11.6.14 Editor’s Desk

11.6.14 Editor’s Desk

SteveBlanchardHeadshot_137x185Sitting in the Watermark newsroom on election night was exciting, sickening, disheartening and enlightening.

Once the polls closed at 7 p.m., it was an all-hands-on-deck situation with members of our editorial team monitoring different races in the different counties Watermark covers. We were streaming live television on the newsroom’s flat screen while refreshing the websites for an array of supervisors of elections offices.
It’s a process I’ve experienced many times in my career as a journalist, and one that tends to raise the excitement and stress levels to new heights each and every time.

For me, this was a disappointing election. Governor Rick Scott was somehow re-elected. And the incumbent governor was joined by his Attorney General, Pam Bondi. Both Republicans have a laundry list of anti-LGBT actions and beliefs, and knowing that a majority of voters support their views stings. It stings because as a gay man, I have to wait just a little bit longer to be recognized as an equal in the state I choose to call home. A slim majority of my neighbors still want discrimination to exist for me and my community, simply because of who we are.

Admittedly, Charlie Crist wasn’t a strong candidate. He had burned bridges in the LGBT community by fighting against marriage equality when he was in Tallahassee as governor before, and disenfranchised both Republicans and Democrats with his Party-Switching two-step—or three-step, if you include his short stint as an Independent.

Many LGBTs didn’t believe his reported change-of-heart when it came to his views on marriage equality. Instead, they saw it as a way to simply win votes.

I wanted to believe his stance, but admit I was more hopeful than convinced of his views. Those who weren’t focused on LGBT issues simply saw both candidates as untrustworthy, according to a large number of polls.

In Central Florida, LGBT advocates Linda Stewart and Joe Saunders lost their bid for re-election, meaning Tallahassee will go back to being a little less friendly toward LGBTs once again.

And patients hoping for the medical assistance of medical marijuana will have to relocate to other states to get the help they so desperately need—which also translates to a big swing-and-a-miss on Florida’s ability to raise tax revenue.

I recall a similar feeling of disappointment in 2008 when an amendment passed so easily here that barred same-sex couples from marrying. That measure even went even further and prevented the state from recognizing marriages performed outside of the state. In other words, if you were married to your same-sex partner in a state with marriage equality, you were single in the eyes of the law once you drove into the Sunshine State’s borders.

So what do the 2014 general election results mean for Florida and for us as an LGBT community? It means we have to fight harder and conquer a few more odds before we have full equality in the Sunshine State.

It’s frustrating, yes. Hell, it’s even a bit depressing.

While voter turnout was better than expected, there were still too many who chose to sit at home rather than cast a vote. That means a minority, rather than a majority, decided who was going to run our government for the next two-to-four years.

But if we’ve learned anything from past elections, especially the mixed emotions that came with the election of 2008, is that we can find a way to win in the long run, no matter the setback.

Marriage equality will head to the Supreme Court, and the dominoes continue to fall in our favor, thanks to the DOMA ruling in the summer of 2013. Eventually, governors, regardless of party affiliation, will have to respect the law of the land, which will undoubtedly support marriage equality in all 50 states.

And that means in Florida, when we can legally marry our same-sex partners on our beaches and in our theme parks in the next year or two, it will be a Republican governor seated in Tallahassee that will have to finally admit that we won our right to equality.

And that is, at least for me, a pretty big victory for our LGBT community.

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