Loss for words.

After the election and the subsequent mayhem regarding the Prop 8 debacle, I've been pretty much at a loss for words. It's hard to blog about your feelings and opinions when you haven't really had a chance to digest them yourself.

I'm delighted about the Obama win. It's a step forward, to be sure. In addition to the obvious racial equality significance, it embodies a passing of the torch to my own generation. The capricious zeal of the boomers, which currently finds its home in the wasteland of religious hypocrisy, has finally been relegated to the kid's table at the White House. And now, I hope that Mr. Obama can stand up under the heavy weight of expectation that we have placed upon him, without shifting center-right in an effort to cajole the mealy religious neo-zealots into shouldering some of the weight.

The Prop 8 brouhaha has been harder to process. I think that my sharp opinions about this have been the reason for my relative silence as of late. Of course I'm devastated by the idea of a simple majority being the only obstacle to rescinding civil rights from our tribe. I also am terrified that this may set a precedent... not only for our own kind, but for all people. Watching how the Mormon church has systematically funneled tens of millions of dollars into this fight has been utterly nauseating... not to mention the less-impressive but still-shameful financial support of the Catholics via the Knights of Columbus.

But this terrible inequity brought out the best in us. Did you see the massive protests all over the country? GLBT people and fair-minded straight folk alike woke up from their collective torpor and finally said "enough is enough". Hypocritical donations across the country, mostly from Mormon sheeple who claim no ill intent, have created a backlash that clearly frightened the normally-stoic LDS church. And now, after the protests erupted, new polling shows that Prop 8 would NOT have passed. Makes you wonder what the No On Prop 8 organizing committee was doing all along, doesn't it?

I'm conflicted. A win for Obama, and a giant step forward. A loss for fairness in California and many other states, and a big wobbly step backward. But I see hope in our future as long as we can keep the good fight going.