Acts of civil disobedience have a long and successful history in this country. My domestic partner (of 21 years) and I have decided, as an act of civil disobedience, to decline participation in the upcoming 2010 Census. We want to communicate, in a meaningful way, to political leaders in this state that their decision to shelve/dismiss the recent civil unions bill is unfair, insulting, exclusionary and demeaning.

Letters, e-mails and phone calls to elected officials go unanswered, forcing us to take more dramatic action. Weeks prior to the civil unions vote, we listened to the mayor inappropriately use his position as mayor and the de-facto voice of the Mormon Church–as well as the lieutenant governor in the name of the Catholic Church–pontificate on a civil issue. They joined voices with evangelical Christians to lecture us on how wrong non-traditional and/or same-sex relationships are and how only heterosexual relationships are worthy and deserving of the rights, privileges and benefits–as well as the responsibilities–of traditional marriage.

Our position is not for recognition or support of civil unions by any church; church approval should not be relevant to this civil rights issue.

We are arguing for equitable treatment of all citizens. Furthermore, these outspoken critics collectively maintain that same-sex unions are a threat to the stability of the family, even as divorce rates hover around 50 percent. It is especially insulting to listen to the “civil unions as a threat to the family” argument when married political leaders, such as former President Bill (“I did not have sexual relations with that woman”) Clinton, Attorney General Spitzer, Gov. Marc Sanford, Sen. John Ensign, Sen. Larry Craig, Sen. John Edwards, sports celebrity Tiger Woods, as well as church leader Ted Haggard, publicly humiliate their spouses and families.

We understand that there is a potential $5,000 penalty for not completing the Census; that would certainly be a tremendous hardship on our household, but we are at the point where we must say that enough is enough. Unfortunately that $5,000 fine will be wasted in the black hole that is federal government spending instead of being spent constructively in the local Honolulu economy (dining, shopping, movies, beach activities and charitable giving).

Please do not ignore us, dismiss us or denigrate our relationship. We count. We are more than just data points to be exploited and used for collecting federal dollars.

We encourage all citizens to identify issues that make them angry–whether it is civil unions legislation, health care reform, Social Security and Medicare deficits, gambling in Hawaii, bank bailouts, Furlough Fridays, the Akaka bill or the flag-flying bill–to figure out their own meaningful form of civil disobedience and act accordingly.

If we don’t count, you can’t count us.

Robert Lebo
Marc Hamman
Honolulu