It’s been a few days since I’ve written.  LOTS going on right now.  Pretty dramatic changes at work over the past 2 weeks.  We now have a new general manager (meaning I have a new boss) and we are still short an assistant general manager for reasons I won’t elaborate here in this blog.  The change in the top leadership I think is a good one.  The old GM accepted a position at another store (for more money) and we now have a newbie, fresh out of training and by far the youngest boss I’ve ever had.  It’s all good though.  In retail consistency does not exist at any level.  You must be able to accept, deal with, and promote change in order to get by on a day to day basis.  I think that is one of the reasons that this time around in life, I really do enjoy my job.  That may of course have something to do with the fact that I’m in a leadership position but I think it has more to do with my resistance to doing things the same way over and over and over again.  I like change, even when it brings challenges.  This new chapter in the history of my store will bring changes, it will bring fresh ideas, and it will bring a change in atmosphere, all of which I am happy for.

Speaking of change, if you’ve not been following the news, there are now 6 1/2 states that recognize gay marriage in this country.  I’m including California only because the 18,000 marriages that took place there prior to the passage of Prop 8 are still valid and still recognized as marriages.  That means that MA, VT, ME, IA, CA, and now CT are on board.  It’s likely that in the next 6 months both New York and New Jersey will join leaving the only hold out in New England Road Island where it will likely be for some time.  Apparently RI doesn’t like the idea and the legislature isn’t going to do much about it.

I found some interesting reading tonight on Pam’s House Blend.  The people who are behind the push to prevent gays from obtaining marriage rights tend to talk out of both ends.  They push for strong marriages “for life” yet most of the leadership in these groups are divorced or on their 2nd or 3rd marriage.  One would think that if you are going to advocate for marriage, you might at least be able to uphold one of the strongest traditions of marriage (at least from their perspective) that marriage is a life long commitment.  Now, I have my own views on divorce.  I do not believe that marriage must be for life in any circumstance.  Shit happens EVERY DAY, and sometimes it is far better for both parties in a marriage to simply call it quits.  That does not mean it should not be taken lightly.  I support no fault divorce laws and I do not view those laws as having degraded the institution of marriage.  That said, many of these folks are quick to tell me that me wanting to get married will degrade the institution of marriage while at the same time they applaud Britney Spears’ 72 hour marriage (and subsequent divorce).  Again, you would think that divorce does more to degrade marriage than trying to prevent people from getting married does no?  Anyhow here is a cut and paste from the Blend: (this is an example of the lies that are being told daily).

Remember this nugget from Larry Stickney’s attorney, Mr. “Government was created to kill” Stephen Pidgeon?

Same-sex divorce…is 8 times higher among homosexual men, and 300 times higher among homosexual women.Pidgeon said these numbers were from a study looking at France, but there can be no study on the divorce rate of same-sex couples in France because same-sex marriage is not legal in France.  Similar wild and unsubstantiated numbers have been fabricated by many anti-family activists.  Larry Stickney has posted a video of Pidgeon speaking this lie on the Protect Marriage Washington website (they’re the Referendum 71 people).

I decided to check the actual, meaningful numbers here in Washington.  Not same-sex divorce rate, because as in France, same-sex couples can’t get married in Washington.  But domestic partnership dissolution rates.  After reviewing the numbers, I can see why Pidgeon resorted to make-believe; reality just doesn’t jive with his apparent need to vilify gay families.
Before we get into the DP dissolution numbers for Washington state, let’s just pause to see how the local professional heterosexuals are faring.  Larry Stickney has a 67% personal divorce rate (3 marriages, 2 divorces) and Rep. Matt Shea a 100% divorce rate (1 marriage, 1 divorce).  Both men are on the Protect Marriage Washington Board of Directors.  Both men say that marriage is “one man and one woman for life”, and use an ideal that they personally failed to attain as some sort of weird rationale for repealing the domestic partnership law.

And now to the numbers.  The Washington Secretary of State keeps track of two numbers: the number of DP registrations, and the number of DP terminations.  DPs were first available (in a much-reduced form) on July 23, 2007.  As of June 2, 2009, there had been 5,475 DP registrations and 137 terminations.  This means that the DP termination rate is a piddly 2.5%

I’m not going to even try to compare this to heterosexual divorce rates because it’s an apples/oranges thing, and heterosexual divorce rates are calculated on a percentage population basis.  But most importanly, there are some important reasons besides a broken relationship that a DP’d couple may need to terminate the DP that isn’t in the heterosexual marriage equation.  For example, a same-sex couple may terminate their DP upon moving to a state or country where they can obtain bona fide marriage.  Or, an elderly different-sex couple may terminate their DP if they initially got one when the DP was little more than a power of attorney and health care proxy.  Not all heterosexual couples may choose to stay in the DP system as DPs become more robust and bind them more tightly in a legal sense.

Suffice it to say that regardless of the fake stats spewed by Stephen Pidgeon et al., the reality in Washington state is that over 97% of us with DPs are stickin’ to ‘em.  Too bad the professional heterosexuals can’t say the same for their cohort.