With its ongoing efforts to define marriage as something that can happen only between a man and a woman, Congress is contributing to an atmosphere of negativity toward any lifestyle outside the “Leave It to Beaver” mode. According to LGBT activists, that is making an already difficult decision — whether to “come out” — all the more difficult for youths.
Besides the legislative effort, there also has been a marked increase of violence and intolerant acts toward lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgendered individuals, according to an article in “WireTap”:
The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force recently found that LGBT hate crimes have gone up 30 percent within the past year. That is in addition to the alarming results found in a national survey of LGBT students conducted by the Office of Public Policy of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) in 2003. The survey found that, “77.9 percent heard remarks such as ‘faggot’ or ‘dyke’ frequently or often at school; 18.8 percent heard similar remarks from faculty or school staff at least some of the time; 82.9 percent reported that faculty or staff never or only sometimes intervened when they were present when such remarks were made; 84 percent personally had been verbally harassed at school because of their sexual orientation; 65.3 percent had been sexually harassed; and 39.1 percent had been physically harassed.”
Newt’s half-sis is on the case:
Candace Gingrich, youth outreach manager at the Human Rights Campaign in Washington D.C. said that we often focus on the anti same-sex initiatives around the country and fail to notice crucial victories. “There were 14 state legislatures that rejected [same-sex] marriage amendments on Election Day. But all we hear about are the 13 that passed them,” said Gingrich. “We need to get these facts out there.”
“The conversation about marriage has really only just begun. We’ve been talking about discrimination, hate crimes, and health issues for 30 or 40 years. We’ve really only been talking about marriage for a second,” Gingrich added.
And finally, the point can be made that:
“In the long run, the U.S. government cannot preach to the rest of the world about freedom and democracy if they are demonstrably not practicing themselves. They cannot legitimately make the claim that U.S. rights can be restricted based on traditional religious grounds, especially as European countries move towards increased rights for LGBTIQ people,” said Christine Johnson, coordinator of TransAdvocate.org based in Olympia, Wash.
But when has hypocrisy ever been a deterrent for the U.S gubmint?
