"GOD MADE US QUEER"

I picked up the NY Post yesterday. I try not to buy the Post to feed the Fox News/Rupert Murdoch hate machine but this copy had been left at a local Starbucks so I felt less guilty--I was only fueling an aggressive coffee chain's coffers this time. There was an article about a gay marriage rights protest in Manhattan yesterday which described the group assembled as "droves." I read on to see that around 300 protesters showed up. That's a little slim for droves, I thought, but at least the conservative Post wasn't low-balling the attendees.

Tom Duane had a good line: (quoting from memory) "If Lady Gaga can call me, then you can call your senators." It's nutty logic but it involves a heroine to the gays so it kinda works. But another slogan quoted really bugs the hell out of: "God made us queer."

I'm glad that 300 were out in the heat protesting but this is a dreadful argument. I don't believe in god and maybe you do. I'm not going to argue that point here. But I do support marriage for gays--so shouldn't advocates of gay marriage have a better point than "God made us this way" if they're going to win? No one knows precisely why we're gay. But I can guarantee that no credible scientists conducting research into this field are considering god as a catalyst in their laboratories. God is subject to interpretation, so the obvious retort to "God made us queer" is "Not my god!" The Bible is the main weapon used to tell homosexuals that we're sinners and therefore we should have no rights to marry, teach school or anything else if the religious right has their way. Why can't we do away with any value system which denounces us? It's positively self-loathing! Because religion is wide scale brainwashing which defies logic, if you ask me. Did you wake up today as a sinner? I didn't, and I hereby rebuke anyone who dares to suggest such lunacy.

I'd like to address the faith-based community from the fact-based community. The US was founded on a separation of church and state because early settlers came here to escape religious persecution. This concept must be vigorously protected from freaks like Palin who would even discredit evolution. Marriage is a religious institution. I don't want to ever say to my enemies in the church "I validate you who oppose me with so much hate by seeking out something you've created." I'd prefer to discredit the church and all that it represents--and then it's arguments can never, ever be used against me. Seeking the approval of the church strengthens it's ability to bash us. You'll no doubt agree that anyone who denounces gays as undeserving of equal rights is wrong--so why not slam the very belief system which makes them mistakenly think that they're superior and gives them most of their ammo against us? You'll see how easy it is to laugh away religious objections to homosexuality the same way that ALL modern christians have been forced by common sense to reject the Bible's insane claims that shellfish, tattoos, divorce and football are abominations.

If all of the rights that a couple has in marriage were applied to civil unions I'd gladly take them. If you step outside the nightmare that organized religion often is, how can we maintain our core American principle of separation of church and state if we're trying to legislate which ceremonies churches can or can't perform? I wouldn't expect success if lobbying a muslim country for the right to wed because the muslim faith is anti-gay. Christianity as it's often practiced in this country is also anti-gay. But this can't be a christian country if we truly uphold the separation of church and state. So why should christianity or it's ceremonies ever enter into the discussion of our laws? It should be ignored and practiced privately with no influence whatsoever on our government, just as our forefathers so wisely intended. The repubublican front-runner for president is a member of a bizarre christian cult of Mormon, so this an excellent time to help renew our commitment to keep religion out of our government. Anything else would be un-American.

I understand that many of you are christian and seek a religious ceremony to validate your relationships. Fine. Go lobby your church and best of luck to you in seeking acceptance from that backward, science-denying, holier than thou and often hateful crew.