Before the election, and before the overwhelming win for the Kentucky Gay Marriage Amendment, our local super-church, South East Christian helped to support this amendment with their “One Man, One Woman” campaign. This campaign involved numerous billboards and mobile advertising and through their weighty clout and coffers, I think they helped to steel conservative opinion around Louisville at least, where the measure passed 60% YES / 40% NO 20-point margin. The rest of the state voted 75/25 YES/NO. Certainly a win for SouthEast and their campaign, and it could be said for Christians state-wide.

Now, while SouthEast claims that “The same-sex marriage controversy is NOT ABOUT… homophobia, [or] whether homosexuals are nice people, good citizens, loving parents, loyal friends or helpful neighbors”, they forgot to mention that this amendment not only bars gays from “marriage”, but also from the lesser charge of “civil unions” which grants them the same rights as a “wedded couple” which includes any number of legal rights, including inheritance, life insurance, medical decisions, etc. Oddly enough, South East has left this out of their website, on any page dealing with “gay marriage”. However, on a funny ha-ha sidenote, they do reference a number of scientific studies in their defense of marriage. To quote:

The recognition that marriage is the union of male and female has never been seriously questioned in America until the past decade. During that time, activists were busy promoting their own private social revolution, and scientists were busy studying the institution of marriage and its affect on the participants and on society.

The results of hundreds of scientific studies and years of sociological research is undisputable. There is a mountain of evidence demonstrating the rewards to society as well as to individual families of marriage.

This is not an indictment of single-parent families; it is a scientific understanding of the dynamics of family structure.

Wow, hey! While you’re thumbing through scientific reports, why not read up on evolution as well! It’s just a letter away from “faggotry”.

I respect SouthEast’s opinion and the opinion of the lawmakers who support this tripe, but did the lawmakers have to go and completely ban even civil unions? I guess they figured that if they hooped and hollered about marriage enough that they could squeak in some verbiage about civil unions and just really kill the whole thing once and for all. That is some pork-barrel baby and the bath water sort of shenanigans that I really hate to see. To bar marriage from homosexuals is one thing, to categorically and systematically bar them from the rights regarded to any other wedded — or joined — couple is just ridiculous. This is a major setback for a very large and very real segment of our society that is not going to “go away”. Well, I take that back — if you wanted to rid the state of gays, well, you’ve made a step in the right direction, Kentucky!

That, of course, brings me to my final point — Kentucky is attempting a branding initiative that will create a singular, unified logo for the state. You, citizen, can even vote for your favorite logo. (On a side note: the agency that got the state’s business is New West, and according to a little bird New West is shipping a great deal of the some $14 million state ad budget down South to Atlanta in the form of contract work! Thanks Gov. Fletcher! Keep it in the state, man!) Anyway, I figure that at least this time the state is giving the public some choice in what logo will represent the state, rather than foisting some candy-assed design on us. Hey! Kentucky — It’s That Friendly (except to gays). Well, in that spirit of public consideration and contribution, I submit my own Kentucky logo:

jine: antiquated and poetic version of “to join”, or perhaps “to agree with”. Note usage here in this old Civil War bar shanty.