California, you broke my heart!

I want you, I need you, but there ain't no way I'm ever gonna love you - but don't feel sad, 2 out of 3 ain't bad. Only, when it comes to fundamental civil rights, it is. I'm typing this up the night of the most important election in the history of our country. Congratulations to Mr. President-elect Obama. Yes we can, and we have. On the issue of abortion in minors - it looks like we have changed. Minors will be protected by being provided with access to abortion - in a time where young people are lost and desperately seeking acceptance and a way to belong, they can make mistakes. Some mistakes are too costly to be used as a teaching tool. When you're 14, seeking love and acceptance and you make a mistake, an unplanned pregnancy, the last thing in the world you need is someone saying "you made your bed, now lie in it" I doubt at 14 anyone has the faculties to make responsible decisions - forcing them to have a child is preposterous. Even if you look at it from the adoption standpoint, this child is still growing and maturing. To carry a baby to term is so incredibly taxing - there's a reason women died in childbirth, and it wasn't just lack of medical care, women had children young - like 14 years old young.

If a child is going to have sex without your approval (I do NOT know ANY parents who want their 14 year old having sex), they certainly aren't going to tell you about a pregnancy, because they KNOW they're in over their head. ANd if they want to abort that baby, they will go about it - in any means necessary. Drano, coat hangers... they may sound like antiquated scare tactics from bad afterschool specials, but the fact is if your child wants to have sex bad enough and gets pregnant from it, they might want to have an abortion bad enough to go about it in unsafe ways - some of which leave them barren. It's not about permission, it's about protection of our daughters.

So far, this proposition seems to be denied (it would force doctors to contact patients parents 48 hours before an abortion is performed. I'm pretty sure that most of those girls don't come from swell families.) And I am proud of people reading it for what it is and protecting our girls.

But Prop 8. Oh God. Please... PLEASE tell me that all the 'no' votes haven't been counted. Please tell me that this state which went blue as SOON as the polls closed didn't turn their back on a very real social class of people. Please tell me that just because we have become better at being colorblind that we haven't begun to discriminate against Same-Sex couples.

California, people look to us to be progressive and forward. We carry the largest amount of electoral votes in this great union of ours. How can you turn your back on a community that is as much a part of you as Hollywood, wine country, earthquakes, sunshine, oranges and silicone valley? Maybe a lot of our policies are conservative, but I fail to see why the definition of marriage is between a man and a woman. That doesn't make it any more binding, lasting, loving, productive, supportive or permanent than it being between two consenting adults. It doesn't mean it's between a man and 2 women, or a man and a child, or a woman and a dog/donkey/goat/sheep/living doll *Ahem* It also doesn't guarantee lasting committment. I was a woman, he a man, and my marriage didn't last. My marriage was abusive, hurtful and disrespectful. It didn't stop him from cheating on me, in my home, where my children lived. It didn't stop me from being run down to almost nothingness under his boot heel.

Marriage is a legal union between two consenting adults. It's a civil partnership. And while most marriages take place in a church and are consecrated by God and their religion, it doesn't necessarily imply morality. Not too long ago (about 40 years ago, actually) whites could not marry anything but whites. How limiting. How disgusting, but how similar. It's not for government to decide who can or cannot be happy and enjoy a union. Same sex marriages are not viewed with the same social status as traditional marriage, and it CERTAINLY is NOT taught in school. My children MUST be in the 4% that does NOT teach marriage as part of the curriculum.

Please, California, by morning, please have proven this post moot, I would enjoy nothing less than deleting this post because I jumped the gun and posted this before the polls were all decided.