KarMel Scholarship 2005
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“Labeled ‘different’” By
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Desciption of Submission: “An editorial piece I composed in response
to contemporary issues with labels and homosexuality
around the globe.” -
I myself am not too fond
of labels, I believe you should be who you are and express yourself that way,
and that way alone. I mean who needs labels?, I could
see food and clothing, but these are inanimate objects, we are humans, living
breathing things, we should not be labeled. Walking through the hallways, what
do you here? What do you see? People in their little cliques, their little
fashion cliques, yelling at one another for being different. Do you ever see
two people labeled “thugs” fighting, or two people labeled “Goths” fighting;
No! do you ever hear two people in the same clique
calling each other names, yelling at one another, picking on and bullying one
another, again, NO! ( and if you do it is very
unlikely and uncommon). Label, the five letter word that makes the world
go-round, that makes hate continue to exist, man vs. man,
that makes peace a word foreign to any language.
Okay so now that I
explained the hatred I have toward labels, I will dig a little deeper to the
reason pertaining as to why I loathe them so much. Unacceptable
to society, a disgrace in the eyes of millions of Americans, an altogether
idiotic view that has nothing to do with the people who see it as a nuisance.
Homosexuality, the word of the year, today’s new “problem” that many people
seem to get themselves entangled in when it is none of their business, just
being played out so much in the media lately that it just makes me sick.
Homosexuals are humans just like straight people or whatever else you can label
someone. I smell the same things you smell, I see the same things you see, I
experience pain and hurt the same way you do, Why is
it such a hard concept to grasp that I AM HUMAN, JUST LIKE YOU AND EVERYONE
ELSE.
I bet that no two people
today can say that they all like the same things, that they all are attracted
to the same kind of person, that they all think the same. But the one thing I
bet they can all agree on is that you do not like the feeling of being hurt or
put down or shunned by society because you are different. I feel like a
monster, like an alien, when that straight man gets on the screen of the
television and begins to voice his opinion on gay marriage, gay rights, or gay
anything. What does he know about us, about me? Why does his opinion count
toward the way I would like to live my life? Why does he get to choose what I
should like and dislike and will do with the rest of my life? Who I will love?
Is this not
Within the last few
months, there have been many many measures being taken to stop gays from ever
getting married. So here, again, I will voice MY opinion, the voice of the gay
male, on the subject matter of Same-sex marriage. A relationship, the last time
I checked, was a bonding between two people, who feel things for one another,
who basically are in love. Marriage, the furthering of a relationship to the
point in which you want to spend the rest of your life with a person, true
love, friendship, an intimate or close union. Where does it state that marriage
is between a man and a women? A marriage, again, is
between two people who love each other, whether man and women, man and man, or
woman and woman, all in all the same.
Do you know what really
gets to me when it comes to the topic of same-sex marriage? Those damn
Conservatives ( although not all), what do they know?
So ignorant, only believe what they believe is true, and what they say is
always right. Yeah okay?!?, what do they know about
being gay? Nothing! That’s all they have to say are those snippy comments in
which they have no clue as to what they are talking about. Take President Bush
for example, I myself am no Bush basher but I must say one thing, who does he
think he is? Trying to add an amendment to the constitution practically banning
same-sex marriage; is this man crazy? Does he want to ruin his chance of ever becoming
president again? Wow, first of all this man is a lunatic, and second he needs
to know and experience what it is like to be a homosexual before he can do such
a thing… ban someone from marrying someone they love, that is all it is; Does
this man have a heart? “ it is not right for the
government to prevent gay people from sharing the rights and responsibilities
of marriage.“ And may I say one more thing to those people out there who
believe that Homosexual marriages will lessen the value of what marriage really
stands for: Giving homosexuals an equal right to affirm their commitment
doesn’t reduce the incentive for heterosexuals to do the same. What we are
asking for is simply our equal right to marry the one we love and care for,
just as non-gay Americans do, is that such a big thing to ask for?
Ahhh! Okay now that I
vented on that topic I shall move on to my next favorite, gay couples being
able to adopt and raise children. We live in a society which pressures
heterosexuals to raise children and pressures lesbians and gay men not to raise
children. The desire to become a parent, however, recognizes no distinctions
based on sexual orientation. If we could just remove all of the effects of all
that pressure, we would undoubtedly find that heterosexuals want children a
good deal less of the time than they have them, and that lesbians and gay men
want them more. In my opinion, children of gays and lesbians are the considered
to be the most planned-for children on earth. Reason being, we can’t have children,
we have to have someone else have the children for us; why would one go through
such a hard process to get a child simply to love, and feel full, to just not
love them. It just makes me upset that people in our society, our supposed
brothers and sisters, basically want us ( gays), their
equal; to have nothing, to live in utmost depression, to be outcast in a
society which was built on freedom of expression, freedom to be who you want to
be, ( freedom of religion - but I won’t go there right now, ill save that
horrid topic for later in my paper). Looking around, and reading a little I
found a very inconsiderate quote that I very much disagree with that I would
like to share with you: “ Children need same-sex and an opposite-sex parent to
have the best chance to develop healthy sexual identities and that Children in
homosexual households are four times as likely to identify with homosexuality.”
Comments such as this aggravate me to the point in which, this may sound a
little odd but, I just want to become President or someone of high ranking in
the country and voice my opinion to the American public, and guide them through
example that these accusations are 110 percent false! One day… One day… I will
voice my opinion on this… Reaching at least one person is my goal.
Next, I would like to
convey how I feel on the topic of Gays serving in the military. I am so
astonished to see how people can get upset over nothing. Lifting the ban on
gays in the military isn’t exactly nothing, but its
pretty damn close. I would also like to explain something that was quite a
surprise, actually shocking, to me after doing a little research; While our
economy is continuously going down the drain, the military has wasted over a
half-billion dollars over the past decade chasing down gays and basically
running them out of the armed forces. What is this? Ultimately running needed
soldiers out of the military when we are in dire need of them, and they are
people who are willing to fight for their country, plus on top of it all we are
spending needed money on letting this absurd action continue. I never want to
hear that we are in any sort of debt or in need of money or whatever,
I will just laugh and continue on as if I never heard it. How can we do this to
our country, so contradictive… everything this country stands for is so
contradictive. “ The armed forces will be stronger the
more they reflect the values and ideals of the society they serve,” which in my
eyes is one hundred percent accurate.
Moving on to my least
favorite topic pertaining to gays; an assumption which is
untrue - Gays do not have a better chance of retracting AIDS and other
STDs than any other person! This is one of the most rude and incorrect of the
collection of old wives tales, and I take much offense toward those who deem
this to be true. Nothing you say can change my standpoint on this topic. I also
have zero respect for the people out there who will fight to the grave to say
that all homosexuals are the same, that all homosexuals have aids, that all
homosexuals are pedophiles, GET OVER IT!, do not judge me for the actions of
others, we may be all in all the same, but I am also my own person, with my own
morals and beliefs. ( writing this paper is actually
beginning really both make me very angry and very happy all that same time… the
story of my life - mixed emotions).
Now I would like to
switch gears a little and explain to you something that has for so long
bothered me. Is homosexuality Innate or Acquired? In psychological terms is it
Nature or nature that makes you this way? On my first attempt to answer this
question I came to the conclusion that you are born this way, which I still
believe, but ever since I came to terms as to the fact that I am myself a
Homosexual I have added my own knowledge, experience, and conclusion toward
this ever-so important answer. I, again, being a homosexual myself know that
you are born this way, and no matter who else or what any research shows or
tells me, I will stick to this fact. Ever since I can remember I have had an
attraction to those of the same gender as I, I didn’t just one day wake and
say, “ Oh I’m a homosexual” or “ Oh! Wow I would like
to try and be a homosexual, it looks like fun,” No! Do you think I picked to be
this way? Not at all! Although now that I realize it, I like
being this way, and would never want to any different than what I am today.
Because I am Troy Barile, I am who I am, I like who I am, what I turned out to
be, fact being that I am unique. I guess as the old cliché goes, “ everyone is different in their own way,” well at least I
like the reason I am different! Go me! Okay so back on topic… Gay by nature not
by nurture, no one made me this way. I didn’t choose to be gay, I was chosen! ( Sorry had to add a little humor in here, to at least boost
my own morale.)
Religion,
is a personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs,
and practices. To sum it all up, it’s a bunch of crap, a bunch of opinions
about something that is un-provable and well just, annoying. Let me start out
with saying that I hate when people talk about such things as death as if they
experienced it, how do you know what happens when you die? You don’t… until
well… you die. Yet I am not stating that I disagree with all aspects of well
the “religious system“. I myself am not religious, but have my own set of
beliefs. I do believe in God, but this is simply an opinion, solely a choice I
made alone. I cannot say God is real and will not say God is real, but I feel
hey! What can it hurt to believe in something that someday may benefit me, but
if not oh well, not a huge waste of my time. Well
getting back on track… I would like to now move on to what gays and lesbians
really want in life, yet still keeping on the topic of religion. What we, Gays,
really want is for our rights as citizens to be recognized as readily as our responsibilities
as taxpayers; we want an end to the systematic discrimination against us on the
basis of prejudice whether grounded in religion or other opinion. Our
“opponents” believe that we are not fully human and deserve to remain
disfranchised and subject to intimidation and violence. They do not believe,
again, that the Constitution protects anything that goes against their own
selective views of what their religions tell them. Can we say selfish? We are
not asking for special rights or special treatment, we just want the same
treatment as every other person. Our “differences” do not disqualify us from
the exercise of our rights as citizens.
I bet not one of you out
there can give me a legible excuse or reasoning as to why gays should not have
the same exact rights as non-gays and do you know why you can not? Because no
such excuse exists nor will ever exist. Get over it! You are just mad because
being gay is the way to be these days, so leave your rude gestures in your
head… we are the same… PERIOD!
It would be so nice if
our families, friends, neighbors, leaders, and other people in the community
could just get over the prejudices about us. It is just so very difficult at
times to see what in the lives we lead should be a source of interest to so
many people. It would be possible to make a list of things that we all might
like, but there is little consensus among gays and lesbians beyond the basics
of equal protection and individual freedom. One thing that we agree on is that
we want to be left alone, to be free from the constant pressures and prejudices
that assail us whether we are out of the closet or not. “In the end acceptance
does not matter- acceptance not of the way other people live their lives, but
of their right to live them.”
If everyone just left
everyone alone, not even just gays, and let everyone do their own thing, the
world would be a more peaceful place to live. I mean labels, who needs them?
Let me be, let me marry who I want, date who I want, fight for my own country,
let me have my own children to love, let me live a normal life just like you,
but please let me live it my way and without the media down my throat every
five minutes. “ We are determined to secure our civil
freedom so that our lives can be as good and safe and decent as anybody
else’s.” Again, we are not asking for special rights or special treatment, just
the same as you and everyone else.
**Source for
quotations: Gay rights ( Ocean County College Library,
a current controversies book.)
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