Lina Aghajanian of LA Weekly profiles Paul and Jeff, plaintiffs in Perry v. Hollingsworth:

Paul Katami and Jeff Zarrillo remember the exact moment when they decided enough was enough.

It was 2009, and California’s same-sex marriage ban, Proposition 8, had passed. The National Organization for Marriage, a nonprofit formed to push for such bans, had launched an ad called “Gathering Storm.” It featured actors in front of a dark, thundery backdrop, speaking about how gay marriage would negatively affect their lives.

Katami and Zarrillo had never been terribly political. With jobs in the entertainment and fitness industries, the longtime couple were foodies at heart who spent their free time exploring L.A.’s restaurant scene, sating their voracious sweet tooths. There probably wasn’t a cupcakery in the city they hadn’t visited.

But the ad was an insult too far.

“I stood up off the couch and I said, ‘That’s it,’ ” Katami says. “ ’We have to do something.’ ”

Read the full story here:

While I could fill pages and pages with names of those I’ve seen fight for equality, I’d like to focus my gratitude on my friend Dustin Lance Black. The reason I send thanks his way is that he’s been a humble and gracious symbol of the thousands who deserve my thanks at this point in history. In thanking him, I’m thanking those he often acts for in proxy.

Lance and I got to know each other during the making of our 2010 Sundance documentary 8: The Mormon Propo$ition. I was just a local TV reporter in Miami armed with insider documents proving the Mormon Church’s historic anti-gay crusade during Proposition 8 and other measures like it. He was a lofty Oscar winner whose call I never expected to receive after I asked him to narrate the film. But he did return the call.  And he had a much larger role in the completion and direction and writing of 8TMP than he’s ever gotten credit for.

For newlyweds Jeff Zarrillo and Paul Katami, the last week has been the most exciting and important of their lives.

As victorious plaintiffs in the federal challenge against California’s gay marriage ban Proposition 8, the couple of more than 12 years fulfilled their dream of legally marrying last week and witnessed many others do the same.

Stier and her partner, Kris Perry, were one of the two couples who were plaintiffs in Hollingsworth v. Perry, the U.S. Supreme Court case that questioned the constitutionality of California’s Proposition 8 voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage. Their 4½-year role as the faces of the case ended June 26, when the Supreme Court ruled that Prop. 8’s backers did not have standing to defend it in court.

 Theodore Boutrous Jr., a key lawyer on the legal team opposing Proposition 8, said some of the lawyers had appeared before Walker in the past. They considered him bold and iconoclastic, and they knew he was gay.

With one of its rulings the Supreme Court mandated federal recognition of gay couples married in places that permit it; with another, it reopened the door to same-sex marriage in California, our most populous state. These practical consequences are huge.

But the two decisions together also have another kind of effect, deeply emotional, potently symbolic and impossible to measure —

For more, read AFER’s press release here.

Maureen Mentrek and Karna Adam, both sophomores at Dartmouth, said they came to the court at 9:30 Tuesday night to get in line. They said they had slept for about an hour, with pillows and sleeping bags on the sidewalk.

“It’s a huge landmark case and to actually be able to see it and to see these people in line so passionate about it is really great,” Mr. Adam said. “It is a changing time for us and these cases are like the civil rights cases used to be for past generations.”

Jared Milrad, a lawyer who lives in Washington, arrived at the court about 11 p.m. Tuesday night. He said he had come to hear the decisions because DOMA personally affected him. He and his boyfriend were engaged last year in New York and hope to be married within a year.

For more, read AFER’s press release here.

Wednesday’s high-court ruling struck down part of the federal Defense of Marriage Act and separately cleared the way for sames-sex marriages in California. Speaking by phone Wednesday, Black said that when he first heard the decision, he shed a few tears and then thought of the “hundreds of thousands of gay men and lesbians who came out and shared their stories so that we could have this day and decision.”

For more, read our press release here.