Yesterday, Governor Martin O’Malley signed a law legalizing same sex marriage in Maryland. This news is the latest in a series of big victories for marriage equality. In February, an appeals court in California ruled Proposition 8 (the amendment banning gay marriage in California) unconstitutional, Washington state legalized gay marriage, and the New Jersey legislature passed a bill legalizing same sex marriage, although NJ governor Chris Christie vetoed the bill. The Maryland law takes effect in 2013, and opponents are expected to fight it. Even though the movement toward marriage equality is still a struggle, these events are important signs that things are changing.

Garnet is a student at Columbia University in New York City. She is “that person” who starts dancing at a party when everyone else is standing around, and if there were a Facebook stalking Olympics, she would be a gold medalist. She also loves cheesy 90s music, and almost died of happiness when Vanilla Ice retweeted her. Once. Follow her on Twitter @garnethenderson.

[Lead image via Karin Hildebrand Lau/Shutterstock]

There are many heterosexual couples that say they won’t get married until after marriage equality is achieved and same sex marriage has been legalized — Brad and Angelina are probably the first couple that comes to mind. This isn’t a decision I’d ever have to think about because, well, same sex marriage is already legal in Canada where I’m from. It’s a decision I admire, and it’s cool to see that one woman has taken the fight for equality a step further.

Yes, an openly gay Texan judge has said she won’t perform marriages until she is able to get married to a person of her choosing. This week Tonya Parker told Stonewall Democrats:

“I don’t perform marriage ceremonies because we are in a state that does not have marriage equality, and until it does, I am not going to partially apply the law to one group of people that doesn’t apply to another group of people.’ And it’s kind of oxymoronic for me to perform ceremonies that can’t be performed for me, so I’m not going to do it.”

It’s a bold move that I completely support. In Canada churches are not required to marry two members of the same sex, and I don’t think a judge should have to perform marriages when they don’t support biased legislation.

[Lead image via Lasse Kristensen/Shutterstock]

Great news out of California this week! Proposition 8, the voter-approved ban on same sex marriage in California, was ruled unconstitutional by a federal appeals court on Tuesday.

Prop 8 has been very controversial since 2008, when it was narrowly passed by a vote of 52 percent to 48 percent. You probably remember the Yes on Prop 8/No on Prop 8 campaigns. Even though the law only affected California, people from around the country got involved with the issue. And even though countless celebrities and big companies like Google threw their weight behind the No on Prop 8 campaign, it still managed to pass.

Ever since then, activists have been fighting Prop 8 in court, trying to get it declared unconstitutional. The recent decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals actually upholds the decision of a lower court from 2010. Prop 8 has now been ruled unconstitutional twice, but both sides are looking to decide the issue for good. The only way to do that is to take the case all the way to the Supreme Court, so it looks like that is probably going to be the next step.

So what exactly does that mean? It creates a lot of what-ifs. First of all, the Supreme Court could decide not to take the case at all. That would make this week’s decision final, and Prop 8 would be squashed.

But because marriage equality is such a big issue, the Supreme Court will probably take the case. And if they do, their decision could have huge long-term effects on the entire country. If the Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Ninth Circuit Court, Prop 8 would be upheld and same sex marriage would be illegal in California. But if the Supreme Court upheld the decision of the Ninth Circuit Court, Prop 8 would be gone for good.

Supreme Court decisions set precedent for other courts, and influence their verdicts. So a Supreme Court ruling on Prop 8 could set the standard for same sex marriage laws and court cases across the country.

It’s a lot to think about, and there’s no way to know what the future of Prop 8 might be. But for now, one more court has ruled it unconstitutional. And that’s one big step in the right direction.

Garnet is a student at Columbia University in New York City. She is “that person” who starts dancing at a party when everyone else is standing around, and if there were a Facebook stalking Olympics, she would be a gold medalist. She also has a love for cheesy 90s music, and almost died of happiness when Vanilla Ice retweeted her. Once. Follow her on Twitter @garnethenderson.

Growing up in Los Angeles, I frequently heard mixed opinions about gay marriage. While LA is fairly liberal, I have, too many times, witnessed homophobic responses to two men holding hands on the street or out on a date. Truthfully, for a long time I tried to avoid having an opinion about gay marriage because I was always hearing mixed messages and both sides seemed convincing. “It goes against the bible. Your religion.” Or, “everyone has the right to marry the one they love.”  I struggled with my opinion for quite a while.

However, especially since going to college, I have been able to form my own opinion free from those around me. Out Magazine recently did an adorable photo shoot spread with Neil Patrick Harris and his “better half,” David Burtka. The article describes the men’s relationship in a way that only fortifies my belief that all people should be able to get married, regardless of sexual orientation. Part of this article is an argument against the belief that two gay men can’t have a family because they can’t reproduce. They are not any different than two parents of opposite sexes. This article also argues against the belief that gay marriage destroys the sanctity of marriage. To be honest, it seems to me that Neil Patrick Harris and David Burtka’s relationship may be more stable than most heterosexual relationships I see around me.

Ashley is a freshman at George Washington University and she’s majoring in Overanalyzing Situations and International Affairs. Follow her on twitter @ashleybrooks25.

The American Civil Liberties Union has issued a letter to superintendents in Utah informing them it is unconstitutional to ban same-sex couples from attending school events.

A female high school student was asked to leave a school dance because she brought a girl as a date. Equality Utah instructed the student to contact the ACLU. Based on previous court precedence under the First Amendment banning a same-sex couple is a violation of equal rights.

Allowing high schools students to bring same-sex dates to school dances has been a highly contentious issue over the last few years. Last week the first lesbian homecoming king and queen couple in the US  received hate mail after receiving national media coverage for their titles. One step forward, one leap back.

You also might remember the Mississippi prom that was cancelled after a student asked if she could bring a female date to the dance. This student sued her school for sending her to a fake prom. While in Utah it doesn’t seem like legal action will be made, the student is making sure other students don’t go through the same ordeal. Because they shouldn’t.

On top of being unconstitutional, questioning high school students right to be involved in a same-sex relationships has also proved to be detrimental. Youth who identify as LGBTQ are two to three times more likely to commit suicide then their heterosexual counterparts. Even in Canada where same-sex marriage is legalized, LGBTQ teens are still being bullied and some are still committing suicide.

Ending bullying by peers unfortunately seems like a lofty goal, but what can be done is ending the bullying from school officials. I know we’re saying that it gets better, but I agree with Canadian comedian Rick Mercer that it’s time to make it better now.

There were so many things this week I could have written about. Anti-choice groups are increasing efforts to make accessing abortions more difficult without being illegal. A Senegalese organization is getting villages to agree to stop the practice of female genital mutilation.  But when I read about an elderly lesbian couple that staged a sit-in after being denied a marriage license in North Carolina, my topic was picked.

Coming across the We Do Campaign video, in which non-heterosexual couples go to apply for marriage licenses in North Carolina, a state in which gay marriage has not been legalized broke my heart. Writing about the divide in belief about same-sex marriage last week, brought up the point that there in some parts of the United States there isn’t a lot of support for legalization. Currently NC is waiting until May to vote on a proposed constitutional amendment that could ban both gay marriages and civil unions.

On the final day of the 10-day We Do campaign, two of the first women to apply for the license returned to the Registry of Deeds in Asheville and staged a sit in. The two were arrested after they refused to leave without obtaining a license. Rev. Kathryn Cartledge and Elizabeth Eve have been together for 30 years. Yes, count that, 30 years. In 2007, the New York Times reported over half of marriages end in divorce before the couple hits 25 years.

This weekend I’ll be raising my glass to Kathryn and Elizabeth because 30 years in any relationship is an accomplishment, and that’s not even considering the extra pressures a lesbian couple would have endured over the years. Their actions, and the act of application by 20 other couples, is an attempt to make it possible for young LGBTQ individuals to grow up without the constant reminder that they will never be given the same rights, and essentially considered equal, to someone that is heterosexual.

Yonge & Dundas Intersection in Toronto after Team Canada Win

This week’s Weekly Ten, Why Canada Deserves Silver, stirred up quite the controversy yesterday. Seriously, I didn’t see this much hate on CollegeCandy since one writer expressed her disdain for Taylor Swift. And rightfully so. Yes it was meant to be a joke, but we in Canada aren’t entirely laughing with you.  While we know for a fact CollegeCandy loves their Canadian readers, and even has a few Canadian writers (myself included), this post pissed a lot of people off.

But instead of get angry and insult the intelligence of the writer, editor or Americans in general, I decided to take the high road and just show why Canada deserves more than just a gold medal in Olympic hockey. So here is my condensed version (there are way too many reasons for one post!) of all the reasons Canada rocks that they forgot to teach you in high school.

Education – Education (university included) receives higher subsidies from the government in Canada, meaning it’s cheaper for us to attend post-secondary school.  Also, did you know that Toronto, Canada’s largely city (where I happen to attend school), has more people with university degrees than ANY other large city in the world? Yeah, take that and deep fry it!

Health Care – Okay, so maybe you’ve heard about this recently with Obama pushing for health care reform and all, but it’s true – we have universal health care in Canada, thanks to this pretty awesome guy named Tommy Douglas.  We also have a higher life expectancy rate and lower infant mortality rate than the United States.

Good Music – I agree with you, America: Avril Lavigne isn’t the greatest, but Canada has some other pretty fantastic musicians.  Arcade Fire, Metric, Stars, Feist, and The Weakerthans are just a few of my personal faves.

Tim Hortons – As I write this, I’m rolling up the rim to win on my Tim Horton’s coffee cup.

Inventions - I’m sure you’re enjoying some Canadian inventions as you read these post.  Have a light on? Used the telephone? Wearing jeans (with a zipper… not Pajama Jeans)? Played or watched hockey or basketball? Used your CrackBerry? Taken out the garbage? Eaten peanut butter? Yeah all these things were made possible by Canadians or on Canadian soil.

Multiculturalism – Canada is a mosaic of multiculturalism.  When people come to Canada we don’t expect them to give up their own identity – instead we embrace our differences.  We have two official languages in Canada – French and English – as well as  two national anthems. “Thy history is an epic of the most brilliant exploits” is a snippet of the English translation of the French version. Yeah, we’re pretty epic.

Nationalism – We have a pretty inoffensive nationalism in Canada, except when it comes to hockey.  The street parties that ensued following Sid the Kid’s gold medal winning goal were truly Canadian – according to CTV 16.6 million people saw this goal, making it the most watched broadcast in Canadian history.

Space/Landscape - As Molson Canadian (makers of the fine Canadian beer) puts it, “we have more square feet of awesomness per person than any other nation on Earth.” We have the fourth lowest population density in the world and our country is full of diverse landscapes.  This was captured by the Group of Seven, a group of Canadian painters from the 1920s that developed a new school of truly Canadian art.

Definition of Marriage – Canada was the fourth country in the world, and first in the Americas, to legalize same-sex marriage.  Much like our belief in the mosaic of multiculturalism, this shows our commitment to equality.

[photo courtesy of Max Mertens]

OK, I can already feel this one’s gonna get messy, so hold on tight folks.

I admit, I’ve put off talking about gay marriage here for a while, in part because, well, I went to a liberal arts school in NYC – I have way too many gay friends to really be impartial here. Then last week, the assistant managing editor of the Notre Dame student newspaper resigned during the controversy over an anti-gay joke that appeared in the paper’s comic strip and I realized that this is an issue that still affects us all, and we need to talk about it.

Now I’m not going to get into a moral argument here – I doubt that I could change anyone’s opinions one way or another about that particular issue; my questions instead are logistical – is gay marriage inevitably going to become legal and if so, what’s the point of fighting it?

Right now, five states allow gay marriage and several other have passed bills allowing it only to have them repealed. Regardless of your moral standpoint, the legal (and yes, marriage is considered a legal institution, not a religious one in the US) arguments for gay marriage are persuasive. Now, admittedly, there’s a lot of strange and old-fashioned laws still on the books that just hang around (did you know that it’s illegal to let a donkey sleep in a bathtub in Arizona?), but that’s mostly because people forget about them. Same-sex marriage is one issue that people are fighting for and are probably going to continue to fight for, so why not just let it go?

On one side, we’ve wasted enormous – like huge, gigantic – amounts of money fighting about gay marriage in the courts. Plus all of the money that’s been spent on propaganda on both sides is way up there too, which seems ridiculous given our current economic climate. Why not put all of that cash toward social programs and just admit that the battle is lost? Same-sex marriage would mean equality (supposedly the most American of all virtues) and it could also help clarify a lot of sticky legal situations about partnership rights and help ease up the burden with the foster system by allowing gay couples to adopt more easily. After all, 70% of Americans believe that the LGBT community deserves the same rights as straight individuals, so it just makes sense, right?

But at the same time, (and this one shocked me) the same percentage of Americans are opposed to gay marriage. And we have always been a country where, if nothing else, your opinion matters and you fight for it. So if that much of America – the “by the people, for the people” nation - doesn’t believe in same-sex marriage, should we really make it a law? I mean, ultimately we Americans have always been about doing what we believe is right – sometimes that has led to bad things, but it’s also the spirit that pushes us to pitch in and help big time with things like the disaster in Haiti.

OK, you tell me, same-sex marriage – yay or nay?
Should we go with the flow, or keep on fighting?
What would you vote for?
Keep it clean people, but duke it out!

That seems a little bit backwards, no?

As same-sex couples around the country take to the battlefields to fight for their right to marry, American TV is making a mockery of the very thing these couples are wishing for. The collective majority of Americans are against allowing a same-sex couple to enjoy the sanctity of marriage, claiming we should “protect the institution of marriage” and uphold traditional American values. Yet, a new reality show reveals America’s hypocritical nature by turning marriage into a cheap game show.

Hitched or Ditched poses the ultimate ultimatum to a rocky couple: Get married in a week or end it for good. Viewers are drawn to the drama and suspense of whether a couple will say “I do” or be publicly humiliated with rejection. This all or nothing, sh*t-or-get-off-the-pot attitude cheapens the idea of marriage. This show will only reinforce our generation’s cynical attitude that marriages and weddings are nothing more than expensive circuses built around an attention-whoring couple. Something akin to the Speidi extravaganza comes to mind.

This is also an example of why our divorce rate is so high. Couples end up at the alter for all the wrong reasons. They feel pressure from each other or friends and family. They marry to take advantage of the monetary benefits, or they see marriage as an excuse to throw a blowout party in their name. But these are the couples who America roots for. These are the couples who are allowed to participate in a sacred union that is continually denied to legitimately in-love couples.

The same people who are picketing against gay marriage are sitting on their couches and watching America exploit matrimony for entertainment value. Where is the logic in that?

Hitched or Ditched is trainwreck reality TV that cheapens the battle that same-sex couples go to bat for everyday. I, for one, will stick with Who’s Wedding Is It Anyway.