The Pressure

News today that the first couple to get married in New Paltz, New York, is splitting up. I am sure some of the conservative forces will have a field day with this one, just as they have with the recent news that the first openly gay Bishop Gene Robinson has voluntarily checked in for alcohol-addiction treatment. Yet you wonder if the pressure of being "the first ones to..." was a factor in these latest developments.

Of course straight marriages also fail (ask anyone from Jessica Simpson to Elizabeth Taylor), but, for some weird reason, I was drawn to the Billian vanRoestenberg - Jeffrey McGowan marriage (both are pictured above in 2004 with friend and doggie) if only because former US Army Major Jefferey McGowen used to live in my adopted neighborhood of Jackson Heights, Queens.

Of course, that was not the only bad news that came down this week about the right for same-sex couples to have access to marriage in New York State. I will let Art Leonard expand on the details here. Last night I ran into New York State Assemblyman Daniel O'Donell (who is a plaintiff in that particular suit along with his partner). He seemed confident that the ACLU would emerge victorious on appeal.