Sunday, December 19, 2010

Progress?: Congress has finally decided that gay people are moral enough to kill

  • Arlo Guthrie (above, left) sang about being unsuitable to be drafted to fight in Viet Nam because he had been arrested for littering.
  • Lt. Dan Choi (above, right) graduated from West Point, served as an infantry officer in Iraq, and was thrown out of the army after coming out as gay.

From "Alice's Restaurant" by Arlo Guthrie: "I mean I'm sittin here on the Group W bench 'cause you want to know if I'm moral enough join the army, burn women, kids, houses and villages . . .  If you're in a situation like that there's only one thing you can do and that's walk into the shrink wherever you are. Just walk in say 'Shrink, You can get anything you want, at Alice's restaurant.' And walk out. You know, if one person, just one person does it they may think he's really sick and they won't take him. And if two people, two people do it, in harmony, they may think they're both faggots and they won't take either of them." (©1966,1967  Appleseed Music Inc.)

From The Associated Press: "The Senate voted Saturday to end the 17-year ban on openly gay troops . . . .  Supporters declared the vote a civil rights milestone . . . . Aaron Belkin, director of the California-based Palm Center - a think tank on the issue - said the vote "ushers in a new era in which the largest employer in the United States treats gays and lesbians like human beings." . . . Repeal means that for the first time in U.S. history, gays will be openly accepted by the military and can acknowledge their sexual orientation without fear of being discharged. More than 13,500 service members have been dismissed under the 1993 law. Before that, they had been explicitly barred from military service since World War I."

Some may be pleased that Congress has decided to stop limiting the supply of cannon fodder based on sexual preference. I'd be more impressed if Congress stopped the nation from participating in stupid wars that kill gays and straights, declared that states can't stop same-sex marriage, and declared that same-sex partners must receive the same benefits as spouses of the opposite sex.

I'm a man who has been married to a woman for 39 years and one week. We would not be less married if a man married a man, or if a woman married a woman, or if a frog married a pencil sharpener.

Why should anyone care who else gets married?

Marriage is not exactly an exclusive club -- like Mensa or the Daughters of the American Revolution -- that is suddenly open to all. The only requirements I remember having to meet were being over 18 and not having syphilis.


  1. Moral enough to kill or be killed -- but not moral enough to marry.

    Sick, and sad.

  2. Baby steps. Baby steps.

    Advancing a little more each year-- don't forget that when our current president was born, there were still places in this country that had "colored" bathrooms, etc.

    Slow and steady wins the race.