I attended U.S. Rep. Marilyn Musgrave's "Stand Up for (hetero-only) Marriage" rally on February 20 in Denver, during which she looked at the large crowd of us who came to protest her message, and said "and I look at my friends over here and say — the legislative process has been available to you all along" to the cheers of her supporters.

The fact is that the legislative process, and in fact the American majority, will never be the source of advocacy for the minority. It will always be the courts, it will always be acts of defiance like the San Francisco marriages, and it will always be our Constitution. If we took a vote today on whether or not taxpayer money should be used to feed and house prisoners, it would undoubtedly fail. What then? If we took a vote for "same-ethnicity marriage" in 1958 when 93 percent of white Americans opposed inter-racial marriage, or heaven forbid, that majority amended the Constitution to define it as "two people of the same ethnic background," the civil-rights movement would have been much longer in the making. But in fact "activist judges," or what speakers at Friday's rally called "judicial barbarians," advocated for the minority in Loving vs. Virginia.

Luckily for gay and lesbian Americans, Musgrave was wrong about something else. She said "the people of Massachusetts don't want gay marriage." In fact, polls are showing that the majority of Massachusetts citizens do support same-sex marriage, so at least in one U.S. state, if not more, we will see perfectly happy and legal same-sex marriage soon.

It is my hope that anyone who feels threatened by this fact look closely at these marriages, at these families, and then look closely at themselves and ask — "Who am I to discourage love?"

LISA GOETTEL, Denver