What are marriage opponents hiding?

Prop. 8 had yet another day in court last week when Federal District Judge James S. Ware heard arguments about whether or not videotape of the original trial should be released to the public.

The most interesting question has been this: If the Prop. 8 proponents are so convinced that their cause is just and their reasoning sound, why are they so determined to keep the public from seeing their case?

The main claims made by the plaintiffs—to quote Ted Boutrous, one of their attorneys—are that the videotapes “aren’t state secrets.”

The Prop. 8 supporters are arguing that the videotapes—which the judge cited in his decision, which were used for prepare for closing arguments, and which are part of the record—ought to be kept from everyone, including the justices of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. They also made the argument—again—that their witnesses will be in danger and will suffer harm if the tapes are ever broadcast.

So we simply must ask: Are you kidding? It’s been two years, and not one scintilla of harm has come to these people. In fact, several of them—David Blankenhorn, notably—go on television and C-SPAN to tout their opinions regularly. How disingenuous to say that you’re an expert on a subject, you’ll talk about it on TV, but you don’t want anyone to see your sworn testimony at trial.

Here’s what Boutrous had to say: “When people hear our arguments about how Prop. 8 is discriminatory, hurts children, and families, and has no purpose, it changes peoples’ minds—and that’s why the proponents don’t want this out.”

I’ve run across a number of people who think that there must be a good reason to deny marriage equality to gays and lesbians; there must be a scientific or sociological or legal reason, or else no one would oppose it. Even though transcripts (and re-enactments) of the trial are out there, these folks still assume that there must have been a case against marriage equality and that the judge must have been biased.

If these people actually see the videos, they’ll see that there is no evidence. They’ll see that they’ve been lied to and made fools of by the proponents of Prop. 8, and that they’ve injured and harmed their neighbors for no good reason.

That’s the last thing the proponents want, because then their fundraising will be done; they’ll run out of money and have to get jobs like the rest of us.

Compiled from Kel’s Hot Flash.