Hate can’t diminish a couple’s love

Tim Doyle

I’ve been noticing a lot of “Yes on 22” signs on the lawns in my

neighborhood. And it makes me sad.

We Americans have a long tradition of tolerance. Live and let live, we

like to say. This country was assembled out of lots of junk parts -

exotic, unusual, international leftovers all jumbled together, layer upon

layer. And it’s all worked out really well historically.

Every single cultural group, every new religious persuasion, every odd

social and political philosophy is tolerated, even encouraged. In

general, we tend to mind our own business and even enjoy these

differences.

There’s still a certain amount of racism and prejudice, but sensible

people know better. Except, for some reason, when it comes to

homosexuality.

It’s bizarre. It’s the one area left in American life where live and let

live just goes out the window. Homosexuality freaks people out, causing

normally smart, good, reasonable folks to get all creepy and start

peeking into each other’s bedrooms and calling each other names.

I don’t know why. Maybe it’s evolution. Maybe we’re like hamsters and

beetles and amoeba. Instinctively we want to procreate for the survival

of the species and anything that diverges from the normal drive to mate

and have lots of offspring, feels unconsciously bad.

But we’re more sophisticated than a hamster, arent we? And we know

intellectually that gay people aren’t bad?

I’m sure we all have friends who are homosexual. Maybe you don’t talk

about it - maybe they don’t even admit it to you but we all know a

couple of ‘roommates’ who each, for some reason, just never found the

right girl.

Growing up, there was always the ‘sissy’ in the class, and the ‘tomboy,

remember?

Are these people bad?

Religion might tell you that what they do is a sin. Maybe it is. We all

sin, right? Or maybe theyre suffering from a mental illness and should be

treated. OK.

But does that make them bad? Are they somehow less than you?

Some researchers believe the gay lifestyle is a choice, others say that

homosexuals are born with the predisposition. Maybe both can be true. We

dont know for sure.

But what we do know is that these people are here. Theyre our neighbors

and our co-workers. They’re our doctor and priest. They’re our cop and

our mail carrier and our brother and our daughter. They’re part of your

life whether you close your eyes to it or not. If you live in this world

they’re not going away.

Proposition 22 takes a stand against gay marriage. We don’t now have a

law permitting gay marriages in California, but on the chance that some

day one gets passed, the Proposition 22 folks think we need to be armed

and ready.

You can argue the specific issues related to gay marriage: survivorship,

health benefits and emergency room access. These things are important,

but not really, because they’re all going to happen anyway.

See, we all know that nothing will stop these protections for gay

couples. Whether gay marriage becomes common or not, businesses and

government will have to acknowledge gay relationships because they exist

and are part of our everyday reality.

Also, because it’s the reasonable, fair thing to do and, as I said, we

are basically a fair and reasonable country.

No, I don’t think these issues are what Proposition 22 is really about.

This proposition is mostly symbolic. It’s a line in the sand for people

who want to think like hamsters and amoeba.

Its trying to draw a distinction, to say one way is right and another way

is wrong. It’s the legislative equivalent of ‘Nya, nyah, nyah, nyah. I’m

better than you.”

It’s also one sad old man’s personal vendetta against his gay son. It’s

pretty depressing, and we don’t need to be a party to it.

The signs on the lawns say, ‘protect marriage’ and that confuses me. If

you love your spouse and give him or her your life, a million laws can’t

change that or what it means.

Ellen DeGeneres can marry a honey-baked ham, for all I care. It won’t

change the way I feel about my wife and daughter.

The same thing applies to gay relationships. Heterosexual, homosexual,

your ‘marriage,’ your commitment, your lover is safe. No one but you can

dismantle your love and no one else’s hate can diminish it.

Tim Doyle

Glendale