Homosexuals are akin to the people who prefer vanilla ice cream. Both are choices which have validity to the person who chooses them, but, to be honest, I do not fully understand either one.
What I do understand is that the only difference between the two is that homosexuality, relating to sexual preference and lifestyle choice, most often is dealt with in the home, while vanilla eaters parade their strangeness on display throughout the streets.
Vanilla eaters aren't the only ones-lots of people parade their \strangeness"" through the streets. People with Mohawks, purple hair, rats on leashes or those who talk to themselves are all free to wander around without too much complaint.
These people are ""OK"" because they are ""moral"" and there isn't a religious doctrine about having small animals on leashes or doing what they do. Some religions do have taboos against homosexuality though and therein begins the angry internal dissonance.
Religious and moral taboos against homosexuality are the reason we don't have homosexual marriages. Religions, after all, began marriage as an institution. They initially set down all the rules and gave us the idea of monogamy and faithfulness.
We love religion so much in this country we made certain we were separate from it, thus keeping religious freedom for everyone, so everyone can choose 38 different religions if they like. The state is not and cannot be a source of religion doctrine and cannot force any religion to recognize homosexuals. The state also cannot force the Southern Baptist preachers to read wedding ceremonies over a homosexual couple.
Any serious attempt to redefine the marriage which is perceived as a religious institution will have religious and moral dissenters up in arms. I cannot say I find fault in their determination to hold true to their religious beliefs, which they have long held sacred, and a redefinition of marriage may in their perception cheapen or degrade.
My extreme solution to the problem would be to end marriage as an aspect of the state. We grant civil unions to those couples who seek them regardless of religion. We allow homosexuals and those non-homosexuals who seek a civil union to have the benefits of the married.
We recognize the marriage of those faiths that we recognize now, asking only that they remain within the standards of unions today. Homosexuals may get ""married"" but only by those faiths which recognize the legitimacy of their union, and those recognized marriages shall be recognized in legality by the state. No religion need recognize the union of any couple save for those whom they themselves have married.
Unions and marriages are only to be recognized by the state as providing certain legal rights, with no preference, be it legal or moral to either. The ability of those adults who wish to join their lives and establish a single entity to the eyes of the public shall in that way not be abridged.
Homosexuals are citizens. Love or hate their lifestyle choice, they are a part of us we cannot tear asunder without first tearing asunder the rights and privileges of citizenship. Recognizing that there must be a balance in upholding their rights and trespassing on the moral and religious beliefs held by large sections of the population, the path we walk must be a careful one.
