To any who oppose gay marriage
Feb. 17th, 2004 07:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
johnpalmer(No cut tag; I don't know where to put one. Apologies...)
OK, all of you people who are fighting against gay marriage: you're going to lose.
I mean, first there's me. Now, I'm not anybody in particular. I'm a nobody. But by everything I hold holy, I will be the loudest, stubbornest, least willing to back down even a step, and most obnoxiously, arrogantly, self-righteous nobody that you've ever met. While there is strength in my body I will fight you. While there is breath in my lungs I will speak against you. While there is love in my heart, every ounce of my will will be opposed to you. I will never give up; I will never surrender; and I will do my damnedest to create more loud, stubborn, unwilling to back down (even a step), obnoxiously, arrogantly, self-righteous nobodies who will also stand against you, with all the strength of their bodies, all the breaths in their lungs, and all the love in their heart.
If it comes down to it, it will be my life's work to change two people's minds, until it's those two people's life's work to each change two other people's minds. That's 30 generations to get to a billion people, and probably a few more after that to get an overwhelming majority of people on this planet. But that's what it's going to take, then that is what is going to happen.
You're going to lose.
But don't think that you're going to lose because of me. You're going to lose because you're battling the strongest, most noble human emotion.
I'm going to say something that should be obvious to just about everyone, but isn't.
Homosexuality has nothing to do with sex. Homosexuality is about love.
Now love, yeah, that has something to do with sex. No, not all love... the love of one friend for another needn't be sexual, the love of a parent for a child certainly shouldn't be sexual, that wonderful love we sometimes feel for other people for no reason other than the fact that we're all human, and all in this crazy, mixed up life together, that doesn't have anything to do with sex.
But there's a type of love that has a lot to do with sex. In fact, that type of love has so much to do with sex, that people don't feel right doing so much as questioning it. And, when that love is between a man and a woman, it's the basis of some of the most beautiful, most compelling, and most universal stories ever written. Movie screenwriters will throw in gratuitous love interests for the sole purpose of increasing the appeal of the movie.
Now, if you don't believe that love could exist between a man and a man, or a woman and a woman, well, you are in denial of reality.
There's an old saying that says that reality is what remains, even if you don't want to believe in it. And even if you don't want to believe in that love, let me tell you something: it's still exists. It's real. And if you spend all of your life not realizing that you could be looking at it, well, I can forgive you for not believing that it exists. But now you just heard someone say that it does, and there is no excuse if you don't start looking critically at what there is between gay folks who build relationships together.
Oh, you can keep closing your eyes to it, but deep inside, you'll know damn well that you're closing your eyes, and that means you're afraid that I'm right.
And if you don't close your eyes, you'll see I'm right... because I am. Oh, it might take you some time... if you've been told something different all of your life, it always takes time to realize that folks have been leading you down the wrong path. But reality has a funny kind of way of continuing to shine through, as long as you open your eyes to it.
So, you see, you're fighting against love, and against a particularly focused form of love, against the kind of love that makes people take foolish risks and do crazy things, if that's what it will take to be with their beloved. Like, flying across the country for the tiniest symbol that says that a single city in a single state of the entire United States of America considers them to be married.
You're going to lose. That's a given. The only question is how.
You can fight back. You can fight back, and you can win a few victories, and you can stand side by side with some of the most vicious hate mongers I have ever seen in my life. You can comfort yourself, saying that politics makes for strange bedfellows, but you'll know that me, and people like me, are on the other side. And you'll know we'll be fighting for love. So you can ask yourself, who are your allies, and who are your enemies, and you can ask yourself what that means about the side you're on.
Or... you can accept that you're going to lose. You can give it up gracefully. 20 years from when the victory is won, when the bigots are still shouting about how terrible things are, you can look at them, and see what you saved yourself from. Oh, I'm not saying the you'll suddenly think that it's OK to be gay. Maybe you will, maybe you won't. But you'll realize that, okay or not, if you made a mistake, at least the mistake will have been made on the side of love... not on the side of hate.
OK, all of you people who are fighting against gay marriage: you're going to lose.
I mean, first there's me. Now, I'm not anybody in particular. I'm a nobody. But by everything I hold holy, I will be the loudest, stubbornest, least willing to back down even a step, and most obnoxiously, arrogantly, self-righteous nobody that you've ever met. While there is strength in my body I will fight you. While there is breath in my lungs I will speak against you. While there is love in my heart, every ounce of my will will be opposed to you. I will never give up; I will never surrender; and I will do my damnedest to create more loud, stubborn, unwilling to back down (even a step), obnoxiously, arrogantly, self-righteous nobodies who will also stand against you, with all the strength of their bodies, all the breaths in their lungs, and all the love in their heart.
If it comes down to it, it will be my life's work to change two people's minds, until it's those two people's life's work to each change two other people's minds. That's 30 generations to get to a billion people, and probably a few more after that to get an overwhelming majority of people on this planet. But that's what it's going to take, then that is what is going to happen.
You're going to lose.
But don't think that you're going to lose because of me. You're going to lose because you're battling the strongest, most noble human emotion.
I'm going to say something that should be obvious to just about everyone, but isn't.
Homosexuality has nothing to do with sex. Homosexuality is about love.
Now love, yeah, that has something to do with sex. No, not all love... the love of one friend for another needn't be sexual, the love of a parent for a child certainly shouldn't be sexual, that wonderful love we sometimes feel for other people for no reason other than the fact that we're all human, and all in this crazy, mixed up life together, that doesn't have anything to do with sex.
But there's a type of love that has a lot to do with sex. In fact, that type of love has so much to do with sex, that people don't feel right doing so much as questioning it. And, when that love is between a man and a woman, it's the basis of some of the most beautiful, most compelling, and most universal stories ever written. Movie screenwriters will throw in gratuitous love interests for the sole purpose of increasing the appeal of the movie.
Now, if you don't believe that love could exist between a man and a man, or a woman and a woman, well, you are in denial of reality.
There's an old saying that says that reality is what remains, even if you don't want to believe in it. And even if you don't want to believe in that love, let me tell you something: it's still exists. It's real. And if you spend all of your life not realizing that you could be looking at it, well, I can forgive you for not believing that it exists. But now you just heard someone say that it does, and there is no excuse if you don't start looking critically at what there is between gay folks who build relationships together.
Oh, you can keep closing your eyes to it, but deep inside, you'll know damn well that you're closing your eyes, and that means you're afraid that I'm right.
And if you don't close your eyes, you'll see I'm right... because I am. Oh, it might take you some time... if you've been told something different all of your life, it always takes time to realize that folks have been leading you down the wrong path. But reality has a funny kind of way of continuing to shine through, as long as you open your eyes to it.
So, you see, you're fighting against love, and against a particularly focused form of love, against the kind of love that makes people take foolish risks and do crazy things, if that's what it will take to be with their beloved. Like, flying across the country for the tiniest symbol that says that a single city in a single state of the entire United States of America considers them to be married.
You're going to lose. That's a given. The only question is how.
You can fight back. You can fight back, and you can win a few victories, and you can stand side by side with some of the most vicious hate mongers I have ever seen in my life. You can comfort yourself, saying that politics makes for strange bedfellows, but you'll know that me, and people like me, are on the other side. And you'll know we'll be fighting for love. So you can ask yourself, who are your allies, and who are your enemies, and you can ask yourself what that means about the side you're on.
Or... you can accept that you're going to lose. You can give it up gracefully. 20 years from when the victory is won, when the bigots are still shouting about how terrible things are, you can look at them, and see what you saved yourself from. Oh, I'm not saying the you'll suddenly think that it's OK to be gay. Maybe you will, maybe you won't. But you'll realize that, okay or not, if you made a mistake, at least the mistake will have been made on the side of love... not on the side of hate.
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no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 03:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 03:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 04:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 04:26 am (UTC)Damn, if you were a girl or I were a guy, I'd be booking us the next flight to San Francisco, darlin', on the basis of this alone.
no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 05:01 am (UTC)This was gorgeous, wonderful, and amazing. I wish I could have written it first. ;)
no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 05:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 05:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 06:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 06:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 06:59 am (UTC)What part of "Life, Liberty and The Pursuit of Happiness" don't they understand?!?
no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 11:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 12:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 12:44 pm (UTC)You are a wonderful man.
no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 01:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 01:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 01:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 01:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 02:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 02:27 pm (UTC)Thank you.
no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 02:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 02:43 pm (UTC)bravo, john....
*SMOOCH*
no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 03:01 pm (UTC)I marched for 17 years in every Gay Pride parade near me, even tried Peacekeeping once, but was too loud and obnoxious when the far out Christians got in my face. (Kids kinda put this on hold, as birthday parties and such now tend to fall on that weekend. Though the older one did attend at least one march with me.) After a while, people would recognize me here in Denver, and I was dubbed "Our little straight cheerleader."
I'll always be a cheerleader in the fight for the freedom to Love.
no subject
Date: 2004-02-18 05:15 pm (UTC)Beautiful and poetic, but overly optimistic
Date: 2004-02-19 04:57 pm (UTC)What will stop the same-sex marriage amendment is to play rough and dirty right from the start. This isn't about love, this is about playing the media.
We lost the Florida debacle for the same reason. From the start the Republicans realized that this was a PR battle more than a legal battle. They immediately started a PR war and the DNC didn't know what hit them. The DNC didn't realize it was going to be won or lost in the press until it was too late.
no subject
Date: 2004-02-23 08:21 pm (UTC)