A marriage amendment passed the Iowa House in March, 54-44, but it hasn't received a vote in the Senate, where Democrats and Republicans are split evenly.  The ad claims that Senator Michael Gronstal blocked the issue in the senate, and therefore prevented the people of Iowa from exercising their right to vote, a right the ad claims even Iraqi citizens now possess.

The ad reads "Let the People Vote," implying that the desire for a state amendment is the will of the citizens of Iowa.  Unshackling the marriage amendment from the constraints of the Iowa legislature would thereby give Iowans what they want; the freedom to vote on gay marriage. However, Focus on the Family's urgency is less about the Lambda lawsuit or even protecting marriage than the imminent fall elections.

The Iowa marriage amendment campaign, like similar initiatives in Florida  and California are anything but grassroots.  The campaigns are financed Focus on the Family and supported by state Focus affiliates like the Iowa Family Policy Council. Florida's marriage campaign allegedly received funds from the state GOP.

The Focus on the Family infrastructure ensures that there is a uniformity of message from the national to the local level.  As a result, advocates of anti-gay marriage are careful to characterize themselves as pro-marriage rather than anti-gay.  They are vehement that their campaigns are not anti-gay and certainly not designed to deprive anyone of their civil rights.

What has enabled Focus on the Family to convince supporters throughout the U.S. that an anti-gay marriage movement is not anti-democratic or bigoted?  One key strategy has been Focus on the Family's relationship with the ex-gay movement.

Exodus, the umbrella organization for the Christian part of the ex-gay movement calls itself:

a worldwide interdenominational, Christian organization called to encourage, strengthen, unify and equip Christians to minister the transforming power of the Lord Jesus Christ to those affected by homosexuality

Exodus International is a global network of religious ministries that attempt to change and convert homosexual men and lesbians to non-homosexual Christian lives through psychological, self-help, therapeutic and biblical approaches.   The ex-gay movement presents testimonies of men and women who have come out of homosexuality through participation in an ex-gay ministry. These ex-gays speak of homosexuality as a condition, a developmental disorder, as a sin,and against God's intention for them.

This advertisement [ picture original source document - pdf document featuring Alan Chambers, the president of Exodus, appeared in 2005 in the Cincinnati Examiner.  Chamber's testimony was supposed to serve as evidence that having gay marriage as a right or political option would have prevented him from realizing he was truly heterosexual.

"I Questioned Homosexuality. By finding my way out of a gay identity, I found the love of my life in the process. Gay marriage would only have blinded me to such an incredible joy."

Ads like this one characterize homosexuality as a condition that can be cured.  To Exodus and Focus on the Family, gay identity is a false lifestyle and identification.  Therefore, gay people do not merit rights or protections like that of the right to marry. With Alan Chamber's testimony as "living proof that change is possible," anti-gay marriage initiatives like that in Iowa can claim that they are not promoting bigotry or discrimination.  How can they deprive someone of a right, they counter, when the very identity that right is protecting is something they believe does not exist?

This enables Focus on the Family to talk of people "struggling with a homosexual orientation" and their belief in "hope for healing" through participation in an ex-gay ministry while denying the existence of a gay identity with full rights to citizenship.

The Iowa ad with the Iraqi woman protests that the rights of Iowans are being taken away, imperiling democracy at home.  Chamber's ad maintains that thousands of gay people will never realize their true heterosexuality if they have a gay marriage option.

Neither of these ads address the contradiction of how Focus on the Family can argue for the rights of anti-gay voters or ex-gays' right to change while the marriage amendment they seek to put in place would deprive gay men and lesbians of their rights throughout the state of Iowa.