From: smithw@col.hp.com (Walter Smith)
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: Re: Attention Skiers Boycotting Colorado
Date: 30 Dec 1992 19:20:55 GMT
Organization: Colorado Springs IT Center
NNTP-Posting-Host: fajita19.cs.itc.hp.com

mhr@hpuerca.atl.hp.com (Mike Reaser) writes:
> So Colorado can take away rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution,
> but no one is supposed to be concerned?  No one from outside the
> state is supposed to show any displeasure?  Get real...

Get real yourself and look at this from a practical standpoint, instead 
of an emotional, reactionary one.  If #2 takes away rights 
guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, it will be ruled unconstitutional 
and be overturned.  People here were upset when it passed, and I think 
if all the boycott hype hadn't come along, more energy would have 
been spent on the overturn instead of on the boycott.  With any 
luck, the whole thing will be ruled uncomstitutional, and the 
boycott will have been an unnessesary (and harmful, since it 
polarizes people) misuse of energy. 

> If they are not bigoted then they are ignorant, because they voted
> _FOR_ a measure without understanding it.  There were several
> amendments and referenda on the Georgia ballot on which I did not 
> cast a vote because I knew nothing of them.

Ignorant (ill-informed?) I'll buy.  People only partly understood 
what it really meant, and the wording was cleaver enough to take 
advantage of that.  I tried to get at least *somewhat* of an 
understanding of each of the amendments, so I could make a 
partially-intelligent vote on them, rather than none at all. 

> But, Walter, rights _WERE_ taken away.  

Yes, they were. 

>You can rationalize all you
> want about what the voters _thought_ they were doing, 

If you want to blow off understanding why an event happened, so 
that something can be done about it, as *rationalizing*, fine...
but that's not very productive.  

> I pay my taxes, I have my
> rights -- and now, you have more rights than I do.  Something about
> the words "All men are created equal" and the fourteenth amendment to
> our federal constitution seem to ring false for me in Colorado.

Well, unless you live here, it hasn't taken away your rights, but 
I get your point.  It does, in my mind, violate th 14th. 
> 
> You're really enamoured of the word "force" aren't you?  

I'm very un-enamoured with the concept of force, which is what a 
boycott tries to do.  It's just the thing that can make you lose, 
when you think you've won.  

> state of Colorado has _forced_ any homosexual to either remain in the
> closet or face the wrath of employers, housing agents, etc., without
> any legal recourse available.  If I can't make the citizens of the
> state understand that I will not accept second-class status because
> they view my basic civil rights as "special", then I will get angry
> and not hesitate to show my anger.

That's fine, but think about your chosen veichle for showing it, and 
make sure it's a productive one, based on getting the bast results and 
not on malice.   As for people thinking that your "basic civil rights" 
are viewed as "special rights", that is one *tired* piece of rhetoric. 
#2 targeted 2 SEPERATE 'rights'; "special" rights like quotas, and 
in a more veiled way, the "basic civil rights" (I like the term 
'human rights' better) that everyone should be entitled to.  People 
do NOT want to see "special" rights for people, and they don't want 
to see (most people, anyways) anyone denied basic human rights.  The 
more you and other flamers rant and rave that the people of 
Colorado want to take away your basic human rights, the more polarized 
an already bad situation becomes.  And the more moderate people 
will get the impression that you (generic you) are twisting the 
issues.
 
Walter