The Taboo of Gayness

Okay, this irks me more than I would like to openly admit, and that's my own weak character flaw. I live in rural, middle America, in the most white-republican-upper class town I know of. So this social injustice is something I don't openly and publicly discuss. Because well honestly, I wouldn't get a fair discussion in my neck of the woods if I did.

I have in my family 3 openly gay people and 1 not-so-openly gay person. I guess growing up with these people in my family it was never gay vs. straight. (Kinda like having adopted people in your family being anything to you other than a blood relative.) This entire gay marriage fight has me irritated.....no it has me pissed off. I don't care what label you put on it, what category it falls into, what name it holds in legal circumstances, people have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. ALL PEOPLE. I'm so agitated by the fact that the right-wing nutjobs get up in arms about gay people wanting the same legal rights straight people have.

If something happened to my cousin who has been in a relationship with the same man for as long as I can remember, and his partner didn't have rights to anything they had built together, we are the criminals for allowing it to happen. It would be OUR fault for allowing civil rights to be ignored. If one decided to retire, the other should be able to carry him on his company insurance, if God forbid, one of them become ill, the other should be able to make medical decisions in times of an emergency. I can't believe the blatant disregard for people's own earned human rights and our hiding behind a book written 2000 years ago. I'm beyond disgruntled. I'm sickened its being allowed to continue and that we have done nothing to correct it.

I'm ashamed to be American and allow fellow citizens, family, friends being treated as second class human beings.