I was telling a friend the other day how my faith in the American citizen, or at least the American citizen who votes, was slightly restored by the recent election.
Not because the Democrats received a mandate. I don't believe they did.
I feel this particular vote was against the madness wing of the Republican Party, which had seized power from the Eisenhower (moderate and sane, albeit pro-business) wing.
But in amongst all the good news was the bad news that 10 or so states took another slap at gay marriage, as if somehow two homosexuals getting hitched would signal the beginning of the end of America's pop-culture branch of Western civilization.
Listen: marriage leads to suffering, and I want gays to suffer as much as I did while legally conjoined.
But attempted cynical humor aside, if so-called upright and so-called moral Americans are paying attention, they cannot help but see that the battles featuring marriage and respectability are already lost (or won, if you are a non-traditionalist).
First of all was the news last month that for the first time in recorded American history single folks outnumbered the married amongst us. That's not even counting the hordes of homosexuals who are not banging on the gates of "holy" wedlock.
This week, the second recent statistical nail in marriage's coffin made the papers.
Out-of-wedlock births have reached a new high (or, if you are so inclined, a new moral low).
About 4.1 million babies were born in the United States in 2005. More than 1.5 million-about 37 percent of the total-were born without the benefit of clergy. Out-of-wedlock births have skyrocketed since the '90s.
These are not all single moms, seduced and abandoned, either.
The stats for 2005 show that about 20 percent of all new moms under 20 were unmarried, and also that 20 percent of that 20 percent were living with the baby's biological father.
Weddings matter because tradition and retail sales demand it be so.
But marriage, as a societal bulwark against homosexuals and unmarried mamas, is a non-issue.
Gay marriage may be the only thing that can rejuvenate a semi-dying cultural tradition that never really caught on in some other parts of the world, where the nuclear family has always run second to the communal family.
And if you are in the wedding business, consider this: 12.9 percent of the adults in Seattle, according to a recent study, are gay or bisexual.
Only San Francisco to the south has a higher percentage: 15.4.
Think of all the weddings there could be, O dressmakers (and tailors, too)!
Think of all the cakes and all the little candy men in tuxes going to waste, O bakers and candlestick makers.
Oh yeah, and sad to say, I now know from 17 years of writing columns now that I must say, once again: I am not gay.
I am not bi.
I am barely hetero some days as I creep toward stage left.
Despite my straightness, though, I am of the odd belief that right is right (not fake moral Right), and fair is fair.
I was an avid supporter in the '60s of black civil rights. I was not then and am not now black.
But right was right then, despite the squadrons of godly bigots calling for damnation for "race mixers."
And now, some of the very black children-adults today-who profited from the civil rights movement have joined their right-wing brethren to oppress homosexuals.
Shame on ya, joining the descendants of those who opposed your freedom.
We will never be free until all folks who work, pay taxes and otherwise contribute have the same chances. Black, white, brown, yellow, tall, short, gay, straight or even bi.
Amen.
LAST WEEK ROBERT ALTMAN, one of America's greatest film directors, died at the age of 81.
He was a unique talent who created a body of work that has to include one or two films on most critics' and reviewers' Top 10 lists.
Altman's "McCabe" is in my top 20 films of all time, and "The Player" is in my top 50.
Altman will be missed by anyone who loves a truly inclusive, semi-populist form of American sensibility.
It is not too bad a comparison to mention him in the same breath as Twain and Steinbeck-other artists who saw America, warts and all, and still loved the place.[[In-content Ad]]
