The Mormon Proposition

Here is my pro-gay-rights rant for the day. Every time I hear about Proposition 8, I get upset. Even though the vote was over a year ago.

I'm not gay, but I do have gay friends. And the gay people I know are some of the nicest people I know, period.

I honestly don't care who people marry, as long as it doesn't involve abuse of any kind. Want to marry someone of your same sex? Fine by me. Want to marry 2 or 3 or 10 other people? Go right ahead, as long as everyone else involved is genuinely happy with the arrangement. Why limit the crapshoot that is marriage to just straight, theoretically monogamous people?

I really want all marriages in this country to be reduced to civil unions performed at the courthouse for everybody. Then if you are religious you can have your white wedding at the church with your pastor/priest/bishop/flying spaghetti monster presiding. It's not taking away from anyone's marriage, just separating the concepts of marriage recognized by the state and marriage recognized by your flavor of deity worship.

I don't even care what religion you are. I know a lot of atheists, a lot of Catholics, more than a few Mormons. I know some Hindu and Buddhist people too. You want to go practice your religion in any way you see fit, go right ahead. But don't hurt other people in the process. If you believe magic underwear will save you, wear it. Wear two pairs, on top of each other, if you think it will help God recognize you as one of the Chosen Ones. If you believe you need to face Mecca every morning and pray, do it. Get audited too, if you need it. Don't celebrate birthdays either if you believe that will keep you from reaching Paradise. Go right on thinking there are monsters in the bathtub if that helps you out spiritually.

Just don't hurt other people. Not physically, not mentally, not emotionally, and certainly not sexually. Just don't do it. It is in complete and absolute conflict with 'civilized' life. If your religion does things to harm other people or interfere negatively in other people's lives, your religion deserves to lose its tax-exempt status, or get rightfully smeared in documentaries or the media. That just seems fair and karmic to me.

My dad taught me to treat other people the way I would want to be treated. I've gotten shit on quite a bit because of that well-ingrained philosophy. But I still believe there is a grain of truth in it.

If I found myself in a position of being emotionally and financially ready, and in a relationship with a man who I liked enough to get married to, and he liked me enough to get married to me, I'd like to feel free to get married if we so chose to do. Denying that same choice to homosexual people is hypocritical and selfish.

Watching those old geezers smile and say that it would be "better to be dead than be homosexual" gets the Aries in me all upset. What the hell people. I'd really like to know where they get off on saying something like that.

I get really pissed off when people say sexuality is a choice. It's not. It's a continuum. To think that it's a binary decision where you just say, "Oh, I must be [blank] today" is stupid.

And to be persecuted for something you cannot change about yourself, that just sucks. You think homosexuals and bisexuals WANT to be treated poorly by their societies? Who in their right mind would CHOOSE that?

OK. I'm done for today.