Points to ponder:
1) Some (probably most) people who are gay, are born that way. If you don’t believe it, stop reading, since it would take Jesus to convince you otherwise.
2) If two (or more) adults want to get together for love, sex, or coffee, I say go ahead. If they decided they want to spend the rest of their lives together (like for hospital visits or shared health plans) that seems okay too. However, if it’s “more than two”, I think we need to have new laws – maybe we need to create the concept of a “family corporation”, since that organization could live forever with new members replacing the old.
4) “Marriage”. Historically, say 500 years ago, if two people wanted to get married, they just said it, and it was done – no priest required. In modern times, it has religious implications. I say pox on both your houses about what “marriage” means. However, since it is currently a more of a religious construct, and gays say they need access to marriage for the legal advantages, please be happy with “civil union”, which provides all the benefits, but doesn’t agitate the religious (unless you want more than just the legal benefits, which I suspect is true for some members of the gay community).
5) Kids. Here’s possibly the one exception to the whole “civil union” vs. “marriage” thing.
-I think gays are born that way, BUT …
-I also thing some people are on the border and susceptible to external influence.
-This implies (and is backed up by a recent study), that it is possible that children of gay parents are more likely to be gay themselves (actually about 10 times more likely according to that study).
-Given choice between dysfunctional heterosexual parents, and loving, awesome gay parents, I would probably choose gay. However, all other things being equal, school was tough enough on my psyche that I didn’t need to be teased (or beaten up) about having two dads or moms (or looked at suspiciously in the locker room as being too influenced).
-There is perspective to be learned from both a male and a female parent – again, all other things being equal – that you just aren’t going to get with same sex parents.
-”normal”. Say what you will. I don’t believe I am homophobic, but at the same time, you will never get me to call gay people “normal” any more (or less) than I would call a person with 6 toes “normal”. They may walk and talk and be nice or mean and do a job just like anyone else, but they still aren’t “normal” in the sense that they are only 3% of the population – a population that they are born from, and would in fact not be here if everyone acted like them.
