Trying My Hand at Political Blogging

Note: As a general rule, I try to stay away from political blogging. I'm not very good at it, and I fear it will get me in trouble somehow. Still, this is important to me, so I'm tossing caution to the wind and letting fly.

This disgusts me. I've been reading and listening to a lot of hubbub about this issue for the last few days and the arguments brought up by the opponants never cease to wrinkle my brown and hurt my brain (and make my middle finger itchy). To whit:

-if we let "the gays" marry, we'll somehow erode the very foundation of marriage itself.

-if we let a man marry a man or a woman marry a woman, what's to keep someone from arguing their right to marry MORE than one person? Or their dog? Or their mother? Or their toaster?! Dear God! It'll be the end of the world!

-allowing gays to marry will send confusing signals to our young people and make them more likely to choose an alternative lifestyle (which assumes, of course, that it's a choice. I don't know about you, but I don't ever remember choosing my sexuality...)

-allowing same-sex marriage will destroy the health care system because all HIV positive patients will have to do is get married to receive health care benefits (I particularly love this one, because it assumes that only gay people are HIV positive).

All if this is so much homophobic, ignorant horseshit. The only reason this topic is being brought up at all right now is because the Republican party is gasping like a trout on a dock and is fearful that it will lose its majority in the upcoming elections. It is a no-brainer that bringing up this social issue fires up the righty-tighty conservatives and religious groups and gives them a common "threat" to rally against (remember the last round of elections? Remember the lovely little duck-and-cover they pulled with the immigration issue to divert our attention away from the train wreck that is our current involvement in Iraq?).

Gay rights is an issue that gets me worked up. I can't stand that society discriminates against people because they are gay, and I hate that people I love can be targets of violence and hatred simply because they don't attract to the opposite sex. Whose business is it, anyway? I want the politicians to focus on cleaning up the messes this country has made in the rest of the world, on making sure our roads are whole and safe, and on fixing the education and health care nightmares we have in this country. Quit picking on gays and get to the real work we elected you to do.