So everyone's getting all "woo equality" on the social networking wing of the Internet, and I'm sitting here watching folks brag about how they're so much more enlightened than this person or that person and so on and so forth, and the usual suspects are getting really sanctimonious, and I just find red and pink to be a color scheme that looks kind of ugly, so I've just been clicking the little 'hide' button and considering how the Human Rights Campaign is a bit of a misnomer.
And don't get me wrong, I'm cool with civil unions and domestic partnerships and marriage and whatever. I honestly don't think the state has any business saying who can and can't between consenting adults but I understand that the legality as such has implications when it comes to legal stuff like kids and hospital visits and whatnot. I wouldn't want to deny that to anyone. I also don't believe that morality can be legislated.
But as far as human rights go... even if gay marriage in some aspect is legalized here, our foreign policy helps prop up regimes that stone you for adultery and have brutal ways of treating folks who swing the other way unless it's somehow already culturally sanctioned. If we're going to talk about equality and human rights, what about our prison system, or our schools, or the disparity in sentencing between cocaine and crack, or that Gitmo is STILL OPEN, and the School of the Americas has just been rebranded, but continues to export terrorism, and that we're STILL AT WAR and bombing the hell out of other countries on top of that, or teaching people how to brutally treat their own and exporting weapons to countries to help them keep people continually marginalized (see: Israel/Palestine, Uganda, etc).
And so I can't help but feel this is a giant smoke screen, a bone to throw the people who voted for hope and change, a way to get the masses riled against each other while the war machine keeps turning. And everyone buys in.
And don't get me wrong, I'm cool with civil unions and domestic partnerships and marriage and whatever. I honestly don't think the state has any business saying who can and can't between consenting adults but I understand that the legality as such has implications when it comes to legal stuff like kids and hospital visits and whatnot. I wouldn't want to deny that to anyone. I also don't believe that morality can be legislated.
But as far as human rights go... even if gay marriage in some aspect is legalized here, our foreign policy helps prop up regimes that stone you for adultery and have brutal ways of treating folks who swing the other way unless it's somehow already culturally sanctioned. If we're going to talk about equality and human rights, what about our prison system, or our schools, or the disparity in sentencing between cocaine and crack, or that Gitmo is STILL OPEN, and the School of the Americas has just been rebranded, but continues to export terrorism, and that we're STILL AT WAR and bombing the hell out of other countries on top of that, or teaching people how to brutally treat their own and exporting weapons to countries to help them keep people continually marginalized (see: Israel/Palestine, Uganda, etc).
And so I can't help but feel this is a giant smoke screen, a bone to throw the people who voted for hope and change, a way to get the masses riled against each other while the war machine keeps turning. And everyone buys in.
That's not very hopey changey, pal.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/galleries/p016ymy3
ReplyDeleteHey, I'm all for sanctimonium, it's so.....so.....sanctimonius. ;-) I don't argue or discuss gay issues for a very good reason. I'm not gay, and I don't know enough to comment on it. When it comes to politics, I'm just about fed up with that subject, too. The only thing I can think to write about on my blog lately is cats, dogs, and food...excluding dog and cats used for food.
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