Although I’m the first to appreciate protest, I find the pastor to be an enormously selfish person. He isn’t going to bear the brunt of “his” protest – his daughter and her companion will. He has persuaded them to be in a relationship with NO legal responsibilities or protections.
In the couple’s own words:
“We are traditionalists – we just want to be called bride and groom,” said Bird, 25, who works part time for her father’s church. “Those words have been used for generations and now they just changed them….We just feel that our rights have been violated” she said.
Well, wait till the rubber meets the road.
Officials said the law is clear.
“I can understand their frustration,” said Gloria Coutts, assistant county clerk for Placer County.” But their marriage is not registered with the state.”
Bird and Codding say they are trying to figure out what to do next. Bird said she does not know what she will do if she should become ill and need insurance [which she could get through a her companion if they were legally married]. “I really don’t know,” she said.
For now, they are busy with their family (she has two children from a previous marriage and he has three) and starting their new life.
“We feel like a a bride and groom,” said Bird.
When one of his kids get sick and she isn’t allowed to pick them up from school or see them in the hospital, or one of her kids gets sick and she can’t afford the medical bills because they are uninsured, then perhaps they’ll understand the value in making sacrifices (like signing a “Party A, Party B” form) for the sake of civil marriage. Until then, they have chosen to create a legally unstable household. They have chosen for themselves and their children the legal ghetto that they are trying to force gays to live in. I hope they enjoy it. I’ll wave to them as I pass them on my way out.
Help keep marriage equal in California by supporting the No On Prop 8 campaign. Anti-equality forces are beating us 3 to 2 in fundraising.
Cross-posted at Pam’s House Blend.
Las Vegas!
i’m guessing that after they’ve gotten their 5 minutes of fame, they’ll sneak off to an undisclosed state and get a civil marriage. for the sake of their kids, i hope they get over themselves soon and do it. until that time, their kids are in legal and financial limbo. family values…
The level of arcane overcomplexity in the pursuit of tautological purity implied in this scenario is almost painful to read at this early hour of a post-primary morning.
<
p>Never mind the homey-looking home included in that fisheye-lensed snapshot of the not-so-happy couple — apparently these people are really living in a Heinleinian tesseract house instead.
<
p>We have write-in candidates for public office, so why not just do the same thing on the marriage license and write in “Rachel Bird (bride)” and “Gordon Codding (groom)” below the legally-required signatures when it comes time for these two lovebirds of a cocked-hat feather to sign on the dotted line?
<
p>Nope, as Laurel points out above, the father in question has managed to convince the kids in the hall to act against their own self-interest in this case — and the self-interest of their collective kids too, of course. But it doesn’t sound like it was that hard a sell for him to make in this case. They obviously buy into this dubiously Bird-brained argument themselvesas well.
<
p>Sigh. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it think…
I’ve been told by a Californian that accident report forms there also use the Party A/B system. I wonder how long until the couple faces another important form that doesn’t let them identify themselves by their preferred vocabulary.
<
p>As for writing in “bride” or “groom” on the license application form, they tried. There is a picture of their altered form in my 2nd link above. The state rejected the forms, because you can’t change a state form.
<
p>Maybe their solution would be to get re-named Bride Bird and Groom Codding? Then they could sign anything without fuss.
Along with NJ hopefully taking up marriage equality next year, it looks like Washington D.C. may do the same submitting a bill in January.
If Gov. Gregoire gets re-elected, it is likely that full-DP or marriage equality legislation will be introduced there also in the next year or so. At the moment, we have DPs that cover about 40% of the state-level legal territory that civil marriages do.