My Gay Marriage Rant

Recently there has been a lot of upheaval over North Carolina’s vote to deny gays the right to marry.  In the interest of full disclosure I have known gay people my entire life, and I have several gay friends.  I also know two separate gay couples that have been/were together for more than 30 years.  I only personally know  two straight couples that I can say the same thing about, so in my eyes gay and straight marriage are on even ground.   I know this is a hot button topic and most people fall either on one side of the fence or the other, very few people have no opinion on the matter.  I try to respect everyone’s opinions, even when they are wrong. 

Honestly, what it boils down to for me is civil rights.  Why any state should be allowed to require gays to live by the same laws, and pay the same taxes but not have the same rights as all other citizens is beyond me.   I believe gay marriage falls under the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, as simple as that.  That is not really what I want to talk about though.

A week or so ago I had a discussion on Facebook with a woman that actually said “being gay is a sin, just like murder.” At first I was dumbfounded by the stupidity of this statement… no I still am.   To equate a hate filled murder to being in love with or even just attracted to a member of your same sex, is crazy!  She went on to say that she had to believe and obey the entire Bible; she could not pick and choose what to believe.  I of course came back with some rules/laws of the Bible that are at best out of date, only to have her ignore my points.  I also pointed out that in this country we have a separation of church and state.  I asked for one, just one, non-religious reason to prevent gays from marrying.  I was told “The Constitution is wrong, the further we get from God the worse off we are.”  This would be the same Constitution that gave blacks and women their rights, and gave this idiot the right to religious freedom.  That really riled me up (if you didn’t notice). 

I thought about what things would be like if we all went back to the strict ways of the Bible.  I also noticed that the same people telling gays live your life according to what we believe; don’t really live their own lives that way.    Let us explore some of these rule/laws that these people do not “pick and choose:

·         Leviticus 11:7-8 And the pig, because it parts the hoof and is cloven-footed but does not chew the cud, is unclean to you. You shall not eat any of their flesh, and you shall not touch their carcasses; they are unclean to you.    

  Easter ham anyone?

·         Leviticus 19:19 “Keep my decrees. "'Do not mate different kinds of animals. "'Do not plant your field with two kinds of seed. "'Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material.

Well, they probably don’t own a Liger but they may own a mule, even if they don’t, what are the chances that none of these religious people own a poly-cotton blend, or plant a garden?

·         Leviticus 19:27   Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard. 

In other words no haircuts or shaving.

·         Leviticus 20:9  For every one that curseth his father or his mother shall be surely put to death: he hath cursed his father or his mother; his blood shall be upon him.

Ironically, this is the same fate should befall gays according to the Bible

Long story short we all pick and choose what parts of the Bible we cling too.  Do some homework; look up what the Bible says about rape, slavery, and any number of other things that shouldn’t be going on in this day and age.   I guess that is the beauty of small town life, everyone walks out of their glass house with a pocket full of stones.