Sometimes politics doesn't suck
Jun. 26th, 2013 01:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenayThis morning I've been watching democracy happen, pretty much in front of my eyes.
I went to bed last night while Wendy Davis was still filibustering to prevent a bill passing that would have made it almost impossible to get an abortion in Texas. By the time I woke up, Twitter had exploded and the bill had been defeated. Only by two minutes and her filibuster was vetoed early (so she only spoke for ten hours and forty-five minutes, only!!), but the filibuster and the subsequent challenges, motions, and noise from the gallery combined to delay the vote until it was too late.
I'm not American, but it's still making something well up every time I think about what Wendy Davis did. About the power of one person standing up and speaking. About people gradually tuning in to listen to what she was doing and then pulling together to support her in every way they could. It's incredible.
There's a very good chance that tonight I'll be watching "The Stackhouse Filibuster" tonight, the West Wing episode that taught me what a filibuster is and why it's such an amazing thing to do.
And then this morning the Supreme Court overturned DOMA. An act that tries to create two classes of marriage, one with all the rights and privileges straight couples expect and one without them because the couples are same-sex. It's been ruled unconstitutional because of that inequality.
It's been a pretty good morning, really.
I went to bed last night while Wendy Davis was still filibustering to prevent a bill passing that would have made it almost impossible to get an abortion in Texas. By the time I woke up, Twitter had exploded and the bill had been defeated. Only by two minutes and her filibuster was vetoed early (so she only spoke for ten hours and forty-five minutes, only!!), but the filibuster and the subsequent challenges, motions, and noise from the gallery combined to delay the vote until it was too late.
I'm not American, but it's still making something well up every time I think about what Wendy Davis did. About the power of one person standing up and speaking. About people gradually tuning in to listen to what she was doing and then pulling together to support her in every way they could. It's incredible.
There's a very good chance that tonight I'll be watching "The Stackhouse Filibuster" tonight, the West Wing episode that taught me what a filibuster is and why it's such an amazing thing to do.
And then this morning the Supreme Court overturned DOMA. An act that tries to create two classes of marriage, one with all the rights and privileges straight couples expect and one without them because the couples are same-sex. It's been ruled unconstitutional because of that inequality.
It's been a pretty good morning, really.
