Two steps forward, one step back

Sometimes I wonder if it’s really one forward and two back.  A few days ago, after years of debate, New York, joined Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont in legalizing gay marriage.  On the other hand, according to Wikipedia, forty states outright prohibit gay marriage.

The New York move was viewed as a huge step in the progress towards equality, fairness, and human rights.  I agree with that view.  I don’t know when it happened, but somewhere along the way, I began to view this issue as a touchstone for our progress as a society.  Ten years ago, if you had told me that I would care about gay marriage, I would have laughed at the thought.  Gay marriage?  Really? 

When Proposition 8 was placed on the ballot in California, however, something turned on for me.  I have friends who got married in the final days before the election.  I saw how happy they were and I realized that marriage is a basic, fundamental right that no consenting adults should be deprived of. 

The arguments of those who oppose gay marriage actually helped convince me of this because they are based on nothing logical.  Instead, they are based on fear, of difference, of intolerant beliefs.  Allowing gays to marry would weaken the institution of marriage, opponents say.  Really?  Allowing people who actually want to get married will weaken the institution?  How does this possibly make sense?  If there was any logic to the arguments against gay marriage, I might not feel as strongly, but I have no patience for intolerance and fear.  As a result, I became an avid supporter of the idea that marriage should be for everybody, whether gay or straight.

New York’s action was good news.  And then it was followed by the news that a disabled gay couple was kicked out of a community pool in Kentucky because they were gay.  The employee who took the action cited the Bible in support of his action.  I can almost excuse this based on my own stereotypes of the South.  Intolerance there takes a whole different shape.

But, then, Monday morning I opened The Sacramento Bee and read this story about a Fair Oaks a church is leaving its national organization over the issue of ordaining gay priests. This isn’t the Deep South with its history of discrimination and hate.  This is the community I live in.  Yes, as Jacqueline Cheung noted in her blog here on Elk Grove Patch a few days ago, Fair Oaks is not quite like the rest of the Sacramento area in terms of its diversity.  But, still, it's happening right here, in my very own background.  And, the national organization won’t force any local church to ordain or accept gay priests if it so chooses.

I just don’t get this.  I see these stories and wonder if there is any hope for tolerance in this country—for acceptance of the idea that people who don’t think the same, don’t believe the same, and don’t do the same, are still entitled to the same basic freedoms as those who do.  Diversity is a good thing that shouldn’t be feared.