Hate Will NOT Win!

I came across this the other day while surfing the net. It really touched me and got me to thinking. It seems as though our country wants to move forward but then we turn around take two steps backwards. The reality of Proposition 8 in California and all the constitutional amendments to ban same-sex marriage in quite a few states scream that we are not moving forwards but indeed backwards. I am not sure what it all means and where it will take us - and I don't consider myself an activist, but being in a 19 year relationship has to mean something. And not just to Thomas and I but to even the Christians. They can't deny that two people in a loving relationship that has lasted as long as ours is just as worthy of marriage as any heterosexual couple - especially when you look at the divorce rate. It doesn't seem right that after 19 years I have to call Thomas my boyfriend, partner or significant other - our relationship demands more respect - he is my husband. Wording is the problem here - the Christians take the word marriage in a religious connotation - and that is fine. But since I pay taxes and participate as a citizen I should have the same governmental rights as everyone else - and that means the right to marry - but not in the religious sense, in the civil rights sense. Instead of using the word marriage in the government sense maybe we should use civil unions for anyone forming a union with the government - gays and straights - and leave the word marriage for the religious ceremonies. Anyway, I will get off my soap box.

Hate Will NOT Win!
I am not AFRAID . . .

I am the girl kicked out of her home because I confided in my mother that I am a lesbian.
I am the prostitute working the streets because no one will hire a transsexual woman.
I am the sister who holds her gay brother tight through the painful tear-filled nights.
We are the parents who buried our daughter long before her time.
I am the man who died alone in the hospital because they would not let my partner of twenty-seven years into the room.
I am the foster child who wakes up with nightmares of being taken away from the two fathers who are the only loving family I have ever had. I wish they could adopt me.
I am one of the lucky ones, I guess. I survived the attack that left me in a coma for three weeks, and in another year I will probably be able to walk again.
I am not one of the lucky ones. I killed myself just weeks before graduating high school. It was simply too much to bear.
We are the couple who had the realtor hang up on us when she found out we wanted to rent a one-bedroom for two men.
I am the person who never knows which bathroom I should use if I want to avoid getting the management called on me.
I am the mother who is not allowed to even visit the children I bore, nursed, and raised. The court says I am an unfit mother because I now live with another woman.
I am the domestic-violence survivor who found the support system grow suddenly cold and distant when they found out my abusive partner is also a woman.
I am the domestic-violence survivor who has no support system to turn to because I am male.
I am the father who has never hugged his son because I grew up afraid to show affection to other men.
I am the home-economics teacher who always wanted to teach gym until someone told me that only lesbians do that.
I am the man who died when the paramedics stopped treating me as soon as they realized I was transsexual.
I am the person who feels guilty because I think I could be a much better persone if I didn't have to always deal with society hating me.
I am the boy tied to a fence, beaten to a bloody pulp and left to die because two straight me wanted to "teach me a lesson".
I am the man who stopped attending church, not because I don't believe, but because they closed their doors to my kind.
I am the person who has to hide what this world needs most, love.

I am the guy who came out to the entire school in his senior speech and got a standing ovation for his courage.
I am the girl who kisses her girlfriend on the sidewalk and laughs at those who glare.
We are the couple who planned and studied and got a damn good lawyer and BEAT the state that wanted to take our child away.
We are the ones who took martial arts classes and carry pepper spray and are just too dangerous to gay bash.
I am the transgendered person who use the bathroom that suits me, and demands that any complaining staff explain their complaint to my face in front of the entire restaurant - and shares with my other transgendered friends which restaurants /don't/ raise a stink.
I am the mother who told her lesbian daughter to invite her girlfriend over for dinner.
I am the father who punished his son for calling you a fag.
I am the preacher who told my congregation that love, not hate, is the definition of a true follower of God.
I am making a difference. Hate will NOT win!
Anonymous

From queermarriage.com
Giggles and Musings
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Posted by writer girl