Soon the bias against gay people will go the way as bias against racial minorities went (or at least is going). There is no rational reason to discriminate against homosexual people in any way, shape or form. The people who are against same sex marriage are caught in a trap of moral superiority where they believe that their disapproval of another’s lifestyle matters. It doesn’t. They are almost always religious. They believe that things like homosexuality are sins and that society has an obligation to prohibit them. Wake up, folks! I don’t believe in the Bible and my citizenship in this country does not require that I do. You are free to express your opinions on morality but you are not free to impose your morality on me. You think being gay is a sin? Fine, don’t be gay then. But keep your hateful and intolerant opinion out of our laws and courts. No one elected you the morality police.

The majority in this country that is against same-sex marriage is the same majority that thinks the ten commandments should be in our public buildings. They are the majority that thinks “under God” needs to be in the pledge of allegiance. The problem is: two plus two does not equal five no matter how many people vote for it. This majority is plain wrong, just like they were wrong about slavery, wrong about civil rights, wrong about women’s rights and wrong about every progressive movement we’ve seen in this country. Our constitution guarantees that all people in this country, whether straight or gay, have the same rights. Read that sentence again: all people have the same rights.

Let’s take a quick swing through the moronic reasons people try to use to rationalize discrimination against same sex couples:

1. Marriage is for procreation. This is too stupid to address but I will anyway. A substantial percentage of heterosexual marriages do not procreate and it does not effect the status of their marriage. Civil marriage has nothing to do with procreation.

2. Heterosexual marriage is the foundation of a healthy family structure. 50% of marriages fail. At least 15% of marriages are subject to extra-marital affairs. I agree that positive marriages result in better families and better children. However, heterosexual marriage does not have a great record in this regard. We need all the positive marriages we can get, whether heterosexual or homosexual.

3. Public endorsement of same-sex marriage reinforces homosexuality as an acceptable lifestyle. Yes, I agree, it does. I don’t see that as a problem. I’m not here to write about homosexuality, per se, but I do think it is funny that people argue that it is somehow unnatural. Think of it this way — since the beginning of humanity it has been normal to expect a certain percentage of the population to be homosexual. It is perfectly normal in this regard.

4. Same-sex marriage will be used frivolously to gain the economic advantages of marriage. This is the only rational argument against same-sex marriage. If anyone can marry anyone, will people be more likely to use marriage as a vehicle for economic advantage. If that was going to be true, we would see a lot more heterosexual marriages of convenience. Even if this did turn out to be true, I see no reason why heterosexuals should be allowed marriages of convenience but not homosexuals.

The bottom line on this is that same-sex couples have the right to protect their families, their children and their estates. Being a committed couple is much harder if you need to jump through legal hoops to insure that your mate will have the same rights to joint custody of your children and your estate as heterosexual couples. Marriage, in addition to whatever religious covenant some people choose, is a legal arrangement. It is a civil union. As such by definition is it an option for all citizens regardless of who they are or who their mate is.

I’ll close with a story about how people change. My uncle was gay. He was diagnosed with AIDS in the 1980’s. His parents, my grandparents, were as conservative as you can imagine — Lutheran North Dakota farmers with barely a high school diploma. When they discovered their son was gay and dying of AIDS they dropped everything and supported him lovingly until the day he died. They stood by him in a way that makes me so proud. They decided that the God they believed in wanted them to love their son more than he wanted them to believe some preacher in some church who condemned homosexuals as sinners destined for hell.

It’s not just gay people who suffer from this prejudice — it’s their mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, sons, daughters and friends. For every loving same-sex couple in this country there is a web of hundreds of people who love and support them. We will not take no for an answer.