Commenter Andy left the following in the comments of my post Just a little survey…or is it?. His comment gets straight to the heart of how the Gay Rights issue should be debated. Areas in bold are my emphasis:
If people aren’t going to apply rationality and logic when they engage with the world, there are pills and white suits who can help them, because sociopaths are defined in one sense as being unable to interact with the world in ways which are consistent and, well, sociable.
This questionnare raised a laugh at the same time as making a serious point. Too often gay people are lumped together in ways which heterosexuals would consider outrageous if applied to themselves. Unfortunately for the right-wing, gay people are as diverse in every way as anybody else. Some of us are sex-mad, it is true – but by definition of numbers, there are more heterosexuals that way. Similarly, marriage – if divorce rates are an indicator, something is wrong.
The prevailing US attitude is medieval and out of step with the rest of the civilised world. Here in the UK we focus on more important things for the most part, though violent homophobia remains a problem despite progressive equality laws including the right to legal recognition of gay partnership ceremonies.
I am continually disgusted when ’subjects’ such as homosexuality, abortion and paedophilia are lumped together. I’m no damn subject and neither should any community member be, gay, straight, bisexual, black, disabled. We’re all people and to reference gay men like myself in the same breath as abortion or paedophilia is damned offensive. I’m not an issue to be debated; I’m not a problem to be addressed; I’m not a footnote on some political arsehole’s agenda, a point to be raised with hatred to gain votes or turn a person to Jesus Christ. I’m flesh-and-blood, fully human like everyone, and it’s the dehumanisation which marks out born-again bigots and their ilk as closer to Hitler and Pol Pot than the Lord they supposedly enjoy getting on their knees in front of to worship…
And of course, what truly terrifies now is that many gay people such as my partner and I are not only visible but confounding stereotypes just by living our lives and pursuing our dreams of raising families. And for anyone to suggest our adoptive child next year will be entering into an environment which will indoctrinate him or her into being gay, well – I suggest heterosexuality isn’t as weak and easily diverted as its own supremacy advocates seem to indicate they believe. For my part, I was born meaning I was the product of heterosexual activity and raised with four brothers and sisters all of whom turned out straight, married, et al. And here I am. Gay. So if my sexuality proved resilient to the overwhelming consensus around me, then why the hell should a child in a gay family unit surrounded by loving people of varying sexualities and colours – aunts, uncles, grandparents – be any less capable of turning out straight or gay or whatever?
The above is how this issue needs to be framed. Andy quite clearly cuts through the bullshit spewed by the likes of “man-on-dog” Rick Santorum as well as others on the right. Some Republicans and fundamentalist Christian groups continuously try to pigeon-hole homosexuals, bisexuals, and transgendered folks to the extent of creating straw-men. Santorum attempted to equate homosexuals as being similar to bestiality. That kind of rationality is just as flawed as responding to someone who says that inner-city schools are underachieving by saying “Why do you hate Black people?”. It’s just as flawed as Republicans who claim that Democrats support a “Cut-and-Run” philosophy with regards to the War in Iraq, or as I call it, the Debacle in the Desert™. The truth is, as Andy states, that homosexuals, bisexuals, and the transgendered are just as human as you and I with the same basic needs: food, clothing, and shelter. When this issue is broken down to the human aspect, it becomes quite a silly argument indeed.
