A straight Republican politician speaks up for equal marriage

With the fight for equal marriage rights for homosexual couples having become such a cultural shibboleth in the United States, it’s always nice to see a politician treating it as something beyond politics.

Washington State Representative Maureen Walsh, a Republican and grieving widow of her own heterosexual partner, made this moving video appeal for the approval of “R74,” a referendum on the state’s new equal marriage bill.

[more after the break]

The video PSA was produced by Washington United for Marriage, an advocacy group supporting the marriage equality legislation against the referendum, which was forced due to an organized petition by people opposed to same-sex marriage.

Here is one of their PSAs:

My Mother, a passionate Christian advocate for equal rights, always tells me that it’s the responsibility of majorities in a democracy to understand and join in defending the rights of minority groups being oppressed or neglected. Representative Walsh expressed the same opinion in a heartfelt speech to the Washington House of Representatives last winter, as they discussed the original bill:

Washington United for Marriage is accepting donations here.