Hat tip to David for putting me up to this.
International Day Against Homophobia is celebrated every year on May 17, and promotes the concepts of tolerance and acceptance, which is basically all that “the gays” are asking from society. I have been a long time, vociferous supporter of the gay rights movement in my limited circles. I am really glad to see that the whole issue is gaining more and more momentum and supporters every day.
There are so many misconceptions regarding this issue. I usually do not discuss this affair on public forum or discussion threads since the inevitable result is that it degenerates into a name-calling contest, and I never win those.
Before I start ranting on it already, let me introduce the awesome music of Cosmo Jarvis called Gay Pirates. Thanks again to David for blogging this. This is most wonderful. A jaunty tune, a catchy beat, kitszchy choreography that anyone can shake their hips with and a story that breaks your heart: this stuff is right out of Bollywood:
My personal impression is that there is a lot of misconceptions going around about homosexuality that causes the doubt in the minds of most fence-riders on the issue of homosexuality. However, like all other forms of persecution and bigotry, homophobes are people who just do not see reason. “Haters will be hatin’”, as they say!
It was good to hear President Obama come out in support of Gay Marriage as a personal standpoint as well as a (possible) policy stand. Although he had never taken a strong standpoint prior to this un-closeting, his coming out as the first pro-Gay American President is a precedent that the other world leaders should emulate. I really should not be talking American Politics, since its not something the dynamics of which I am very aware of, but two of the social issues that Obama supported made me a fan of his: pro-gay stance on the issue of gay marriage and scrapping the “Don’t ask don’t tell” doctrine for employment of gay people in the US Armed Forces. Two very discriminatory and derogatory issues on which he took a strong stance really was good to see and would have won him the support of the considerably large gay and pro-gay voters…
While the President was open about talking about issues like Gay rights and marriage, his presidential competition, “Mutt” Romney dodged and danced and Piers Morgan had a field day harassing him with to the point questions, it was refreshing to see this happen:
Closer home, however, like many other issues of a sensitive nature (and a possibly vote-bank disrupting threat) the Government has done flip-flops that would make Romney look amateurish. Once they Home Ministry opposed the gay rights agenda in Supreme Court (and got duly rapped by the judges):
But they soon realized the importance of the issue and tried to appease the pissed off judiciary and got into all kinds of tangles. The news papers had a field day spinning off on the tomfoolery of the state:
Anyways. On the occasion of IDAHO, I would, on a personal note, like to assert the right of people to love, live and marry. May the powers that be see sense…