Same sex marriage properly unravelled...

You may know that the U.S. Supreme Court has recently legalised same-sex marriage across fifty U.S. states, right on the heels of a referendum in Catholic Ireland whereby Irish voters recently backed same-sex marriage by landslide. Both outcomes are a very BIG deal from a community ‘Way of Life’ perspective because the institution of marriage has been around a while, but has existed almost exclusively as a privilege for the heterosexual community – as per the conventional, religious mindset that both underpins and preserves this institution and it’s overwhelmingly rigid constraints.

The problem is that over time, communities have seen fit to entangle marriage with legal and financial concerns, and while this has never been an issue for conventional ‘hetro’ relationships (since they have inherently been the primary beneficiaries of this practice) – it ‘has’ had a somewhat catastrophic impact on gay communities, due to same-sex couples’ basic legal and financial entitlements being withheld by virtue of their’ sexual preferences; a direct outcome I suggest, of learned prejudice that has been inadvertently injected by archaic, superficial and quite often erroneous belief and value systems - into the fabric of modern ‘Way of Life’ frameworks as far as the naked eye can see.

Folks, one does not need to be an ophthalmologist to distinguish sexual preferences from basic human entitlements and one does not have to be a civil engineer to understand that the former does not dictate the latter in any kind of logical world. So why then has this madness continued unabated for so very long?

Well, I suggest it is because for centuries, this learned prejudice that emerges from fear, ignorance, insecurities and a bunch of other undesirables - has been deeply engrained into our community psyche and has been hard at work clouding our judgement, running interference on our perspective and conspiring quite successfully it seems - to sabotage our capability for social justice. There is simply no other logical explanation for any society brazenly denying people legal and financial entitlements for reasons related to their sexual preferences. Could you even for a moment imagine withholding medical treatment from an accident victim because as a tea-tottler, he or she was not able to take out insurance, since insurance was invented by coffee drinkers; That's right coffee drinkers NOT God or any other divine force. Just plain old coffee drinkers. EXACTLY – it is as ludicrous as it is confronting.

Personally, I am not particularly fussed about anybody’s sexual preferences but I AM entirely certain of my convictions regarding their fundamental rights and their humanity. If you find yourself still struggling with this matter, consider that how ‘you’ might feel about other people’s sexual preferences is something that can only exist inside of your mind - until of course, ‘you’ bring it into physical reality by virtue of who you choose to ‘be’. So try for a moment to imagine who you might ‘be’ - if your child turned out to be gay. That’s always a good test of people’s resolve - wouldn't you say?.

Whilst you think about that, keep in mind that a handful of classic old-schoolers running some of the most unyielding institutions of the day such as the U.S Supreme court, have just outpaced you in the all-too-precious ‘Game of Life’ - and that never looks good on a resume.

Good luck finding your next job.

Thanking you in anticipation of your struggle with perspective – Your Enemy and forever, Your friend