Don't Ask Don't Tell

Greetings:

I would like to submit the following as an op-ed piece for the Atlanta Journal-Constiution touching on the subject of gay rights, and especially with regard to the military and marriage:

There is no more choice in sexual preference than there is in hand preference. It is not a choice when we first fall in love with a schoolmate. It just happens. We may try to suppress the feeling, but the feeling itself is no illusion. It’s exactly the same with our original preference to write with the left or right hand. At one time left handers were treated as we do homosexuals today (the Latin word for "left" is the root of the English word "sinister").

Religious beliefs play a major role in our consideration of the homosexual. The marvel of the Christian religion is the simplicity and clarity of what is required to be pleasing to God, namely the development of a heart dedicated to universal neighborly love. Once homosexuals in our society can be as open as left handers, we will discover that they are just as loving (and unloving) as heterosexuals.

At the time the Christian scriptures were written it seemed natural for everyone to be straight because sexual energy was needed to fuel more children to offset the high mortality rate at that time. Today the situation is quite different; we need less people and less children. Thanks to the homosexual inclination, we could have up to 10% of our populations living in intimate and satisfying unions, but which would result in no children and would accomplish this without war or famine or plague or catastrophe (the natural restraints), and without need for abortion or contraceptives or drugs or surgeries or even the most ineffectual of all: personal restraint (and all of which are highly unnatural). Indeed it could very well be that the homosexual, so decried by many Christians as a curse, is actually a blessing bestowed by a benevolent nature upon an ungrateful and undeserving world to mitigate the problems of overpopulation due entirely to the excesses of the heterosexual majority. Perhaps the fact of the inexplicable and continuing preference by 10% of the population for the left hand in writing can help convince us that the homosexual is another “quirk of nature”, and indeed one of enormous potential benefit with regard to the size of the world population. But what is the usual response of a corrupt world to the gifts of God according to Christian thinking? Crucifixion!

It is certainly the prerogative of any church to deny membership to anyone they wish, be they homosexuals or left handers. But it is quite another thing for our society to deny either of these their rights as Americans. I'm ashamed that I didn’t promote the civil rights of African-Americans in the 1950's and 1960’s. But I'm not going to be ashamed this time with regard to the civil rights of homosexuals.

Hopefully the recent recognition of the right of homosexual Americans to serve openly in our armed forces will also send a message to the Federal courts that the majority of Americans agree that no state may deny the right of any two Americans to marry as they choose. To deprive the homosexuals of this right to marry is no more defensible than denying left handers that same right.

Philip Rudisill

To contact the author, please e-mail: pmr&&kantwesley.com (note: the && must be replaced by @)

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