Guest blog: One Marine's thoughts on DADT & Marriage

The following short essay was sent to me by a young Marine currenty on active duty. He has already done one tour of duty in Iraq, and is probably going back soon.

Gay Equality

The majority of the nation gives us their support in defending our Country.  In fact 79 percent do according to the most recent poll.  There are 100 members in Congress in support of repealing the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy with the Military Readiness Enhancement Act. They believe we have the right to serve openly in our Nation’s military.  After all, if we’re going to die defending freedom, we’d rather die as who we are and not a lie we lived.  So why is it that they have our back on defending the principles by which they live but not on us enjoying in those same principles?  Marriage is not something all of us ask.  What we ask for is the recognition of rights equal to marriage.  Call it whatever you will.  I will compromise the term marriage for these rights because I understand the church’s position on same sex marriage in the eyes of God.  But for the government to attempt to deny us these rights by encouraging amendments that would prohibit legal status identical or similar to marriage is to make a mockery of the freedom this Country stands on.  Deny these freedoms and everyone falls.

Texas

recently passed Proposition 2.  It reads:

BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF

TEXAS

:

Section 1.  Article I, Texas Constitution, is amended by adding Section 32 to read as follows:

Section 32. (a)  Marriage in this state shall consist only of the union of one man and one woman.

(b)   This state or a political subdivision of this state may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage.

This proposition was supported by the governor Rick Perry along with many churches throughout the state of

Texas

.  The damage this amendment will do to gays and lesbians who call

Texas

home is as self evident as are the truths spoken of in the United States Constitution promising us life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  But religion in

Texas

has an enormous influence on politics.  And therein lays a root in the corrupted tree that is our present government.  Remember, this is the state that arrested two gay men and fined them for having consensual sex when officers showed up at their house on a weapons disturbance call.

In 2004 the states of Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Utah all proposed and passed amendments defining marriage as belonging exclusively to heterosexual couples.  A major difference between those states in 2004 and in

Texas

in 2005 is the voter turnout.  In

Texas

it was extremely low reaching 11 percent with 55 percent of the precincts reporting.  Precincts with larger gay and lesbian populations had larger turnouts of course.  Where is our voice?

It should not be surprising that we fail at stopping such measures.  Not only are the odds stacked against us, we are stacked against ourselves too.  Rather than seeing everyone in the same boat striding for the same goal, we bring hate unto each other.  A heterosexual acting gay or “straight” acting cannot stand a more feminine gay.  The same goes for lesbians.  Some will have nothing to do with the other.  There are gays open about their homosexuality who cast judgment on closeted homosexuals and many of us frown heavily on transsexuals because we can’t understand their reasoning or feel they hurt our cause.  But rather than work together to come together as one movement we build walls.  We judge just as society judges us.  If we are to win in equality we must first treat ourselves as equal.  The truth is we are all in the same boat together and we will not make it if we choose who stays behind.  It is our prejudices which we must leave behind, not our own.

So before everyone gets into an uproar over the possible demise of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, consider this:  Yes, it is a change in the right direction, but we have yet to receive all the freedoms and rights which we defend, which we have died for.

"When I was in the military they gave me a medal for killing two men and a discharge for loving one." - Epitaph of Leonard P. Matlovich, 1988