RENWL

Andrea Shorter, Deputy Director, Marriage and Coalitions (EQCA)

Over the weekend RENWL posted (How To Sabotage the CA 2010 Marriage Equality Campaign;Twitter Style) which revealed that some pro-2012ers were sending out tweets discouraging folks from providing a signature for the 2010 marriage equality initiative; one million sigs are needed for the initiative to make it to the November 2010 ballot. Well, the feedback to that post was, shall we say—quite lively.  As to be expected, there were some who immediately rose up in loyal and indignant defense of Vote For Equality and its pure-as-the-driven-snow reputation. We didn’t get much of that on EQCA’s behalf, though. Well, that is, until this morning.  Check this out:

Folks,

Thank you for the opportunity to clarify Equality California’s commitment to win marriage back in California:

EQCA is NOT organizing or involved with a decline-to-sign campaign. Furthermore, we don’t know of any other organization that is waging a decline-to-sign campaign versus individuals who are expressing their position on the matter of when best to return to the ballot in California.

EQCA is working with a number of different organizations to win marriage back — regardless of whether they support a 2010 or 2012 campaign.

We respect the work of all of our marriage equality advocates in California. The Jordan/Rustin Coalition, of which Ron Buckmire is a founder, is a member of Let California Ring, a public education project on marriage housed at the Equality California Institute (www.letcaliforniaring.org). Over 50 organizations are involved in the coalition that drives this effort. Vote For Equality (VFE) is a member.

Regarding Love Honor Cherish: We admire the dedication of Love Honor Cherish. As Lester says above, we’re looking at co-sponsoring a canvass with Love Honor Cherish in December as we have co-sponsored other canvasses with LHC in the past.

EQCA, along with several other organizations and leaders, maintains that 2012 is the optimum time to return to the ballot to win marriage back in California. In the meantime, we are working daily to build much needed support among Californians for marriage equality — work that will make the critical difference for victory.

Best,

Andrea Shorter
Deputy Director, Marriage and Coalitions
Equality California

Well, how about that. Talk about making it to the big leagues! Andrea Shorter, the deputy director of Marriage and Coalitions for EQCA (what an interesting title) took the time out of her busy schedule to send out a nice note today “thanking us” for the opportunity to clarify Equal California’s commitment to marriage.  We know Andreeeeaaaa.  Well okay, we met her once. She’s got big dreadlocks, has a hearty laugh and lives in the Bay area. Or used to. She’s African American.  Which is so appropriate don’t you think for Miss Shorter to represent EQCA in this particular touchy matter, being that, well, RENWL predominantly serves African Americans in the South Los Angeles communities. And after all, the accusations did occur on RENWL’s blog.  Sooooo, it stands to reason that the best person to represent EQCA on this matter, obviously according to Marc Solomon’s unquestionable wisdom, would be another black person, right? Black on black.  How nice. Not that we’ve ever heard from Andrea Shorter before on issues or concerns pertaining to the African American LGBT community and South Los Angeles. And that’s not a swipe, by the way. I’m sure she’s been busy speaking on the behalf of EQCA to other black communities and relations and thanking them profusely for the opportunity to clean things up when there’s been a misunderstanding of sorts. Thing is though, we got white people  and Latino people in our community, too.  But as in most things I’m sure they’re looking at it from a majority rules perspective. Makes sense. Nonetheless, we’re deeply honored for the clarification as well as moved by the  touch of cultural sensitivity that was put into delivering the message.  God only knows the kind of offenses that could have potentially taken place had Marc Solomon ordered a non-black person to do it or horror of horrors—-to have sent the clarification himself. We hope to hear from Andrea again. Who knows? This could be the start of many collaborative efforts.  Maybe we can get in on one of those coalitions she directs. Guess we’ll just have to wait ‘n’ see. Now everyone let’s get back to the business of marriage equality, shall we? There’s much to do. So little time to do it:)

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