Draft 2... I think I have a good editorial here :)

You Can’t Have It Both Ways

Ok, so let me get this straight (no pun intended). According to some folks, homosexuals choose to be as they are, and pick their “lifestyle.” Homosexual relationships should not be validated by society as life giving. Homosexuals who want to get the legal protections provided by the civil ceremony of marriage would be destroying the marriages of heterosexuals. A homosexual family would be destructive to the children within the family. Homosexuals marrying would interfere with heterosexuals conceiving children. They say tradition shows homosexual relationships are immoral, sinful, and unacceptable. Therefore, any attempts by homosexuals (gays and lesbians to those of us who are) to create relationships should be vigorously discouraged by all of societies structures.
What reasons do these people give for these statements? Well, here’s a few often thrown about. Gay and lesbian folks are promiscuous, noncommital in their relationships, participate in “unsafe sex,” get STD’s, at risk for contracting the AIDS virus, violent in relationships, mentally ill, and commit suicide more often.
Now, you might consider that our whole society since the 1960's has gone through the same cycle, or that our society is just more open about all that used to be hidden, but that might be too obvious. So let’s take a look at the trouble with these statements.
From an early age all children hear about homosexuals. Hold on, let me rephrase that. They hear about faggots. Which of course most children have no idea about other than they would rather be anything else than that. Then for some bizarre reason these children from stable church going families ( just like all the ones heterosexuals grow up in) who’ve heard nothing but the joys of girlfriends and boyfriends start choosing to fall in love with members of the same sex.
These children then want to start dating and doing the teenager “thing,” but it’s not with the right person. So, it’s gotta be a secret! Let’s not tell anyone. It would be a horrible thing to admit, and dangerous too! They’ll pretend they don’t think that way, but it won’t leave their minds. How do they deal with it? Ignore it, and it will go away. And if by chance they do meet someone they like of the same gender, they’ll keep it physical because it won’t be emotionally serious that way (or so they think). It might even get violent. You do know that self hate is taken out on the ones closest to you. Just look at all the battered women’s shelters across the country.
Now that these children have tried every way they know possible to be heterosexual, especially talking with God, they still choose to be intrinsically evil, objectively disordered, immoral, sinful, abominations. Hey, I bet most people would choose to be someone who is ridiculed, threatened, abandoned, and made to feel as if they are a mistake (NOT!) If they don’t commit suicide over it, or throw their lives into addictions to deaden the feelings and thoughts, they go off to start their lives, what a joyful way to enter adulthood!
Would you care to guess what kinds of relationships are possibly created? Possibly relationships that are non spiritual, noncommital, secret, hidden, promiscuous, and violent ones? How can anyone expect a person to create healthy relationships from that upbringing? Well, they do! It often takes a lot of hard work to make it happen. The evidence is all around us to see, even if some folks would care to put blinders on.
You can’t blame the effect for the cause. Sorry, the tree did not fall down and cause the lightning to strike. If gay and lesbian folks are told over and over how horrible they are, don’t use the effect to say, “Told you so!” It can’t be reasoned that these effects make same-sex marriage and/or relationships invalid.
Religious voices denounce same-sex marriage as throngs of couples show up to be married in San Francisco and New Paltz. Yet these couples are doing the exact thing these voices desire for people. Cardinal McCarrick of Washington, D.C. is quoted in the Washington Post saying, “. . . we live in a world where people are afraid of absolutes. The living of the world say, “I'll love you till next Wednesday.” And that has had its effect on marriage, on religious life, on the priesthood. People are afraid of making commitments that are absolute.”
Thank goodness there are positive messages in society that youth can see and hear today. Gay youth groups and GSA’s are popping up in communities all across the United States. The ordinary lives of gay and lesbian persons are shown in the media. Religious denominations and groups are speaking up and supporting gay and lesbian rights. Companies are encouraging diversity and providing benefits. However, adversity in coming out is still prevalent. Hopefully coming to accept one’s sexual orientation will take a much gentler path in the future.
If gay and lesbian youth are shown same-sex relationships to be healthy, positive, loving, respectful, intimate, committed, and God given, they will create new ideals for the future and their families. When the lives of gay and lesbian persons are affirmed by our parents, schools, churches, and society as a whole, those “effects” will melt away. Hopefully those of us already in the struggle of life will be able to open up our lives to show the way, and to fight with all our given talents to create a world where future generations of gay and lesbian children will flourish.

Mudger
7/5/05