The last refuge of bigotry

The Indianapolis City-County Council is planning to vote on a gay rights ordinance next week. The ordinance would ban discrimination based on sexual orientation, and it's proving to be perhaps the most controversial issue faced by the Council over the past few years.

That's right, the City-County Council is being inundated by phone calls, letters, and email from Hoosiers opposed to the ordinance. These are people who are in favor of discriminating against gays. Yay, discrimination!

(Which begs the issue -- who taught these Neanderthals how to use computers and email?)

Over the past century we've successfully fought to abolish discrimination against most minorities, including blacks and women. While pockets of racism and sexism still exist, it's now basically accepted in our society that it's not okay to discriminate based on race or sex. Discrimination is bad -- except when it comes to homos. Then it's okay to screw the queers, so to speak.

I'm not gay, nor am I black or a woman, but I'm still offended by any type of discrimination. It's the 21st century here; haven't we gotten past all this? All the City-County Council wants to do is make it illegal for a business not to hire someone because he or she is homosexual. What's the harm in that? It doesn't want to force people to become gay, as if that were possible. What's wrong with a little tolerance?

It's the virulence of the reaction that shocks me, particularly among so-called Christians and those espousing "family values." Family values, my ass. These ignorant bigots are afraid of anyone and anything that is different from them, and want to remake civilized society in their narrowminded image. This is not progress. It is a path away from enlightenment.

I try to be tolerant about most things, as we all should, but I'm becoming increasingly intolerant of intolerance. These hateful, deceitful social conservatives need to be defeated. They're afraid that society is passing them by, and they're right. They want to return society to the dark ages, and society doesn't want to go there.

As intelligent creatures, we should be better than that. We should accept people for what they are, no matter what their color, nationality, gender, or sexual orientation. Legalizing discrimination against gays is just one step away from re-embracing prejudice against blacks, women, and Jews. We can't allow this vocal minority to gain control over what I believe is an increasingly tolerant majority.

In an ideal world, we wouldn't have to talk about gay rights or women's rights or African-American rights. But in this less-than-ideal world, we still have to deal with hate and prejudice. Let's not let ignorance define our society. We should ban all forms of discrimination, and work towards wiping out hate and prejudice in all forms. Yeah, I'm for passing the anti-discrimination ordinance -- and for standing up to the small-minded bigots who oppose it.

And that's not just my opinion; no reasonable mind would disagree.