de Rossi and DeGeneres to Wed

Ellen DeGeneres and her partner, Australian-born Portia de Rossi, are celebrating the California State Supreme Court’s decision favoring gay marriage by- what else? – getting married.

DeGeneres was taping the episode of “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” on Thursday, the day the state’s high court struck down California laws against gay marriage, and it was to air Friday, a person close to the production said.

The person, who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly, spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity.

Citing the court’s ruling, DeGeneres said she and girlfriend de Rossi (“Ally McBeal,” “Nip/Tuck”) would be getting married.

De Rossi, 35, who was in the studio, and DeGeneres, 50, were applauded by audience members, the person close to the production said.

Yesterday, California’s high court ruled that laws banning gay marriage in that state were unconstitutional.

In its 4-3 ruling, the Republican-dominated high court struck down state laws against same-sex marriage and said domestic partnerships that provide many of the rights and benefits of matrimony are not enough.

“In contrast to earlier times, our state now recognizes that an individual’s capacity to establish a loving and long-term committed relationship with another person and responsibly to care for and raise children does not depend upon the individual’s sexual orientation,” Chief Justice Ronald George wrote for the majority in ringing language that delighted gay rights activists.

Of course, conservatives and religious activists vow to fight this ruling to the bitter end. They plan on putting a Constitutional amendment declaring marriage as “between one man and one woman” on November’s ballot. They’ve already collected the needed signatures needed to put it to the voters.

Gay and lesbian couples won’t be able to marry in the state for 30 more days, the length of time it usually takes for rulings to become final. In that time, anti-gay marriage groups plan to try to get the judges to rethink their ruling. Presidential candidate John McCain says that judges shouldn’t be making these decisions, while Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama have both gone on record as saying that these are decisions that should be made by the state. California Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, says that he will respect the judge’s decision and that he has “bigger fish to fry” than a gay marriage ban.

I personally agree with the ruling and hope that it stands. It pains me that there are groups who are willing to spend so much time and resources to prevent people from actually marrying and committing to each other. You’d think they would be all for this. Aren’t there more important things to worry about in this world? For instance, the United States economy is tanking, people are losing their jobs and homes, Americans are going hungry and children are going without healthcare. Shouldn’t these concerned citizens be spending their resources helping make a dent in issues. I’m happy that the California Supreme Court made this decision. I don’t believe that two people that love each other should be prevented from enjoying a legal marriage just because some people find it distasteful based on their religious preferences. I think our country needs to stop allowing entire groups of people to remain second class citizens – without the same basic rights as the majority- and allowing gay marriage is a huge step in eradicating another subclass of not-really citizens.

My thoughts are similar to JJ here:

Give me a break. Really. Are heterosexual people really afraid that equal rights for gay couples would do some kind of harm to their own ability to stay married? Or somehow impede their ascent to Heaven when God comes back and strikes up the Armageddon band? Pfft.

Consider that 30-50% of marriages[PDF] (heterosexual, of course) will end in divorce (or have ended, but we’ll just stay with the “will end”) eventually. I’m not going to dig through a lot of data to look at how long marriages survive on average, because it’s only important to this particular point that they don’t always survive. For whatever reason, couples (heterosexual) break up, the family is torn apart and the kids’ lives are irreparably damaged1. This doesn’t even account for the couples (heterosexual) who never marry and yet create families that they will eventually tear asunder for no doubt purely selfish reasons. People can’t stay married. Laws have been changed to make it easier for them to either not marry at all (and therefore fornicate like unclean beasts) or throw their marriage vows right down the toilet without so much as a “God, Please forgive me.”

A commenter there said something that rings true too:

Besides, I’ve always felt that homosexuals should have the right to be as miserable as the rest of us so let them get married.

I congratulate Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi on their upcoming nuptials and I hope that they stay together for the rest of their lives. If the gay community can show the rest of us how to do it right, maybe our divorce rates will fall dramatically and we can move on to more important things.

---

Did you enjoy this post? Why not leave a comment below and continue the conversation, or subscribe to my feed and get articles like this delivered automatically each day to your feed reader.