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I was forwarded this email from a good friend, she got it from her cousin, the author, whose family is shown in the photo above. Please read the text from the email (below) and keep in mind as you decide what to vote on Prop. 8 (California measure to change the constitution and abolish same sex marriage). Please vote no on Prop. 8!

For weeks I’ve been struggling with my conflicted feelings towards my Mormon family and friends. As a young child I knew I was gay, I was also very active in the church. As an adult who has accepted himself and has tried to create his own loving family and support system, I have encountered a mixed bag from my Mormon Family and Friends; Love, support, derision, judgment, ostracization, rejection, understanding, for the most part I am now tolerated. Some of you even love and value me.

I’ve learned to be okay with this, leaving the church and being honest about who I have always been has cost me the family I thought I had and many relationships I had treasured.

Out in the world I have made new family members, I kept my dearest friends from my mission and from BYU, and I’ve never looked back or regretted my path. Eight years ago I met my husband Eric. He is better person by far than any I have met in my life time. One week before our daughter Talia was born, I had the privilege of marrying him in Canada. Since then we have been blessed with two more children; Finn & Lily. Our young family was not accidental or easy to come by.

Earlier this year the Californian Supreme Court finally came out with a decision that confirmed what should have been obvious. Treating Gays separately under the law amounts to discrimination and is direct conflict with our state and federal constitution. Eric and I married again this time legally in the U.S. in California on July 11th 2008.

Now we are equal with your families in this state, our children are protected, they can’t be denied insurance coverage, I can’t be denied spousal benefits, we can worry less about one of us dying, I can stop demeaning our relationship, our love, and our family by finally referring to “my Husband” not partner.

I thought I’d left the Mormon Church behind and was free to live my life. But now the church is directly attacking my family.

The yes on proposition 8 in California, 102 in AZ and 2 in Florida campaigns if successful will strip my family and others like us, of over 1300 basic rights and privileges that are bestowed by the state with legally recognized marriage.

OF the 28 million dollars raised to build discrimination permanently into our state constitution, 22 million has come from the Mormon Church and its members at the aggressive pressuring from its leadership.

This is wrong. I know so many gay Mormons, so many uncles, brothers, cousins, fathers, mothers who are gay who will be permanently hurt and marginalized even further by this. Even the church has recently come out and acknowledged that same sex attraction is innate and not a choice. You can look it up on the LDS website in a piece called “God Loveth his Children”

I’m not asking any of you to stop being Mormon, but please don’t support this attempt to build hate and discrimination into our constitution. That document is all that makes a difference between countries like ours and China or Iran. You can try to take away my rights, freedom and equality, you can strip my children of their basic protections and dignity, but it’s a start of an unraveling that will come to your own doorsteps. I beg you to consider these things and speak up for what is truly fair and right.

If Proposition 8 passes in California, My family won’t stop being a family, Eric and I won’t stop loving each other, our children and many like them will still go to school with your children, gay people won’t “choose to be straight” We will be however sitting ducks for a wide variety of discriminations. Eventually these bigoted unfair ideas will be seen by history for what they are; the rights and dignities of a powerless minority put up for a vote by a religious driven homophobic lynch mob.

Most of you can’t imagine the kind of pain one goes through when a learned core belief is in direct opposition to one’s core being as you grow up. But it is something every dedicated Mormon kid who happens to be gay, goes through. This scenario is repeated in other religions that demean their gay adherents and across societies that prey on their gay members throughout the globe. As a parent I would never want this for my children, but I won’t try to prevent it by asking my gay children to be straight or by denying them fair and equal treatment under our laws.

Try to place yourselves historically in every great move forward for freedom & civil rights. The thirteenth amendment to our constitution ended slavery, we fought for Women’s suffrage, interracial marriage, etc. What side of the fence would you have been on? It’s easy to think you would have been on the side of freedom and fairness, but most religions of the day vehemently opposed every one of these movements.

IF you read this far thank you. I hope you know plenty of gay people besides me and that you understand we don’t have a special agenda to convert people into becoming gay. The fear mongers want to depict us as sex crazed, dancing naked on floats, pedophiles, deviants, less than human, not your brothers, sisters, friends who struggle everyday to live decent lives like yourselves. We can certainly paint the straight community with broad strokes in a similar fashion but it’s not who I know all of you to be. We are people good and bad just like the rest of you, hopefully we all value freedom and fairness.

If any of you can do anything in any of these states to help stop these initiatives please act now! Polls show we are split evenly in California and every vote counts.