Average Americans are earning $8,000 – $10,000 a year less now than they were in 2007. The value of the average home (where members of the middle class hold most of their wealth) is $35,000 less now than in 2007. Record numbers of Americans depend on government handouts just to get by. Unemployment is still historically high and has been for a decade. If you count those that are no longer even looking and those that are underemployed, which the government doesn’t report, the rate is at record levels. Despite spending trillions more, annually, than the American taxpayer can possibly supply, the US Government was incapable of reducing spending even back to last year’s record levels of spending, proving that the US population is no longer capable of self-sufficiency – forcing us to borrow until the credit eventually runs out. Healthcare costs are up 32% following the passage of the “Affordable Care Act” two years ago. The new normal for gasoline pricing is $3.50 – $4 per gallon. The economic opportunities of the poor and minorities are fewer than ever before. The rich get richer because their ability to withstand the economic drag of government interference is far better than that of the poor. The poor – and many in the middle class- are just out of luck. Ask a group of twenty-two year olds what they plan to do upon graduation from college and you will likely get a lot of worried facial expressions, but few confident answers.
But the big concern today is over whether the union of two men or two women can be legally called “marriage.” Mind you – neither the federal government, nor any state or territory of the United States prevents gay people from loving each other. No law prevents any person from living with or sharing a life with the person of their choosing. No law prevents comingling of wealth, visiting one another in the hospital, or passing on a personal estate to the loved one of your choice. Even states with statutes restricting the definition of legal marriage to opposite sexes recognize legal same-sex marriages from other states. Many states allow for adoption of children by same-sex couples, and nowhere is the legal parenthood or guardianship of these couples questioned or at risk. Gay couples in committed, permanent relationships have become widely accepted in the public eye, in the media, and in the hearts and minds of many, if not most, Americans.
Despite the public activists’ outcry, what is in question here is NOT a restriction of civil rights. It is a question of the allowable use of a word. So why do gay “rights” activists continue to fan the flames? Why must they shout and protest and invite hostility from those that, for whatever reason, are uncomfortable with the idea? Most “traditional” “conservative” Americans, when asked say something to the effect of, “I’m OK with people doing what they want, but why does it have to be in my face so much?”
Is it possible that the gay community MIGHT get a lot further by toning the rhetoric down a bit. It would seem that what gay couples should be striving for is the normalization of who they are. Acceptance doesn’t come from setting yourselves up as a group of victims and organizing loud protests and demands of drastic changes to the traditional morays of the culture. Real acceptance comes from the quiet assimilation into the mainstream. You know – like normal people.
All of us, regardless of who we are or how we form our families, would be much better served by focusing on the REAL issues that threaten our way of life and not the distractions of semantics.
