Two steps forward, one step back...

I've learned the hard way that, even in an increasingly progressive, post-Obama-as-president society, publications still shy away from polarizing, controversial viewpoints so as to protect their image and/or their hard dollars. And sometimes, the wrong people associated with said publications just flatly disagree with the viewpoint.

Such has been the issue I've found with this editorial. I'm sure if I kept shopping it around a bit more, I'd find someone who would accept it, but the topic has grown somewhat cold. I did spend time writing this, so I want it to be read by someone, goddammit.

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I’ve been pretty disappointed in black folks these past couple weeks.

The beauty and historical significance of Barack Obama’s election has, in my eyes, been dramatically undercut by the passing of Proposition 8 in California. The proposition was designed to amend the Constitution to state that true marriage is only between a man and a woman. Its passing sets the gay rights movement back heaven knows how many years, and will essentially serve to preserve their status as second-class citizens.

That this proposition was even on the ballot is troubling. That it was the most highly-funded state campaign in the country is baffling. But that black voters – who no doubt turned out in record numbers to elect our champion – played a pivotal role by being some 70 percent of people who voted for the proposition simply angers me and proves that we still have a long, long way to go.

Unfortunately, nothing about it surprises me; the 800-pound gorilla in the room here is definitely the church. Black folks are a spiritual people, and we’re rather steadfast in our ideas about the family structure. So because we interpreted the antiquated text of the Holy Bible as any and everything gay is “against God,” we leveraged that as an excuse to vote for the proposition…exercising a right we didn’t even have 140 years ago because they thought we were second class citizens.

If you have half a brain that isn’t slowly leaking out of your ass, it should be easy to come to the conclusion after very little invested thought that the civil rights of homosexuals are no intrusion on the rights straight people have to marry whomever they want of the opposite sex. It should be easy to deduce that using the term “marriage” to define existing gay civil unions isn’t going to make more people gay, corrupt our children or lead to plague, genocide and the collapse of American civilization as we know it.

People need to understand that legalization of gay marriage won’t require any church to marry who they don’t want to marry, just as no church or its pastor is required to marry a straight couple.

Gay marriage isn’t going to serve as a detriment to the existing shitty institution of marriage. Folks harp on about how straight marriage is a cornerstone of the traditional family; meanwhile, over half of them end in divorce and any pairing of straight people who’ve known each other for one evening and several Jagerbombs can jaunt down to any city hall with a few bucks and get married only to get that shit annulled the next day.

If anything, gay marriage may help boost the existing divorce rates given that they’ve fought so hard just to have the right.

I could go on and on and on with this topic...it runs that deep. In summation: Americans in general – and black folks specifically – need to pull their heads out of their collective ass and recognize the existence of prejudice in its purest, most malevolent form. I urge you to think long and hard about nature, the history of America, the essential tenets of your religion and the basic common sense that is all too often obfuscated by dogma.

If you still come to the conclusion that gay equals bad, then hopefully your god can help you…because I sure can’t.