My favorite quotes from the gay marriage news coverage

From Kris Hill, after making an appointment to marry her partner Karen Stodghill on June 16 at City Hall in San Francisco: "It's like we're not second class citizens in California anymore... It's like we get to drink at the same water fountain now." (San Francisco Chronicle) Hmm... I wonder what water fountain they were drinking at before.

Also from the Chronicle, in an op-ed by Scott Olin Schmidt, proclaiming "Biggest shift in gay culture since Stonewall":

"Now we just need someone to marry!" one friend messaged me, pretty much summing up the conundrum facing gays and lesbians over the next six months… Until today, there has been no archetypical relationship for gays and lesbians across America. Nothing to look at and say "That's what I want." Only in tiny Massachusetts could a gay man like me even think about getting married and then consider with whom to form that union.

This lack of a model or structure for legal, recognized partnerships created the impression that promiscuity was the norm for the gay community. And, I would argue, contributed to the spread of AIDS and other plagues on the gay community.

But today, all that has changed.

Now, that's a new argument -- Let's repeat this sentence: “This lack of a model or structure for legal, recognized partnerships created the impression that promiscuity was the norm for the gay community.” Okay, so the impression that promiscuity was the norm contributed to the spread of AIDS “and other plagues.” I guess, because, you know, all those slutty gays just wanted to imitate the norm.

But I'm still curious about the mysterious phrase, "and other plagues." Is this the Middle Ages? I mean, marriage certainly helped to halt the spread of plagues then.