Delaware Gov. Jack Markell has signed a bill into law that gives same-sex couples legal protections and recognition beginning in 2012.That Minnesota just yesterday voted to pass a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, one day before another state voted to give same-sex couples legal protections, pointedly underlines the divisions in this country right now.
It makes Delaware the eighth state to allow civil unions or domestic partnerships for same-sex couples.
The Democratic governor signed the civil unions bill Wednesday night before a cheering crowd of more than 600 at The Queen theater Wilmington.
The law takes effect Jan. 1, 2012.
The reality is this: There are people who believe in equality, and people who don't. There are people who want to recognize same-sex relationships as equal to opposite-sex relationships, and people who don't. There are people who respect the bodily autonomy and agency and self-determination of women, and people who don't. There are people who believe the President has a legitimate claim to his office, and people who don't.
And it's no coincidence that the same people keep showing up on the same sides of those divides.
We're wrestling with undeserved privilege in this nation, and one side thinks the government should aspire to challenge and destroy it, and one side thinks the government exists exclusively to protect it. We're fighting for the very definition of what the US is.
I guess we always have been, but that struggle feels very evident right now.
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