I wasn't born here - here, as in Canada. That hardly makes me unusual around here - more than 18% of people legally living in Canada weren't born here, or born to Canadian parents. That's over five million people. Just under 2.3 million of these are, like me, of European extraction - and just under 2 million originated in Asia. The top seven source countries for immigrants from 1991 to 2001 were in Asia - which is a far cry from 1895 to 1906, when under 5% came from places other than Europe and the United States. Even in 1956, almost 90% of immigrants came from Europe (and about 2% from Asia).
Every year, about 150,000 immigrants take out Canadian citizenship (last year, my parents were two of these). The requirements for citizenship are simple: come as an immigrant, stay a while, and keep your nose clean. We accept it as a given that, if you live and work here and came here legally, you have every right to be given access to full citizenship. We don't question it: rather, we are shocked when we find out that, in Switzerland, there are third generation "immigrants" who are not entitled to citizenship. You were born in the country, your parents were born in the country, you may not even speak the language of your "ethnic origin" - and yet, you are not a citizen. Why no change? Have a look at the little graphic above: a promotional ad run by Swiss People's Party last summer, arguing against granting citizenship to immigrants. You wouldn't want all those greedy non-Swiss hands reaching for the pie. 20% of people living in Switzerland aren't entitled to it.
Unthinkable, for most of us. We are a land of immigrants, with ever changing sources of people. We make a point of non-discrimination based on ethnic origin (or race, or sex, or ability) - it's enshrined in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. But what if, in 1956, we had gone to a plebicite to decide if we should open our doors to people who are different from the majority - whether by race or religion? What if we left all human rights decisions up to popular vote? If the collective will was high-minded enough to ensure that we made the non-discirminatory decisions, we'd hardly need the Charter, would we?
The way I see it, we have institutions like the Charter to safeguard the interests of all of us - including minorities. We're fortunate in many ways, but there are places where racism exists (I'd argue we don't have to go very far to find it). We tend to reproduce ourselves, which means, to me, that we are most comfortable in systems we understand and we want to perpetuate them. But if my company were to call a meeting on hiring practices, and we voted on what sort of people we will hire in the future and we agreed, by consensus, that we would not hire anyone with an accent when he or she speaks English, we'd be in violation of the Charter, and we'd deserve to have our asses called out by the perfectly qualified applicants that we rejected because, well, they're not exactly like us.
Just because the majority wants something doesn't mean it's right. And a referendum is no way to decide human rights issues. I expect our politicians (and our courts) to make decisions is accordance to human rights, equity, justice and the like, as it is enshrined in the Charter. As of 1996, under Bill C-33, sexual orientation is analgous to race, ethnicity, disability and the rest of the reasons for which you cannot legally discriminate. We are equal in the eyes of the law, and "we" includes gays and lesbians. To use the analogy of citizenship, Bill C-33 finally extended this to the homosexual community: it doesn't matter where you're born, what colour you are, or what gender you prefer to go to bed with, we are entitled to the same things.
One of those things, as far as I'm concerned, is marriage. We can have marriage without the church - I can go to city hall and marry. It's not a "civil union", it's a marriage. I don't need any church blessing, I don't need to believe in any higher power, and I don't even need to stick with it for that long. If we change our minds, we can do it all over again with other people - and it will be as full and legal a marriage as before. It's not just profession of belief I'm exempt from - it's procreation. I can marry if I'm past my reproductive years. I can marry for partnership and extension of benefits. I can marry for shits and giggles. As long as I do it with a man?
I could argue that it affects my life not one little bit, whether we pass gay marriage or not. It will never have any bearing on my life, because it's irrelevant if you're heterosexual. Except not. It does affect me, if I live in a country that denies such a basic institution - which we already don't tie to religion - to a portion of people for no other reason than that they're not like us. To me, it's no different than denying citizenship based on ethnic origin three generations ago.
If the ceremony performed at civil hall is a marriage, then that's the word I want used. If we reserve "marriage" for "church wedding" and call all civil ceremonies "civil unions", fine, let's call it civil unions for all who leave religion out of it - but if two men have their civil union blessed by a church, it's a marriage.
Posted by Johanna at February 22, 2005 04:02 PM