River Coyote’s marriage has been battled in courtrooms, voted on by millions of Californians, and is a perennial political campaign topic.
Since her Incline Village wedding in 2003 and her official marriage in 2008, Coyote has seen campaign signs denouncing her union, watched as tens of millions of dollars have been spent trying to disallow her marriage, and seen her love life debated in newspapers, TV, and radio.
Through it all, Coyote and her wife, Susie, have dealt with uncertainty, inequality, and emotional pain that no heterosexual couple can quite understand.
Proposition 8, passed by 52 percent of California voters in the fall of 2008, was the latest effort to invalidate Coyote’s marriage. More than $80 million was spent, making it the most expensive social ballot measure in California history, to strip the right of marriage from gay couples. The success of the ballot measure, which was subsequently overturned in the California courts, was a deeply hurtful reaffirmation that she is viewed as inferior to the rest of society.
‘When that passed we cried. It was really painful. I’ve never had a law that was passed that hurt that much,’ said Coyote, an Incline Village resident.
Today, Coyote and Susie are in limbo. They have been legally married in California, yet they live in Nevada, a state that does not recognize gay marriages. And even in California, as the challenges to Proposition 8 head through the court system on appeals, they are hardly treated the same as a straight married couple.
‘We just want to live our lives and be happy and be treated like everyone else,’ said Coyote, who has been with Susie for 12 years. ‘It’s just weird that people are telling you that you are not OK.’
For Coyote and the small community of gay men and women that live in Truckee and North Tahoe, the right to marry is indicative of progress toward equality. They see it as one of the last great civil rights debates.
‘We definitely see this as a civil right issue. I am not equal to you in this country, if you are a straight man,’ said Coyote.
For Coyote and Susie, the fact that their marriage is not fully recognized means they might not be able to visit their loved one in the hospital, their taxes are among the most complex in the nation because of conflicting standards between state and federal recognition of their partnership, and there are questions about how they will share their estate. But most of all, the full right to marry would mean another step toward equality in a society that has made it very clear that homosexuals are treated differently from the rest of society.
Susie remembers the happiness and acceptance that washed over her the night in 2008 when she was married.
‘That night when we went to bed, and we had been together for 10 years, we wept because we had been fully validated by the state,’ said Susie. ‘You felt part of the society that you had been living in for so long.’
Keaven Van Lom can’t understand the fear that is so evident in the political campaigns that have been waged against her right to marry. A Truckee resident since 2005, Van Lom said she doesn’t understand how her right to marry whomever she wants threatens certain people.
‘There is no gay agenda,’ said Van Lom. ‘The agenda is to love who you want.’
While California voters certainly have not accepted gay marriage at the ballot box, there are signs of a changing attitude toward gay rights within the populace. Proposition 22, the 2000 California ballot measure that was the first to take away the right of gays to marry, passed by 62 percent. It was overturned in the courts in the spring of 2008. Proposition 8 passed by only 52 percent. And, according to data by the Public Policy Institute of California, the support for a ban on gay marriage will likely wane even further in the future. The oldest voters supported Proposition 8 the heaviest, while the youngest voters opposed the proposition. Likewise, seven out of 10 voters with a high school education or less supported the proposition, while college graduates opposed the measure by a seven percentage points.
But until Proposition 8 is fully defeated on appeals in the court system, the uncertain position of gay citizens of Truckee and North Tahoe will continue. It’s something that Susie’s mother warned her about when Susie announced to her that she was gay.
‘My mom said, ‘It is such a hard life,’ and she was right,’ said Susie. ‘If River could be a man, or if I could be a man, that’s what we would choose. We would choose that and live the American life just like everyone else.’
