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The issue, in my opinion, is whether sexual identification has to result in creating an underclass of people who are required to pay taxes to support the same government which refuses to recognize that everybody is entitled to equal rights. I can't express myself a fraction as well as some of our more eloquent DUers, but I trust that my deepest beliefs are clear to all.
There must be some benefit to society as a whole in order to pass laws forbidding certain behaviors, or acts. Recognizing that equal rights include the rights of every member of society to conduct their private affairs as just that, private, is of utmost importance.
Whether a couple can marry or not is something that nobody but the consenting adults affected should decide. Surely even the most right-wing fanatic does not expect that barring marriage will also bar couples from living together, loving each other, and behaving in every sense that is important, exactly like a straight married couple.
The Bible Belt also has a pretty high divorce rate, if I remember correctly, but that is apparently not worth whipping the true believers into a frenzy over. Before I go to bed (much too late), my only other comment is that until every citizen is able to partake of true equality, our country has no business preaching morals to anyone, citizen or foreign. There is no difference, from what I can see, between the things straight Americans and gay Americans want. The gay community is only asking for the same rights enjoyed by everybody else, and that is the only fair and just thing to do.
I can't understand the right-wingers, I can't put myself into their mindset, and use their reasoning to arrive at certain conclusions. I will never truly understand why they hate, and fear the GLBT community so much. I have spent a total of 41 years of my life married, the last 21 of them to my second husband, the first 40 to my first. I was born during WWII, and grew up in the late 40s and early 50s, and if anyone should have become narrow minded, it's people like me. Oh...I also live in Texas.
When sixty-something women can see the harm, and wrong, in discrimination toward a sizable segment of our society, I would say that it's time to grow up, and move on. We should be much more enlightened than we appear to be. To my brothers and sisters who live with the burden of this irrational distaste and disapproval, all I can say is that I'm on your side.
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