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A Mother's Reflections
The following is a very strong and moving letter written by the mother of a gay boy in Vermont...
"Many letters have been sent to the Valley News concerning the homosexual menace in Vermont. I am the mother of a gay son and I've taken enough from you good people. I'm tired of your foolish rhetoric about the "homosexual agenda" and your allegations that accepting homosexuality is the same thing as advocating sex with children. You are cruel and ignorant. You have been robbing me of the joys of motherhood ever since my children were tiny.
My firstborn son started suffering at the hands of the moral little thugs from your moral, upright families from the time he was in the first grade. He was physically and verbally abused from first grade straight through high school because he was perceived to be gay.
He never professed to be gay or had any association with anything gay, but he had the misfortune not to walk or have gestures like the other boys. He was called "fag" incessantly, starting when he was 6.
In high school, while your children were doing what kids that age should be doing, mine labored over a suicide note, drafting and redrafting it to be sure his family knew how much he loved them. My sobbing 17-year-old tore the heart out of me as he choked out that he just couldn't bear to continue living any longer, that he didn't want to be gay and that he couldn't face a life without dignity.
You have the audacity to talk about protecting families and children from the homosexual menace, while you yourselves tear apart families and drive children to despair. I don't know why my son is gay, but I do know that God didn't put him, and millions like him, on this Earth to give you someone to abuse. God gave you brains so that you could think, and it's about time you started doing that.
At the core of all your misguided beliefs is the belief that this could never happen to you, that there is some kind of subculture out there that people have chosen to join. The fact is that if it can happen to my family, it can happen to yours, and you won't get to choose. Whether it is genetic or whether something occurs during a critical time of fetal development, I don't know. I can only tell you with an absolute certainty that it is inborn.
If you want to tout your own morality, you'd best come up with something more substantive than your heterosexuality. You did nothing to earn it; it was given to you. If you disagree, I would be interested in hearing your story, because my own heterosexuality was a blessing I received with no effort whatsoever on my part. It is so woven into the very soul of me that nothing could ever change it. For those of you who reduce sexual orientation to a simple choice, a character issue, a bad habit or something that can be changed by a 10-step program, I'm puzzled. Are you saying that your own sexual orientation is nothing more than something you have chosen, that you could change it at will? If that's not the case, then why would you suggest that someone else can?
A popular theme in your letters is that Vermont has been infiltrated by outsiders. Both sides of my family have lived in Vermont for generations. I am heart and soul a Vermonter, so I'll thank you to stop saying that you are speaking for "true Vermonters."
You invoke the memory of the brave people who have fought on the battlefield for this great country, saying that they didn't give their lives so that the "homosexual agenda" could tear down the principles they died defending. My 83-year-old father fought in some of the most horrific battles of World War II, was wounded and awarded the Purple Heart.
He shakes his head in sadness at the life his grandson has had to live. He says he fought alongside homosexuals in those battles, that they did their part and bothered no one. One of his best friends in the service was gay, and he never knew it until the end, and when he did find out, it mattered not at all. That wasn't the measure of the man.
You religious folk just can't bear the thought that as my son emerges from the hell that was his childhood he might like to find a lifelong companion and have a measure of happiness. It offends your sensibilities that he should request the right to visit that companion in the hospital, to make medical decisions for him or to benefit from tax laws governing inheritance.
How dare he? you say. These outrageous requests would threaten the very existence of your family, would undermine the sanctity of marriage. You use religion to abdicate your responsibility to be thinking human beings. There are vast numbers of religious people who find your attitudes repugnant. God is not for the privileged majority, and God knows my son has committed no sin.
The deep-thinking author of a letter to the April 12 Valley News who lectures about homosexual sin and tells us about "those of us who have been blessed with the benefits of a religious upbringing" asks: "What ever happened to the idea of striving . . . to be better human beings than we are?"
Indeed, sir, what ever happened to that? "
Indeed, how does demonizing a group of people to the extent the Republican party has homosexuals lift us in any way? How does anyone claim to be Christian and encourage mindless hate and fear?
I wish I knew.
Posted by John C. Welch at 11:04 | Permalink
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Comments
I know how you meant your ending, but let me say; I don't wish to know, I hope I can never figure out how the hell people justify that crap.
Thanks for posting that.
Posted by: W. Ian Blanton | August 7, 2005 06:53 PM
It's not your own letter, but thanks for posting a letter that smacks down the hypocrites.
Posted by: Commodus | August 9, 2005 09:12 PM
I just think more people need to see how this demonization of homosexuals hurts people.
Not inconveniences, not puts them out, but hurts them. How it makes parents cry at night over what could be happening to their babies just because they're gay.
No one deserves that 'just because'
Posted by: John C. Welch | August 10, 2005 03:36 PM
thought you might like a film coming out about a violent, homophobic, stuttering war monger (sound like anyone you know?)who becomes a gay friendly, inspirational speaker
check it out at http://www.revolutionmovie.com
Posted by: joe klein | August 16, 2005 12:40 AM
I was enjoying this piece until it got to the word "Republican". Last November in Ohio, a Constitutional amendment to prohibit same-sex marriage passed by a margin of 2:1. When 67% of voters approve such a measure by such a majority, it means people from political backgrounds of all kinds likely supported it. Opposition to and discomfort with homosexuals does not stop at any kind of political boundary.
It's also worthy of note that Ohio's Republican Governor and both Repulican Senators opposed the amendment.
Posted by: Aaron Adams | August 26, 2005 03:19 PM
Yeah...unfortunately, the conservative yahoos behind those have done a fantastic job of demonizing the gay community and emotionalizing the issue until people are sucked into thinking that gay people are this force of evil looking to undo all that is good in the world.
I really wish that something besides time and far too much hard work was the cure for that.
Posted by: John C. Welch | August 26, 2005 04:09 PM
I'd say that gay people themselves are equally to blame. Their message is based on emotion as much as the anti-gay crowd, and gay people in general have done a lousy job of organizing themselves, formulating a clear, logical message, and appealing to the voters. I honestly think the majority of Americans, homosexual and heterosexual, haven't taken time to think about the topic within the context of government's role in our lives. People just know that they do or don't like X, so X should or shouldn't be allowed via the law.
Posted by: Aaron Adams | August 27, 2005 10:36 AM
Very good letter, and the follow-up postings are pretty well thought out as well.
It seems to me, and correct me if I am off-base here, that with the "collapse" of Communism and the tearing down of the Iron Curtain, "the church" has needed a common enemy against which to "rally the troups." Gays & Lesbians are a convenient villan. Most people really have no idea what it really means to be gay. They've heard, through ministers and even the media, that gays are immoral and pedophiles. They remember the lisping, mincing stereotypes from movies & television, and apply the stereotype to all gay men (and all lesbians wear flanel shirts, too). Stereotypes are based on reality... there are gay men that mince and swish, and Lesbians that can drop an engine block in 5 minutes, but they are in the minority. It becomes a stereotype when you apply such a narrow definition to an entire group of people.
But I digress. My point being that many (certainly not all, by any means) religious leaders demonize homosexuals as a focal-point for monetary support. Political types, some of them gay themselves, jump on the band-wagon for political gains. They do this by spreading lies and mis-information, not really caring who they hurt in the process.
It's a business model.
Invest your gay child.
Posted by: Chiron (aka Paul) | August 30, 2005 08:14 PM
While I agree that homosexuals are often a target of religion, I don't agree that religion is the primary motivating force behind homosexual discrimination. I think it is something much more basic than that. Many people who are heterosexuals simply can't or won't understand or relate to homosexuals, and because homosexuals are a minority "them" and heterosexuals are a majority "us", homosexuals are "abnormal" and need to get their act in gear and become "normal". Obviously there are giant flaws in this reasoning, and those who subscribe to it are much more likely to have these thoughts based on emotion rather than logic.
Posted by: Aaron Adams | August 31, 2005 11:45 AM
Definitely.
Face it, if you went by stats, the whole "OH NO, TEH GAYZ R AFTER THE CHILDRYUN" silliness would be all about straights.
But it's easy to demonize that which you don't understand. What I don't understand is why that matters. So I don't understand two men having sex. What does that matter? I don't understand a lot of things, doesn't mean I fear or hate them.
Posted by: John C. Welch | August 31, 2005 04:13 PM
Coming in two months late to this conversation, but still wanted to comment. I think it is yet ANOTHER example of, to paraphrase a famous Canadian politician, "the government having no business in the bedrooms of the nation" This comment was made inthe early 60's, just before Canada struck down sodomy laws and a few other things. Now we have legalized both gay marriage and divorce. Some churches are blessing these unions, some are not. I don't have a problem with that-- you do whatever the hell you want in your own church.
But let me make my point simply--even though I "choose" to live as a heterosexual white woman, it appalls and disgusts me that there are still people out there who feel not only the right but the need to shriek their outrage and condemnation against the gay community. To me, I only hear them broadcasting their own ignorance--but it is still dangerous.
One of my children had a teacher (of the same gender) who was gay. This is the litmus test of any of those old tapes still playing in your head. It was common knowledge, and I have yet to meet a parent who has removed their child or made a fuss about this teacher. It is a non-issue up here. Something that makes me infinitely proud to live where I do (even though gas is over a buck a litre).
Great column, John, sorry I missed it till now.
Lisa
Posted by: Beseel | October 29, 2005 08:44 PM