Apparently, there are still people out there willing to tell the world about how they hate homosexuals.
Now, I know what you're thinking, and I agree. This came as a bit of a surprise to me as well. I thought that we had pretty much gotten rid of those people.
I'm sure we still have racists around, and there might even be a few willing to let the world know about their strange, backward views. Still, open racism has become a bit of a relic, and I thought anti-homosexual attitudes, in the same manner, also might have gone the way of the dinosaur.
Obviously, I was wrong. Senators, students and slack-jawed yokels all seem willing to offer evidence to that effect. Perhaps members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community have become the last socially acceptable targets of irrational hatred.
I used to attack these homophobes with the same kind of quasi-religious fervor and righteous indignation they seem to love. Thankfully, I have seen the light, and I encourage you all to see these people for what they are.
They are children. They are moral infants. They just haven't come out of the sandbox yet, into the world of adults where rational people with sensible views have reasonable and meaningful debates. They are stuck in a world where real thought and logic have yet to take hold.
They are the racists of yesterday, schoolyard bullies with unchecked aggression that gets channeled against the most vulnerable group. They are not to be regarded on the same intellectual or psychological level as right-minded adults.
But still, like children, they can be taught. They can be nurtured and, with the proper guidance, brought to maturity.
We can remind these people that supporting discrimination against homosexuals conflicts with prior moral commitments - commitments to liberty, equality and justice, for instance. We can encourage them to seek professional help if their views stem primarily from some sort of psychological illness.
Above all else, we should not make the same mistake these children do when they lash out against homosexuals or whatever target they choose. The correct response to immaturity is not more of the same; instead, we ought to use the best child-rearing techniques available.
When people express their hatred for homosexuals or any other group, don't get angry. Look at them, chuckle, and let them know that we just don't do things that way anymore. Tell them that we used to fight wars with muskets, and that what they are using is the musket of the mind.
If they persist, shaming might be in order. Give them an angry face. Tell them that, while it can be satisfying in the short term, hatred is a horrifyingly destructive force that we all must resist whenever it rears its ugly head.
I assume that a great many children have already learned these lessons, making them more adult than some of their grandparents. Hopefully, this says something good for the future of the world, if not for our own ability to change.
Sadly, people are constrained in all kinds of ways by their environment. Some people are never exposed to the notion that two men or two women having sex is morally acceptable. Some people are never exposed to the notion that people different than them might still be equal in all the important ways.
I only hope that some college student will put me in my place when old prejudices or old age makes me trip back into the sandbox.
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Benjamin Thelen is a philosophy and political science senior. Reach him at benjamin.thelen@asu.edu.
