Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1998 11:03:09 -1000 From: Mia H H Lam Subject: A message from Tracey Bennett ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1998 10:51:16 -1000 From: Tom Ramsey A message from Tracey Bennett, member of the Board of Directors of Marriage Project Hawaii: Al & Jane Nakatani, Wally & Christine Amos, and Jackie Young will be on TV: Wed., Oct 7 & 14 at 5:30 pm, KBFD Oceanic cable 4 Thurs., Oct. 8 & 15 at 8:30 pm, Oceanic cable ch. 16 Sun., Oct 11 at 10:30 pm. Oceanic cable ch. 16 Tuesdays in Oct. at 4:30 pm, KIKUm Oceanic ch. 19 ============== Please let your friends know. Tom Ramsey P.S. Did you see the great ads with Dr. Jennifer Frank in Sunday's Advertiser Star-Bulletin, and on TV? She talks about the next civil right to be restricted: the access to abortion. Already, Hawaii's House has passed a sweeping bill on late term abortions---it was so vague that it would have prohibited all late term abortions and late term was defined to include part of the second trimester. The Senate blocked the House action, but we all know how reliable the Senate can be when the chips are down. Jennifer Frank was telling the plain truth. Most people in Hawaii don't know the many negative agendas behind the call for a Constitutional Convention. One legislator was very clear to UHPA this summer during an hour-long interview: he wanted a ConCon to roll back native Hawaiian gathering rights and to limit OHA's access to ceded land revenues. He never mentioned same-sex marriage. Another legislator, a senator, in another hour-long interview this summer, declared that "we make life too hard for the developers." This senator wanted the ConCon to roll back constitutional guarantees of environmental protection and wanted to address native Hawaiian rights as well. Same-sex marriage was not mentioned as having any kind of priority. The real agenda behind ConCon (and in putting the ConAd on the ballot) was always elsewhere. Can anyone really believe that Milton Holt cared one bit about protecting the sanctity of traditional marriage? He did, however, care passionately about the Bishop estate. So did Terrance Tom, who collected $4000 a month as a retainer from the Bishop Estate. What a pity, that this virulent anti-gay amendment could not save their political careers after all, but the rest of us must deal with the aftermath of pandering to prejudice and hate. I was amused (?!) to hear yet again, on Hawaii Public Radio this morning, that a conservative minister urged a "yes" vote on the ConAd because otherwise we might have POLYGAMY. Honest to God, is there anyone out there who can properly ridicule this absurdity? Hawaii's Supreme Court directly addressed this issue, and said that Baehr v. Miike WOULD NOT AFFECT THE STATUS OF POLYGAMY. Ok, so that is being logical and reasonable about this. What is truly amazing, is how REAL this fear and RECURRENT this fear is among our opponents. Depth psychology anyone? Are we getting close to the real heart of traditional marriage: male supremacy, the right for MALES to have multiple partners, a deep seated, primate "gravitation" of powerful men toward multiple, female partners? Testerone poisoning? Somehow, polygamy is a very real psychological fact for our opponents. They FEEL the possibility could be just over the horizon. Odd, indeed. This isn't the first time, of course, that a majority seeks to punish a minority for the sins of the majority. It's called scapegoating. I talked with a UH faculty member one evening about the amendment; he actually thought that somehow it might threaten traditional marriage. When I pressed for details he pointed to Bill Clinton's antics in the White House. Huh? For once, I was speechless.