A Vote For Romney Is A Vote Against Dr. Darcy
Welcome to Format Free Fridays at AskDrDarcy.com, the one day a week when I break the format of answering your questions and I dispense that which we rarely welcome in life: Unsolicited information.
Election day is 11 days away. Interestingly enough, as we’ve neared this date, I’ve personally had to distance myself from posting political endorsements for President Obama on Facebook because, quite frankly, I don’t have the stomach for the comments that my endorsements provoke from Romney supporters. My reasons for supporting Obama have been further fueled by a personal journey that I began this summer – one that I’ll speak more about in a later post.
But my recent journey aside, I get a knee-jerk repulsion every time I learn that friends or family members plan to vote for Romney. I become flooded with feelings and emotions that I can’t seem to put words to and so I become silent. Or I avoid Facebook. You see, I don’t really believe that someone can care about me much less love me and support Mitt Romney because I believe the two are mutually-exclusive.
Until this week I’ve been unable to articulate the reasons for my feelings…and then I stumbled upon an article on Huffington Post by a man named Kergan Edwards-Stout entitled, “Please Defriend Me,” and I thought, finally, there’s a voice to my feelings. His words are, to me, so relatable, so beautifully expressed that I requested permission from him to post his article on my blog. This is the first time since the inception of AskDrDarcy.com that I’ve ever used another’s writing. What follows is an excerpt from Kergan’s article followed by a compilation of words written by various Facebook friends. I’ve changed the final language to personalize it to my family.
One final note to my family members, virtually all of whom are planning to vote for Romney: Please do not discuss your perspective with me. I am not interested in a debate. We can agree to disagree on politics, though I’ll remind you that those who enable discrimination are as culpable as those who perpetrate it.
Please Defriend Me
If you plan to vote for Mitt Romney, you are putting a nail into my civil rights coffin, and I’d rather not have friends who think I deserve anything less than equal treatment under the law. Romney supports DOMA (which directly and negatively impacts me, restricting my partner Russ, our kids, and my federal protections and tax benefits under the law), and has noted his support for an anti-marriage equality amendment as well. While you may see your vote for him as one about the economy (and we can debate who’d be better for that until the cows come home), what you intend by your vote really doesn’t matter. Your vote means that you are supporting someone who not only thinks I’m not equal to you, but who works vigorously to ensure my “less-than” legal status. Your vote for him means that you are totally fine with me being treated with disrespect.
Now, you may see this as an indication that I am being too “single-minded,” and I’ll admit that when you’re denied even the simplest of human considerations, it makes it difficult to look beyond that. But this is about much more than my treatment under the law. Who I am and what I believe passionately in are also things which Romney discounts…
Bottom line: I don’t care who you are; whether you are my relation by blood or a longtime acquaintance, I don’t want “friends” who don’t think I’m as good as they are. I want friends who value me, who see my worth as a human being, and who fully support my equal protections under the law. So, if you’re voting for Romney, whether you follow me on Twitter or Facebook, please defriend me. You won’t hurt my feelings. I won’t cause a big stink. In fact, you’ll be creating space in my life for others to come in who do feel that my being here on the planet matters.
I’m not interested in debating this. Please respect my wishes.
~Kergan Edwards-Stout
Let’s assume that Romney and his plan are better for America. To get this better plan you must, however, vote to restrict someone else’s rights. Some may say, “Well it’s worth it because Obama sucks.”
Does Obama suck enough that you would say gays don’t get the same rights as you?
Still good with that vote?
What if to get the Romney plan, you had to restrict the rights of interracial couples?
Still good with that vote?
What if to get the Romney plan you had to restrict the rights of Jewish people (does this remind you of anything)?
Still good with that vote?
At what point would the word Gays, be replaced by a term that you could not support? Even if you think (incorrectly) that being gay is a choice, isn’t being Catholic, or Protestant or any other faith a choice? What if we said, “Do what you want, but if you marry Catholic, you must pay more taxes on your health care, and you will have your spousal rights limited?”
Are you still good with that vote?
What if it was your name in that sentence, or your child’s name, or your parent’s name?
Think about this when you vote in 11 days.