Sunday, June 05, 2005

Same Sex Marriage debate outside the blogshpere

Taking a wee break from the Grewal shenanigans for a minute, I'd like to share a letter I have sent off to one of our local fish-wrap weeklies, Nepean This Week. This paper is very Conservative - and yes I mean the big 'C'. This paper might as well be the propaganda wing of the local Conservative Riding Association.

Any way, this letter is a response to a letter from one Tim Carter, and can be found inside the current issue (sorry PDF). This angry rant of his, in response to an earlier letter of mine, which was a response to a hate-filled, fundamentalist-Christian rant against Same Sex Marriage and homosexuality in general.

Here is my letter in response:

"Mr. Carter,

I don't expect you or anyone else to ignore any facts. I do, however, expect you to learn what the facts are. Everything in your latest angry diatribe is false. Clearly you are being spoon-fed "facts" from places like Focus on the Family, NARTH and other fundamentalist, right-wing sources. Let me present the real facts, as gleaned from sources such as the American Psychiatric Association, The University of Western Ontario, The University of Lethbridge, John Hopkins Medical School, DeGroote School of Medicine at MacMaster University, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Karolinska Institute in Sweden and the US National Academy of Sciences, to name a few.

Homosexuality has been observed, in the wild, in as many as 450 species of animals. These include dolphins, bears, fruit flies,whales, penguins, salmon, and in two other primate species - Orangutans in Sumatra and Japanese Macaques. These researchers weren't looking for this behaviour, they found it while conducting other research. It was a surprise to them and was confirmed by others in the field of biology and zoology.

I could find no research that confirms you assertion that gays are more likely to be involved in "abuse." And while you are quick to point out that gay men are at a higher risk of HIV and AIDS, you seem to miss the fact that the group that is at the lowest risk or ANY demographic are lesbians. Tell me again how being gay is the cause and reason for AIDS? By your logic, we should not allow natives in Saskatchewan to marry, since, statically, they are more likely to be in abusive relationships and to re-commit crimes. Or we should not allow blacks from Africa to marry because they are one thousand times more likely to spread AIDS than white North Americans.

That HIV and AIDS are more spread by high-risk activities such as promiscuity is not in question. But if you really wish to prevent the spread, allowing gays and lesbians to enter into legally recognized, long-term , monogamous relationships will prevent the spread. Same Sex Marriage is actually a solution to the spread of AIDS and HIV, not an enabler of it.

I don't expect to change your hate-filled mind about homosexuality being a natural condition. I will not sit by while you spread false and misleading information about gays and lesbians, intended to generate hate toward and identifiable group.

Let me point out something you may have missed, Mr. Carter. Homosexuals have been allowed to adopt children for more than a decade in Ontario. Studies have shown that gays and lesbians are as good and sometimes better parents than straight parents in raising kids. And no one is being "raised gay". You can no more raise someone and teach them to be gay than you can teach someone to be straight - either they are or they are not. Our schools will simply teach children to respect other people - you know, that old "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" idea - and not "how to be gay". Your assertions are pure paranoia and pathological fear. Ontario has had legal gay marriage for 2 years and we haven't descended into chaos. Nothing has happened.

Oh, and let me point out one more thing, again, because you clearly missed it the first time. You go on though out your letter with accusatory "you want us to..." and "only your own" etc, implying I take the position I do because I am gay (and thus part of the vast "Gay Conspiracy"). As I stated in my first letter, I am straight, married and a father. I form my opinions based on researched facts, not on fear, hatred and dogma. If you can show real evidence to back up your claims, I would change my opinion. But you haven't. You have only shown to me the underlying, anti-gay bigotry that drives your opposition to gay marriage. You letter has been written a thousand times in the past, only then the word "gay" was replaced by the words "Jew", "Black" or "Catholic." Same hatred, different day."


This is the kind of ground-level hatred I have to deal with on a daily basis, and I'm not even gay. I used to wonder how the Germans could get sucked in to supporting genocide back in WWII. Not anymore.

June 16th cannot come fast enough.

Ok. You may now resume Grewal speculation...

11 Comments:

At 5:05 PM, Blogger Richard said...

Wow, even when presented with facts to the contrary Mike you still blindly forge ahead... That's amusing...

 
At 5:31 PM, Blogger Mike said...

What "facts" would those be Richard? You're not going to dredge up Paul Cameron again are you? Mr. Carter was wrong. He got his "facts" from NARTH, or Focus on the Family or any one of the other right-wing Christian fundementalist websites out there. Not from science.

Do you see that list of Universities, Research Institutes and world reknown Medical Schools I presented? All of them have produced peer-reviewed, scientific studies showing a biological basis for homosexuality. Over the years, the evidence has gotten stronger not weaker. The vast majority of mainstream science accepts the biological basis for homosexuality.

The latest pheremone study I have cited in the National Geographic before, the Oregon sheep study from 2002, observations from whale studies in Mexico, dolphin studies in Brazil, years of observations of Macaques in Japan, have shown it. They weren't looking for homosexual behaviour, Richard, but that's what they found. The work of Hamer, Vilian, and LeVay in the 90's. All well respected.

Just because you don't like these facts, Richard, doesn't mean they aren't true. Present some peer-reviewed research from a recognized research institute or University, Richard, and we'll talk. Try Boston University Medical School. Try the University of California at San Diego, try the University of Texas.

Anything with the name Paul Cameron attached to it will be immediately discarded and ignored, since he is not a real researcher and his "research" has been thoroughly discredited by the scientific community for more than 20 years.

Go one. I'll wait.

Until you come up with that kind of evidence we can actually debate, Richard, have a nice steaming cup of STFU.

:)

 
At 6:52 PM, Blogger AJSomerset said...

Good letter, Mike.

But as you can see, sound, rational arguments make no progress whatsoever.

 
At 7:00 PM, Blogger Mike said...

Thanks wonderdog.

I still gotta try. Perhaps one wingnut will read the real facts and change their mind on this.

Notice I'm not holding my breathe, though.

 
At 11:14 AM, Blogger Progressive Maritimer said...

Fantastic letter, well done! It's a shame though that this won't do a whole lot to break through the hatred, ignorance, intolerance, and lies being spewed out by some people who are adamantly opposed to same-sex marriage.

Still, perhaps one of these days, it will...

Well I can dream can't I?

Again, great letter, well done! *applauds*

 
At 3:20 PM, Blogger ricky said...

Good stuff. Even in the Conservative heartland of the Okanagan, I have not received that kind of response and I am gay.

Most of them out here try to keep their hatred under the hat until they actually meet you.

Rick

 
At 12:39 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Heh.. as I posted over at http://www.ianism.com/?sectionid=7

"You might be a moral relativist.....
You think oral sex is wonderful, but same sex sex is just, well, unnatural, you
know?"

 
At 9:37 PM, Blogger Cyrano said...

One point I can take issue with without looking for any research, is the desire for homosexuals to be married in monogamous relationships. You're assuming too much here. Read Andrew Sullivan's commentary on SSM:

“The world of no-strings heterosexual hookups and 50 percent divorce rates preceded gay marriage,” he points out in the New Republic. “All homosexuals are saying…is that, under the current definition, there’s no reason to exclude us. If you want to return straight marriage to the 1950s, go ahead. But until you do, the exclusion of gays is…a denial of basic civil equality” (emphasis added). Gays do not want a marriage in the traditional mold, only the watered-down version that exists today."

One problem with SSM is that it entrenches this non-monogamous mind-set. To be fair, I have tremendous problems with heterosexual relationships where marriage is not seen as a permanent arrangement. But let's not skirt around the issue here - SSM amounts to public endorsement of the idea that marriage is not monogamous and permanent. Too many heterosexuals have paid lip-service to what marriage is supposed to be, to be sure - but that doesn't excuse us from codifying that lip-service into an actual feature of the institution.

 
At 10:28 PM, Blogger Mike said...

Cyrano, that's a load of bullshit and you know it. It an extension of the old "most gays don't want to get married" line the religious right tries to use.

Ask Rick Barnes.

Gays want to get married to be in monogamous,loving relationships just like my wife and I are in. End of story. None of that crap the New Republic says.

Two consenting adults want the same rights that I enjoy with my wife. They should have it.

 
At 8:43 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

There is good and bad in all groups;....

Hating people who 'hate' is illogical and part in parcel of the black and white logic of today....

Caesar J. B. Squitti

ps...we are not all equal....we are suppose to be equal before God and before the Law....this has been manipulated by special interest groups.....

 
At 8:50 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Oh and by the way....

Research has shown that logic, terminology and stats have been used by radical feminists, including SOME radical lesbian feminists to promote an anti heterosexual agenda for the past 30 years....look up Judy Rebick...

Child abuse;
Men who abuse, women and children victims.
WHY ATTACKING MEN ?


Spousal abuse;
Stop violence against women.
WHAT ABOUT THE ABUSES OF WOMEN, AND MEN ?


Stop violence...for your daughters.
WHAT ABOUT YOUR SONS...where is the justice, the equality.

It appears the devil, has deceived North America, and the world and some individuals have manipulated logic to polarize the sexes.

Oh...and by the way, we all discriminate...some is logical and rational, some is not.

Bottom line we are not all equal....all men are not equal to each other....you have to qualify for a right based on logical and morally correct logic.

We give some people special rights to those who are not equal because of compassion...ie the disabled, the seniors...

 

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