OC Activist Compiles Prop. 8 Trial Tweets

​Anyone who thought the trial in the federal lawsuit challenging California's ban on gay marriage would be a dry, legalistic affair has been proven wrong by accounts of the first two days inside the San Fransisco courtroom. It's a case about the constitution, but the testimony thus far has delved into the very nature of homosexuality and what it means for society.

The Supreme Court put the kibosh on plans to televise the trial. But it shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone that the Internet provides ways to follow the courtroom drama as it unfolds live.

Just ask Irvine's Laura Kanter.

I met Kanter in November while working on the Weekly's cover story about Orange County's gay rights movement. She helped found the Orange County Equality Coalition, but, she says, was a little too radical to remain on its board of directors. Kanter speaks her mind and devotes an enormous amount of energy to the cause of same-sex marriage. When a Prop. 8-like measure was on the ballot in Maine last fall, Kanter spent two weeks on the ground in Maine campaigning against it. When Weekly freelance writer Dave Barton made a disparaging comment about the OC gay activism community on Navel Gazing, Kanter... chewed him out (and accidentally targeted me, too!).

So it makes sense that she's been "obsessed" with the federal trial.  How has she been keeping up with it?

Twitter, of course.

Kanter's assembled a Twitter list of people who are tweeting from inside the courtroom. It's here. You can sit in front of it all day, every day, for the next few weeks and watch it update.

And on her Tumblr blog, Kanter stitched together many of the tweets from the first day of the trial to create a narrative of what went on. It's here.

She says that as fascinating as the courtroom updates are, even more intriguing are the tweets of observers in the Yes-on-8 camp. Watching them, she says, makes you understand why the anti-gay-marriage side didn't want the trial televised.

Two other places to watch what's going on in the trial: the American Foundation for Equal Rights Twitter account, and Courage Campaign's "Prop 8 Trial Tracker" site.