On Election Day, tolerance in the USA took a huge step
forward with the election of our first African-American president.
On at least three other fronts, however, tolerance took a
step backwards in a somewhat different direction. Californians passed
Proposition 8, to ban same-sex marriage in that state. Similar marriage bans
were approved in Florida and Arizona.
While an African American can now win election to the
highest office in the land, gays and lesbians remain second-class citizens, and
cannot enjoy all of the benefits that the state has to offer, simply because of
whom they happen to be sexually attracted to. It is absurd.
I hear all kinds of excuses: If you allow a man to marry
another man, the next thing you know, people will want to marry their pets.
Sorry, folks, but that Rick Santorum slippery-slope argument is as ridiculous
today as it was when it was used to oppose interracial marriage 45 years ago.
And I hear them say that it’s God’s word. However, the Bible
also condones slavery, and forbids working on the Sabbath under punishment of
death. I have yet to see the homophobes in recent decades give equal time to
these other words of God.
Conservatives point their fingers and denounce the “gay
agenda.” Yet, the gay agenda is nothing more than a desire for equal treatment
under the law. No special rights, just the same rights that we heterosexuals
enjoy.
Conservatives claim that same-sex marriage will destroy the
institution of marriage. But they don’t answer the question of how. Anyone who
feels that his own heterosexual marriage would be threatened if gays could
marry obviously has some very deep personal issues that cannot be fixed through
legislation.
And their fears have already been proven baseless. For
example, Massachusetts has permitted same-sex marriages since May of 2004, and
that has not led to the end of civilization in that commonwealth as feared by
the right-wing homophobes.
I have no doubt that the anti-gay double standards will fade
over the coming generations, just as Jim Crow has become a thing of the past,
at least on paper.
In the meantime, though, the bigots are hard at work trying
to write inequality into their state constitutions.
And these extreme reactions to a nonexistent threat lead me
to ponder: What are these people really afraid of?
Mary Shaw is a Philadelphia-based writer and
activist, with a focus on politics, human rights, and social justice. She is a
former Philadelphia Area Coordinator for the Nobel-Prize-winning human rights
group Amnesty International, and her views appear regularly in a variety of
newspapers, magazines, and websites. Note that the ideas expressed here are the
author’s own, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Amnesty
International or any other organization with which she may be associated.
E-mail: mary@maryshawonline.com.
