Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Freedom for free love

As of late this blog has been pretty light and fluffy. That is to say that my posts lately have been mainly of the " humourous rant " variety. Well it is not always sunshine and lollipops here people. I have a real rant today and i just wanted to see what you people thought.

See, I was absentmindely reading news articles on the internet today ( during work hours - i know how to waste time too... ) and I came across an article about Hallmark producing greeting cards for same sex marriages. I'd link to the article but the article itself is of little consequence really. No, its not the article that has me riled up but the barrage of comments left after it. Frankly, some people are dipshits.

Just to clarify - I am not gay. I like men ( although I'm starting to think that maybe they dont like me so much, but thats a whole other post ). So, yea, I like men, but I also like men who love men, and women who love women. I'm just in love with the human race so it doesnt matter to me who each specific human happens to be in love with. I also do not give two figs about who you choose to have sex with either ( unless you're into man+dog=love, or woman+horse=love - that shit is just sick! ) Basically I'm all for people, whether they be gay, straight, metro, retro, black, white, tran, tri, bi or otherwise. And not only am i for people, I am most definately for people being in love. So if your name is Elton and you love David, then I'm happy for you. If your name is Ellen and you're in love with Portia, then thats a beautiful thing. And if you all want to get married, then i wish you all the love and happiness in the world.

My bug bare is that not everybody else agrees with me. You know how when you're in love with someone there are still things about them that you might not like ? Yea, well like i said i'm in love with the human race but the thing i dont like so much is those of us who are close-minded, abusive and inconsiderate. The first comment after the article was a " God thinks homosexuals are wrong " rant, and it just carried on from there. Of course there were individuals such as myself defending the right to love whom you choose, and the right to marry whom you choose, but the majority of commenters were being downright homphobic and, frankly, disgusting in their arrogance and, in some cases, hypocrisy.

So many of the commenters claimed to be good, upstanding Christians who were disgusted in the fact that Hallmark would produce such trash in support of what is morally wrong and a deadly sin. Firstly - love is a sin now ? Secondly, I was rasied Catholic ( until the age of 15 when i told my priest that i didnt believe in God ) , I've read the Bible, and i distinctly remember the part about love thy neighbour and do unto others as you would have them do unto you. So why are these supposedly Good Samaritans treating others like dirt ? I'm sure they dont appreciate it when people call them, oh, i dont know , brainwashed red-knecked Bible bashers, so according to the book and, indeed the God they so revere, they should be treating gays and lesbians with the utmost respect. Thats what gets me about the Christian faith, or at least the way it has ingrained itself in society - so much of it has been twisted and warped and is nothing like the author of the stories intended. Yep, i said stories....

The second thing that got me about some of the comments was people who were saying they were against same sex marriage because marriage is defined as being between a man and a woman. By whom exactly ? By law makers ? By some fat old men hundreds of years ago ? Newsflash for those people - laws can be changed! Definitions can change too. Funnily enough, not that long ago the most common definition of " gay " was completely different, so why cant the definition of marriage be changed? To me, marriage is about love, not biology. Marriage is the best expression of love, of being so completely enamoured of another person that you want to spend every day of the rest of your life with them. And as far as I'm aware that depth of love is not exclusive to a man-woman relationship, so why should marriage be exclusive to hetero couples only ? It just doesnt make logical sense.

And to those who said marriage was about having children - BBBBRT, wrong. Sex is about having children. What we know about human anatomy and biology says so. Sex is completely possible without marriage, and marriage is possible without children, so your theory makes no sense at all. The whole idea that being married is partly for the purpose of producing children is just another Christian idea thrust upon as all.

I dont want this to turn into a Chrsitian-bashing post, or an anti-religion rant. Far from it. Unlike so many deeply religious people, I dont try to push my ideas and beliefs upon others, and try to uphold a basic respect for others rights to their beliefs, no matter how ridiculous, backward or just plain wrong i think them to be.

So what about you people ? Any opinions on the topic, whether you're for or against gay marriage ? I'm not usually so politically charged or socially controversial, but sometimes things get under my skin....

5 comments:

  1. Hi Amy, was it Freud who suggested that people who rage against the sexual nature of others are in fact repressing urges within themselves they deem to be wrong? So the loudest voices there have probably had some interesting fantasies of their own shall we say.

    I dunno, I tend to go for the live and let live approach. We're all human beings aren't we? The same flesh and blood. We all just want to give love and be loved however that may occur. If it's against your faith I guess that opinion needs to be respected, but to openly shout about it in some facist kinda way doesn't exactly show Christian spirit. This is the irony isn't it?

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  2. Indeed it is Steph - and hypocritical too.

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  3. I don't disagree with you on the most part "yay let's all be gay together and share in our gay-ness excitement"

    However, religions do have a right to their beliefs, and just as it is OK for Christianity to say that there is no other God, it can say it is wrong to be gay.

    I would think that marriage is actually an institution stipulated by the church or said other religion for the joining of a man and a woman. A concept taken on by many governments, and occaisionally written into their constitutions. So I consider the fact that "marriage" actually is the joining of a man and a woman, as recognised by the church, if two gay people want to commit to each otehr and spend their lives together that's fine, but I don't think is needs to be "marriage" it can be a "civic union".

    Anyway, point is, I don't agree with your rant about changing the term for marriage.

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  4. I know that for me, this is a tough topic. I was raised in a conservative Presbyterian church that, as of this year, decided to divide itself because the majority faction (the part my home church belongs to) is against gay marriage, and the other half isn't.
    I, being of this generation, am much more open minded. I think that people taking verses straight from the Bible as examples aren't looking at the context of things. That's not to say that I think the Bible lays out any direct indication that homosexuality is fine, but I also don't think it says it's wrong. The homosexuality referred to in the New Testament is that of lustful, sexual desire; people were having gay orgies, and Paul said, you gotta focus on God. Now, if those same people had loving, monogamous, gay relationships, perhaps Paul doesn't say anything. I know of hetero couples that are likely much worse off on the sin chart than the gay couples I know.
    Believe it when I say Hallmark didn't make that decision lightly. They knew they'd get trashed. But to not make those cards is to not target a major untapped market, plus it's saying that the only love worth celebrating is the love the government approves of.
    Let's just remember that in the Bible, God was cool for thousands of years with males having multiple wives.

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  5. It is my personal belief that people put too much effort into things that do not affect them. The fact that steve and barry are lovers in the house next door does not change their daily lives at all. It is simply a mater of control of things that people are either afraid of, or dont understand. I personaly dont care either way. Everyone has a right to be miserable. Besides, imagine the court tv drama of Steve and Barry fighting over who keeps the caddy and who keeps the poodle!!! This is ratings fused Tely!!!

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