GAY MARRIAGE….On the same day that the Massachusetts legislature became the first in the nation to finally approve gay marriage, Michael Kinsley writes about “The Quiet Gay Revolution”:
On no issue is history moving faster than on “gay rights” — an already antiquated term for full and equal participation and acceptance of gay men and women in American life….Kids grow up today with gay friends, gay parents, gay parents of friends and gay friends of parents. If only blacks and whites were as thoroughly mixed together in society as gays and straights are. Kids are also exposed constantly to an entertainment culture in which gays are not merely accepted but in some ways dominant. You rarely see a reality show without a gay cast member, while Rosie O’Donnell is a coveted free agent and Ellen DeGeneres is America’s sweetheart. The notion that gays must be segregated out of the military for the sake of our national security must strike Americans younger than, say, 40 as simply weird, just as we of the previous generation find the rules of racial segregation weird. (O.K., run that by me again: they needed separate drinking fountains because … why?)
In the long run, it’s almost impossible to keep hatred of gays stoked up among people who actually have friends and acquaintances who are openly gay. It’s just too obvious that there’s really nothing to be afraid of. So Dobson and his ilk can keep screaming, but they know they’re losing. Sometime soon, they’re going to have to find a different peril to Western civilization to keep the checks rolling in.
In the meantime, congratulations to Massachusetts, the first state in the union to enter the 21st century. Only 49 to go.
