Last week’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality was a big win for gay rights groups. However, advocates say their fight is far from over.
Fair Wisconsin interim director Megin McDonell says the ruling is cause for celebration, even if there are other issues of equality that still need to be addressed. “We’re not going anywhere,” she says. “There’s still a huge amount of work to do to achieve true lived equality for LGBT people in Wisconsin and across the country.”
McDonell says discrimination in employment, housing, schools, and health care access remains a major concern. She says some of those issues will require changes in state and federal laws, which is where they hope to focus their work going forward. “We’re going to continue to work to update the laws in Wisconsin…to modernize them,” she says.
As for the future of the same sex marriage debate, Governor Scott Walker said following last week’s ruling that a federal constitutional amendment may be needed to allow states to reinstate their own bans. McDonell does not expect that idea to catch on though, pointing to recent polls that show at least 60 percent of U.S. residents support the idea of allowing same sex couples to marry.