The Pursuit of Happiness as Long as You’re Not Gay or Lesbian

The Fourth of July is tomorrow and I’m appalled, because the Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness rights promised in the Declaration of Independence are being denied to our fellow citizens. In Washington, D.C., the city council approved a bill recently that would recognize gay marriages from other states,  and the most vocal opposition came from the city’s African-American churches.

Leading the opposition is Rev. Patrick Walker, pastor of New Macedonia Baptist Church. He also heads the task force for black ministers fighting same-sex marriage in the city. Walker believes that recognizing same-sex marriages will be a tragedy and an affront to God. “I believe the Bible is absolutely clear,” he says. “God performed the first marriage when he sanctioned Adam and Eve.”  Walker cites Sodom and Gomorrah and passages from the Bible calling homosexual acts an abomination. Nowhere, he says, does God sanction homosexual marriage.

Ok.  He’s basically saying that peoples’ rights should be denied because he interprets his religion as saying so?  Isn’t this why we are fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? Because some religious extremists think that Western Civilization is evil?  But Rev. Walker thinks all of the answers are in the Bible.  The Bible is great for a lot of things but he’s picking and choosing what to follow. The Bible greenlights incest. Check out Genesis chapter 19, versus 33 thru 36:

33 So they made their father drink wine that night. And the firstborn went in and lay with her father. He did not know when she lay down or when she arose.  34 The next day, the firstborn said to the younger, “Behold, I lay last night with my father. Let us make him drink wine tonight also. Then you go in and lie with him, that we may preserve offspring from our father.” 35 So they made their father drink wine that night also. And the younger arose and lay with him, and he did not know when she lay down or when she arose.  36 Thus both the daughters of Lot became pregnant by their father.

I seriously doubt that any fans of the Bible could advocate incest, simply because its in the Bible.  I think that Rev. Walker would benefit from visiting Religious Tolerance.org they do a nice job of presenting a wider range of scholarly Bible interpretations.  Also Rev. Walker doesn’t see the overall gay rights movement as a civil right issue.  He says, “When I talk to most people of African descent, many of them are absolutely appalled by any comparison to the civil rights movement, simply because we cannot take off our blackness,” Walker says. Gay men and lesbians, he says, never sat at the back of a bus, or suffered Jim Crow segregation laws.  Well I’m of African decent and a Catholic.  I think Rev. Walker needs to do some deeper investigation.

He could start by talking to the participants in the 1969 Stonewall riots.  The New York City Police Department had its hands full when gays took a stand on the night of June 28th against long time police intimidation, entrapment, and harassment.  Rev. Walker could then talk to the family of the late Matthew Shepard about how their son was tortured, tied to a fence, and left for dead.

Or Rev. Walker can talk to the family of Chad Gibson who received a severe head injury when the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission raided the Rainbow Lounge, a Ft. Worth gay bar he was in last week.  Authorities said they were doing routine inspections to ensure compliance with state alcoholic beverage laws.  However witness said that, “If anyone dared ask what was going on, they were handcuffed or taken out.”  All of this should sound familiar to Rev. Walker– a minority group in America fighting intolerance and being denied civil freedoms.  Its a fundamental denial of rights.  Even Ted Olson thinks so.

Olson is the conservative lawyer who successfully argued Bush vs. Gore before the Supreme Court back in 2000.  Olson even represented Ronald Reagan during the Iran-Contra investigation.  He has serious conservative credentials.  Even he doesn’t think it makes sense.  Olson has signed on to a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of California’s Proposition 8, which bans gay marriage. He spoke at a press conference last May saying:

“I suspect there’s not a single person in this room that doesn’t have a friend or family member of close acquaintance or professional colleague and many of them who are gay. And if you look into the eyes and hearts of people who are gay and talk to them about this issue, that reinforces in the most powerful way possible the fact that these individuals deserve to be treated equally like the rest of us and not be denied the fundamental rights of our Constitution.”

The argument: the State of California giving same sex couples “the separate-but-unequal institution of domestic partnership,” instead of full marriage, violates equal protection and due process clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment, creating a class of “second-class citizens”

So gays and lesbians can’t marry and receive all of the legal benefits and protections that straight couples get in all 50 states.  And to add insult to injury they can’t fight for this country, thanks to Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.  Think about that.  People who are willing to put their life on the line to defend this country can’t.  Top military people don’t think it makes sense.

Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. John Shalikashvili (Ret.) and former Senator and Secretary of Defense William Cohen spoke against the policy publicly in early January 2007: “I now believe that if gay men and lesbians served openly in the United States military, they would not undermine the efficacy of the armed forces,” General Shalikashvili wrote. “Our military has been stretched thin by our deployments in the Middle East, and we must welcome the service of any American who is willing and able to do the job.”

But that’s not what we’re doing.  Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell insures that we throw qualified people out of the military.  Its makes about as much sense as refusing to let a talented neurosurgeon operate on you– because they might be gay.  We’re talking people like Lt. Dan Choi a West Point grad and Iraq War vet who has crucial Arabic translation skills.

Jon Stewart summed it up the best when he said, “So it was okay to waterboard a guy 80 times but God forbid the guy who could understand what that prick was saying has a boyfriend? Waterboarding may make a prisoner talk, but it ain’t gonna make him talk English.”

So if anything I’ve said in this post makes sense to you, go to Lt. Dan Choi’s website and sign the petition to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”.

Or If you are on Twitter, please retweet the following text:
RT @CourageCampaign Keep fighting Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell with Lt. Dan Choi. Sign our letter to Speaker Pelosi http://bit.ly/XUHCH

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