Monday, July 01, 2013

Upon Whose Shoulders We Stand



"After the Landmark Court Ruling, opponents of gay marriage ruling ready for national battle." Story linked here or below
Did anyone of us who enthusiastically supported the end of DOMA and Prop. 8 ever think the haters and obstructionists would simply go away, quietly, into the night? Who of us did not know the fight would continue long after the SCOTUS verdict was rendered?

The demand for minorities’ civil rights is a long -- very long -- fight for justice. Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott and many others who fought for the right of women to even vote never lived to see the epic results of their momentous efforts.



Some on the front lines of civil rights for African Americans never lived to see the fruits of their efforts. MLK, Malcolm X, Rosa Parks, Bobbie Kennedy, Frederick Douglas, Harriet Tubman, William Lloyd Garrison, Sojourner Truth and too many others to mention here never lived to see the changes for which they dedicated their lives. Neither did the slain civil rights workers in 1964 -- James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner -- or the the four young girls killed in the bombing of the Birmingham 16th Street Baptist Church -- Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson and Denise McNair -- live to see the passage of the 1965 Civil Rights Act. The struggle for civil rights in our day goes on as malevolent Republican mostly white obstructionists continue to nefariously try to block the minority vote.

Harry Hay, Harvey Milk, James Baldwin, Will Geer, Del Martin and many more gay rights activists never lived to see the day when men and women regardless of sexual orientation could marry whom they chose to love.

One must resign oneself in our age at this time that the struggle continues loudly into the day so that future generations can and will breathe freer. We must go onward, heads held high and figurative swords drawn to continue the fight against those who would repressively return us to the days of ignorance and oppression. The baton of justice will be passed to the generations succeeding the giants who paved the way for us and upon whose shoulders they will and all of us now do stand!





NOT ANYMORE

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