Um, well, if disagreeing with another person can be called bigotry, throw it at me!
Just to make sure, I looked up "bigotry" in the dictionary, which defined the word as "stubborn and complete intolerance of any creed belief or opinion that differs from one's own." Stubborn, perhaps I am, but completely intolerant? Since when is disagreeing, asking "But-what-about...", how is that bigotry? I think my First Amendment right to freedom of speech is being infringed upon!
It was another lifetime ago for me, before kids, before marriage, that I worked for the Catholic Diocese of Burlington when gay marriage/civil unions electrified Vermont. That was in 2000. Answering the phone during that legislative session was horrible. It seemed that every person who disagreed with the Bishop's stand that marriage remain defined as "one man and one woman" had to call and vent. Little wonder that a year later I was job hunting out of state and focusing on television production rather than public relations!
I remember my grandparents asking me what was going on in the legislature, why was this being debated? My grandfather had served in the House of Representatives from the mid-1960's to late 1980's, different but changing times. I had explained to my grandparents that marriage was being called a "civil right" and that the civil rights struggle of the '60's was still in recent enough memory that saying "civil rights" was like granting a free pass, putting everyone on notice to get their hands off, because no one wants to infringe on civil rights. At the same time, I voiced my perplexity with this popular reasoning. Weren't civil rights about being a citizen? Voting?
Nine years later, the Vermont legislature upgraded civil unions to same sex marriage, though I'm not sure I knew about it when it happened. I was five hundred miles away and dealing with a two-year-old and four-year-old. Reading the news was never high on my priority list. If I was aware of anything politically, it was the settling in of our new president, the first black man to lead our country, less than a dozen miles from my home. I hoped he would do well as president, but knew he had been handed a bad platter of problems.
To this other issue.
Like a patch work quilt, all the states in the union are being called to declare themselves on marriage and to define it for this age. I wonder how it will equip or confuse the current and coming generations about relationships and dealing with not just with differences in opinion but differences in perspective that are wired into gender. Pandora's box is open. Now how do we deal with it? Can we really be so naive to think it is all and only about love? Terrible things can happen under the guise of love.
And can I go live under my rock again?
Not likely now that I have children venturing out into the uneven seas of school.
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