Stop pulling anti-gay shenanigans
by Barry Henderson
Give me one good reason why our government, at any level, should attempt to ban marriages between people of the same sex.
It may be that some religious sects might want to exclude whole classes of people from their sacraments for silly, archaic reasons, but that should be no business of the government in this Republic.
There are movements in many states and in Congress to institute a constitutional prohibition of marriages or civil unions between gays, lesbians, bisexuals of the same sex, and maybe even transgendered people. In Tennessee, there is no such idiocy in the offing, as of now, but the Legislature is in session, and there are lawmakers slavering at the notion, so consider this a pre-emptive message. Don't.
Already on the state's law books is the indefensible and probably unenforceable Marriage Protection Act of 1996, which contends that marriages are to be between a man and a woman, and that's that. Well, it isn't.
Same-sex marriages are recognized in an increasing number of world jurisdictions where faith-based bigotry is not recognized as a proper or legitimate influence in civil government matters. Canada has draft legislation before its Supreme Court that would equalize the marriage opportunity for all Canadians, as Ontario and British Columbia already have within their provinces.
In this country, Vermont law authorizes same-sex civil unions, and the Massachusetts Supreme Court has ruled such unions legal and permissible. Ohio legislators passed a same-sex marriage ban last month, and days later the Cleveland suburb of Cleveland Heights opened what it calls a "domestic partners' registry," allowing couples unable to marry to formalize their commitment to each other, regardless of their gender. Though the registrations lack legal status, the municipality is preparing to issue certificates of "domestic partnership," which can be dissolved by canceling the registration by certified letter. The Arizona Senate's Family Services Committee turned back an attempt to amend that state's constitution to prohibit gay or lesbian marriages, then turned around and adopted a symbolic, non-binding measure to urge Congress to pass a U.S. constitutional amendment to do what the committee couldn't bring itself to recommend to its own state's constituency.
Besides Ohio, 36 other states have been stampeded by bigots into adopting some sort of marriage ban, barring same-sex couples from enjoying the same rights and privileges—and the privileges are many under the law—as their heterosexual counterparts. Ironically, a lesbian woman could marry a gay man in those jurisdictions, but homophobia still reigns in those states until the matter is settled, eventually, by the High Court.
Even a federal constitutional amendment would not be the last word on an issue that is so openly and demonstrably discriminatory against a class of U.S. citizens.
The argument that excluding same-sex unions protects the institution of marriage rings hollow. Allowing more marriages would logically bolster the institution, not detract from it or work somehow to destroy it.
As to the biblical admonition, raised by some preachers and scoffed off by others, that homosexual unions are an "abomination," I've got your abomination, and it is your hatred of other humans who are not like you. That whole abominable barrage of baloney rings of an Inquisition cry of "heresy."
Lest you think this defense of marriage for all citizens is some kind of liberal drivel, the reaction of the Log Cabin Republicans' executive director, representing an organization that backs all manner of conservative initiatives, called down President Bush for giving the nation, in his State of the Union speech two weeks ago, "a signal to the voices of intolerance that they had the cover to move forward" with same-sex marriage prohibition measures. "Tinkering with the American Constitution to codify discrimination is not noble or conservative. It is discriminatory. It is unfair. It is bad politics. It is un-American. And it is simply wrong. We are a better nation with a higher calling," the Log Cabin Republican leader said.
Gay and Lesbian leaders across the political spectrum are showing this struggle for equal treatment under the law to be one of the compelling civil rights issues of the first decade of this new century.
They are not going to stay on the back of this bus and remain silent, and they shouldn't. They, not the fundamentalist, moralist moronic faction of some religious orders, have the moral high ground here. More power to them. They own the inalienable claim to full citizenship, with all of the rights that status confers on all of us.
February 5, 2003 * Vol. 14, No. 6
© 2004 Metro Pulse
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