Yes On #1

I do not like labels. Not applied to people anyway.  But apparently there is some human need to classify, label, and categorize other humans.  It’s all bullshit.  It’s all about control, subjugation, and domination.  Humans seem to need to separate themselves from one another, to perpetuate their inherent presumption that their group, tribe, or ideology are superior to those they wish to control, subjugate, or dominate.

 

On the Maine ballot this election is a referendum on “Gay Marriage.”  The question being whether marriage between two people of the same gender should be allowed to marry.  Seriously?  We are even arguing this?  Still? 

 

Those opposed seem to be primarily heterosexual individuals who do not want their marriages to equate on equal footing with those of homosexual individuals.  One group trying to subjugate, dominate, control the rights of another group.  First of all, wtf, is “Gay Marriage?”  Why not, just “marriage,” period.  No, it must be classified, labeled, just so one group can point out that it is different…  Different from what?  Are we to believe that heterosexuality, and couplings between individuals of different genders are the norm, ie. “normal?”  Is there such a thing as “normal?”  Despite what anyone might argue to the contrary, both homo and hetero sexualities have existed since the dawn of Humankind; in a very real and basic sense, both are, “normal.”  The concept that one (homo) is aberrant and contrary to the laws of nature is absurd.  “Grow up,” is what I would suggest to such people who cloak themselves in this belief.  “Gay” people are every bit as legitimate to human existence as “straight” people…to borrow from Bill Belicheck, our hooded, Obi Wan football guru down in Foxboro: “It is what it is.”  Get over it…already, for cripes sakes.  People are people, humans are humans, and love and attraction are love and attraction…who the flying fuck is anyone to say that their love and attraction is more legitimate or more real than another’s?  Control. Subjugation. Domination.

 

Then there are the biblicals.  It is against God’s will…they propose.  Really?  You speak for God?  Presumptuous, are we?  For it is so written in the Bible, they argue.  Really? Show me where.  Leviticus?  God’s words?  Really?  And though there are those who will insist that the words and concepts contained within the pages of the Bible (which Bible are we to go by, btw, and who makes that decision…and why the Bible, not the Torah or Qur’an or other religious handbooks?) are the actual word of God.  Really? Is this not simply your belief?  And should the rest of us be subjugate to your beliefs?   I mean, really, are they the actual mouthed or written words and concepts spoken or penned by God, or, are they merely Man’s interpretation of God’s thinking, a collection of words and concepts and beliefs of various individuals, later distilled through the further interpretations (and in far too many cases, perversions) of clerics and biblical scholars, bible-thumpers, charlatans, and the armchair righteous?  Control. Subjugation. Domination.

 

Oh, and let us not neglect the condescenders.  Those who preach “tolerance” of “diversity.”  Tolerance?  As if, people who are different (different from what?) should be tolerated?  As if diversity was something to be tolerated rather than something that just is.  The control, subjugation, domination is more subtle here, but it is there nonetheless.  You are different than me but that is okay, I will tolerate you and your right to be different…somehow with the presumptive undertone that the one being “tolerated” is still in an inferior position.  I will “grant” you the right to be different, or in this case, marry, because, though I view you with a diminished eye, I don’t really care what you do when it doesn’t directly affect me…as if to say, if one’s very existence and right to that existence, is only dependant on the condition that I don’t directly affect anyone else around me.  Condescension.  Control. Subjugation. Domination.  People, don’t diminish others because they are different; we are all different in our own individual ways.  Don’t condescend to tolerate me because my difference is different than your difference.

 

There is no such thing as gay. There is no such thing as straight.  These are labels.  We are all, merely people.  And this is a country where we’re supposed to respect the rights of individuals, and groups, to differ from the thinking, beliefs, and practices of other individuals and groups.  Marriage is a social construct, not merely a biblical or religious mandate or privilege.  Nobody has the right to deny another from the advantages, privileges, or enjoyment of this social construct, as long as we are trying to abide life in a constructed society based on personal freedom and the right to pursue our individual happiness.  This country was not founded on the principles of control, subjugation, or domination…at least not in theory.  Might does not make right, nor does majority win out over minority when pertaining to inalienable rights of all individuals.  Labels are divisive and damaging, hurtful and…bullshit.  It’s not “gay” marriage, it’s just marriage…period.  Let’s be done with it and move on, please…there is much more important work to be tasked.