Gay Marriage...

With the passing of Proposition 8 in California on Tuesday and subsequent (and similar) ballots cast in Arizona, Arkansas and Florida - I am really wondering when people are going to wake up and see that they're blurring the lines between Church and State.

I'm sure most of you have heard about this either prior to the election and now, especially afterwards. These states have passed constitutional amendments to ban gay marriage. California of all places! It passed rather solidly in California - 52% in favor of it. It has been listed as the most expensive ballot measure in the history of mankind with over $70 million spent from both sides. With rumored (and entirely possible) financial support pouring in from the bible belt and Utah LDS leadership/businesses to snuff out the original California Supreme Court ruling back in January that allowed for gay marriage to take place. Since then nearly 18,000 couples have been recognized as legally married under the law. And going forward in the new year, that will cease.

I guess I just don't get it. I grew up in a conservative Christian household and if you talk with any evangelical/conservative Christian, they'll spout off how the Bible tells of the evils of homosexuality and that stance has been run with within the individual denominations. That those who are homosexual are equal to the devil or some sort. These were beliefs held myself at one point in my life and this was well before I started to take a hard look at what I was parroting and what I truly believed.

I have some friends that are gay. Both male and female. I don't believe for one single minute now that they made some "lifestyle choice" and have made some conscience decision to just be a homosexual. All evidence points to that these people are just wired that way from birth. No differently than I was for heterosexuality. It's who they are, not a choice to lead some hedonistic lifestyle that is in defiance of the ruling cultural values.

And if you disagree with me, then fine. But how many of you know childhood friends of yours who at an early, early age were just behaving a little differently? And, some years later when you were an adult and you found out that they were gay, that it just wasn't very shocking to you. In your heart you know that they were just born that way and when you heard that news it was almost like "well, duh?"

I can't see why it could be a preferential choice - it's just who they are. And that they are born into a society that just doesn't know how to deal with it. Millions of people who went through their own struggles in the most awkward years when all people start to realize their sexual drives and what fuels them. The courage that every homosexual has to summon to not only realize the root of their internal conflict, but also to overcome that they were born differently and then to become public with that difference. I can only imagine what these men and women had to endure.

I would liken it to be born left handed into a entirely right handed world. Where those lefties were forced to be right handed and if you were left handed, you were chastised and ridiculed for being left handed. Even when things just worked much better when they let their left hand dominate they had to submit for social reasons. We have actually had some of that pressure today on left-handed people that that's just the use of a dominate hand! My god.

If a gay couple wants to marry because they love each other, it has absolutely no bearing on my heterosexual marriage. Just as other heterosexual marriages have no bearing on my own. Those people out there that have taken their fear and intolerance based upon religious and ancient cultural views who then manipulate those same fears in the general populace to pass legislation to diminish and/or remove civil liberties away from very good people. It's criminal not to mention unconstitutional.

And that if that gay couple wants to take on that responsibility of raising a child - by no means will that child turn up to be homosexual. There is absolutely no evidence that environmental ques factor into how a child will grow up to become either homosexual or heterosexual.

If these states that just passed laws banning gay couples and/or singles from adopting children could put their irrationality aside for only just one moment and see that with a 1 in 2 failed marriage rate, I would think that this has a far larger impact on a child's life than any perceived impact from being raised in a gay household. Children develop into quality adults when they are loved and cared for - that is the A#1 priority for the health and welfare of our children. The people who voted for these measures need to wake up and smell their own hypocrisy.

And if gay people make you uncomfortable, then you need to take a good hard look at yourself in the mirror. If you call yourself a Christian, then for every verse in the Bible that denounces homosexuality you will find 10x in loving your neighbor as yourself and the generosity of spirit. Don't cast your own religious beliefs in this wrong context and if you feel that morality in America is slipping - keep in mind that is only your opinion and that the Christian version of morality isn't law - it only your belief. Exercise your own right to the freedom of religion and quit messing with other people's lives by trying to legislate your morals onto others who neither need them or want them.