America prides itself on the widespread air of social tolerance generated by the melting-pot dynamic and yet somehow Proposition 8 has passed in California. Much credit for this landmark of intolerance goes to those religious institutions that donated millions of dollars in support of it.
Those institutions which have in the past preached the inferiority of women the barbarity of blacks and the abomination of interracial marriage are now working against gay rights.
They have also denied the rights in light of their supposition that homosexuality is a choice. They rationalize that permitting gay marriage would ruin the sanctity of marriage – in a time when more than half of all U.S. marriages end in divorce. These institutions are hypocrites for treating gays as second-class citizens and in denying them civil rights while masquerading under a guise of morality.
The fact that even some popular black preachers such as Bishop Harry Jackson Jr. fail to see the correlation between the gay rights movement and the civil rights movement reflects an absurd blindness to the injustice of Proposition 8.
Some religious institutions preached “Yes on 8” under the assumption that if it did not pass their children would be taught about same-sex marriages in public schools or that their churches would be sued for not allowing gay couples to marry under their roofs.
Others take ignorant solace in conveniently quoting biblical passages out of context to justify their stance.
Such passages deal with sodomy which in their historical context refers to sex between a noble woman and a farmer. Those passages which refer to the sinful nature of a man laying with another man as he would his wife are used as the basis of their argument. All the while a multitude of other passages are conveniently tossed aside as being of a cultural manner condemning is everything but themselves.
This application of God’s divine justice to this issue is a mere cop-out to their fears.
Even Pepperdine which advertises a “learning process within modern global contexts has an administration that repeatedly prohibits the formation of a gay/straight alliance on campus. Pepperdine is among the pack that is stained by the hypocrisy of the popular cliché, Hate the sin love the sinner.” This marks the institution as “tolerant” while spitting in the faces of gays.
Fear inspires arguments about the potentially negative impact of gay marriage on America’s future according to Gary Gates a demographer at the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law.
This fear fuels heterosexists leading them to spew propaganda suggesting that restricting gay marriage might stimulate the slumping economy. It has also raised unfounded beliefs that children raised by same-sex couples would be socially and mentally deficient. They believe this despite the October 2005 studies presented at the American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition. These studies show that children raised in same-sex households are no different psychologically sexually or emotionally than children of heterosexual couples.
Those who have voted in favor of Proposition 8 view the November amendment as a victory but they fail to see the larger picture: As Reuters reported on March 3 by passing this proposition gay couples are denied more than a thousand rights at the federal level among them are hospital visitation rights marital confidence privileges and for federal workers health benefits.
Yet the people who have supported Proposition 8 are only delaying the delivery of a God-given right. Their persistence that homosexuals are of a lower class than heterosexuals continues.
They act as if the love between two men or women could easily be separated as if homosexual inclinations could be ripped apart much like Matthew Shepherd was brutally murdered for his sexuality in 1998.
They act as if these facets of identity could be beaten out with a bat like the San Francisco child in 2008 who was assaulted by his father who believed he could “cast the demon of homosexuality out of him.”
They act as if such inclinations could pass through like the bullet that passed through 15-year-old Lawrence King’s head in 2008.
The supporters of Proposition 8 believe that by burying gay marriage rights they have in some vague manner made a difference but they haven’t. Just as women blacks and interracial couples hammered at the walls of church-fueled ignorance so will gays tear down the battlements that have kept them from those rights which are incontrovertible.
When the day comes when gay marriage is finally recognized and the injustices against the gay community are rectified America will look back and be baffled by the ignorance and nauseating inhumanity that was Proposition 8.