Kansas GOP Steps Backwards Into Hate

We knew it wasn’t over, so this really isn’t that much of a surprise, but the level of childishness and stupidity is boundless.

Out in Kansas, lawmakers of the Republican variety  are backing a bill that labels same-sex marriages “parody marriages” and seeks to stop the state from recognizing them, while another bill would create an “elevated marriage” status for straight couples and make divorce more difficult.

Yes, straight marriages are waaaay up there, while same-sex marriages are a joke.

Oddly enough, this renewed disapproval of same-sex marriages from some GOP lawmakers comes on the heels of Kansas voters electing the state’s first out gay lawmakers and just two weeks after the introduction of a bill that would prohibit discrimination against LGBT individuals statewide.

So, let me get this queer, the people of Kansas, for whom these Republicans work, voted in some gay congresspeople, and the state is working toward banning LGBTQ discrimination, but a handful of Republicans wanna take the state back a decade or so … or even further?

And before I get in any more of a snit, the good news is that Kansas has a Democrat, Laura Kelly, left, in the governor’s office and one of her first official acts after being elected by the people was to restore non-discrimination protections for LGBT state workers. So, it doesn’t seem likely that she’d sign any anti-LGBT marriage bills.

Still, the bills mark the reemergence of same-sex marriage as a political wedge issue by some in the Kansas Statehouse, like Congressman Randy Garber, middle, a Republican because, of course:

“Their marriage probably doesn’t affect me—their union or whatever you want to call it. But in my opinion, they’re trying to force their beliefs on society.”

Two of the most offensive and discriminatory words: their and they. Their marriage … they try to force their beliefs. And he doesn’t even notice how he says a same-sex marriage doesn’t affect him, but he still wants them stopped. That’s the basic stupidity of the GOP; this doesn’t affect them at all, but they don’t like it, so it has to end.

But then there’s Congresswoman Susan Ruiz, right, Democrat who is the first lesbian to serve openly in the Kansas Legislature:

“I am very disappointed. I see who the co-sponsors are and I sit with a couple of them in committee and I’m certainly going to talk to them about that and say, ‘hey, I don’t know if you know about it or not, but I’m not a myth… Am I a unicorn?’”

No, but you scare Republicans because they don’t want to focus on the real issues, and if they make same-sex marriage a wedge issue again maybe they won’t have to talk about guns and the environment and infrastructure and their racist president.

Again, this probably won’t happen in Kansas because cooler, smarter, more openminded heads, will prevail, but it is something to look out for, and to fight against. Our marriages are not jokes, and our marriages are not less than those of straight couples, and if the Kansas GOP wants to make marriage an issue, we’ll fight back.

I mean, we won once already, this second attack should be a cake walk.

The march goes on …

Kansas City Star