LOVE ARTS NEWS: New York's Same Sex Marriage Bill Gives Hope To California Residents

Sunday, June 26, 2011

New York's Same Sex Marriage Bill Gives Hope To California Residents

'California needs to catch up,' one gay-marriage supporter says.
By Kara Warner

Photo: Spencer Platt/Getty Images

LOS ANGELES — As the celebrations continued in New York on Saturday (June 25) for the passage of the same-sex marriage bill, many Americans were just waking up to and learning of the news. Expressing similar ecstatic emotions to those expressed by New Yorkers, many California residents spoke to MTV News about their enthusiasm for the bill's passage.

"I think it's the next step for states," John Stoeckly told MTV News after New York became the sixth and most populous state to legalize same-sex marriage. "I think people should be happy about it. I think California is probably going to be the next state that makes that step."

"You love who you love, you can't really help that," Samantha Capatosto said of her support for same-sex marriage. "I think it mean that they don't let people get married, my aunt can't get married, and I'm sad about that. She lives in Florida." "You can't help who you love, be with who you want to be with!" Jackie Mossberg chimed in. Both young ladies, along with friend Lauren Vigil, agreed that they feel like same-sex marriage will soon be legal nation-wide.

"All the states are slowly letting gay marriage become legal," Vigil said.

"I think [California is] kind of stubborn," Capatosto added. "But maybe it will happen."

California courts made same-sex marriage legal in 2008 before the passage of Proposition 8 that year negated the ruling. The law has been overturned by the U.S. District court and is now pending a decision by the California Supreme Court.

California resident Orlando Soria was equally excited about the news, but offered a more cautiously optimistic opinion. "It seems like it keeps going back and forth between things being legal and not legal," he pointed out. "New York is sort of a vanguard state, so it seems that the rest of the country will eventually go that direction, but we have no idea. In a year they could be like, 'Oh that's illegal again.' Part of me thinks it's very exciting for now, especially after Prop 8, but it's hard to get fully excited about this stuff because you never know what's going to happen. I don't know. I should just be excited, but at the same time I'm excited with trepidation."

Soria went on to say that the most surprising aspect of the news was learning that the bill was passed for all of New York State, not just New York City.

"New York State is kind of conservative. I lived in upstate New York for four years, and it was very different from the city," he said. "That's amazing to think that crazy conservative New York state passed something that California has yet to. It's nuts." Rebekah Nazarian's response to the news was that "California needs to catch up. Big ups to New York for taking the lead in being the biggest state to allow same sex marriage, " she said. "This is one time I don't mind being a follower, and I hope soon too California can be proud of the same beautiful accomplishment."

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