From Jim Boushay and Rickey Sain
· Warriors, fight, attack, slay, sword, kill, battlefield, army, confrontation, wipe out, obliterate, militant, mobilize, clash, contend, dog fight, battle cry, soldier, maim, an offensive, call to arms, besiege…and all the horrid rest of the words and terminology of war.
But the words above are used to characterize the efforts to bring peace. Even superficially paying attention to what’s happening reveals that.
We live in contradiction.
More than a year ago we co-wrote a series of letters to religious leaders around the world, asking why is it that the so-called bringers of peace find it necessary to engage the rhetoric of war and battle. Many thoughtful (and profoundly unsettling) responses came back—a book’s in fact. This morning in town over breakfast at the Pancake House, we met with an ordained clergy member. This executives secular job is to lead and organize and empower a new religion initiative, which is statewide and perhaps national in its planned civic and political impact. He was seeking support. Shockingly to us, he said, “We’re thankfully in the process of blowing away those bastards.”
Christiane Amanpour’s three part CNN prime-time series last Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday (last night)—titled God’s Warriors—covered our culture’s global predicament at the extremes of religion and religious expression. It’s too easy—and grossly incorrect—to say the predicament is between the clearly secular and the profoundly sacred, although surely it is that. It is much more. Listen carefully to the rhetoric and the metaphors: Our culture is readying for global war. God help us, have mercy on us. When religious leaders across the spectrum cannot keep from routinely using the brutal language of fight and attack when talking of bringing peace, then for us two there is much less hope for an “enduring” peace. Under the circumstances described here, peace is ever illusory, near impossible.
If you get a chance, read The War for Righteousness: Progressive Christianity, the Great War, and the Rise of the Messianic Nation by Richard Gamble. He details how the language of “progressivism” led to World War I, the war that was supposed to end all wars but which led to all to the other wars since. When will we learn? He describes how the attitudes and actions of the progressive Christian clergy in 1910-1918 played a major role in drawing the U.S. into a world at war. That situation sounds much like the attitudes and violent language of the religious leaders of today in their clever and tragic recommendations for so-called “applied Christianity.”
Historically in our messianic “religious” nation, says Gamble, the real meaning of “applied Christianity” is conveyed in use of the rhetoric of crusades, of a suffering God as victim and as disempowered, rather than as omnipotent and all-loving. Talk about a global crisis of faith!
Professor Gamble shows how the progressive, mainstream Protestant clergy in the late 19th Century and especially the first decade of the 20th Century provided—in the pulpit and their writings—the images and the language indispensable to waging the destruction that is war. And here we are doing pretty much the same thing 100 years later. Do we learn from history? Right now the answer seems to be: hardly.
The ones talking of and really meaning peace are being drowned out apparently by the louder voices of those using the battle cry language of attack and fight. With the nation at war Abraham Lincoln told us something important concerning those who say God is on their side in the conflict. He reminded Americans that less do we need to state that God is on "our" side. More do we need to ask if we are on God's side.
Thanks, Rachel, for asking and for listening here. Good luck Sunday. You’ll have to give a mighty sermon in that mighty Presbyterian church. Break a leg! Oops. I guess we really do live in contradiction.
Monday, August 27, 2007
Thursday, August 16, 2007
A GREAT ARTICLE THAT I READ EARLIER TODAY!
RY
THE FEET OF DUENDE ~ Duende in the Dark Times
by Michael Meade
In Spain they say, one is not truly living unless one is dying. Only in dying again and again, do we truly inhabit the Earth. Only in learning to die do we learn to fully live. Each life a journey of many steps and each step the journey between life and death. Each moment a living and a dying away, so subtle it makes things appear constant.
Meanwhile, we walk the roads and work amongst those who knowingly and unknowingly craft the shapes that life will inhabit in the future. The philosopher Unamuno insisted that without the Tragic Sense that knows the secret conversation between life and death, we become simply visitors, passers-by who slow occasionally down to look on when accidents reveal the close presence of death. Those lives lack enduring meaning, are not fully lived into, like shoes worn for a while, then tossed aside as time marches on. This is the ‘common tragedy,’ the dull preoccupation that finds only the open earth at the end.
Unless we “... act in such a way as to make our annihilation an injustice. In such a way as to make our brothers... and our brother’s sons and daughters, feel that we ought not to have died.” Unless we “...perpetuate ourselves in them, in their children... this is the way...to perform our occupations passionately, tragically if you like.” To occupy our lives fully, to perpetuate life within the tragedy of being, to walk the entire road with the feet of the soul, that makes the life a work, an art, an opus.
In Spain, where they make shoes of Spanish leather, they say there are three kinds of shoemakers. The first kind makes shoes in order to make a living and they make good shoes. The second kind of shoemaker toils on a higher plane, making shoes for the art of it; making the best, most beautiful shoes that can possibly be made, all the while knowing they will be worn to tatters.
The third kind of shoemaker works on an altogether different level. That one aspires to become, for his friends and for his fellow humans an altogether, indispensable, irreplaceable maker of shoes. That one fashions shoes that connect people’s feet to the goat’s earth and reminds them of the dance of life. That one has Flamenco in mind while making shoes, crafting shapes from the memories and messages rising darkly from the earth itself.
This third maker, works the leather with a passionate spirit that tries to sing its way into the world through the feet of each human soul. That one makes shoes for dancing, for weddings and funerals, for sacrifices that lift the blood-dark dreams that ever whisper in the human heart. That one crafts shoes that remember where the soul has been. That one fashions memories that lift the foot knowingly from the past, through the arch of the present toward the startling ground of the future.
When that maker dies, people will feel he ought not to have died. For, he inspired them to contemplate deeper truths found only in the long corridors of the soul. People will try to keep his memory alive, for he shod them for the love of them, for the love of god in them, for the love of the dark spirit of the earth speaking through them. He shod them in the skin of life itself. He shod them religiously, spiritually, devotionally, in the spirit of living and dying, and in the knowledge that on the road where death awaits them, their feet will go and their legs will carry them.
When that shoemaker enters the door of death, no one will fill the life-long shoes he leaves. For, this is the way that death is defeated, by dying into our own lives and thus continuing to live. Death defeated by being embraced, by being sewn into the shapes of life. Life and death woven so closely that the two embrace and the footprints of the soul mark the road of time for those who follow. For then, others will pick up the shape and direction sewn into their lives and begin to walk the ‘way soul could walk before time began.’
This is the road of Duende made of moments where the knowing spirit rises from the Dark Earth and enters the feet, like dreams pouring through the sleeper’s mind. The feet feeling their way between waking and sleeping, slowly becoming indispensable to the life given and available to the darker knowledge that it carries. Thus, we begin to die in ways that make new forms arise; not the simple changes of fashion, but the fashioning of shapes that carry life on.
Life and death being crafted again and again from the skin of living, from the scrape of close calls, from the willingness not simply to try, nor even bravely to fall, but awkwardly to arise and dance when the blood-dark spirit aggravates the marrow from within. For, Duende is Culture in the Blood, the marrow memories singing passionately within the bones.
Duende is anything that knows earth, that has black sounds, anything that has enough shadow and blue descending to black. Pena Negra, the black sounds that rise from the mystery of “the root fastened in the mire…the fertile soil that gives us the very substance of art.” The mysterious sense of life wound around death speaking dark sounds into the ear of memory, whispering where the breath of day gathers in the blind recesses of the soul.
Duende is power, not simply work and not only thought, but a struggle with spirit in the blood. Not a question simply of talent given or skill earned, but an issue of genius entering life at the moment of birth and continuing to whisper dark notes to the mind and the heart. More a matter of true living style, of style written in the soul and born anew each time the self is willing to die again.
Duende is the power that compels us to sing the song within despite and because we are torn apart by living. It is a sacrifice growing within, a tragedy pursed at the edge of knowing, a little dance with death that make life more than simple possibility.
Spontaneous creation, that’s what it is; the unique motions of creation rising from the earth, penetrating the soles of the feet, cracking open the unseen seeds that inspire the mind and awaken the heart, crafting bits of eternity into time making us indispensable to the waiting bride of the future.
In the ancient ground, where blood is made, the Duende boils with an exact knowledge of who we are and what we are meant to be. It intones messages that we ignore at our own peril. For, we have come here to perpetuate that hidden fever, to die into the notes of the inner song, to dance into the knowledge carried in our own blood.
Duende is the wound-womb we cannot hide and only suffer more each time we try to cover it over. The wound burdened with its songs and mysteries, always on the verge of reopening, perpetuating the specifics of sorrow, drawing us to its dark waters, creating out of painful necessity all the arts of healing.
Without the wound and the struggle to heal, we would all disappear without a trace, mere vapors unable to hold to the dark earth, unable to generate children or put shoes on their feet. For, duende finds in each moment a rebirth of the wound and its healing; knowing that all inventions occur at the rim of the wound, near the dark sounds of blood pouring both life and death into the world; each giving birth to the other, making the world over again from the same tragic substance.
The real dilemmas of life are never solved; the darkness between notes is never relieved, for each art and each life arises from that ancient ground- the mud of all creation, inviting us into the fervid dance that eschews progress in favor of being. The deeper song of life and death intoned again through us; the requirement that those who receive the gift of breath fashion the world over again.
In Spain they say, the heart is an endless road, an ancient path trodden with the feet of the soul, stained with the grape-crushing feet of dark gods. In the distant-down murmurings where the roots of speech ever persist, we know again the language of suffering and healing, the criss-crossing of swollen feet in the night of the heart where we learn again the tragic sense that life and love require.
Dying while continuing to live, walking the pathless paths, finding and losing again the shoes of redemption. Shoes that can only be made by shoemakers of the higher order who willingly bend to the deeper ground.
Death only comes as a total surprise to those who fought the wrong battles in life. For, in the fight with our own spirit we lose properly and die frequently enough that death becomes us. In the end, there is no consolation; only the necessary annihilation that began in blood and bone and tried to sing from behind the first breath to the last words
RY
THE FEET OF DUENDE ~ Duende in the Dark Times
by Michael Meade
In Spain they say, one is not truly living unless one is dying. Only in dying again and again, do we truly inhabit the Earth. Only in learning to die do we learn to fully live. Each life a journey of many steps and each step the journey between life and death. Each moment a living and a dying away, so subtle it makes things appear constant.
Meanwhile, we walk the roads and work amongst those who knowingly and unknowingly craft the shapes that life will inhabit in the future. The philosopher Unamuno insisted that without the Tragic Sense that knows the secret conversation between life and death, we become simply visitors, passers-by who slow occasionally down to look on when accidents reveal the close presence of death. Those lives lack enduring meaning, are not fully lived into, like shoes worn for a while, then tossed aside as time marches on. This is the ‘common tragedy,’ the dull preoccupation that finds only the open earth at the end.
Unless we “... act in such a way as to make our annihilation an injustice. In such a way as to make our brothers... and our brother’s sons and daughters, feel that we ought not to have died.” Unless we “...perpetuate ourselves in them, in their children... this is the way...to perform our occupations passionately, tragically if you like.” To occupy our lives fully, to perpetuate life within the tragedy of being, to walk the entire road with the feet of the soul, that makes the life a work, an art, an opus.
In Spain, where they make shoes of Spanish leather, they say there are three kinds of shoemakers. The first kind makes shoes in order to make a living and they make good shoes. The second kind of shoemaker toils on a higher plane, making shoes for the art of it; making the best, most beautiful shoes that can possibly be made, all the while knowing they will be worn to tatters.
The third kind of shoemaker works on an altogether different level. That one aspires to become, for his friends and for his fellow humans an altogether, indispensable, irreplaceable maker of shoes. That one fashions shoes that connect people’s feet to the goat’s earth and reminds them of the dance of life. That one has Flamenco in mind while making shoes, crafting shapes from the memories and messages rising darkly from the earth itself.
This third maker, works the leather with a passionate spirit that tries to sing its way into the world through the feet of each human soul. That one makes shoes for dancing, for weddings and funerals, for sacrifices that lift the blood-dark dreams that ever whisper in the human heart. That one crafts shoes that remember where the soul has been. That one fashions memories that lift the foot knowingly from the past, through the arch of the present toward the startling ground of the future.
When that maker dies, people will feel he ought not to have died. For, he inspired them to contemplate deeper truths found only in the long corridors of the soul. People will try to keep his memory alive, for he shod them for the love of them, for the love of god in them, for the love of the dark spirit of the earth speaking through them. He shod them in the skin of life itself. He shod them religiously, spiritually, devotionally, in the spirit of living and dying, and in the knowledge that on the road where death awaits them, their feet will go and their legs will carry them.
When that shoemaker enters the door of death, no one will fill the life-long shoes he leaves. For, this is the way that death is defeated, by dying into our own lives and thus continuing to live. Death defeated by being embraced, by being sewn into the shapes of life. Life and death woven so closely that the two embrace and the footprints of the soul mark the road of time for those who follow. For then, others will pick up the shape and direction sewn into their lives and begin to walk the ‘way soul could walk before time began.’
This is the road of Duende made of moments where the knowing spirit rises from the Dark Earth and enters the feet, like dreams pouring through the sleeper’s mind. The feet feeling their way between waking and sleeping, slowly becoming indispensable to the life given and available to the darker knowledge that it carries. Thus, we begin to die in ways that make new forms arise; not the simple changes of fashion, but the fashioning of shapes that carry life on.
Life and death being crafted again and again from the skin of living, from the scrape of close calls, from the willingness not simply to try, nor even bravely to fall, but awkwardly to arise and dance when the blood-dark spirit aggravates the marrow from within. For, Duende is Culture in the Blood, the marrow memories singing passionately within the bones.
Duende is anything that knows earth, that has black sounds, anything that has enough shadow and blue descending to black. Pena Negra, the black sounds that rise from the mystery of “the root fastened in the mire…the fertile soil that gives us the very substance of art.” The mysterious sense of life wound around death speaking dark sounds into the ear of memory, whispering where the breath of day gathers in the blind recesses of the soul.
Duende is power, not simply work and not only thought, but a struggle with spirit in the blood. Not a question simply of talent given or skill earned, but an issue of genius entering life at the moment of birth and continuing to whisper dark notes to the mind and the heart. More a matter of true living style, of style written in the soul and born anew each time the self is willing to die again.
Duende is the power that compels us to sing the song within despite and because we are torn apart by living. It is a sacrifice growing within, a tragedy pursed at the edge of knowing, a little dance with death that make life more than simple possibility.
Spontaneous creation, that’s what it is; the unique motions of creation rising from the earth, penetrating the soles of the feet, cracking open the unseen seeds that inspire the mind and awaken the heart, crafting bits of eternity into time making us indispensable to the waiting bride of the future.
In the ancient ground, where blood is made, the Duende boils with an exact knowledge of who we are and what we are meant to be. It intones messages that we ignore at our own peril. For, we have come here to perpetuate that hidden fever, to die into the notes of the inner song, to dance into the knowledge carried in our own blood.
Duende is the wound-womb we cannot hide and only suffer more each time we try to cover it over. The wound burdened with its songs and mysteries, always on the verge of reopening, perpetuating the specifics of sorrow, drawing us to its dark waters, creating out of painful necessity all the arts of healing.
Without the wound and the struggle to heal, we would all disappear without a trace, mere vapors unable to hold to the dark earth, unable to generate children or put shoes on their feet. For, duende finds in each moment a rebirth of the wound and its healing; knowing that all inventions occur at the rim of the wound, near the dark sounds of blood pouring both life and death into the world; each giving birth to the other, making the world over again from the same tragic substance.
The real dilemmas of life are never solved; the darkness between notes is never relieved, for each art and each life arises from that ancient ground- the mud of all creation, inviting us into the fervid dance that eschews progress in favor of being. The deeper song of life and death intoned again through us; the requirement that those who receive the gift of breath fashion the world over again.
In Spain they say, the heart is an endless road, an ancient path trodden with the feet of the soul, stained with the grape-crushing feet of dark gods. In the distant-down murmurings where the roots of speech ever persist, we know again the language of suffering and healing, the criss-crossing of swollen feet in the night of the heart where we learn again the tragic sense that life and love require.
Dying while continuing to live, walking the pathless paths, finding and losing again the shoes of redemption. Shoes that can only be made by shoemakers of the higher order who willingly bend to the deeper ground.
Death only comes as a total surprise to those who fought the wrong battles in life. For, in the fight with our own spirit we lose properly and die frequently enough that death becomes us. In the end, there is no consolation; only the necessary annihilation that began in blood and bone and tried to sing from behind the first breath to the last words
Sunday, August 12, 2007
A Video on Gender
What is the world without gender? Without Race, sexual orientation, sex, anatomy, or any of these broad definitions that place us into tiny boxes that are anything but who we really are? What does it mean for a boy to be a boy? A girl to be a girl? a penis? a Vagina? even then what constitutes a vagina? A penis?
When it comes down to it on an indivudal level, my challenges to these social archytypes are not because I want there to be anarchy, but my ideal world would ask us to at least acknowledge these differnces, but not to let differences such as mannerisms, phyiscal makeup, race, etc, etc, to define us as human beings. To me everything is relative, hard for some in my philosophy classes to believe in, but true none the less...Your life is your life, no matter what you make of it, and you are who you are, no matter what anyone, especially society tells you you're supposed be. In my world right is niether right nor wrong and vise versa....wrong is niether wrong or right. We are made from our life experiences, our love for one another and our hate for one another and when it comes down to it it is not the tiny box we tried fitting into, but rather the way we feel when we are old (or young) and on our death beds and when we look back on our lives. Will we be happy with the choices we made to walk past that homeless person on the street, to ignore poverty and AIDS around the world, to distance ourselves from those closest to us, to pretend that everything in the world is okay, when in reality it is not. What will we do on that day and what is life when there is so much in between.
Look between the black and white and that is where you will find me....WATCH MY VIDEO
When it comes down to it on an indivudal level, my challenges to these social archytypes are not because I want there to be anarchy, but my ideal world would ask us to at least acknowledge these differnces, but not to let differences such as mannerisms, phyiscal makeup, race, etc, etc, to define us as human beings. To me everything is relative, hard for some in my philosophy classes to believe in, but true none the less...Your life is your life, no matter what you make of it, and you are who you are, no matter what anyone, especially society tells you you're supposed be. In my world right is niether right nor wrong and vise versa....wrong is niether wrong or right. We are made from our life experiences, our love for one another and our hate for one another and when it comes down to it it is not the tiny box we tried fitting into, but rather the way we feel when we are old (or young) and on our death beds and when we look back on our lives. Will we be happy with the choices we made to walk past that homeless person on the street, to ignore poverty and AIDS around the world, to distance ourselves from those closest to us, to pretend that everything in the world is okay, when in reality it is not. What will we do on that day and what is life when there is so much in between.
Look between the black and white and that is where you will find me....WATCH MY VIDEO
Thursday, August 9, 2007
A video on School bullyin I hope EVERYONE WILL WATCH
This is a video I made about the importance of teaching love, respect and all of that in schools and to our children. Please PLEASE WATCH
Saturday, August 4, 2007
In the Eyes of the Beholder
You know I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what beauty is and what it is people see in each other when they think of beauty. For many in our society, mainly in the mainstream media, beauty comes in the form of 6 ft tall size 6 women that have large breasts and long legs. In regards to men, it is becoming the ideal to have a six pack, a nice set of pecs and a chiseled face. All Asthetic, all things based upon our physical traits as human beings. In the media, there seems to be a cookie cutter shape and form for what beauty is. However the more I think about it, the more I have come to realize that every person in this world has different things that are attractive to them. Not only that, but white, blonde and fit people are not the only form of beauty in this world. Our society has looked past the beauty of many other cultures, and sizes and shapes that create this universe. While it is striving to be better in all these areas, emphasis is still placed on the asthetic appearances, rather than the intrinsic qualities within a person. I’m sorry, but the last thing I want is a man who is all looks, but has no personality, no heart, and no intelligence. We treat beauty as if it is something we need to survive. The beauty of Youth is so valued in our culture, that when we get to our golden years we start to de-value ourselves because we are no longer considered beautiful in the same sense. Why is this? And how does this play out in our interpersonal relationships?
For me, and one of the saddest things about this, is the fact that I feel like what we have become is objects to each other. When we are out there searching for that special someone, what are we really looking for? What is it that draws us to one another and what traits are attractive to us. If all we can think about while we’re pursuing someone is how beautiful they are, what they look like, or what we will look like together, than how is that treating the other person with any kind of love or compassion or understanding. There is a little saying out there, and yes it comes from a religious text or two or eight, but that doesn’t mean it has no value. It is called “ do unto others as you would have done to you”. I think about this, and I ask myself, do I want to be viewed in that way. Do I want someone to only see what lies at the surface? Do I merely want to be some thing, as opposed to some one? Do I want to be objectified? Do I want to be treated as a scrap of meat? And in this thought process I also think of “Love thy neighbor” and I think, what if I met the next Albert Einstien, Rosa Parks, Elanoorre Roosevelt or Martin Luther King, and I never took the time to get to know them? Never took the time to understand the true beauty that lies within all of us?
I’ve been used before, and I’m not going to lie, I’ve used before as well. I cannot say I regret it, only because I would not have come to the understandings of life I now have because of those experiences. I’m not perfect by any means, but I do know how painful those times were for me. I do know what it was like to look into some ones eyes and only see my own reflection, to see no depth or life, but simply the here, now and present. I couldn’t see within them, the pain I carried deep within my own heart. The loneliness, the isolation and the confusion of who I was. I didn’t realize at the time, they they were in as much pain as I was, and that my treatment of them, their treatment of me was contributing to my hurt/ their hurt more so than it was helping. The temporary moments of holding someone, of being in the arms of another, were small breaks in a long road of hurt, and made the road even darker when upon reflection I would realize that they were nothing but the moment, nothing but meaningless and emotionless aspects of my life.
The tears that would later flow from my heart, became from my own self hatred my own self loathing. It was from my realization that the objectification of another, the objectification of myself, contributed no more to my happiness or my well being than all of the hurtful words others would use in my direction. I realized then that if I wanted to be okay, if I wanted others to see more than just WHAT I was, but who I was, I had to start seeing WHO other people were too. I couldn’t just see someone for what they were, but truly for WHO they were.
In this discovery I have finally understood the beauty of life, humanity. The understanding that there are so many different types of beauty in this world, so many different ways to interpret life and so many different ways to live. I realized that to see a person, to love a person, is to see within their soul. To know who they are completely and to love them anyway, unconditionally. With all of my heart and soul. I’ve learned that to fall in love with a person, is to see all of them, and to live life is to say that you know who you are, but also that you know who others are as well. To live life, is to love life and to love life, one needs only to look around them and see what is truly there. They need to look at the sky, the trees, the leaves, the roots, the trunk, the grass, your own hands, the lines on your hands, the finger tips, and then, the eyes of another.
I’ve learned that to know a person, you have to take the time to listen. And before we hate, before we objectify and abuse, we must understand the inner most depths of the human soul.
For me, and one of the saddest things about this, is the fact that I feel like what we have become is objects to each other. When we are out there searching for that special someone, what are we really looking for? What is it that draws us to one another and what traits are attractive to us. If all we can think about while we’re pursuing someone is how beautiful they are, what they look like, or what we will look like together, than how is that treating the other person with any kind of love or compassion or understanding. There is a little saying out there, and yes it comes from a religious text or two or eight, but that doesn’t mean it has no value. It is called “ do unto others as you would have done to you”. I think about this, and I ask myself, do I want to be viewed in that way. Do I want someone to only see what lies at the surface? Do I merely want to be some thing, as opposed to some one? Do I want to be objectified? Do I want to be treated as a scrap of meat? And in this thought process I also think of “Love thy neighbor” and I think, what if I met the next Albert Einstien, Rosa Parks, Elanoorre Roosevelt or Martin Luther King, and I never took the time to get to know them? Never took the time to understand the true beauty that lies within all of us?
I’ve been used before, and I’m not going to lie, I’ve used before as well. I cannot say I regret it, only because I would not have come to the understandings of life I now have because of those experiences. I’m not perfect by any means, but I do know how painful those times were for me. I do know what it was like to look into some ones eyes and only see my own reflection, to see no depth or life, but simply the here, now and present. I couldn’t see within them, the pain I carried deep within my own heart. The loneliness, the isolation and the confusion of who I was. I didn’t realize at the time, they they were in as much pain as I was, and that my treatment of them, their treatment of me was contributing to my hurt/ their hurt more so than it was helping. The temporary moments of holding someone, of being in the arms of another, were small breaks in a long road of hurt, and made the road even darker when upon reflection I would realize that they were nothing but the moment, nothing but meaningless and emotionless aspects of my life.
The tears that would later flow from my heart, became from my own self hatred my own self loathing. It was from my realization that the objectification of another, the objectification of myself, contributed no more to my happiness or my well being than all of the hurtful words others would use in my direction. I realized then that if I wanted to be okay, if I wanted others to see more than just WHAT I was, but who I was, I had to start seeing WHO other people were too. I couldn’t just see someone for what they were, but truly for WHO they were.
In this discovery I have finally understood the beauty of life, humanity. The understanding that there are so many different types of beauty in this world, so many different ways to interpret life and so many different ways to live. I realized that to see a person, to love a person, is to see within their soul. To know who they are completely and to love them anyway, unconditionally. With all of my heart and soul. I’ve learned that to fall in love with a person, is to see all of them, and to live life is to say that you know who you are, but also that you know who others are as well. To live life, is to love life and to love life, one needs only to look around them and see what is truly there. They need to look at the sky, the trees, the leaves, the roots, the trunk, the grass, your own hands, the lines on your hands, the finger tips, and then, the eyes of another.
I’ve learned that to know a person, you have to take the time to listen. And before we hate, before we objectify and abuse, we must understand the inner most depths of the human soul.
How Homophobia Affects Straight People
How homophobia affects straight people
AbstractA considerable amount of debate has developed over the issue of homosexuality and the acceptance of gay and lesbian persons as full people into our society. When looking at gay and lesbian issues, it is important to investigate the issues that have led up to the oppression of the gay and lesbian culture and examine how history and time have affected this category of people and how these person’s existence has played a part in society at large. Gender roles have been a part of Western society since the hunter/gather days of the past millennia. These roles have contributed to the current social norms that have inadvertently abused and neglected the gay and lesbian population resulting in dramatic and unnecessary annihilation and discrimination of the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender) community. The social construct of gender role stereotypes, has adversely affected both men and women. These adverse affects resulting in discrimination and fear of the gay and lesbian community have left the American culture in a state of disarray resulting in gender norms that are not conducive to the whole human person, gay or straight. The purpose of this study is to examine how homophobia adversely affects the way the world is perceived by our society and how not only are LGBT persons affected dramatically by this discrimination, but that our own biases and judgments have resulted in oppression based on gender as well. The implications of these findings are discussed at the conclusion of this report. Gender Role Discrimination towards Gay and Lesbian Personsand its Adverse Effect on Society. It is important for us as a nation and also as humanity to recognize that we share this globe with billions of people. Because of this it is important to understand how we interrelate culture to culture and how our actions play a part in the lives of others and how their lives can adversely affect our own. Thus, if in our own culture we see a great number of discriminatory acts towards homosexual persons, we have to examine how those acts then reflect back upon our society as a whole. In order to do this we must first understand issues the greater society has with the homosexual population and be able to comprehend the ins and outs of why our society is so “anti-gay”. Unfortunately, to date the majority of research published in relation to homosexuality has been concerned with the homosexual's problems, and with the etiology of homosexuality. As little as 8% of published research has dealt with attitudes toward homosexuals, and less still has been concerned with perceptions of and beliefs about homosexuals. Existing research on the latter is reviewed, and research is outlined that investigates perceptions of homosexuals. Stereotypes of male and female homosexuals are examined in the context of masculine-feminine traits using the Personality Attributes Questionnaire. Results strongly support the view that sex role definitions are a highly salient reference point for the public definition of homosexuals (Taylor, 1983). As we can see, a huge part of our culture’s issues with homosexual persons is our own understandings of sex roles and what we view as “male” and “female”, “masculine” and “feminine”, “men” and “women” and the various roles for which each camp is responsible (Bornstein, 1994).Bornstein suggests that society’s issues with sexual orientation may have to do more with gender itself, as opposed to sexuality, for what exactly does it mean for a man to be attracted to a man, a woman to be attracted to a woman, or a man to be attracted to a woman? To what point does a friendship turn into something more, and how do we tell? Is it just a sexual act, or is there something more behind who we end up falling for? What exactly makes up a physical attraction to a person of one gender over the other, and more so how do these physical and psychological characteristics play a greater perception on our society’s views towards homosexual and heterosexual persons? These are the questions that this study will attempt to identify. We will explore whether or not gender roles effect the discrimination towards GLBT person, as opposed to sexual acts commonly seen of the GLBT community amongst society. Elizabeth Haste (1998) uses metaphor to illustrate how social constructs of gender perpetuate gender roles in Western society. Haste examines how feminist theories have confronted existing social theories. She describes the metaphor of dualism that exists primarily in Western culture in which the world is viewed in terms of "either/or." Masculinity is the point of departure from almost any cultural perspective, with femininity being "other" (Derr, 1995). Gender roles themselves are the conclave that separate gay and lesbian persons from society. These social norms have ostracized so many from society at large, and these do not just pertain to homosexual persons, rather any person lying just outside these gender rules. Everything in our society tells us that we must conform to these social constructs of gender roles in order to be a part of a society that is based solely on the fact that a majority of persons are born with either a penis or a vagina. Findings suggest that college-level textbooks may be reinforcing rigid gender distinctions while neglecting young women's needs to develop greater flexibility in their gender role conceptions (Anonymous, 2000). So, within the classroom we can see reinforcement of what men are supposed to do and what women are supposed to do. Males have become so accustomed to masking their true emotions, that it seems like second nature (Zmarkly, 1998) Through these gender roles society has created a binary view of the world that all are expected to mold into, when in reality there are several truths, several visions of what a person honestly is. “Research confirms that boy’s groups are more exclusionary; boys tend to reject girls or anything girl like, including boys whom like to do girl things” (Golden, 1998). “During adolescence, girls undergo a process of feminization as their identity becomes tied to a feminine expression while they are learning to conform to the norms and rules governing femininity” (Kaplan, 1997). This explains how right from the beginning we are systematically separated into two distinct categories where we must learn to obey and trust the norms of our society. Think about it, we have pink shoes for baby girls, and blue shoes for baby boys, automatically separating them into what gender they are. However, these rules do not apply to those persons that do not fit along distinct gender lines, and have created harsh biases and negative sentiments towards those that do not fit those distinct gender roles. One of these major groups is the homosexual population. Stereotypes of Gay and Lesbian PersonsFor many in the gay and lesbian community, biases favoring the social construct that gender norms have been the biggest hurdle to participation in society as full and complete human beings. For many, these social norms have cast a dark shadow over the entire community forcing upon those that are gay or lesbian for years a sense of shame, closeting most in the community. G.M. Herek 1990 reports that society’s views on homosexuality can be described through the words homophobia and heterosexuality. Society’s rethinking of sexual orientation was crystallized in the term “homophobia”, which heterosexual psychologist George Weinberg coined in the late 1960s. Weinberg used homophobia to label heterosexuals' dread of being in close quarters with homosexuals as well as homosexuals' self loathing. The word first appeared in print in 1969 and was subsequently discussed at length in Weinberg's 1972 book, Society and the Healthy Homosexual. The American Heritage Dictionary (1992 edition) defines homophobia as "aversion to gay or homosexual people or their lifestyle or culture" and "behavior or an act based on this aversion." Other definitions identify homophobia as an irrational fear of homosexuality. Around the same time, heterosexism began to be used as a term analogous to sexism and racism, describing an ideological system that denies, denigrates, and stigmatizes any non-heterosexual form of behavior, identity, relationship, or community (Herek, 1990). The term heterosexism highlights the parallels between antigay sentiment and other forms of prejudice, such as racism, antisemitism, and sexism. We can see this “ideal” as a primary reason why gay and lesbians of our society are considered outcasts. Like institutional racism and sexism, heterosexism pervades societal customs and institutions. It operates through a dual process of invisibility and attack. Homosexuality usually remains culturally invisible; when people who engage in homosexual behavior or who are identified as homosexual become visible, they are subject to attack by society (Herek, 1990). This is evident not only in the physical number of hate crimes throughout the United States, but also in the psychological attacks on persons such as bullying and harassment that take on many different forms such as denying someone a job based on their sexual orientation or in policies that either exclude gays or restrict gays from being visible persons within the greater society. Examples of heterosexism in the United States include the continuing ban against lesbian and gay military personnel; widespread lack of legal protection from antigay discrimination in employment, housing, and services; hostility to lesbian and gay committed relationships, recently dramatized by passage of federal and state laws against same-gender marriage; and the existence of sodomy laws in more than one-third of the states. (Herek 1990) It was not until only 5 years ago, that the sodomy laws were over turned in Lawrence vs. Texas during a Supreme Court Decision. Up until 5 years ago, people were still being arrested for engaging in forms of sodomy. The assumption that everyone in the world is straight has been a very detrimental subject for the gay and lesbian community, especially when orientation is dependent on a social construct such as gender. Even within the gay community, there are even more struggles with gender roles where we see gay men being more socially ousted than lesbians. Prior research examining gender role transgressions has generally observed that, although both males and females are likely to be evaluated less positively when they do not conform to gender role stereotypes, males tend to be viewed more negatively than females when they transgress gender roles (Antill, 1987; Archer, 1984; [McCreary], 1994) While there still remains a sense of privilege in the homosexual community, primarily favoring upper class white men, it seems that this is one of the biggest transgressions. Our country is phalo-centric (Bornstein, 1994). Everything is dependent on a male perspective, and thus when a male is observed pulling away from that cultural ideal, then he is seen as less than and considered more deviant than a woman who tries to obtain the cultural ideal by becoming more masculine (Bornstein, 1994) The perceived value dissimilarity (PVD) model provides a third explanation for the harsher evaluation of men who transgress their gender-based roles. The PVD model is based on Schwartz’s theory of the psychological structure of human values and the extent to which people believe that members of an out-group differ from themselves with regard to these values (see Schwartz & Bilsky, 1987). According to this perspective, those who are thought to violate a group's shared norms (i.e., by holding, or being perceived to hold, a different set of values from those of the observer) present a threat to the group and, as a result, will be perceived more negatively than those who are thought to share the group's norms (Esses, Haddock, & [Zanna, M.P.], 1993). Haddock and his colleagues have examined attitudes toward gays (Haddock, Zanna, & Esses, 1993) and men's attitudes toward women (Haddock & Zanna, 1994) using the PVD approach and found that individuals who perceived a greater degree of value dissimilarity between themselves and either women or homosexuals held more negative attitudes about those groups. Thus, because greater perceived value dissimilarity is associated with more negative attitudes, it is possible that male gender role transgressors are treated more harshly than female gender role transgressors in part because they are perceived to differ from the perceiver vis a vis these universal values (Sirin, 2004). Another study done adds more to the argument that gender roles play a huge part in the negative attitudes towards gays. Following the procedure used by Broverman, Clarkson, Rosenkrantz, & Vogel (1970), Page had male and female undergraduates describe a male homosexual, lesbian, and normal adult in terms of 41 adjective rating scales, each scale having a masculine and a feminine poll. Results indicated that compared to ratings of the normal adult, the male homosexual was viewed unfavorably and was significantly different from "normality" on 27 scales. Ratings of the lesbian were closer to those for the normal adult, although significant differences appeared on 11 scales. Ratings for the lesbian differed significantly from those for the male homosexual on 20 scales. On all but two scales, lesbian ratings were closer to the more favorable poll than were male homosexual ratings. The position seems supported that male gender nonconformity is viewed more seriously than female gender nonconformity (Page, 1985). We can see that gays and lesbians are judged more so, on the basis that they stray away from traditional gender roles, rather than for the sexual acts they may or may not engage in. This is imperative to understanding how the discrimination of gay and lesbian persons not only affects the homosexual population, but also those who are perceived as homosexual, or those who stray away from traditional gender roles. It is the instigation of fear that to be different is to be homosexual, that usually keeps people on one end or the other of the gender spectrum. There is a negative correlation between gender roles and sexual orientation due to the straying from gender norms. It has had such a negative impact on the gay and lesbian communities, as well as those who are perceived to be homosexual. 26% of gay adolescent males were forced to leave home as a result of their sexual identity (Gibson, 1989). Agencies serving street youth in Los Angeles estimate that 25-35% of homeless youth are lesbian and gay, and in Seattle, 40% of homeless youth are estimated to be lesbian or gay. (Ryan and Futterman, 1998) The National Network of Runaway and Youth Services has estimated that 20-40% of youths who become homeless each year are lesbian, gay, or bisexual (2001). According to Washington, DC’s Department of Health and Human Services, a study they conducted shows that gay and lesbian youth are two to three times more likely to commit suicide than other youths, and 30 percent of all completed youth suicides are related to the issue of sexual identity (Gibson, 1989). Please note, that this figure includes gay and lesbian youth as well as those who are perceived to be gay or lesbian. From these statistics we can also report that 84% of GLBT students report being verbally harassed at school(Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network, 2003).It is alarming that in these United States, the land of the free and home to the brave, there are so many who are affected by our traditional gender role dichotomies and it is primarily the queer population that is most devastated by these social constructs. In a nation where same-sex couples live within 99.3% of all counties nation wide (Census/ Urban Institute 2000) who are raising over 1 million children, they are still seen as social outcasts. Our very own military discriminates against gay and lesbian persons with the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy. And we know that they are in the military, because there are more than 1 million gay and lesbian veterans in the United States (Urban Institute, 2000) who have fought and served their country and yet are not recognized by that very democracy for which many have given their lives. In 36 states people can still be fired legally for self identifying as gay or lesbian. And finally if the United States were to allow same-sex couples to marry, the US would save over $1 billion dollars per year (Congressional Budget Office, 2004), but because of these hidden biases towards GLBT persons, they are not. These and more are just some of the many ways that GLBT persons are affected by traditional gender role expectations, which ultimately will play out in various ways throughout the rest of society. Adverse Affects on Society at Large:Not only do we see a huge correlation between suicide and gay youth, we also see an astonishing correlation between suicide and youth who are perceived to be gay or lesbian. One of the biggest ways homophobia affects heterosexual individuals is perception. Because homosexuality is not something one can see on the outside of a person, we have created stereotypes to tell what a “homosexual” is, and those stereotypes come directly from not presenting traditional gender roles. This is just one of many, many attributes that are connected to the gender role discrimination towards gay and lesbian persons and their relationships with the rest of the world. . One of the most dramatic effects on heterosexual and homosexual culture is in our personal relationships with one another. Homophobia, both internalized and realized, can be a barrier to the formation of deeper and more meaningful friendships. What happens when a heterosexual male gets too close to one of his friends? More so why is this some horrible thing? Imagine what that young man is missing out on by having to suppress his emotions for a close friend that could have nothing to do with sexuality, rather a deep appreciation for the person his close friend is? One person to examine this more thoroughly in her own words is Mary Hunt, who in her book, Fierce Tenderness: A Feminist Theology of Friendship details the distance in these friendships due to homophobia. Because she writes as a lesbian as well as a feminist theologian, Hunt, is also painfully aware of how homophobia has shaped and often thwarted same-gender friendships. Culturally embedded homophobia negatively affects same gendered affection--preventing men, for example, from developing deeply intimate and/or physically affectionate friendships--and, for gay men in particular, thwarts even appropriate self-love: "If one cannot love another person who is like oneself, it is very hard to develop the kind of ego strength necessary for healthy self-love" (pp. 53, 72). Conversely, of course, Hunt argues that we must learn to befriend ourselves, one another, and the pluriformity of all life (Clark, 1995). It is interesting to think about how many relationships out there, particularly between men, have been strung out to dry due to our cultures own homophobia. One investigative report done by the Seattle Times Newspaper, explored what happened when two men went out on what they deemed a “man date”. This was where two men, who were presumably straight, would do something like go to an art gallery together and a dinner as old friends. What the article uncovered was the things men do, in order to show to the rest of the world that they are heterosexual, going so far as to look at entirely different paintings within the art gallery, from posturing in ways that would give off the “I’m straight” look, paying for the bill separately and insisting to the waiter at the beginning of the meal that they pay separate to even how these old friends greeted each other, not with warmth and tenderness, rather a firm handshake and a pat on the back. Throughout the whole evening, they constantly were fighting what might be assumed of them, and this is the tragedy of homophobia. When two people who love and respect each other cannot express those feelings to each other; this is an issue that must be addressed. Another issue that homophobia and heterosexism impact in mainstream society is the roles and rights of women. In 1989, the US Supreme Court heard a case that involved a woman who had been refused partnership to a law firm on the basis of “sexual stereotyping” (Ertman, 1991). The Court defined sexual stereotyping as acting on the belief that "a woman cannot be aggressive," and in this case Ms. Hopkins was "abrasive", "harsh" and "impatient" with staff members (presumably secretaries or other support staff), and used profanity. Ms. Hopkins' employer's key blunder, (coup de grace), according to the Court, was advising Ms. Hopkins to "walk more femininely, talk more femininely, dress more femininely, wear make-up, have her hair styled, and wear jewelry." Id., 109 S.Ct. at 1782. The Court found, in short, that Ms. Hopkins, and all other women, have a right to act like men without losing their jobs. However positive this outcome was for women everywhere, we still have to look at the homophobia surrounding the case, and more so the gender roles that played into these biases. Had any man walked around the office doing the same things, he would have been considered a stern, yet efficient boss. What is wrong with a woman who is strong and confident and in charge? This would play into the idea that women are not to be masculine, or Lesbian, at all, or else they come off as “bitchy”. We can see homophobia here, because these fears come from the fact that for a woman to be masculine is to be abnormal, when in reality there are probably a majority of both men and women who represent both spectrums, masculine in some areas of life and feminine in others. It’s also important to note that under laws passed such as Title VII and other such laws that gave women the freedom and protections they so deserved during the women’s movement, gay and lesbian persons were not included under the new laws. Without overlooking the homophobia in the decision to exclude lesbians and gay men from protection under Title VII, the US court's decision regarding one of the plaintiffs, a gay man named Donald Strailey also demonstrates a lack of concern. He worked at a nursery school for two years, and was fired for wearing a small gold hoop earring. The court stated that Title VII does not protect against "discrimination because of effeminacy...homosexuality...or transsexualism." Id., 608 F.2d at 332. Especially in contrast to Price Waterhouse which supports the contention that the law, here Title VII, protects the right to act like a man but not like a woman. Implicit in both of these decisions is the idea that anyone in her right mind strives to be as much like men as possible, just as people of color must want the same rights as white people. The message is to assimilate to the white male heterosexual mold because no other counts or is respected. If they don't respect it, they won't protect it (Ertman, 1991). In both cases we see blatant acts of homophobia that linger in both the courts and employers who assume that a man is supposed to be masculine and a woman is supposed to be feminine. Straying from these gender norms cause uneasiness and resulted in one woman being fired and one man being fired for the same reasons with two different outcomes. Another issue that we will touch on is the issue of homosexuals who avoid coming out of the closet and marry into traditional roles of man and woman. There is not a whole lot of research done on this, but the fact that we force a certain minority to hide who it is they really are, leads to secrecy and cover-ups resulting in tragic endings to what was seen as beautiful stories. These poor heterosexual men and women, who marry these closeted homosexual women and men, end up wondering their whole lives, “why didn’t I see?” The internalized homophobia which drives these people to get married, even though they are gay is saddening, and leave many homes broken. The differences in divorce adjustment of women divorced from homosexual men compared to women divorced from heterosexual men have been explored. The results of the study indicated women divorced from homosexual men do not differ greatly from women divorced from heterosexual men in psychological symptoms or in overall divorce adjustment, although they appear to have more anger on divorce adjustment (Smith, 1990). The rates of men who are coming out of the closet and divorcing their wives is on the rise, and this has a direct affect on the heterosexual population. There is a part of us all that desires to fit into the mold of what society has told us we should be, but when concerning matters such as spending the rest of your life in a partnership with someone, disclosing information such as ones sexual orientation is still not the number one priority. Just imagine after 25 years of marriage, your spouse decides that he or she wants to come out of the closet and leave you for another person. This is what happens to many people, and is something that needs to be of concern to our society for the well being of all individuals both gay and straight. Is it the individual’s fault for hiding his or her true feelings, or is society to blame for making the individual stay closeted and getting themselves into these expected situations? Another interesting case was a study done on couples going to watch romantic movies. Now what’s interesting about this study is that what would be predictable according to gender roles would be that the women would more than likely prefer to see romantic movies. But what stereotypic gender roles in this study didn’t account for was the fact that the men as well enjoyed romantic movies. I think this is a huge view into how homophobia affects everything from our personal relationships, to our jobs, to what kind of things we can like or not like such as books, movies, or music. What is interesting is that both males and females in the study predicted that other men would not prefer romantic movies, according to societal expectations (Harris, 2004). What’s fascinating about this is how we limit ourselves to choose only within our specified gender role, rather than simply based on what we like or dislike due to fear of repercussion for liking something outside of our specified “gender”. A man may refuse to listen to certain types of music for fear of being too feminine or “gay”. A man may pick a novel based upon his gender, and if he is caught reading the other type of novel, the fear instilled within him of homosexuality; if this, than that, a slippery slope way of looking at the world, when really the two have no connection. He will even choose what sports he participates in based solely on his sex, rather than what he prefers. The sole purpose not necessarily that one acts, rather that one does not act, is due to perception. What would he look like if he played a “girls” sport? Weak or in most cases, he would be considered “gay”. The issue of lesbianism in female sports is so controversial that few women, gay or straight, will speak on the record about it. Their fears are not unfounded. Being perceived as a lesbian in the women's sports world often carries the same stigma as being a lesbian. And the notion that many women in sports are lesbians is widespread (Cart, 1997). As our stereotypes of homosexual persons display themselves in all forms, it is important to see how our homophobia affects women as well and their abilities to be treated just as equally and fairly as men in the realm of athletics. It’s almost the opposite effect for gay men who are involved within sports. It is the assumption that gay men do not play sports, when in reality there are probably more professional gay male athletes than one can imagine. The homophobia in sports affects them in a way that requires them to be closeted about who they are or risk being ostracized or targeted as an outsider. At this time in society it is inconceivable that gay men participate in as many sports as their heterosexual friends on the same teams. For many gay youth, athletics is an experience away from harassment and bullying, when they “prove” their masculinity. Again, here we attribute homophobia not to a sex act, rather the fulfillment of sex role requirements created by society at large. My Utopian Vision of AmericaWhat we as a society must recognize if we are to eradicate our discrimination of not only gay and lesbian persons, but each other, is that ultimately what connects each of us is not our sex, race, sexual orientation, culture or creed, rather our common humanity. What we share in common is the mere fact that we are even here to begin with. When two straight men can’t love one another as fellow human beings because they fear that others might perceive that one or both of them are gay, there is an inherent bias that keeps people from being themselves completely. As I mentioned before, many groups besides gay and lesbian persons are affected under the sex-roles created by society including men, women, intersexed or hermaphrodite persons, transsexual persons, and cultural persons outside the US. When we recognize as a society that gender is as fluid and diverse as race is, then we will be able to truly start to break down the walls that we have created for ourselves. One day I hope that men will be able to openly express their feelings to other men and women, without feeling too feminine or gay. I hope that women everywhere will be able to stand confidently for who they are, and not have to dumb down to impress a potential suitor. I hope that gay men and women will feel comfortable enough to be themselves everywhere, whether they are naturally more masculine or feminine, and that their personal relationships will be looked upon not as deviant sexual episodes, rather romantic, fulfilling and loving partnerships. I hope that young men everywhere will recognize within women their true beauty, known as the human soul and will no longer look to women just to fulfill their sexual gratifications or a cultural role. I hope that women will no longer be afraid of being seen as anything less than a full human being in our society and will not have to fear walking to their car alone in the middle of the night. I hope that gay and lesbian persons will no longer be stereotyped as too masculine or too feminine and that they will feel welcome in church , medical facilities, universities, and public school classrooms without the fear of intimidation or harassment. In my Utopian world, we are all seen as equal, and while we have many differences, the one thing that does connect us, is our humanity. I hope when we look into the eyes of another, we will see who they are, rather than what they are. I hope we can afford to them the same amount of dignity and respect that they as human beings deserve. What I hope this study has brought to you, is not necessarily the full and complete answers to every burning desire one may have about these issues, but more the idea that our own words and actions do affect us in some way. Whether it is calling some kid a fag in middle school or denying someone full access to the same rights and privileges that we ourselves enjoy, it affects everyone. Through our own ignorance of the world, we neglect to see what truly matters, the human spirit.“When we lose the right to be different, we lose the privilege to be free.” -Charles Evans Hughes-
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AbstractA considerable amount of debate has developed over the issue of homosexuality and the acceptance of gay and lesbian persons as full people into our society. When looking at gay and lesbian issues, it is important to investigate the issues that have led up to the oppression of the gay and lesbian culture and examine how history and time have affected this category of people and how these person’s existence has played a part in society at large. Gender roles have been a part of Western society since the hunter/gather days of the past millennia. These roles have contributed to the current social norms that have inadvertently abused and neglected the gay and lesbian population resulting in dramatic and unnecessary annihilation and discrimination of the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender) community. The social construct of gender role stereotypes, has adversely affected both men and women. These adverse affects resulting in discrimination and fear of the gay and lesbian community have left the American culture in a state of disarray resulting in gender norms that are not conducive to the whole human person, gay or straight. The purpose of this study is to examine how homophobia adversely affects the way the world is perceived by our society and how not only are LGBT persons affected dramatically by this discrimination, but that our own biases and judgments have resulted in oppression based on gender as well. The implications of these findings are discussed at the conclusion of this report. Gender Role Discrimination towards Gay and Lesbian Personsand its Adverse Effect on Society. It is important for us as a nation and also as humanity to recognize that we share this globe with billions of people. Because of this it is important to understand how we interrelate culture to culture and how our actions play a part in the lives of others and how their lives can adversely affect our own. Thus, if in our own culture we see a great number of discriminatory acts towards homosexual persons, we have to examine how those acts then reflect back upon our society as a whole. In order to do this we must first understand issues the greater society has with the homosexual population and be able to comprehend the ins and outs of why our society is so “anti-gay”. Unfortunately, to date the majority of research published in relation to homosexuality has been concerned with the homosexual's problems, and with the etiology of homosexuality. As little as 8% of published research has dealt with attitudes toward homosexuals, and less still has been concerned with perceptions of and beliefs about homosexuals. Existing research on the latter is reviewed, and research is outlined that investigates perceptions of homosexuals. Stereotypes of male and female homosexuals are examined in the context of masculine-feminine traits using the Personality Attributes Questionnaire. Results strongly support the view that sex role definitions are a highly salient reference point for the public definition of homosexuals (Taylor, 1983). As we can see, a huge part of our culture’s issues with homosexual persons is our own understandings of sex roles and what we view as “male” and “female”, “masculine” and “feminine”, “men” and “women” and the various roles for which each camp is responsible (Bornstein, 1994).Bornstein suggests that society’s issues with sexual orientation may have to do more with gender itself, as opposed to sexuality, for what exactly does it mean for a man to be attracted to a man, a woman to be attracted to a woman, or a man to be attracted to a woman? To what point does a friendship turn into something more, and how do we tell? Is it just a sexual act, or is there something more behind who we end up falling for? What exactly makes up a physical attraction to a person of one gender over the other, and more so how do these physical and psychological characteristics play a greater perception on our society’s views towards homosexual and heterosexual persons? These are the questions that this study will attempt to identify. We will explore whether or not gender roles effect the discrimination towards GLBT person, as opposed to sexual acts commonly seen of the GLBT community amongst society. Elizabeth Haste (1998) uses metaphor to illustrate how social constructs of gender perpetuate gender roles in Western society. Haste examines how feminist theories have confronted existing social theories. She describes the metaphor of dualism that exists primarily in Western culture in which the world is viewed in terms of "either/or." Masculinity is the point of departure from almost any cultural perspective, with femininity being "other" (Derr, 1995). Gender roles themselves are the conclave that separate gay and lesbian persons from society. These social norms have ostracized so many from society at large, and these do not just pertain to homosexual persons, rather any person lying just outside these gender rules. Everything in our society tells us that we must conform to these social constructs of gender roles in order to be a part of a society that is based solely on the fact that a majority of persons are born with either a penis or a vagina. Findings suggest that college-level textbooks may be reinforcing rigid gender distinctions while neglecting young women's needs to develop greater flexibility in their gender role conceptions (Anonymous, 2000). So, within the classroom we can see reinforcement of what men are supposed to do and what women are supposed to do. Males have become so accustomed to masking their true emotions, that it seems like second nature (Zmarkly, 1998) Through these gender roles society has created a binary view of the world that all are expected to mold into, when in reality there are several truths, several visions of what a person honestly is. “Research confirms that boy’s groups are more exclusionary; boys tend to reject girls or anything girl like, including boys whom like to do girl things” (Golden, 1998). “During adolescence, girls undergo a process of feminization as their identity becomes tied to a feminine expression while they are learning to conform to the norms and rules governing femininity” (Kaplan, 1997). This explains how right from the beginning we are systematically separated into two distinct categories where we must learn to obey and trust the norms of our society. Think about it, we have pink shoes for baby girls, and blue shoes for baby boys, automatically separating them into what gender they are. However, these rules do not apply to those persons that do not fit along distinct gender lines, and have created harsh biases and negative sentiments towards those that do not fit those distinct gender roles. One of these major groups is the homosexual population. Stereotypes of Gay and Lesbian PersonsFor many in the gay and lesbian community, biases favoring the social construct that gender norms have been the biggest hurdle to participation in society as full and complete human beings. For many, these social norms have cast a dark shadow over the entire community forcing upon those that are gay or lesbian for years a sense of shame, closeting most in the community. G.M. Herek 1990 reports that society’s views on homosexuality can be described through the words homophobia and heterosexuality. Society’s rethinking of sexual orientation was crystallized in the term “homophobia”, which heterosexual psychologist George Weinberg coined in the late 1960s. Weinberg used homophobia to label heterosexuals' dread of being in close quarters with homosexuals as well as homosexuals' self loathing. The word first appeared in print in 1969 and was subsequently discussed at length in Weinberg's 1972 book, Society and the Healthy Homosexual. The American Heritage Dictionary (1992 edition) defines homophobia as "aversion to gay or homosexual people or their lifestyle or culture" and "behavior or an act based on this aversion." Other definitions identify homophobia as an irrational fear of homosexuality. Around the same time, heterosexism began to be used as a term analogous to sexism and racism, describing an ideological system that denies, denigrates, and stigmatizes any non-heterosexual form of behavior, identity, relationship, or community (Herek, 1990). The term heterosexism highlights the parallels between antigay sentiment and other forms of prejudice, such as racism, antisemitism, and sexism. We can see this “ideal” as a primary reason why gay and lesbians of our society are considered outcasts. Like institutional racism and sexism, heterosexism pervades societal customs and institutions. It operates through a dual process of invisibility and attack. Homosexuality usually remains culturally invisible; when people who engage in homosexual behavior or who are identified as homosexual become visible, they are subject to attack by society (Herek, 1990). This is evident not only in the physical number of hate crimes throughout the United States, but also in the psychological attacks on persons such as bullying and harassment that take on many different forms such as denying someone a job based on their sexual orientation or in policies that either exclude gays or restrict gays from being visible persons within the greater society. Examples of heterosexism in the United States include the continuing ban against lesbian and gay military personnel; widespread lack of legal protection from antigay discrimination in employment, housing, and services; hostility to lesbian and gay committed relationships, recently dramatized by passage of federal and state laws against same-gender marriage; and the existence of sodomy laws in more than one-third of the states. (Herek 1990) It was not until only 5 years ago, that the sodomy laws were over turned in Lawrence vs. Texas during a Supreme Court Decision. Up until 5 years ago, people were still being arrested for engaging in forms of sodomy. The assumption that everyone in the world is straight has been a very detrimental subject for the gay and lesbian community, especially when orientation is dependent on a social construct such as gender. Even within the gay community, there are even more struggles with gender roles where we see gay men being more socially ousted than lesbians. Prior research examining gender role transgressions has generally observed that, although both males and females are likely to be evaluated less positively when they do not conform to gender role stereotypes, males tend to be viewed more negatively than females when they transgress gender roles (Antill, 1987; Archer, 1984; [McCreary], 1994) While there still remains a sense of privilege in the homosexual community, primarily favoring upper class white men, it seems that this is one of the biggest transgressions. Our country is phalo-centric (Bornstein, 1994). Everything is dependent on a male perspective, and thus when a male is observed pulling away from that cultural ideal, then he is seen as less than and considered more deviant than a woman who tries to obtain the cultural ideal by becoming more masculine (Bornstein, 1994) The perceived value dissimilarity (PVD) model provides a third explanation for the harsher evaluation of men who transgress their gender-based roles. The PVD model is based on Schwartz’s theory of the psychological structure of human values and the extent to which people believe that members of an out-group differ from themselves with regard to these values (see Schwartz & Bilsky, 1987). According to this perspective, those who are thought to violate a group's shared norms (i.e., by holding, or being perceived to hold, a different set of values from those of the observer) present a threat to the group and, as a result, will be perceived more negatively than those who are thought to share the group's norms (Esses, Haddock, & [Zanna, M.P.], 1993). Haddock and his colleagues have examined attitudes toward gays (Haddock, Zanna, & Esses, 1993) and men's attitudes toward women (Haddock & Zanna, 1994) using the PVD approach and found that individuals who perceived a greater degree of value dissimilarity between themselves and either women or homosexuals held more negative attitudes about those groups. Thus, because greater perceived value dissimilarity is associated with more negative attitudes, it is possible that male gender role transgressors are treated more harshly than female gender role transgressors in part because they are perceived to differ from the perceiver vis a vis these universal values (Sirin, 2004). Another study done adds more to the argument that gender roles play a huge part in the negative attitudes towards gays. Following the procedure used by Broverman, Clarkson, Rosenkrantz, & Vogel (1970), Page had male and female undergraduates describe a male homosexual, lesbian, and normal adult in terms of 41 adjective rating scales, each scale having a masculine and a feminine poll. Results indicated that compared to ratings of the normal adult, the male homosexual was viewed unfavorably and was significantly different from "normality" on 27 scales. Ratings of the lesbian were closer to those for the normal adult, although significant differences appeared on 11 scales. Ratings for the lesbian differed significantly from those for the male homosexual on 20 scales. On all but two scales, lesbian ratings were closer to the more favorable poll than were male homosexual ratings. The position seems supported that male gender nonconformity is viewed more seriously than female gender nonconformity (Page, 1985). We can see that gays and lesbians are judged more so, on the basis that they stray away from traditional gender roles, rather than for the sexual acts they may or may not engage in. This is imperative to understanding how the discrimination of gay and lesbian persons not only affects the homosexual population, but also those who are perceived as homosexual, or those who stray away from traditional gender roles. It is the instigation of fear that to be different is to be homosexual, that usually keeps people on one end or the other of the gender spectrum. There is a negative correlation between gender roles and sexual orientation due to the straying from gender norms. It has had such a negative impact on the gay and lesbian communities, as well as those who are perceived to be homosexual. 26% of gay adolescent males were forced to leave home as a result of their sexual identity (Gibson, 1989). Agencies serving street youth in Los Angeles estimate that 25-35% of homeless youth are lesbian and gay, and in Seattle, 40% of homeless youth are estimated to be lesbian or gay. (Ryan and Futterman, 1998) The National Network of Runaway and Youth Services has estimated that 20-40% of youths who become homeless each year are lesbian, gay, or bisexual (2001). According to Washington, DC’s Department of Health and Human Services, a study they conducted shows that gay and lesbian youth are two to three times more likely to commit suicide than other youths, and 30 percent of all completed youth suicides are related to the issue of sexual identity (Gibson, 1989). Please note, that this figure includes gay and lesbian youth as well as those who are perceived to be gay or lesbian. From these statistics we can also report that 84% of GLBT students report being verbally harassed at school(Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network, 2003).It is alarming that in these United States, the land of the free and home to the brave, there are so many who are affected by our traditional gender role dichotomies and it is primarily the queer population that is most devastated by these social constructs. In a nation where same-sex couples live within 99.3% of all counties nation wide (Census/ Urban Institute 2000) who are raising over 1 million children, they are still seen as social outcasts. Our very own military discriminates against gay and lesbian persons with the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy. And we know that they are in the military, because there are more than 1 million gay and lesbian veterans in the United States (Urban Institute, 2000) who have fought and served their country and yet are not recognized by that very democracy for which many have given their lives. In 36 states people can still be fired legally for self identifying as gay or lesbian. And finally if the United States were to allow same-sex couples to marry, the US would save over $1 billion dollars per year (Congressional Budget Office, 2004), but because of these hidden biases towards GLBT persons, they are not. These and more are just some of the many ways that GLBT persons are affected by traditional gender role expectations, which ultimately will play out in various ways throughout the rest of society. Adverse Affects on Society at Large:Not only do we see a huge correlation between suicide and gay youth, we also see an astonishing correlation between suicide and youth who are perceived to be gay or lesbian. One of the biggest ways homophobia affects heterosexual individuals is perception. Because homosexuality is not something one can see on the outside of a person, we have created stereotypes to tell what a “homosexual” is, and those stereotypes come directly from not presenting traditional gender roles. This is just one of many, many attributes that are connected to the gender role discrimination towards gay and lesbian persons and their relationships with the rest of the world. . One of the most dramatic effects on heterosexual and homosexual culture is in our personal relationships with one another. Homophobia, both internalized and realized, can be a barrier to the formation of deeper and more meaningful friendships. What happens when a heterosexual male gets too close to one of his friends? More so why is this some horrible thing? Imagine what that young man is missing out on by having to suppress his emotions for a close friend that could have nothing to do with sexuality, rather a deep appreciation for the person his close friend is? One person to examine this more thoroughly in her own words is Mary Hunt, who in her book, Fierce Tenderness: A Feminist Theology of Friendship details the distance in these friendships due to homophobia. Because she writes as a lesbian as well as a feminist theologian, Hunt, is also painfully aware of how homophobia has shaped and often thwarted same-gender friendships. Culturally embedded homophobia negatively affects same gendered affection--preventing men, for example, from developing deeply intimate and/or physically affectionate friendships--and, for gay men in particular, thwarts even appropriate self-love: "If one cannot love another person who is like oneself, it is very hard to develop the kind of ego strength necessary for healthy self-love" (pp. 53, 72). Conversely, of course, Hunt argues that we must learn to befriend ourselves, one another, and the pluriformity of all life (Clark, 1995). It is interesting to think about how many relationships out there, particularly between men, have been strung out to dry due to our cultures own homophobia. One investigative report done by the Seattle Times Newspaper, explored what happened when two men went out on what they deemed a “man date”. This was where two men, who were presumably straight, would do something like go to an art gallery together and a dinner as old friends. What the article uncovered was the things men do, in order to show to the rest of the world that they are heterosexual, going so far as to look at entirely different paintings within the art gallery, from posturing in ways that would give off the “I’m straight” look, paying for the bill separately and insisting to the waiter at the beginning of the meal that they pay separate to even how these old friends greeted each other, not with warmth and tenderness, rather a firm handshake and a pat on the back. Throughout the whole evening, they constantly were fighting what might be assumed of them, and this is the tragedy of homophobia. When two people who love and respect each other cannot express those feelings to each other; this is an issue that must be addressed. Another issue that homophobia and heterosexism impact in mainstream society is the roles and rights of women. In 1989, the US Supreme Court heard a case that involved a woman who had been refused partnership to a law firm on the basis of “sexual stereotyping” (Ertman, 1991). The Court defined sexual stereotyping as acting on the belief that "a woman cannot be aggressive," and in this case Ms. Hopkins was "abrasive", "harsh" and "impatient" with staff members (presumably secretaries or other support staff), and used profanity. Ms. Hopkins' employer's key blunder, (coup de grace), according to the Court, was advising Ms. Hopkins to "walk more femininely, talk more femininely, dress more femininely, wear make-up, have her hair styled, and wear jewelry." Id., 109 S.Ct. at 1782. The Court found, in short, that Ms. Hopkins, and all other women, have a right to act like men without losing their jobs. However positive this outcome was for women everywhere, we still have to look at the homophobia surrounding the case, and more so the gender roles that played into these biases. Had any man walked around the office doing the same things, he would have been considered a stern, yet efficient boss. What is wrong with a woman who is strong and confident and in charge? This would play into the idea that women are not to be masculine, or Lesbian, at all, or else they come off as “bitchy”. We can see homophobia here, because these fears come from the fact that for a woman to be masculine is to be abnormal, when in reality there are probably a majority of both men and women who represent both spectrums, masculine in some areas of life and feminine in others. It’s also important to note that under laws passed such as Title VII and other such laws that gave women the freedom and protections they so deserved during the women’s movement, gay and lesbian persons were not included under the new laws. Without overlooking the homophobia in the decision to exclude lesbians and gay men from protection under Title VII, the US court's decision regarding one of the plaintiffs, a gay man named Donald Strailey also demonstrates a lack of concern. He worked at a nursery school for two years, and was fired for wearing a small gold hoop earring. The court stated that Title VII does not protect against "discrimination because of effeminacy...homosexuality...or transsexualism." Id., 608 F.2d at 332. Especially in contrast to Price Waterhouse which supports the contention that the law, here Title VII, protects the right to act like a man but not like a woman. Implicit in both of these decisions is the idea that anyone in her right mind strives to be as much like men as possible, just as people of color must want the same rights as white people. The message is to assimilate to the white male heterosexual mold because no other counts or is respected. If they don't respect it, they won't protect it (Ertman, 1991). In both cases we see blatant acts of homophobia that linger in both the courts and employers who assume that a man is supposed to be masculine and a woman is supposed to be feminine. Straying from these gender norms cause uneasiness and resulted in one woman being fired and one man being fired for the same reasons with two different outcomes. Another issue that we will touch on is the issue of homosexuals who avoid coming out of the closet and marry into traditional roles of man and woman. There is not a whole lot of research done on this, but the fact that we force a certain minority to hide who it is they really are, leads to secrecy and cover-ups resulting in tragic endings to what was seen as beautiful stories. These poor heterosexual men and women, who marry these closeted homosexual women and men, end up wondering their whole lives, “why didn’t I see?” The internalized homophobia which drives these people to get married, even though they are gay is saddening, and leave many homes broken. The differences in divorce adjustment of women divorced from homosexual men compared to women divorced from heterosexual men have been explored. The results of the study indicated women divorced from homosexual men do not differ greatly from women divorced from heterosexual men in psychological symptoms or in overall divorce adjustment, although they appear to have more anger on divorce adjustment (Smith, 1990). The rates of men who are coming out of the closet and divorcing their wives is on the rise, and this has a direct affect on the heterosexual population. There is a part of us all that desires to fit into the mold of what society has told us we should be, but when concerning matters such as spending the rest of your life in a partnership with someone, disclosing information such as ones sexual orientation is still not the number one priority. Just imagine after 25 years of marriage, your spouse decides that he or she wants to come out of the closet and leave you for another person. This is what happens to many people, and is something that needs to be of concern to our society for the well being of all individuals both gay and straight. Is it the individual’s fault for hiding his or her true feelings, or is society to blame for making the individual stay closeted and getting themselves into these expected situations? Another interesting case was a study done on couples going to watch romantic movies. Now what’s interesting about this study is that what would be predictable according to gender roles would be that the women would more than likely prefer to see romantic movies. But what stereotypic gender roles in this study didn’t account for was the fact that the men as well enjoyed romantic movies. I think this is a huge view into how homophobia affects everything from our personal relationships, to our jobs, to what kind of things we can like or not like such as books, movies, or music. What is interesting is that both males and females in the study predicted that other men would not prefer romantic movies, according to societal expectations (Harris, 2004). What’s fascinating about this is how we limit ourselves to choose only within our specified gender role, rather than simply based on what we like or dislike due to fear of repercussion for liking something outside of our specified “gender”. A man may refuse to listen to certain types of music for fear of being too feminine or “gay”. A man may pick a novel based upon his gender, and if he is caught reading the other type of novel, the fear instilled within him of homosexuality; if this, than that, a slippery slope way of looking at the world, when really the two have no connection. He will even choose what sports he participates in based solely on his sex, rather than what he prefers. The sole purpose not necessarily that one acts, rather that one does not act, is due to perception. What would he look like if he played a “girls” sport? Weak or in most cases, he would be considered “gay”. The issue of lesbianism in female sports is so controversial that few women, gay or straight, will speak on the record about it. Their fears are not unfounded. Being perceived as a lesbian in the women's sports world often carries the same stigma as being a lesbian. And the notion that many women in sports are lesbians is widespread (Cart, 1997). As our stereotypes of homosexual persons display themselves in all forms, it is important to see how our homophobia affects women as well and their abilities to be treated just as equally and fairly as men in the realm of athletics. It’s almost the opposite effect for gay men who are involved within sports. It is the assumption that gay men do not play sports, when in reality there are probably more professional gay male athletes than one can imagine. The homophobia in sports affects them in a way that requires them to be closeted about who they are or risk being ostracized or targeted as an outsider. At this time in society it is inconceivable that gay men participate in as many sports as their heterosexual friends on the same teams. For many gay youth, athletics is an experience away from harassment and bullying, when they “prove” their masculinity. Again, here we attribute homophobia not to a sex act, rather the fulfillment of sex role requirements created by society at large. My Utopian Vision of AmericaWhat we as a society must recognize if we are to eradicate our discrimination of not only gay and lesbian persons, but each other, is that ultimately what connects each of us is not our sex, race, sexual orientation, culture or creed, rather our common humanity. What we share in common is the mere fact that we are even here to begin with. When two straight men can’t love one another as fellow human beings because they fear that others might perceive that one or both of them are gay, there is an inherent bias that keeps people from being themselves completely. As I mentioned before, many groups besides gay and lesbian persons are affected under the sex-roles created by society including men, women, intersexed or hermaphrodite persons, transsexual persons, and cultural persons outside the US. When we recognize as a society that gender is as fluid and diverse as race is, then we will be able to truly start to break down the walls that we have created for ourselves. One day I hope that men will be able to openly express their feelings to other men and women, without feeling too feminine or gay. I hope that women everywhere will be able to stand confidently for who they are, and not have to dumb down to impress a potential suitor. I hope that gay men and women will feel comfortable enough to be themselves everywhere, whether they are naturally more masculine or feminine, and that their personal relationships will be looked upon not as deviant sexual episodes, rather romantic, fulfilling and loving partnerships. I hope that young men everywhere will recognize within women their true beauty, known as the human soul and will no longer look to women just to fulfill their sexual gratifications or a cultural role. I hope that women will no longer be afraid of being seen as anything less than a full human being in our society and will not have to fear walking to their car alone in the middle of the night. I hope that gay and lesbian persons will no longer be stereotyped as too masculine or too feminine and that they will feel welcome in church , medical facilities, universities, and public school classrooms without the fear of intimidation or harassment. In my Utopian world, we are all seen as equal, and while we have many differences, the one thing that does connect us, is our humanity. I hope when we look into the eyes of another, we will see who they are, rather than what they are. I hope we can afford to them the same amount of dignity and respect that they as human beings deserve. What I hope this study has brought to you, is not necessarily the full and complete answers to every burning desire one may have about these issues, but more the idea that our own words and actions do affect us in some way. Whether it is calling some kid a fag in middle school or denying someone full access to the same rights and privileges that we ourselves enjoy, it affects everyone. Through our own ignorance of the world, we neglect to see what truly matters, the human spirit.“When we lose the right to be different, we lose the privilege to be free.” -Charles Evans Hughes-
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Some Words of Advice for people struggling to come out
So great to hear from you and more so what an honor that you would think of me in a time like this. First off, let me say that life is relative....yeah yeah, seems simple, but what I mean is that every persons experience is going to be different. Every person's life experiences contribute to the way in which they view the world. So my first recomendation is to acknowledge that you're friends circumstance can best be understand through your friend himself. He will know ultimately I hope what his family will do, and you and him will know you're friends and how they will respond. I have to say that from personal experience that I have had a unbelievable ammount of support and have been very fortunate in my life to have such wonderful friends as your entire family as well as all of my other friends and family who all truly care about me. Then, on top of that, remember that for your friend, it took however many years to come to terms with who he really was, and so to expect everyone around him to suddenly understand completely what he has been living with for all of these years can and is very scary and challenging some times. So for your friend my hope is that he may learn patience and most of all forgiveness. Understandting that not everyone may get it at first, more so some may be cruel and hurtful, but if he can remember who he is, and why it is those people are important to him, then he can forgive more easily. The biggest thing however, is always to remember that benig gay is simply a PART of who a person is. A part, and that for us to reduce ourselves down to what we are, rather than who we are deminishes our purpose in life. On top of that, for others to reduce us down to what we are, rather than to see us for who we are is also taking away our humanity. Remember that sexual orientation is not just about sex. In fact it is far from it. It is about love. It is about emotion and our interconnectedness. One must ask themselves.....when two human beings love each other, what is so aweful about that? Whether it be two men, two women, or a man and a woman? Then ask what is love exactly? Is it simply the act of sex? Or is it more those small little moments in life that we all cherish. Laughter, tears, laying in a field and staring at the stars, growing old together, living life togheter, being together. Its an emotion. Its not just lust. Lust does not encompas love, but LOVE can encompas lust. There has to be a level of respect for intimate interpersonal relationships, not just for oneself, but for the other as well. Being gay, does not define who a person is, but is truly an intrinsic part of who they really are. It is the lens through which they see the world and it should be celebrated for what it really is. I hope that you're friend is doing ok. I hope that he is getting by, and making sense out of the scary world we seem to live in. I do have some contacts in the CO area as well as some other things if he ever wants to know, just ask. Just know that for him, the world may seem an empty, desolate and lonely place. Sometimes as a LGBT person it feels as if no one can possibly understand or that there are others out there like us. But he is not alone. In fact there are so many people out there who truly are impacted by this amazing experience of loving someone. He merely has to open his eyes. There is a rich and vibrant culture within our society. A depth of history that has created this great country of ours, a history that INCLUDES gay and lesbian persons. Since the dawn of man, we have existed and we will continue to exist and we must not be affraid of it, but we must embrace and love it. Have your friend do some research on "gay history" and help him to learn about what love is. Have him read "Einstiens Dreams" By Alan Lightman. Read Shakespears Romeo and Juliet, and Twelvth Night. Watch the Movies "The Hours" with Nicole Kidman as well as "American Beauty" "Kinsey", "Saved" "Pleasantville" and "Closer". Listen to Sarah Mclachlan's "Witness" as well as coldplay. hahaha. But most of all, remind him to dream. Dream as big and as grand as he wants to dream, and never to let go. To fight with all his heart, and to never give in to what people tell him he should be, but to become who he always has been. Tell him to go outside, to look up and see how great the sky is, then to look to the trees and see how great they are, then to look at the bark, then the leaves, then teh cells that make up those leaves and realize how amazing they really are. Then look at another and see how great and amazing they are, they hands, the eyes, the nose, the arms, legs, fingers and toes. Then look to his own hands, his fingers, and cells and realize wow how great. I could go on and on about this my friend, but ultimately, I hope that this initial stuff helps. Please let me know if I can do any more. Also, please read the attachments and let him read them as well. They will be good not just for him, but for you as well. Thanks so much and I hope things turn out okay:)Ryan PSREAD IT ALL!!!!hahaOn Mon, 30 Jan 2006 08:43:58 -0800 (PST) Maggie Reinsvold writes:Hey Ryan!!This is Sarah (steve's sister). I hope you are doing awesome in Washington!! How are you and your family? I know we all miss you guys out here!!I need your help/advice. One of my best friends recently came out. Right know I am the only one who knows. I really wanted to help him get through how to tell his family and the rest of our friends. He's struggling with it right now because there is the possibility they won't be as open. I am truly amazed and impressed by all the work Steve has told me about that you have done at Gonzaga and in general. Do you have any advice for him? He doesn't have an email, or at least one he uses a lot. Thank you so much!!Sarah
My Speech AGainst Don't ASk Don't Tell
I want to thank you all for coming out today, my name is Ryan Olson and we are here representing a organization known as Soulforce , a group that follows the life and teachings of both Gandhi and King in non-violent demonstration in order to end institutional and religiously based discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. We are here today to support our troops. There is a fundamental belief that we share with the rest of America when we say that we believe our troops to be brave, honorable and courageous young women and men. I dont think any one would disagree that to be in the armed forces takes integrity, honesty, and above all a sense of duty to ones country. I personally have had the honor and privilege of knowing such people, women and men whom I have considered some of my closest friends. In fact one of my roommates in college has been honored with some of the highest awards possible for his time in the ROTC program at our school. He and I and all of our friends would go to movies together, football games, and on school nights talk about the great depths of life. Through him I also was able to meet several other ROTC members, where I was honored to truly see the spirit of comrodery and discipline the army instills in its service members. I am proud to call these men and women my friends and can honestly say that my experience with them has deepened my appreciation for the great sacrifices they are willing to make so that we average civilians can live in the peace and harmony that we do. Being their friend has shown me what great men and women we have in uniform.It is a uniform that represents so much and in my extensive conversations with these friends, I have often wondered how strange it seemed that there was still a ban on openly gay and lesbian soldiers, and how because I am not willing to lie or cover up who it is I really am, I am denied access to one of the top employers in our nation, the United States Armed Forces.I would look at my friends, and then look at myself and I saw no difference. I am someone who has been recognized by the Spokane community for my outstanding athletic achievements. I have received numerous awards and accolades for my efforts to provide services to the less fortunate. I was a student leader in both my high school and now where I go to college, one of the top universities in all of America. I am fit and I am willing to answer the call to duty should they take me.Unfortunately, at a time when we need soldiers more than ever, I and countless others would be turned away from the armed forces because of a policy known as Dont Ask, Dont Tell which bars any out gay or lesbian soldiers from serving. It is a policy that in its 13 years of existence has ended the careers of over 11,000 service members, including those of high ranking officials and highly trained specialists, particularly in the area of linguistics which given our current conditions in the middle east, are highly valued. They would rather lose these valuable men and women then serve with someone who is gay or lesbian. There are an estimated 63,000 gay and lesbian soldiers currently serving in the armed forces according to a report by the 2004 Urban Institute. There are another 1,000,000 veterans who self identify as gay or lesbian, brave people who were forced to serve their country in silence. Ironically, our troops already serve with out gay and lesbian soldiers from 23 allied countries that do not have bans on service. And in these countries there have been no reports of any problems relating to sexual orientation whatsoever. But this is not important, if there were only one gay soldier, one person who was being discriminated against because of the Dont Ask, Dont Tell policy we would still be here today. So on this day we participate in soul forces right to serve campaign which is taking place in 33 cities across the nation. What the right to serve campaign hopes to accomplish is to end the Dont Ask Dont Tell Policy by encouraging our state and federal legislatures to adopt the Military Readiness Enhancement Act which would do away with Dont Ask dont Tell and add sexual orientation to the armed services non-discrimination policy. We plan to accomplish this by attempting to enlist in the armed services as openly gay and lesbian people, and when we are denied, our friends will join us to hold a peaceful sit in that will take place until we hear from our state legislators with their commitment to the end of Dont Ask Dont Tell. We call upon Maria Cantwell, Governor Gregiore, Brian Baird, Norman Dicks, Doc Hastings, Rick Larsen, David Reichert, and any member of the federal and state legislators to Sign the Military Enhancement Act and to End the Dont Ask dont Tell Policy today. Let no brave and courageous soldier be turned away For what its worth, I just want to say that we are here against a institutional policy that allows hate and discrimination to exist in our armed forces. We are not here to humiliate or disrespect the fine women and men behind the doors of this recruitment center or those already serving in the military. If anything we hold them in the highest regard and hope that they will see why we are here today. Am I brave? No, I am simply asking for the same rights and opportunities as everyone else, including the privilege to serve honestly along side my friends for the country that I love. I want to leave you with an image that I have conjured up in my head for many months now. It is a famous image, one in times square of a young man coming home from war and embracing a young woman in a backward fall and expressing his affection for her. I wonder about the moments that led up to that encounter and what it must be like for a young gay soldier in todays world to come home from three years away at war, to run to that person that got him through, yearning just to hold him, to kiss him, to love him when he suddenly has to stop. Because simply to say I love you, in that certain way, could mean the end of his career, his livelihood and all that he has ever worked for. So to the brave, honorable and courageous young men and women who would give up their lives for this country so that we may be free, whether you are gay or you are straight, we support you. We respect you, and we honor you. Hopefully one day, all troops will be able to serve openly and honestly without fear or degradation for simply being who they are.
Tragic Flaw
Tonight you see what is inside
you see that which I hate most about myself,
you see what keeps me from being the best that I can fully be.
What I don't think you saw though,
was how the pain and yearning for more
could make me settle for a taste,
a taste of what love is all about.
Numbing myself from the pain I feel,
I reduce myself down to an act, an object
and nothing more than what I am.
Searching for you is no easy task
I must admit however, finding what it is
you have desired for so long
is a long and lonely road.
It was good when you were at least there,
but when you said those hurtful words,
I didn't know what to do,
when I felt you weren't still there.
So the tragic flaw in I is that Love is what I truly want,
what I truly see and what I truly feel.
I yearn just to hold a person through the night,
just to laugh with someone,
and someone to tell my deepest secrets too,
even though there are so very few.
Yet waiting for that to come along
can be torturing and hostile to a heart
that has bore the scars of many wounds.
The flesh of which it is encased
becomes the gaurd of a heart which seems like it can take no more.
I hate myself....I love myself.
But who will love me? Who will know me?
If not you than who? When?:
I’m, tired of fighting this world alone,
I'm tired of hiding alone and
I'm tired of walking this destined path on only two feet,
with no one to lean on.
you see that which I hate most about myself,
you see what keeps me from being the best that I can fully be.
What I don't think you saw though,
was how the pain and yearning for more
could make me settle for a taste,
a taste of what love is all about.
Numbing myself from the pain I feel,
I reduce myself down to an act, an object
and nothing more than what I am.
Searching for you is no easy task
I must admit however, finding what it is
you have desired for so long
is a long and lonely road.
It was good when you were at least there,
but when you said those hurtful words,
I didn't know what to do,
when I felt you weren't still there.
So the tragic flaw in I is that Love is what I truly want,
what I truly see and what I truly feel.
I yearn just to hold a person through the night,
just to laugh with someone,
and someone to tell my deepest secrets too,
even though there are so very few.
Yet waiting for that to come along
can be torturing and hostile to a heart
that has bore the scars of many wounds.
The flesh of which it is encased
becomes the gaurd of a heart which seems like it can take no more.
I hate myself....I love myself.
But who will love me? Who will know me?
If not you than who? When?:
I’m, tired of fighting this world alone,
I'm tired of hiding alone and
I'm tired of walking this destined path on only two feet,
with no one to lean on.
To care for things as if they were people, is illusion... To care for people as if they were things, is violence... To care for people as if they were people, is justice... To care for people as if they were ourselves, is love...
Thesis
I used to be afraid of the world. One of those things in time where as a youth I hated myself so much and was so afraid to just live. It was my fear of living that closed me off to really seeing what was right in front of my nose. And through the course of my life I realized that I would be okay, and in the end would discover how much I had missed out on, but how much was still left to be discovered.
Body
I think I was one of the happiest kids growing up. At school I was always the outgoing one coming up with new and inventive ways of doing things. At recess My friend Brad and I would always play the fourth graders in basketball and would always win, making us THE kids to know as merely second graders. I was proud of that, and will still brag about it to this day.
At home, my sister and I were best friends. We would always build these elaborate forts made of cushions and chairs and go out onto the lake behind our house in our small inflatable boat to catch snapping turtles and craw dads. We would have dancing nights, where my parents would put on the old country music and swing each other back and forth while my sister and I used our light bright to create “ambience”. My dad was a girl’s basketball coach at a local high school and I was his biggest fan. I would sit at the end of his bench and always scream at the players “Good Job” and hiss and growl every time the opposing team would be shooting free throws. I attended his basketball camps every summer and was the star every year.
I was always the adventurous kid and in my spare time I always wanted to explore the world around me and see how far one path could take me, before I had to turn around and come home. I would always take my bike, sometimes miles by myself exploring the trial that ran behind our house.
Another important part of me were My Grandparents on my mother’s side. Whenever they would visit, I was always excited, because I knew that they would bring me back gifts from their travels around the world. It was that time in their lives where they had just retired and spent the first 10 years of it traveling the globe. My grandmother would always bring back treasures from everywhere. One time she brought back a beret from France, which I proudly wore to school every day until I was 10. Another item she brought back was this intricate hand woven vest with dragons and circles on it from China. She had told me that she purchased it on the Great Wall where she learned about the culture there and how dragons served as a means of protection.
When the war had broken out in Ireland between the Catholics and the protestants, my grandparents joined a group that every summer would bring together one Protestant and one Catholic to try to create peace in the country. My grandparents were amazing people and I loved them very much.
Being a teacher from New Mexico that worked with lower income families, my Grandmother had the opportunity to work very closely with the Native American Tribes in the region. She would always share stories of the culture they had, stories of respecting the land, and honoring everything and everyone within it, telling me tales of great warriors, spirits and tribal dance. One time she even went in to have eye surgery, and because my sister and I were visiting and she had no one else to drive her, she decided to forgo anesthesia “like a native warrior would” so she could drive herself home and be with us. She was an amazing woman and one who inspired me greatly. One of the fondest memories I had of her, was the day she came to visit and she brought me a gift… it was a picture of a guardian angel, and she explained to me what a guardian angel was and it was in that moment that I felt protected by something greater. My Grandmother in that moment became my guardian angel which would become much more apparent many years later.
Back at school, I started having some trouble. I had always known that I was different than everybody else…and it scared me. As far back as I remember, I can recall always having a different orientation to the world. I was different than the other kids my age and worst of all, I knew it. And I knew enough that to be different was not good and that if I were to get along with my fellow classmates I would have to hide my innermost feelings and suppress how I really felt about a lot of things.
Over the course of the next few years, I became more aware of my difference which made me feel more and more alienated from people around me. The same world my grandmother had once taught me to love and to cherish slowly seemed to be crashing in on me. I was alone.
As adolescents will do when faced with those who stray from the “norm”, I soon found my self slowly ostracized from my peer group. I wish I could have taken pictures from above my group of friends, because at the beginning of my sixth grade year I started out at the very center and over the course of a couple months I slowly was pushed out. My difference became something that was harder to hide; and internally harder to accept. I would be called such horrible things by people I once considered friends, and found myself deeper in isolation. I found solace in knowing that I still had my family and my soccer team and even God left in my life. When I was called such horrible things it was “Father Forgive them for they know not what they do” that I would repeat to myself over and over again to get through my day. It was this that kept me going, words my grandmother had once instilled within me.
And the funny part was that throughout all of the name calling and degradation, to the whole world, everything appeared fine. I still excelled in everything I did. I was the captain of my soccer team, first chair violinist for our school orchestra, acknowledged for my work ethic and simply put a kid that seemed to have it all. And yet, every day I would find myself coming home and escaping to the seclusion of my room. I became the hunchback of Notre Dam; I became not afraid of the outside world, but more so, myself. The same names and taunts that others used against me, I had internalized and when I looked into the mirror, I knew what I really was.
As the years dragged on, the taunting became a constant in my life. It became something that drove me away from some of the things I loved the most. While I still had my club soccer team to turn to, my passion for basketball dwindled, to the point where when I actually made the basketball team in 9th grade, I decided not to play because my teammates had been my tormentors. My father the basketball coach, the man who had watched me play all those years and knew how good I really was, was quite shocked when I came home and told him that I had decided not to play. When he asked why, I was scared to tell him the truth because I didn’t want him, my father to start thinking the same thing that they did. The more depressed I became, the more I tried to hide it from those I loved the most. I stopped going out with my family because I was afraid that someone from school would call me those awful names in front of them and that my family would think the same thing and reject me as my peers had. I had heard once on TV that people like me were often rejected by their families, kicked to the curb if you will and left to live on the streets. I even heard once that families of people like me would rather their children be dead, than different like I was.
To escape the pain, I buried myself in movies and music and slowly drifted into an abyss known as my dark and cold room, where I would simply sit and wonder about why I was the way I was. I asked myself, is it true that someone like me was going to hell? Was I bad person? Inhuman? Was their something wrong with me? Sometimes I would cry myself to sleep and other nights I would yell at God and ask why? Why me? What purpose do I serve?
Fighting the internal hate and sadness that had overcome me by that point in my life, I often would ask God to simply end it all. It became a burden I no longer felt I could bare and on top of that I had distanced myself from everyone simply to numb the pain of wondering constantly “if they only knew who I really was, would they still love me?”.
I would fall asleep at night hoping never to return to the consciousness I knew, to die in my sleep and to forever escape the anguish of knowing who I really was.
****PAUSE****
And yet I would wake, each morning. Faced with a new day. I was given life over and over again. And suddenly one day it just dawned on me… wait a second I wasn’t alone. Someone had been with me the whole entire time. Someone who loved me, who cared for me, and created me just the way I was.
Slowly but surely the more I started to think about it, the more I realized how wrong I was, how wrong my tormentors had been. In fact, I started to recognize that instead of being some ugly demonic person both I and society had made me out to be, I realized that my existence was quite the opposite.
I realized that not only am I something beautiful, but someone who is connected to something greater. That my existence is apart of a whole world of people all connected and all related in some way or another. I remembered the children in China my grandmother had once told me about. I remembered that stupid beret I would were every day. I remember the kids my grandparents would host every year from Ireland, the same kids who in their native land would be bitter enemies, but some how became the best of friends when they realized they were simply human. I remembered the stories of love and forgiveness of some foreign man who died on a cross my parents would read to me at night.
As I slowly came out to people and told them the truth about who I really was, the more I realized just how amazing it was to know that all along I had someone with me. That the same people who I once feared had always been there, that God had been in them for me and my life. From my mother who stood by my side on a rainy Sunday afternoon embracing my battered body and sobbing soul as I revealed to her who I really was. It was ok. In her heart she had always known and even more so, had always been there, whether I knew it or not. My father’s first words to me were “First foremost, and always, I love you…the same emotions and feelings of unconditional love a man once told his people. My sister my best friend, simply said, nothings changed, and it hadn’t. She was and always had been there. My friends in school, many had suspected all along and had remembered the times I made them laugh, or been a shoulder to cry on. They said that if I wasn’t the way I was, the way God had made me to be, then I wouldn’t have been the same person to them. They had been there all along too.
The same love I now knew was there, both for myself and from others, led me to also recognize the same beauty in even those who had hurt me once before. While my tormentors raced through my nightmares over and over again at one point in my life, I saw in them the same beauty I now knew to be in everyone, including me.
I am created of a different dust, but am still human, still thy brother, still thy neighbor, still thy friend. I am gay. I am human, in and of the same being. Of His flesh, His blood; of your flesh, your blood. I recognize that God exists not only in one person, but in everyone and everything. That we were all made in a common image, and that would be our existence itself. I am apart of something and what is in everyone and everything is God.
In my eyes, God is love. Love is what connects us to one another and what we strive for. It is the simple connection between one person and another. It is in every human being, in everyone.
conclusion
In conclusion, I just want to say that my story may be similar to many, but unique to me and me alone. I have realized how truly blessed I am and recognize the privilege I have been given in my life of knowing who I am and knowing that God loves me. There are so many people in this world who suffer far greater than I could have ever imagined. There are young women and men being exported from their native countries as sex slaves to greedy men. There are children in Darfur and Iraq who see bloodshed every day. There are people who are dying from starvation in both our country and abroad. There are people who experience hate and bias in multiple ways from the color of their skin, the country they were born in, the language they speak, their abilities to walk upright, see clearly or hear perfectly, people who are born of one gender or the other, people whose love is not recognized by others, children, elderly, and even some of us. There are people on our very campus who sit alone as I once did, scared of the world and scared of themselves.
If you take away one thing from my talk today, I hope it is not the loss of hope or feelings of despair, but rather the genuine sense that there is something greater in our lives that connects each and every one of us. There is something beautiful that we should embrace and cherish, love and commit ourselves too. So many times we have distain and disgust for things we may not know of first hand, but if we can open our eyes and accept all people no matter who they are, even people we’ve never met as truly God’s children, as perfect beings in and of themselves, then I think it will be easier to also accept ourselves.
Walk away from this Search, this experience not only KNOWING that you ARE LOVED, but remembering to give back this love to others as well, from a simple smile to that homeless person on the street or contributing your time and energy to one of the many humanitarian services around the globe, place these feelings and emotions into action, and remember those people out there who might not know or realize just how loved they truly are. I leave you with Yeha-Noha or Wishes of Happiness and Prosperity) by a group known as Sacred Spirits….a group my Grandmother once introduced to me.
Thesis
I used to be afraid of the world. One of those things in time where as a youth I hated myself so much and was so afraid to just live. It was my fear of living that closed me off to really seeing what was right in front of my nose. And through the course of my life I realized that I would be okay, and in the end would discover how much I had missed out on, but how much was still left to be discovered.
Body
I think I was one of the happiest kids growing up. At school I was always the outgoing one coming up with new and inventive ways of doing things. At recess My friend Brad and I would always play the fourth graders in basketball and would always win, making us THE kids to know as merely second graders. I was proud of that, and will still brag about it to this day.
At home, my sister and I were best friends. We would always build these elaborate forts made of cushions and chairs and go out onto the lake behind our house in our small inflatable boat to catch snapping turtles and craw dads. We would have dancing nights, where my parents would put on the old country music and swing each other back and forth while my sister and I used our light bright to create “ambience”. My dad was a girl’s basketball coach at a local high school and I was his biggest fan. I would sit at the end of his bench and always scream at the players “Good Job” and hiss and growl every time the opposing team would be shooting free throws. I attended his basketball camps every summer and was the star every year.
I was always the adventurous kid and in my spare time I always wanted to explore the world around me and see how far one path could take me, before I had to turn around and come home. I would always take my bike, sometimes miles by myself exploring the trial that ran behind our house.
Another important part of me were My Grandparents on my mother’s side. Whenever they would visit, I was always excited, because I knew that they would bring me back gifts from their travels around the world. It was that time in their lives where they had just retired and spent the first 10 years of it traveling the globe. My grandmother would always bring back treasures from everywhere. One time she brought back a beret from France, which I proudly wore to school every day until I was 10. Another item she brought back was this intricate hand woven vest with dragons and circles on it from China. She had told me that she purchased it on the Great Wall where she learned about the culture there and how dragons served as a means of protection.
When the war had broken out in Ireland between the Catholics and the protestants, my grandparents joined a group that every summer would bring together one Protestant and one Catholic to try to create peace in the country. My grandparents were amazing people and I loved them very much.
Being a teacher from New Mexico that worked with lower income families, my Grandmother had the opportunity to work very closely with the Native American Tribes in the region. She would always share stories of the culture they had, stories of respecting the land, and honoring everything and everyone within it, telling me tales of great warriors, spirits and tribal dance. One time she even went in to have eye surgery, and because my sister and I were visiting and she had no one else to drive her, she decided to forgo anesthesia “like a native warrior would” so she could drive herself home and be with us. She was an amazing woman and one who inspired me greatly. One of the fondest memories I had of her, was the day she came to visit and she brought me a gift… it was a picture of a guardian angel, and she explained to me what a guardian angel was and it was in that moment that I felt protected by something greater. My Grandmother in that moment became my guardian angel which would become much more apparent many years later.
Back at school, I started having some trouble. I had always known that I was different than everybody else…and it scared me. As far back as I remember, I can recall always having a different orientation to the world. I was different than the other kids my age and worst of all, I knew it. And I knew enough that to be different was not good and that if I were to get along with my fellow classmates I would have to hide my innermost feelings and suppress how I really felt about a lot of things.
Over the course of the next few years, I became more aware of my difference which made me feel more and more alienated from people around me. The same world my grandmother had once taught me to love and to cherish slowly seemed to be crashing in on me. I was alone.
As adolescents will do when faced with those who stray from the “norm”, I soon found my self slowly ostracized from my peer group. I wish I could have taken pictures from above my group of friends, because at the beginning of my sixth grade year I started out at the very center and over the course of a couple months I slowly was pushed out. My difference became something that was harder to hide; and internally harder to accept. I would be called such horrible things by people I once considered friends, and found myself deeper in isolation. I found solace in knowing that I still had my family and my soccer team and even God left in my life. When I was called such horrible things it was “Father Forgive them for they know not what they do” that I would repeat to myself over and over again to get through my day. It was this that kept me going, words my grandmother had once instilled within me.
And the funny part was that throughout all of the name calling and degradation, to the whole world, everything appeared fine. I still excelled in everything I did. I was the captain of my soccer team, first chair violinist for our school orchestra, acknowledged for my work ethic and simply put a kid that seemed to have it all. And yet, every day I would find myself coming home and escaping to the seclusion of my room. I became the hunchback of Notre Dam; I became not afraid of the outside world, but more so, myself. The same names and taunts that others used against me, I had internalized and when I looked into the mirror, I knew what I really was.
As the years dragged on, the taunting became a constant in my life. It became something that drove me away from some of the things I loved the most. While I still had my club soccer team to turn to, my passion for basketball dwindled, to the point where when I actually made the basketball team in 9th grade, I decided not to play because my teammates had been my tormentors. My father the basketball coach, the man who had watched me play all those years and knew how good I really was, was quite shocked when I came home and told him that I had decided not to play. When he asked why, I was scared to tell him the truth because I didn’t want him, my father to start thinking the same thing that they did. The more depressed I became, the more I tried to hide it from those I loved the most. I stopped going out with my family because I was afraid that someone from school would call me those awful names in front of them and that my family would think the same thing and reject me as my peers had. I had heard once on TV that people like me were often rejected by their families, kicked to the curb if you will and left to live on the streets. I even heard once that families of people like me would rather their children be dead, than different like I was.
To escape the pain, I buried myself in movies and music and slowly drifted into an abyss known as my dark and cold room, where I would simply sit and wonder about why I was the way I was. I asked myself, is it true that someone like me was going to hell? Was I bad person? Inhuman? Was their something wrong with me? Sometimes I would cry myself to sleep and other nights I would yell at God and ask why? Why me? What purpose do I serve?
Fighting the internal hate and sadness that had overcome me by that point in my life, I often would ask God to simply end it all. It became a burden I no longer felt I could bare and on top of that I had distanced myself from everyone simply to numb the pain of wondering constantly “if they only knew who I really was, would they still love me?”.
I would fall asleep at night hoping never to return to the consciousness I knew, to die in my sleep and to forever escape the anguish of knowing who I really was.
****PAUSE****
And yet I would wake, each morning. Faced with a new day. I was given life over and over again. And suddenly one day it just dawned on me… wait a second I wasn’t alone. Someone had been with me the whole entire time. Someone who loved me, who cared for me, and created me just the way I was.
Slowly but surely the more I started to think about it, the more I realized how wrong I was, how wrong my tormentors had been. In fact, I started to recognize that instead of being some ugly demonic person both I and society had made me out to be, I realized that my existence was quite the opposite.
I realized that not only am I something beautiful, but someone who is connected to something greater. That my existence is apart of a whole world of people all connected and all related in some way or another. I remembered the children in China my grandmother had once told me about. I remembered that stupid beret I would were every day. I remember the kids my grandparents would host every year from Ireland, the same kids who in their native land would be bitter enemies, but some how became the best of friends when they realized they were simply human. I remembered the stories of love and forgiveness of some foreign man who died on a cross my parents would read to me at night.
As I slowly came out to people and told them the truth about who I really was, the more I realized just how amazing it was to know that all along I had someone with me. That the same people who I once feared had always been there, that God had been in them for me and my life. From my mother who stood by my side on a rainy Sunday afternoon embracing my battered body and sobbing soul as I revealed to her who I really was. It was ok. In her heart she had always known and even more so, had always been there, whether I knew it or not. My father’s first words to me were “First foremost, and always, I love you…the same emotions and feelings of unconditional love a man once told his people. My sister my best friend, simply said, nothings changed, and it hadn’t. She was and always had been there. My friends in school, many had suspected all along and had remembered the times I made them laugh, or been a shoulder to cry on. They said that if I wasn’t the way I was, the way God had made me to be, then I wouldn’t have been the same person to them. They had been there all along too.
The same love I now knew was there, both for myself and from others, led me to also recognize the same beauty in even those who had hurt me once before. While my tormentors raced through my nightmares over and over again at one point in my life, I saw in them the same beauty I now knew to be in everyone, including me.
I am created of a different dust, but am still human, still thy brother, still thy neighbor, still thy friend. I am gay. I am human, in and of the same being. Of His flesh, His blood; of your flesh, your blood. I recognize that God exists not only in one person, but in everyone and everything. That we were all made in a common image, and that would be our existence itself. I am apart of something and what is in everyone and everything is God.
In my eyes, God is love. Love is what connects us to one another and what we strive for. It is the simple connection between one person and another. It is in every human being, in everyone.
conclusion
In conclusion, I just want to say that my story may be similar to many, but unique to me and me alone. I have realized how truly blessed I am and recognize the privilege I have been given in my life of knowing who I am and knowing that God loves me. There are so many people in this world who suffer far greater than I could have ever imagined. There are young women and men being exported from their native countries as sex slaves to greedy men. There are children in Darfur and Iraq who see bloodshed every day. There are people who are dying from starvation in both our country and abroad. There are people who experience hate and bias in multiple ways from the color of their skin, the country they were born in, the language they speak, their abilities to walk upright, see clearly or hear perfectly, people who are born of one gender or the other, people whose love is not recognized by others, children, elderly, and even some of us. There are people on our very campus who sit alone as I once did, scared of the world and scared of themselves.
If you take away one thing from my talk today, I hope it is not the loss of hope or feelings of despair, but rather the genuine sense that there is something greater in our lives that connects each and every one of us. There is something beautiful that we should embrace and cherish, love and commit ourselves too. So many times we have distain and disgust for things we may not know of first hand, but if we can open our eyes and accept all people no matter who they are, even people we’ve never met as truly God’s children, as perfect beings in and of themselves, then I think it will be easier to also accept ourselves.
Walk away from this Search, this experience not only KNOWING that you ARE LOVED, but remembering to give back this love to others as well, from a simple smile to that homeless person on the street or contributing your time and energy to one of the many humanitarian services around the globe, place these feelings and emotions into action, and remember those people out there who might not know or realize just how loved they truly are. I leave you with Yeha-Noha or Wishes of Happiness and Prosperity) by a group known as Sacred Spirits….a group my Grandmother once introduced to me.
SEARCH OPEN LETTER
Spirtual lessons learned from my study abroad
Dear Searchers,
Welcome to Search and to an experience that will forever alter the course of your life. Know first and foremost that you are meant to be here, in this moment, at this hour, in this place sitting next to the people to your right and left, in front and behind you along with all of the people that will come into your life in the next couple of days, whether you know them just now or for the rest of your life. Whatever that moment is to you, cherish it, respect it and honor it, for it can be a powerful tool for you throughout the course of your life.
For me, this moment in time, represents love. Pure and simple love and the idea or concept that no matter who you are, where you come from, or the life experiences you have faced or will face, you should know that somewhere in this world there are people who not only love you, but are there for you in ways you would never expect them to be. In your darkest hour know that there is someone in this world who loves you. It truly is all around you, and every where you have ever gone or ever will go.
In fact, I’m writing to you now from Ho Chi Min City, Vietnam on my travels around the world through a program called semester at sea where we live on a fully staffed cruise ship traveling the globe at yes, 20 miles per hour. We have visited such countries as Brazil, South Africa, India, Vietnam, and Malaysia. It’s been an amazing adventure so far and when you get this I will be in the historic city of Bejing, China. I’m truly living my dreams.
One of the most fascinating things that I have learned on my adventure is the incredible capacity for human beings to love. One of the saddest things in the world to me used to be the simple fact that I would never meet each and every person in the entire world. There was just something about not being able to know who each person is on the inside and out, understanding their life histories and what life experiences made them who they were. But I’ve come to realize that to a degree I already know every person in the world who has existed and will exist some day and that is because we share something very important in common, and that is our humanity. No matter where I have gone, a simple smile lights someone up inside. A child’s innocent laugh is just the same as well, and so are the tears of woman begging for food for her child. The joy and pain of the world is cross cultural and imbedded in each and every one of us.
On my journey I have been blessed to feel the warmth of the Indian Ocean as the sun beat down on our ship. I have tasted the spices and teas of India. I have heard the beautiful laughter of children who simply love life in South African townships. I’ve smelt the incense in the air at a Hindu prayer service. I’ve traced my hands along the marble stones of the Taj Mahal. I’ve been part of a massive gyrating body of people creeping down the street to loud music celebrating carnival in Brazil. I’ve gone on a safari and seen baby lions, elephants, deer and more I’ve awoken to a sunrise so beautiful it brought me to tears. I’ve taken the same path that millions of slaves had to travel from South Africa to the Americas. I’ve felt the hand of an untouchable. I’ve seen, heard, tasted, smelt, and felt the world and when it comes down to it, I’ve truly seen how interconnected we are. How our lives are parallel to many we may never meet, but most importantly in my heart I have witnessed how alike we all truly are.
So as you sit there bathed in love from around the world, reflect on what this love means and how it applies to you and your life. How this feeling that you are feeling right now is shared by millions around the world in a million different ways and how truly interconnected we all are and could be if we were to give it a little more attention. No one can be alone in the world when they learn to look into each other and see what we all have in common, what we share, the love that we have for our world and one another. So please continue the rest of your Search knowing how beautiful you are simply for being you and how your existence in and of itself makes the world we all share that much brighter and beautiful because you are here. Remember to live awake and aware that this world is amazing and that right here, right now is the moment to shine, to be yourself, to love yourself and others, and to live your dreams in the here and now.
Dear Searchers,
Welcome to Search and to an experience that will forever alter the course of your life. Know first and foremost that you are meant to be here, in this moment, at this hour, in this place sitting next to the people to your right and left, in front and behind you along with all of the people that will come into your life in the next couple of days, whether you know them just now or for the rest of your life. Whatever that moment is to you, cherish it, respect it and honor it, for it can be a powerful tool for you throughout the course of your life.
For me, this moment in time, represents love. Pure and simple love and the idea or concept that no matter who you are, where you come from, or the life experiences you have faced or will face, you should know that somewhere in this world there are people who not only love you, but are there for you in ways you would never expect them to be. In your darkest hour know that there is someone in this world who loves you. It truly is all around you, and every where you have ever gone or ever will go.
In fact, I’m writing to you now from Ho Chi Min City, Vietnam on my travels around the world through a program called semester at sea where we live on a fully staffed cruise ship traveling the globe at yes, 20 miles per hour. We have visited such countries as Brazil, South Africa, India, Vietnam, and Malaysia. It’s been an amazing adventure so far and when you get this I will be in the historic city of Bejing, China. I’m truly living my dreams.
One of the most fascinating things that I have learned on my adventure is the incredible capacity for human beings to love. One of the saddest things in the world to me used to be the simple fact that I would never meet each and every person in the entire world. There was just something about not being able to know who each person is on the inside and out, understanding their life histories and what life experiences made them who they were. But I’ve come to realize that to a degree I already know every person in the world who has existed and will exist some day and that is because we share something very important in common, and that is our humanity. No matter where I have gone, a simple smile lights someone up inside. A child’s innocent laugh is just the same as well, and so are the tears of woman begging for food for her child. The joy and pain of the world is cross cultural and imbedded in each and every one of us.
On my journey I have been blessed to feel the warmth of the Indian Ocean as the sun beat down on our ship. I have tasted the spices and teas of India. I have heard the beautiful laughter of children who simply love life in South African townships. I’ve smelt the incense in the air at a Hindu prayer service. I’ve traced my hands along the marble stones of the Taj Mahal. I’ve been part of a massive gyrating body of people creeping down the street to loud music celebrating carnival in Brazil. I’ve gone on a safari and seen baby lions, elephants, deer and more I’ve awoken to a sunrise so beautiful it brought me to tears. I’ve taken the same path that millions of slaves had to travel from South Africa to the Americas. I’ve felt the hand of an untouchable. I’ve seen, heard, tasted, smelt, and felt the world and when it comes down to it, I’ve truly seen how interconnected we are. How our lives are parallel to many we may never meet, but most importantly in my heart I have witnessed how alike we all truly are.
So as you sit there bathed in love from around the world, reflect on what this love means and how it applies to you and your life. How this feeling that you are feeling right now is shared by millions around the world in a million different ways and how truly interconnected we all are and could be if we were to give it a little more attention. No one can be alone in the world when they learn to look into each other and see what we all have in common, what we share, the love that we have for our world and one another. So please continue the rest of your Search knowing how beautiful you are simply for being you and how your existence in and of itself makes the world we all share that much brighter and beautiful because you are here. Remember to live awake and aware that this world is amazing and that right here, right now is the moment to shine, to be yourself, to love yourself and others, and to live your dreams in the here and now.
The Invisible
Published fall 2004 Gonzaga Bulletin
Invisible to the naked eye, I am the invisible man. A man you cannot touch, see or feel, I am a man that exists not of the body, but of the soul. My identity? My sexuality. My invisibility is not easily identified for it is draped in culture, heritage, and in some cases shame. It is my invisibility, and it is my choice to share it with the world.
The next month here at Gonzaga and across this great nation will be a month of celebration for invisible people like myself. It is called National Coming Out month where people of my diverse background are celebrated for who we are, where we can color ourselves however we wish, for this is the time to show the world our true selves.
What makes us invisible is that what we feel and how we see the world are all hidden within us. We have grown up alone. Some have been fortunate enough to have someone in their lives to show them the way, but for many, the process of self discovery has been a very long and painful road.
It’s not easy to come to terms with ones invisibility, especially when it is different. Role models are far and few between, and social attitudes towards our invisibility have made us hate ourselves more than anything. Our idea of love must be found within, for we live in a world not of our own. Growing up thinking we must be one way, when really we are the other we must fight ourselves for our existence. Our hopes and our dreams must alter drastically in order to accommodate societal institutions.
The American Dream becomes our own when we dream of one day having a husband or wife, 2.5 kids, a dog and a steady well paying job. Although in a country where you can be fired for being invisible in 36 states and can’t even have the hope to marry the person you love our hope ceases to exist. It becomes a faint glow of our hearts and leaves us wondering what we are to do with our lives.
Coming to this realization some will take there own lives as apparent in our national suicide rate where 1/3 of all suicides can be related to a struggle with sexual orientation. Others waste away trying to make the most of life by loving the material world. Some make the most of what they have and just get by. Others fight for a love that the world cannot see. And a few try to pretend that who they are, isn’t there. They try to assimilate into America, marrying the way society has told us to, and finding the American Dream on the premise of lies and untruths.
It is a sad way to grow up, constantly having to question everything around you. From the people one meets in the super market to those closest to us, we must question all, and in some cases fear the worst. Always wondering who to unmask ourselves to, we seek out others, but they too are alone. We cannot look across the room to see people like us. So it is a personal struggle that is made more horrendous by the hate shown towards our kind. While the word fag may have ran rampant in the sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth grades as just a negative connotation, to us it was like stabbing a dagger into our hearts, because for us, it was true. We were that awful word and could do nothing to change it.
For those of us that come out of the closet, it is a new set of what ifs. No longer is it, “Will my parents still love me when I tell them I am gay?”. It is “Do I tell the doctor I’m gay? What if the doctor is homophobic? What if the police officer is homophobic, will he treat me in a just way? Will I be fairly evaluated when applying for jobs? Will I be able to have a fair trial if the judge thinks that what I am is evil? Will I be able to move into a neighborhood without my neighbors thinking I’m a child molester? Will they accept me and my family like any other family? Will I be treated differently by my professors if they know I’m gay? Do I tell my roommate I’m gay? Will I make them uncomfortable? Do I go to the movies with my significant other?” and many, many more questions like that? It is a burden that has and will continue to live with invisible people.
The baring of our hearts is one that must come if we are to be free and to enjoy the life that God intended us to. However to bare ones heart is to unveil the invisibility that was forced upon us since the day we were born. Our desires for love, come with consequences, however, it is love we seek not only because we are drawn to it by our primitive nature, but because it is a long and lonely road to walk and the dream to have someone beside you is a dream that moves one forward. The hope that one day, someone, somewhere will help bare the burden of isolation.
So to the world I call out “What If”? I ask what if our invisibility was seen? What if you could trust it, because you knew that it was there. You could see and feel what was invisible? Would you then cast away your doubts of our existence? Would you be not afraid of the love that we show, the love that we hold in our hearts? Would it be possible one day to see that our invisibility is not evil or perverse; but rather a gift? What if one day the world saw us as equal?
You see, our invisibility may seem impossible, but it is merely improbable to those that refuse to open their eyes. National Coming Out Month is an acknowledgement of that existence. It makes the unseen, visible and the unheard, audible and it is time for the world to see not with their eyes, but with their hearts for the soul can only be visible to those that seek to find it. Come out during National Coming Out Month whether you are gay, lesbian, bisexual or straight and show the world that you choose to see.
Invisible to the naked eye, I am the invisible man. A man you cannot touch, see or feel, I am a man that exists not of the body, but of the soul. My identity? My sexuality. My invisibility is not easily identified for it is draped in culture, heritage, and in some cases shame. It is my invisibility, and it is my choice to share it with the world.
The next month here at Gonzaga and across this great nation will be a month of celebration for invisible people like myself. It is called National Coming Out month where people of my diverse background are celebrated for who we are, where we can color ourselves however we wish, for this is the time to show the world our true selves.
What makes us invisible is that what we feel and how we see the world are all hidden within us. We have grown up alone. Some have been fortunate enough to have someone in their lives to show them the way, but for many, the process of self discovery has been a very long and painful road.
It’s not easy to come to terms with ones invisibility, especially when it is different. Role models are far and few between, and social attitudes towards our invisibility have made us hate ourselves more than anything. Our idea of love must be found within, for we live in a world not of our own. Growing up thinking we must be one way, when really we are the other we must fight ourselves for our existence. Our hopes and our dreams must alter drastically in order to accommodate societal institutions.
The American Dream becomes our own when we dream of one day having a husband or wife, 2.5 kids, a dog and a steady well paying job. Although in a country where you can be fired for being invisible in 36 states and can’t even have the hope to marry the person you love our hope ceases to exist. It becomes a faint glow of our hearts and leaves us wondering what we are to do with our lives.
Coming to this realization some will take there own lives as apparent in our national suicide rate where 1/3 of all suicides can be related to a struggle with sexual orientation. Others waste away trying to make the most of life by loving the material world. Some make the most of what they have and just get by. Others fight for a love that the world cannot see. And a few try to pretend that who they are, isn’t there. They try to assimilate into America, marrying the way society has told us to, and finding the American Dream on the premise of lies and untruths.
It is a sad way to grow up, constantly having to question everything around you. From the people one meets in the super market to those closest to us, we must question all, and in some cases fear the worst. Always wondering who to unmask ourselves to, we seek out others, but they too are alone. We cannot look across the room to see people like us. So it is a personal struggle that is made more horrendous by the hate shown towards our kind. While the word fag may have ran rampant in the sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth grades as just a negative connotation, to us it was like stabbing a dagger into our hearts, because for us, it was true. We were that awful word and could do nothing to change it.
For those of us that come out of the closet, it is a new set of what ifs. No longer is it, “Will my parents still love me when I tell them I am gay?”. It is “Do I tell the doctor I’m gay? What if the doctor is homophobic? What if the police officer is homophobic, will he treat me in a just way? Will I be fairly evaluated when applying for jobs? Will I be able to have a fair trial if the judge thinks that what I am is evil? Will I be able to move into a neighborhood without my neighbors thinking I’m a child molester? Will they accept me and my family like any other family? Will I be treated differently by my professors if they know I’m gay? Do I tell my roommate I’m gay? Will I make them uncomfortable? Do I go to the movies with my significant other?” and many, many more questions like that? It is a burden that has and will continue to live with invisible people.
The baring of our hearts is one that must come if we are to be free and to enjoy the life that God intended us to. However to bare ones heart is to unveil the invisibility that was forced upon us since the day we were born. Our desires for love, come with consequences, however, it is love we seek not only because we are drawn to it by our primitive nature, but because it is a long and lonely road to walk and the dream to have someone beside you is a dream that moves one forward. The hope that one day, someone, somewhere will help bare the burden of isolation.
So to the world I call out “What If”? I ask what if our invisibility was seen? What if you could trust it, because you knew that it was there. You could see and feel what was invisible? Would you then cast away your doubts of our existence? Would you be not afraid of the love that we show, the love that we hold in our hearts? Would it be possible one day to see that our invisibility is not evil or perverse; but rather a gift? What if one day the world saw us as equal?
You see, our invisibility may seem impossible, but it is merely improbable to those that refuse to open their eyes. National Coming Out Month is an acknowledgement of that existence. It makes the unseen, visible and the unheard, audible and it is time for the world to see not with their eyes, but with their hearts for the soul can only be visible to those that seek to find it. Come out during National Coming Out Month whether you are gay, lesbian, bisexual or straight and show the world that you choose to see.
I love you
written awhile ago for someone I care very much about:)
I love you. Never ever in my life have I ever felt as wonderful as I do when I think about you, my one and only. To wish upon myself your simple touch and the simplicity of your soul, devours my desire to destroy it. To force myself to believe that I am wrong, that you can only be an image of a life I only wish I had. I refuse to believe that what I feel is morbid and perverse, for what I feel has completely altered my life and the way I think. It is my love for you that sustains my being, and it is my love for you that gives me the strength and courage to wake each morning and face the new day. You take my breathe away, every little glance, every childish laugh, every impressionable smile, sustains itself within my soul, for I can not find the words to say that I need you so. You are the light by which my soul is guided and it is the feeling I get just by being by your side that makes me feel such incredible joy and relief. I can’t believe it. What am I to do? I’m trapped in a world that will not let me live the life I desire to live, and even worse, I feel binds you to this earth, hidden behind curtains of shame and ugliness. I do not know what will happen, but am certain that there can be love, and I shall wait for I believe. I believe in love.
I love you. Never ever in my life have I ever felt as wonderful as I do when I think about you, my one and only. To wish upon myself your simple touch and the simplicity of your soul, devours my desire to destroy it. To force myself to believe that I am wrong, that you can only be an image of a life I only wish I had. I refuse to believe that what I feel is morbid and perverse, for what I feel has completely altered my life and the way I think. It is my love for you that sustains my being, and it is my love for you that gives me the strength and courage to wake each morning and face the new day. You take my breathe away, every little glance, every childish laugh, every impressionable smile, sustains itself within my soul, for I can not find the words to say that I need you so. You are the light by which my soul is guided and it is the feeling I get just by being by your side that makes me feel such incredible joy and relief. I can’t believe it. What am I to do? I’m trapped in a world that will not let me live the life I desire to live, and even worse, I feel binds you to this earth, hidden behind curtains of shame and ugliness. I do not know what will happen, but am certain that there can be love, and I shall wait for I believe. I believe in love.
Can You See What I See
Published October 2005 in the Gonzaga Bulletin
Drawn out conclusions from misinterpretations, sophist arguments not for right or wrong, but to prove ones own agenda, debates fueled by the intensity of fear and demoralization rather than openness and honesty, all a part of a national debate that fails to address the real issues at the heart of the civil marriage debate. I ask you all; how many of you have ever walked through fire, been struck by lightning, jumped out of a plane, or ran across America from Ocean to Ocean. Not many of you can say that you have actually experienced one of these situations, let alone, can you honestly say that you truly know what it’s like to go through any of these experiences. What you do know is that these experiences do exist and that people somewhere out there in the great big world do these things, sometimes on a regular basis.
How many of you understand what it’s like to be a gay or lesbian person, better yet a minority in society? How many of you have had to live everyday in fear of who you are? How many of you have to hide the true beauty that is you because you are afraid that your friends and family may disapprove of what you are? I ask you, how many of you truly understand what it’s like to grow up gay or lesbian in today’s society?
I don’t believe that many of you here at Gonzaga truly and honestly know what is like to be gay or lesbian. For if you truly knew, you couldn’t say that it is grotesque or perverted, unnatural or wrong, or even a conscious decision or choice. How many of you know what it’s like to grow up hiding who it is you are, fearing the abandonment of your parents and friends, feeling confusion and torment over where your place is in this world, or to be ashamed of something that has the potential to be so beautiful and wonderful?
The realities of being gay in our world today are horrific and gruesome, the fact that in Egypt right now, 45 men are being held captive, tortured and beaten to death because they are gay. The fact that American parents kick their own children out of their homes onto the streets because their children tell them “Mommy and Daddy… I’m gay.” (what a great family Mr. Bush) The fact that one third of all teenage suicide can be directly linked to a struggle with sexuality. Many young gay and lesbian youth are ostracized or beaten up by their peers due to the simple fact that they are attracted to members of the same gender. There are still so many closeted youth and adults who are still ashamed and afraid of what they are. Why? Why does this happen to these people? What makes them deserving of these unjust, ignorant and often times isolating actions? I’m sorry but is that what God intended, an all loving God, a God who cares for all, Creator of heaven and earth? Excuse me, but where in the Bible does it say that thou shall insult, ridicule, demean, deny, ignore, intrude, demoralize, demote, denounce, degrade, defame, defect, defile, debase, dehumanize, demonize, detach, and desolate homosexual people?
The whole reason I am here today on this platform shouting at the top of my lungs, desperate for anyone to hear, is because I do live by the same moral code that many of us here at this University live by. I too was taught when I was a young child that Thou shall not lie, thou shall love thy neighbor as thyself , thou shall love thyself as thy loves Me, thou shall not bare false witness against thy neighbor(Exodus 20:21), and it is because I was taught these commandments that I stand here today in honesty out of love for myself, my god and my neighbor, letting the world know that I am created of a different dust, but am still human, still thy brother, still thy neighbor, still thy friend.
I am gay. I am human, in and of the same being. Of His flesh, His blood; of your flesh, your blood and I do not ask you to understand; merely to accept that there are things that we may never know, that we may never understand, but that ultimately they are all Created out of love for the completeness and wholeness of the Universe by His truly.
All I want out of life is to find happiness, love and compassion. Part of that is loving myself. Part of that is loving my fellow man, and part of that is having the hope that one day I too may find my prince charming and live happily ever after. I want kids, I want to have someone to wake up to in the mornings, someone to hold when I am cold, someone to comfort me when I am sad, someone to have and to hold, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish until death do us part.
I hope that one day we will all realize that we were all made by the same Creator and that what connects all human beings is not our blood and bones, but our heart and our soul. Our gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, culture or creed, are merely reflections of that which truly embraces all humanity, our souls. Some things exist whether we believe in them or not. Truth can only be found within ourselves, and it is within ourselves that we will find the strength to create a world in which all people are given the common courtesy and respect that they as human beings, as Creatures of God deserve. Believe it or not, love can exist between two people of the same gender in all of its glory and splendor. I personally hope that you my brothers and sisters, my friends and family, my neighbors and fellow human beings will welcome me and my love, not just into your nation, but into your community as well. I can walk through fire and Jesus did walk on water.
Drawn out conclusions from misinterpretations, sophist arguments not for right or wrong, but to prove ones own agenda, debates fueled by the intensity of fear and demoralization rather than openness and honesty, all a part of a national debate that fails to address the real issues at the heart of the civil marriage debate. I ask you all; how many of you have ever walked through fire, been struck by lightning, jumped out of a plane, or ran across America from Ocean to Ocean. Not many of you can say that you have actually experienced one of these situations, let alone, can you honestly say that you truly know what it’s like to go through any of these experiences. What you do know is that these experiences do exist and that people somewhere out there in the great big world do these things, sometimes on a regular basis.
How many of you understand what it’s like to be a gay or lesbian person, better yet a minority in society? How many of you have had to live everyday in fear of who you are? How many of you have to hide the true beauty that is you because you are afraid that your friends and family may disapprove of what you are? I ask you, how many of you truly understand what it’s like to grow up gay or lesbian in today’s society?
I don’t believe that many of you here at Gonzaga truly and honestly know what is like to be gay or lesbian. For if you truly knew, you couldn’t say that it is grotesque or perverted, unnatural or wrong, or even a conscious decision or choice. How many of you know what it’s like to grow up hiding who it is you are, fearing the abandonment of your parents and friends, feeling confusion and torment over where your place is in this world, or to be ashamed of something that has the potential to be so beautiful and wonderful?
The realities of being gay in our world today are horrific and gruesome, the fact that in Egypt right now, 45 men are being held captive, tortured and beaten to death because they are gay. The fact that American parents kick their own children out of their homes onto the streets because their children tell them “Mommy and Daddy… I’m gay.” (what a great family Mr. Bush) The fact that one third of all teenage suicide can be directly linked to a struggle with sexuality. Many young gay and lesbian youth are ostracized or beaten up by their peers due to the simple fact that they are attracted to members of the same gender. There are still so many closeted youth and adults who are still ashamed and afraid of what they are. Why? Why does this happen to these people? What makes them deserving of these unjust, ignorant and often times isolating actions? I’m sorry but is that what God intended, an all loving God, a God who cares for all, Creator of heaven and earth? Excuse me, but where in the Bible does it say that thou shall insult, ridicule, demean, deny, ignore, intrude, demoralize, demote, denounce, degrade, defame, defect, defile, debase, dehumanize, demonize, detach, and desolate homosexual people?
The whole reason I am here today on this platform shouting at the top of my lungs, desperate for anyone to hear, is because I do live by the same moral code that many of us here at this University live by. I too was taught when I was a young child that Thou shall not lie, thou shall love thy neighbor as thyself , thou shall love thyself as thy loves Me, thou shall not bare false witness against thy neighbor(Exodus 20:21), and it is because I was taught these commandments that I stand here today in honesty out of love for myself, my god and my neighbor, letting the world know that I am created of a different dust, but am still human, still thy brother, still thy neighbor, still thy friend.
I am gay. I am human, in and of the same being. Of His flesh, His blood; of your flesh, your blood and I do not ask you to understand; merely to accept that there are things that we may never know, that we may never understand, but that ultimately they are all Created out of love for the completeness and wholeness of the Universe by His truly.
All I want out of life is to find happiness, love and compassion. Part of that is loving myself. Part of that is loving my fellow man, and part of that is having the hope that one day I too may find my prince charming and live happily ever after. I want kids, I want to have someone to wake up to in the mornings, someone to hold when I am cold, someone to comfort me when I am sad, someone to have and to hold, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish until death do us part.
I hope that one day we will all realize that we were all made by the same Creator and that what connects all human beings is not our blood and bones, but our heart and our soul. Our gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, culture or creed, are merely reflections of that which truly embraces all humanity, our souls. Some things exist whether we believe in them or not. Truth can only be found within ourselves, and it is within ourselves that we will find the strength to create a world in which all people are given the common courtesy and respect that they as human beings, as Creatures of God deserve. Believe it or not, love can exist between two people of the same gender in all of its glory and splendor. I personally hope that you my brothers and sisters, my friends and family, my neighbors and fellow human beings will welcome me and my love, not just into your nation, but into your community as well. I can walk through fire and Jesus did walk on water.
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