{"id":16129,"date":"2014-06-20T15:47:57","date_gmt":"2014-06-20T07:47:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=16129"},"modified":"2014-07-09T20:00:35","modified_gmt":"2014-07-09T12:00:35","slug":"modern-family-actor-ty-burrell-headlines-fundraiser-to-fight-utahs-gay-marriage-ban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2014\/06\/20\/modern-family-actor-ty-burrell-headlines-fundraiser-to-fight-utahs-gay-marriage-ban\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Modern Family\u2019 actor Ty Burrell headlines fundraiser to fight Utah\u2019s gay marriage ban"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Ty<\/a>
Ty Burrell. Photo by Rubenstein \/ Flickr.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

SALT LAKE CITY\u2014\u201dModern Family\u201d actor Ty Burrell says he sees gay marriage in the United States is a \u201ctide that can\u2019t be turned.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burrell headlined a fundraiser Thursday evening in Salt Lake City to help cover legal costs for couples fighting Utah\u2019s ban on same-sex marriage, lending his celebrity to help a group backed by sitcom co-star Jesse Tyler Ferguson.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really a tide of people understanding that love is love, and that there\u2019s no going back,\u201d Burrell said in the downtown clothing store he partly owns. He drifted among chambray shirts and chandeliers to take pictures with plaintiffs and mingle with attendees. About 100 people came to the event.<\/p>\n

Ferguson, who plays one half of the ABC hit\u2019s gay couple, founded Tie The Knot with his real-life husband, Justin Mikita, in 2012.<\/p>\n

At the event, they sold a bow tie designed by Burrell, featuring vintage road maps of his native Oregon for $25. Bartenders mixed Moscow mules, a signature cocktail at Burrell\u2019s Salt Lake City speakeasy-style bar called Bar X.<\/p>\n

Ferguson said he and Mikita are \u201cnot the type of guys that are going to be out with the bullhorns going, \u2018equality now.\u2019 We do it through humour, we do it through fashion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Moudi Sbeity and Derek Kitchen, one of the couples bringing the lawsuit, knew of Tie the Knot and pitched the fundraiser idea to Burrell.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou would be surprised at how many people are eager to put what they can on the table and support us here, so it\u2019s really great,\u201d Kitchen said.<\/p>\n

In December, Burrell served as the official witness to an unplanned lesbian wedding at his bar when same-sex marriage was briefly legal in Utah.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was such an exciting few days,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Thursday\u2019s event comes as gay marriage advocates wait for a federal appeals court in Denver to decide whether Utah\u2019s same-sex marriage ban is constitutional. A federal judge overturned it in December.<\/p>\n

Utah has become a focal point for the gay marriage movement since then, followed by a string of similar rulings by judges in other states. The latest came in Wisconsin, marking the 15th consecutive ruling supporting gay marriage since a landmark Supreme Court ruling last summer.<\/p>\n

In Utah, Burrell told The Associated Press, \u201cI think a lot of people need some time to breathe and think about\u201d gay marriage. He characterized the state\u2019s dominant Mormon community as \u201cloving\u201d and \u201clevel-headed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEven if they don\u2019t agree with something, hate isn\u2019t really a part of the way in which they behave. They\u2019re a very tolerant group,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

When Ferguson\u2019s character, Mitch, married his gay partner on \u201cModern Family,\u201d many saw it as yet another sign of widening acceptance for gay marriage in the U.S.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was a huge moment for all of us,\u201d Ferguson said, referring to the cast. \u201cNobody aspires to be a domestic partner. You aspire to be a wife or a husband. You aspire to marriage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Born and raised in Oregon, Burrell lives in Salt Lake City with his wife, a Utah native, when he is not in Los Angeles filming \u201cModern Family\u201d or working on other projects.<\/p>\n

He has said he feels much like a \u201cSalt Laker.\u201d<\/p>\n

Laurie Wood and Kody Partridge, who wed in Utah in December and also brought the lawsuit, said they\u2019re glad they get to be involved in bringing marriage equality to Utah.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe said, this is our state, this is our home, this is where we want to be wed,\u201d Partridge said. \u201cSix months has been wonderful.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SALT LAKE CITY\u2014\u201dModern Family\u201d actor Ty Burrell says he sees gay marriage in the United States is a \u201ctide that …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":16130,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[106],"tags":[5051,4930,5724,2087],"class_list":["post-16129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-hollywood","tag-ban","tag-gay-marriage","tag-ty-burrell","tag-utah","mauthors-annie-knox","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16129"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16129\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}