The vote: Victory, shock

Re “Focused beyond marriage,” Nov. 6

There is too much irony in the 2008 election. How can a people make such great progress by electing the first African American president but relegate an entire section of its population to second-class citizenship?

Today I wake up and find myself separate and unequal. I do this on the same day many Americans feel equality for the first time.

C. Stenke

Los Angeles

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When I woke up Thursday morning, I felt pretty bad. But then I checked my e-mail and saw messages of consolation from friends and family. Then I went for a hike in the hills with my partner, the love of my life for 16 years. Then I went to work -- where straight colleagues, whom I’ve known for only a few months, came up to say how sorry they were about the results.

And that’s when it hit me: We’re still here.

Why is this so satisfying? Because the people who sponsored Proposition 8 don’t only want to protect marriage -- they want to destroy gay people. I’ve got news for them: It is they who don’t fit in. We may not have won this round, but it’s clear which way this country is going.

Joann Moschella

Santa Cruz

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As a black male, I can tell you that the reason the African American community voted for Proposition 8 had less to do with religion and more to do with a sense of resentment toward the gay community and the California Supreme Court for attempting to equate one’s bedroom activities with the color of one’s skin.

Try as you may to fallaciously link the two, interracial marriage is still a man-woman issue, and gay marriage is not. It is something new and different, for which our society has already crafted a new and different type of union called a domestic partnership.

Jason W. Perrault

Studio City

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It’s amazing that seven in 10 blacks in California voted in favor of Proposition 8.

Despite many of us having already received our not-so-subtle voting instructions on this issue in church, you could have figured that more blacks here would have known better than to inflict discriminatory laws on another minority group.

Regardless of personal religious views or insecurities, one’s credibility in the equal-rights arena is shot when you get caught “doing unto others” that which you fought against when it was applied to you.

Mike Henderson

Los Angeles