Prop 8 Trial: homophobia and the fear of transparency (days 2 & 3)

Today, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to forbid the public broadcast of this landmark civil rights trial, while in the courtroom, witnesses detailed the history of anti-gay discrimination in America and showed evidence of homophobia by the Prop 8 sponsors.

Days 2 and 3 of the trial focused on expert witnesses giving testimony and being cross-examined:

* Dr. Nancy Cott spoke on the history of marriage in America, including several changes in the definition of legal marriage.

* Dr. George Chauncey detailed the last 100 years of anti-gay discrimination in America.

* Dr. Letishia Peplak covered the similarities between gay and straight relationships, and why gay marriage will not harm heterosexual marriage.

* Prop 8 television ads, and letters from Prop 8 sponsors, were shown (or blocked) as evidence of the anti-gay motives of the sponsors.

Prop 8 Tracker wrote:

The proponents of Prop. 8 seek to hide and obfuscate. They did not want their own ad played in court. They did not want documents from their own strategists to become public because the documents show clearly that their entire campaign was built on the decades of prejudice and fear that we heard about in detail yesterday from Prof. Chauncey. As Ted Olson keeps saying, their arguments do not hold up in public or in court. They only win when they can manipulate the media and the public, using scare tactics.

And they do not want the public to see the truth on television. They appealed to the Supreme Court, and the majority opinion said that no live broadcast will be allowed because it will cause 'irreparable harm' to the homophobes. The American Foundation for Equal Rights released a statement in response to the ruling.

So it's fine to hate on gays in television ads for months before a public vote to take away our rights, but they're worried that the people who took away our rights will be harmed if the world sees them testifying on why they hate and fear us.

And they do fear us. At the trial, they keep arguing that they oppose our marriages because they need to 'protect' their children. But you don't need protection against good or neutral things - you only feel the need to protect yourself from things you FEAR, whether or not the danger is real. Homophobia is an irrational fear or hatred of homosexuals, and their need to 'protect' themselves from gay people who are not harming them proves that they are afraid of us, irrationally afraid, and thus homophobic.

In one cross-examination, the marriage ban lawyers argued that anti-gay discrimination is gone because we have Barney Frank in Congress, plus the show 'Will & Grace' and the movie 'Brokeback Mountain.' (How can Brokeback be evidence that discrimination has faded? It shows anti-gay murders with no legal consequences and a gay man so afraid for his life that he never lives with the man he loves.)

The Prop 8 lawyers are pushing the same circular argument we saw in Anchorage against the equal rights ordinance: there is no anti-gay discrimination, so we should be allowed to continue discriminating against gays.

Let's hope that Judge Walker recognizes the absurdity of the argument and comes to a conclusion based on the testimony and evidence, unlike Mayor Sullivan's 'popularity contest' approach to civil rights.

Good live-blogs and daily reviews of the trial are HERE, HERE and HERE, along with updates on all your favorite queer sites and articles on mainstream news sites around the world.