When Chris Norberg arrived at San Francisco’s Civic Center Plaza to demonstrate against Proposition 8 last Saturday, he knew what point he wanted to make.

“A lot of my friends are really pissed off at minority groups in this city right now,” he said. “They voted against us.”

Norberg, 26 and white, is a furniture builder who married his same-sex partner last June.

Standing on the grass outside City Hall, he held a banner displaying the names of high-profile gay crime victims like Matthew Shepard and Harvey Milk, both of whom were murdered.

“I’m really hoping that minorities catch on that this isn’t just a gay issue,” said Norberg.

“Us” and “Them” have become the de facto terms of engagement for many angry activists since Prop 8 passed on November 4th, following the release of exit polls suggesting that black and Latino voters overwhelmingly supported the measure. In editorials, blog posts and Facebook messages, white gays and lesbians have expressed dismay that other historically oppressed groups would vote to overturn the law permitting same-sex marriage.

It’s an argument that’s frustrating to nonwhite gays and lesbians, many of whom say they feel invisible.

Rafael Delgado, 21, a senior at UC Berkeley, said he was disappointed when Prop 8 passed. But what hurt more, he said, was the reaction of the white gay community.

“A lot of internalized racism came out,” he said.

Delgado said he identifies strongly as both gay and Latino, but that neither community feels completely comfortable to him.

“I feel like I’m invisible in both,” he said. The gay movement, he said, is “a very white movement” with which he has trouble identifying. On the other hand, he said, in Latino communities, his gay identity is not always tolerated.

“I identify strongly with my race,” he said. “But then my queerness gets ignored.”

Delgado said he thought the campaign against Prop 8 was dominated by white gays, and did not adequately address the concerns of communities of color. For them, he said, same-sex marriage is not a high priority.

That sentiment was echoed by Dejanira Cruz, who along with Delgado is a member of YQUE, a queer Latino student organization. Both Cruz and Delgado said that while they support marriage rights, they think that the issue can distract from more pressing social-justice goals.

“YQUE didn’t spend a lot of time phonebanking for Prop 8,” said Cruz, 23. “We spent more time on the propositions affecting our communities.” The ballot measures dealing with abortion rights and prison law, she said, were the most relevant to low-income, nonwhite communities.

The schism between white and nonwhite gay communities is not new, says Reverend Roland Stringfellow of the Pacific School of Religion. Rev. Stringfellow, who is black and openly gay, organized against Prop 8 but said he found many gay blacks unwilling to join his cause.

The reasons, he said, trace all the way back to the 1960s Stonewall riots, which are widely considered to have kicked off the modern gay rights movement. “It was Latino and African-American drag queens who began those protests. They were the ones arrested, they were the ones who suffered beatings and were thrown in jail,” said Stringfellow.

Black gays, he said, felt that white people “jumped on board afterward” and co-opted the movement.

When the AIDS crisis hit, said Stringfellow, blacks felt a similar betrayal. “[AIDS awareness] was largely driven by white gay men. And when cocktails became available for patients, they went to those who could afford it, largely white gay men as opposed to gays of color.”

The same issues, he said, affected the debate over Prop 8.

“Folks of color have many other issues to deal with in terms of survival,” he said. “Gay marriage isn’t even on the radar screen.”

For young, queer people of color, said Stringfellow, finding a supportive community is crucial to navigating the complicated politics of race and sexuality. For Delgado, that community is YQUE, which he said would probably end up being more important to his life than any other experience at Berkeley.

“So many people of color assume gayness is a white thing,” he said. “My job is to say no, it’s in every community. And if you disenfranchise them, you’re disenfranchising someone in your community.”

Stringfellow, Cruz and Delgado all expressed hope that the ultimate result of the Prop 8 debate would be positive.

“Nobody wants to be discriminatory,” said Cruz. “They just need another human being to talk to them about these things.”

Update: On November 19th, the California Supreme court agreed to hear the lawsuits but denied a motion for an immediate stay.

Update: Alameda County and the City of San Mateo unanimously voted in closed session to join the lawsuits on November 18th. The city of Oakland voted in closed session to join the lawsuits on November 19th.

In a four to one vote, the Fremont City Council voted on November 18th, to become a party in the now four lawsuits being waged against the state in opposition of Proposition 8. Fremont is the first city in Alameda County to join the lawsuits.

City Attorney Harvey Levine presented his legal assessment of the litigation its primary argument that Proposition 8 is a revision, rather than an amendment to the California state constitution.

“The underlying issue is whether or not you can take a fundamental right away from the Constitution with a simple majority vote,” said Levine.

Following Levine’s remarks, the microphone was opened up for community statements. Seven individuals came forward, each making two minutes speeches urging the council members to support these lawsuits.

Each of the seven, while presenting individual perspectives, all referenced Fremont’s minority majority population and large immigrant community as reasons to oppose Proposition 8 and ensure that rights for all will be protected.

Christina Melnarik, a resident of 22 years, emphasized the American commitment to the separation of church and state as set forth by James Madison.

She went on to state, “Every generation has resisted the inclusion of a group of others into our society. How can we laud the election of our new president election as a triumph over bigotry and prejudice while on the other hand we apply that same bigotry and prejudice against another subset of other?”

Reverend Barbara Myers, a minister at Mission Peak Unitarian Universality congregation and 33-year resident of Fremont, said she was concerned that Proposition 8 might establish a precedent for taking away the rights of other minority communities in the future.

“In my view this is simply not just and I’m confident that eventually justice is going rain in this matter,” she said

Natalie Mun stepped up to the podium and with a quivering voice and tears in her eyes, urged the council to do the right thing.

“I’m embarrassed that the constitutional change wrought by Proposition 8 is wrong for CA, that it’s wrong for my neighbors, and that it’s wrong for our city. As a minority majority city we have a particular need to protect the rights of all our residents, but especially minorities. Let’s wake up from this bad dream,”

Following the statements, councilmembers briefly discussed the issue, turning to Levine for clarification on the difference between filing an “amicus” brief, or simply join the lawsuit. This time also gave members the opportunity to voice their personal opinion on the matter, which were overwhelmingly supportive.

Vice-Mayor Anu Natarajan stated, “Something more important than whether we join in the lawsuit is the fact that we as community leaders are taking a stand on this for our community in Fremont. Especially in a diverse community like ours, we need to be looking out for the smallest of the groups amongst that diverse group.”

Also a vocal supporter was Councilman Bob Wieckowski, who said, “Can you imagine after the Civil Rights Act had been passed by Congress, that the state decided by a majority that they want to go our own way because this is what the majority of our state wants? So sometimes it’s appropriate for the city to express their will.”

The city expressing its will was one of the reasons given in Councilman Steven Cho’s sole voice of dissent. He argued that the city council has not taken an official stance on civil rights issues that have been brought to the council in the past and that this issue was no different.

“I want to protect civil rights, but to change the definition of marriage, in my mind, is a different issue than one of civil rights. The Prop 8 language is what I grew up with. I will talk about civil rights but I won’t go against 8,” said Cho.

Mayor Bob Wasserman said that during his 16 years as mayor he has been a staunch opponent of getting involved in issues that do not affect the city. But he was quick to jump in and say that this issue is different because it results in the “deprivation of rights of people in Fremont.”

Despite Cho’s disagreement, the majority opinion of the council was summed up by Councilman Bob Wieckowski, “There’s no reason why we shouldn’t join the lawsuit. We’re doing this for all of our citizens.”

The four to one vote was met with a standing ovation by those in the gallery, many of whom were wiping away tears.

Fremont joins the ranks of San Francisco city and county, Los Angeles city and county, city of Oakland, as well as Santa Clara, Alameda, Marin, San Mateo and Santa Cruz counties in their lawsuits against the state of California.

Volunteers help Chinese voters with limited English skills.

By Guo Shipeng

A steady stream of Chinese residents cast their votes in several polling stations in Oakland’s Chinatown throughout Tuesday, many supporting Obama in line with the community’s long-time leaning toward the Democrats.

But a considerable amount of Chinatown voters cited traditional Chinese family values and voted for Prop 8 that would ban same-sex marriages, disappointing a group of campaigners against the proposition who stayed outside a polling place for a whole day to try to win over people.

“I’ve always voted for the Democratic Party. It has treated Chinese Americans well in the past,” said housewife Candy He, 50. “As an ethnic minority, we are most concerned about our children’s rights in education and employment.”

He said she strongly opposed gay marriage and had asked her three children, the youngest in 12th grade, to vote for Prop 8.

“They agreed a little grudgingly this time. I don’t know how they’ll vote in the future,” said He.

He accompanied a neighbor, a first-time voter who moved to the United States from China in 2000, to the small polling station in the hallway of the Lincoln Elementary School on the 11th Street.

The neighbor, a 50-year-old waitress who would only give her surname Zheng, said she voted for McCain and Prop 8.

“There is a Chinese saying: the older ginger is spicier. So I chose the more experienced one,” Zheng said. “I can’t accept same-sex marriages. It’s always one man, one woman in the Chinese society and after all the mankind has to reproduce.”

The divide on the contentious issue seemed to fall on generational lines.

Albert Fan, 18 and a freshman at the San Francisco State University, voted for Obama and against Prop 8.

“It’s equal rights. They were just allowed to get married fairly recently and now we are going to take the right back? It’s not fair,” Fan said after casting his ballot in the Lincoln Neighborhood Center.

His friend Alex Cheng, a 12th grader months away from 18, said he would have voted for Obama and against Prop 8 if he was able to.

Early voting and the concentration of at least four polling stations around the Chinatown area meant there was not much waiting in both the school and the neighborhood center.

Both stations had Chinese-speaking volunteers to help voters with limited English skills.

Lu Lisheng, 80, has helped in several elections. This time, he was one of the language volunteers in the Lincoln school.

“The procedures and Chinese instructions on the forms are confusing sometimes, so we just tell voters how to do it,” Lu said. “Five out ten voters need our help, but we’ll never tell them whom to vote for.”

Six volunteers from a San Francisco group against Prop 8, including an architect and a lawyer, manned the street corners near the Lincoln Neighborhood Center, handing out flyers and talking to people in the hope that they would vote against the proposition.

Emily Wages, a Mandarin-speaking immigration lawyer from San Francisco, campaigns against Prop 8 outside the Lincoln Neighborhood Center polling station.

Oakland City Council Member Jean Quan and her husband also spent several hours in the cold campaigning for the Democratic Party and against Prop 8.

Quan ran into a group of Chinese women supporting Prop 8 after dark.  When she challeged the group about their sources of funding, the Prop 8 supporters became emotional but things were short of a showdown.

“If you let them discriminate against gay people, then what keeps them from discriminating against Chinese, or women?” Quan said.

The demonstrators yelled slurs like “faggot,” according to several people who said they were harassed. Some said they were pushed, poked, and hit with signs by aggressive demonstrators.

“They said, ‘You’re a sick fag,’” said Oakland resident Anthony Lecours, 46, who held a sign opposing Proposition 8. Lecours said he was poked repeatedly and that one demonstrator told him he had AIDS.

“They were telling me I wish I had a penis,” said Julie Harris, another resident of Oakland who was holding a sign opposing Proposition 8 across the street from the main demonstration. “[They said] that I was angry a man left me, stuff like that.”

Harris also said a demonstrator pushed and elbowed her.

On Friday, police department spokesman Jeff Thomason said one demonstrator was cited for battery.

The demonstration drew between 30 and 40 people to the intersection of Lakeshore Avenue and MacArthur Boulevard, as the sun set Thursday. Over several hours, between three and six Oakland police officers monitored the scene. Drivers passing by honked and pointed toward the side they supported.

Asked about the allegations of harassment, Officer Chris Keden said that several people had complained to him about the slurs, but that he personally had not heard anyone use them.

Proposition 8 supporter Benjamin Finau, 27, was holding a sign and yelling to passing cars.

“Gay and lesbian marriage, and just being gay, too, that’s not good,” he said. “I see it as a spiritual battle between good and evil, and we’re on the good side.”

His view appears to conflict with the stated position of the sponsors of Proposition 8, who say on their Web site that the measure is not an attack on gay couples or homosexuality but rather a reaffirmation of heterosexual marriage.

The measure’s sponsors have repeated this stance in television advertisements and media interviews. In recent days, however, witnesses have reported numerous instances of abusive language and physical intimidation at Yes-on-8 demonstrations throughout Oakland.

The Protect Marriage campaign, which is sponsoring Proposition 8, declined to comment for this story.

Finau said he and many of the other demonstrators are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The Protect Marriage campaign estimates that 40 percent of its donations have come from members of the LDS church; Californians Against Hate, a group opposing Proposition 8, puts the amount at 80 percent.

A spokesman for the Oakland Temple, a local LDS branch, said the church does not take political positions.

“Individuals can do what their conscience dictates,” he said. “I’d be disappointed that church members were using anything but good language.”

A ballot measure to end gay marriage in California has attracted money and endorsements from Christian groups around the country, but many local Christians say they are wary of being associated with the campaign.

Groups supporting the gay marriage ban, Proposition 8, have raised more than $25 million, according to data from the California Secretary of State’s Web site. Some of the biggest contributions have come from Christian groups like Focus on the Family, which is evangelical, and the Knights of Columbus, which is Catholic, according to an analysis of the data by the 510Report.

Rev. Jeff Johnson, pastor of the University Lutheran Chapel near the University of California, Berkeley campus, opposes Prop. 8. His church has a rainbow flag—a symbol of gay rights—hanging outside on its wall. Johnson said that while many local Christians and churches share his views, the visibility of the Prop. 8 campaign could lead some observers to associate Christianity with an opposition to gay marriage.

“It gives Christianity a bad name,” Johnson said of the campaign.

Other local Christians say they are more conflicted about Prop. 8. Sara Chi, a senior at the University of California Berkeley, said she has been a member of the Cal Christian Fellowship since she started college. She said she will vote against Prop. 8, but the decision was made difficult by her conservative Baptist upbringing.

“When I first saw it on the ballot I was pretty torn,” said Chi, 21. “Growing up, it was emphasized in my home or among my friends that gay people are weird.”

Andrew Lee, a sophomore and member of the Christian fraternity, Alpha Gamma Omega, said he skipped Prop. 8 when he voted by mail earlier this month.

“Morally, I don’t think there should be gay marriage…but I don’t think it’s the government’s job to define what marriage is,” said Lee, 19, a Presbyterian.

In interviews with several local Christians of various denominations, none would go on the record as supporting Prop. 8.

An analysis of campaign contributions and published endorsements shows that Evangelical, Mormon and Catholic denominations are among the Christian churches most supportive of Prop. 8. Episcopal and Congregational groups are among those most opposed, favoring a continuation the legal gay marriage made possible by state Supreme Court ruling in May.

But the divisions do not always occur along the lines of denominations, some of which are themselves conflicted about gay marriage. In opposing Prop 8, University Lutheran is in conflict with congregations such as Zion Lutheran Church outside Sacramento, which has endorsed the measure. And by performing gay marriage ceremonies, the church is at odds with the official policy of its national affiliate, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

“It’s a very gray area in the church,” said ELCA spokesman John Brooks. “We don’t recognize same-sex marriage but there’s no outright ban.”

But according to Johnson of University Lutheran, gray areas could get lost among in a socially liberal setting like Berkeley.

“If you’re a Christian in Berkeley, then everyone assumes that you think like Jerry Falwell,” the late fundamentalist leader, Johnson said.