If You Can’t Arrest ’em, Fine ’em

If you can’t arrest a gay couple for trying to get married, at least you can fine them 41 bucks and dish out 28 hours of community service. That’s the punishment doled out to Kate Burns and Sheila Schroeder, a couple convicted Wednesday of trespassing for staging a sit in at the Denver county clerk’s office in protest of the Colorado law banning same-sex marriages.

After hearing the verdict and punishment, they left the courtroom, hand in hand, smiling and saying they look forward to helping the community during those 28 hours each has to serve.

Yeah, it would have been a terrible thing for these two to be married. It would have really ruined the ideals of marriage.

I hope you realize those sentences drip with sarcasm.

One of these days, we’ll all realize that a gay couple getting married is really not a big deal. It’s just two people in love, wanting to cement it with legal documentation and get a few tax breaks along the way.

This shouldn’t be a party line political issue—it’s a basis civil rights problem. Gays are no different than straights, blacks, whites or Hispanics.

Some gay couples would in fact ruin the “sanctity of marriage,” just the same as straight couples. Good marriages are based on good people. Period.

So kudos to Kate and Sheila for standing up for their rights and accepting the small punishment they received for trespassing.