Even though it was four months ago that Prop 8 in California was passed, it doesn't mean it's over for the millions of people in this country that got royally screwed by not just strangers, but people we thought we trusted--friends, family, neighbors.
So everywhere we as the LGBTQ community turn we now have mistrust and disappointment toward people we meet and people we know. Every time I see someone with a bumper sticker or hear someone say something negative about the people in our community, I want to ask, "Why? Why do you hate us so much that you'd condemn us to second-class citizenship?"
A lot of people try to defend their actions, usually by either using the Bible as an excuse, or by saying, "Well, I have gay friends." Bullshit. Just because you know gay people does not mean you are friends with them. Let me define friendship for you.
The state of being friends; friendly relation, or attachment, to a person, or between persons; affection arising from mutual esteem and good will; friendliness; amity; good will.
When you tell a person through casting a ballot that they don't deserve the same rights as you do, you are not being a friend. You are being selfish, and insecure. You are being hateful, and hate breeds more hate. No wonder we're so bitter.
Click here.
And here.
I agree with this. One thing I find when I see these kind of bumper stickers or lawn signs or whatever...Is I have an overwhelming desire to walk up to some of these people who tot such messages and ask them point blank if I need to be worried that they're going to hurt me.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds extreme but when you think about it by having that kind of label clearly stapled to their foreheads they're basically putting themselves in a threatening position towards me. So I wanna know. How deep does it really go on an individual basis.
Would that soccer mom on the corner who drives my kid to practice once a week actually raise a hand against me for her beliefs? Because even if the answer is no there are certainly other people in the world who would as soon as stone me to death as they would look at me or worse just because of my sexual persuasion.
Why does this matter?
All other things aside the world turns on commonalities. Too many people don't take this into consideration. So tell me? What is the relationship between that wholesome soccer mom and, lets say, Hitler? They seem pretty separate don't they? Yet the GLBT community was one of the groups Hitler targeted. Hence the soccer mom and Hilter are alike if only on that one issue.
I can hear the outraged protest now. Sure the soccer mom on the corner isn't Hitler. Yet she displays threatening message in plain view of the public that target a specific group of people. To the soccer mom the display is an innocents proclamation of her beliefs. Naturally she doesn't condone murder over something like a persons sexuality.
Yet hateful people everywhere who see that sign on the back of her mini van cheer to themselves thinking that they've just seen more evidence of their righteousness.
Why would anyone want willingly wear a banner that puts them in the same association as certian murderers, terrorist, and fiends?
Soccer mom may be innocent. She has a right to her opinions and beliefs. But she should also have to take responsibility for the impact, good or bad, that those beliefs have on the people around her.
Soccer mom might not raise a hand to me. But I'd be willing to wager that I should look over my shoulder a little more carefully at one of her dinner parties.
Why? Because if people really are attracted to like minds in various intensities then there's reason to think that even though soccer mom wouldn't raise her hand to me in violence over her beliefs one of her less morally discriminating friends and associates just might.
~Sam
I wish I had your talent for writing. You basically said everything I was thinking but couldn't articulate. Mind you, I wrote this at 4 a.m., but still.
ReplyDeleteCan I lick your brain?