Melissa Etheridge, HRC Team Up To Fight Marriage Amendment

Washington, DC - Melissa Etheridge is speaking out against the Federal Marriage Amendment in a new online ad released today by the Human Rights Campaign. "Is that what America is about?" Etheridge rhetorically asks in the ad when pondering same-sex couples being denied marriage rights. "We must fight this attack on our community from every part of our community," said HRC President Cheryl Jacques. "We thank Melissa for her time and energy in fighting this attempt to write discrimination into our Constitution." The U.S. Senate is expected to take up the Federal Marriage Amendment mid-July. This ad is a series of steps HRC is taking to motivate our community to contact their legislators and talk to family and friends about why the FMA is discriminatory, unnecessary, unwise, and undermines the constitution.

Etheridge, who will be performing a free concert at Taste of Chicago, is featured in the ad strumming her guitar in a hotel room. The script follows: "I grew up thinking you could do anything, and be anything, because that was the American dream. But because I'm gay... I'm denied that. Because of people's prejudices, I'm denied a civil right. Because I'm gay... I can never get married. Is that what America is about? I don't know... That's not the America I was raised in."