some have asked me how she could possibly not have known she was gay as she went through three marriages and had five children. My response is that one can go to great lengths to deny what they do not want to accept. I did it for decades and might well have stayed closeted but for a totally unplanned encounter a decade ago - you might say that "I kissed a boy and I liked it." And that unplanned encounter and the way it "felt right" for the first time made me have to face what I had never wanted to accept because of my religious background and upbringing in a conservative area. Younger readers may not recall that homosexuality was classified as a mental illness until 1973 (my third year of college) and the ever gay-hating Catholic Church was of course preaching that gays were going to go straight to Hell. I suspect that Meredith Baxter, especially being older than me, went through some similar type of denial for years as I did. Here are some highlights from MSNBC:
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For seven years, actress Meredith Baxter has been hiding a secret. Now Baxter, who played the devoted hippie mom constantly butting heads with her conservative kids on “Family Ties,” is making a public admission.
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“I am a lesbian and it was a later-in-life recognition,” she told Matt Lauer on TODAY. “Some people would say, well, you’re living a lie and, you know, the truth is — not at all. This has only been for the past seven years.” Baxter, 62, though anxious, decided to come out on national television after her sexuality became tabloid fodder. “I’ve always lived a very private life,” said the actress, who’s never even had a publicist. “To come out and disclose stuff is very antithetical to who I am.”
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The National Enquirer reported that Baxter was spotted last month aboard a Caribbean cruise sponsored by lesbian travel company Sweet, writing that she was seen “traveling with a female friend, and she seemed very relaxed and comfortable.”
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Baxter says that her relationship with men was complicated, and it took her decades to understand why. . . . “I got involved with someone I never expected to get involved with, and it was that kind of awakening,” she said. “I never fought it because it was like, oh, I understand why I had the issues I had early in life. I had a great deal of difficulty connecting with men in relationships.”
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Both Baxter’s former on-screen family and her real family have known about her sexuality, though she was initially nervous about telling her five children. “I said, ‘I think I’m gay,’ and my oldest boy said, ‘I knew,’ ” Baxter laughed. “The support from my family and anyone close to me has been so immediate and unqualified. I’ve really been blessed.”
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Now that she is coming out, she also sees herself as an advocate for gay rights. “This is a political act, even though that’s not what it feels like to me,” she said. “If anyone knows someone who’s gay or lesbian … they’re less likely to vote against them to take away their rights. I can be that lesbian you know now …”

Venezuela: Same Sex Partnerships on Fast Tract

As the USA continues to lag behind a number of other nations in granting full equality to LGBT citizens, it now finds itself on the verge of being even less progressive than Hugo Chávez' Venezuela. Increasingly, it seems to me that the phrase "with freedom and liberty for all" is no longer worth the parchment on which the words were originally written by the Founders. Instead, it is liberty and freedom for those the homophobic majority likes - at least for the time being. As my prior post indicates, I have serious concerns for the future if a mere majority is allowed to strip legal rights from an unpopular minority. Here are some details from Blabbendo:

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Romelia Matute, a member of Venezuela's National Assembly and Deputy of the Assembly's Family Commission [pictured at above left] , has announced that the Venezuelan legislature is well on its way to approving a bill that would grant same-sex couples legal recognition, including shared patrimony and inheritance rights.

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As reported on Friday in Spain's ABC, Matute stated that "the report on the 'Organic Bill for Gender Equality' is almost ready for a second - and final - [legislative] debate," adding that it would include language allowing "the union between two people of the same gender" in the form of something she called "co-inhabiting associations".

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She [Matute] said that the government would recognize "the joint-living associations formed by two persons of the same gender, on mutual accord and free agreement, with the full legal and patrimonial effect". Matute also said that the bill would address transgender issues: "Whoever changes their gender through quirurgical means, or any other means, exercising their freedom, has the right to their identity, and to drafting or changing all documents associated with their identification".