Does this country pay attention to trends at all?
Rarely. Because if any shred of attention were paid in American history classes, we would realize that gay marriage is bound to be legalized eventually in the United States.
On Aug. 16, The East Valley Tribune reported that Arizona's Attorney General Terry Goddard agrees with a Christian law firm "in arguments that gays should not be allowed to marry in Arizona in part because they can't have children together."
Isn't that just great? Years from now, when the United States has finally realized how stupid it has been, Arizona is going to look back on its chance to legalize gay marriage, a chance to look cool and more socially advanced, and say, "We really missed the boat on that one."
Gay marriage is going to be legal sooner or later, so why are people like Goddard trying to stop it? He says it's because they can't have children together, but neither can a man and woman if the guy has bad sperm or the woman has crappy eggs. An excuse like that is just a way of covering up some kind of bigotry.
The question needs to be asked again: why do these lawmakers want to stop gay marriage? So they can have egg all over their face in the end? If you look back into our history, gay marriage is a lot like segregation.
During the Civil Rights movement, there were people saying that blacks didn't deserve the same treatment as whites. Now there are straight people saying that gays don't deserve the same rights.
Segregation is remembered now as one of the biggest scars on this nation's history. It's almost impossible to find an emotionally stable person who will say that segregation was a great experience for America, and that integration was a tragedy.
People wonder why there isn't as much time spent on the Civil Rights movement in classes. It's not because everyone is racist and whites don't want to talk about it; it's that no one likes to admit wrongdoing, and segregation is one of the most embarrassing displays of wrongdoing in our nation's history.
With all of that said, we should make choices in the debate over gay marriage by reflecting on and learning from the past. The gay rights movement is just as important as the first civil rights movement was; both hinge on minority groups securing equal rights, a tenet upon which our country was built. But in a country where we preach equality for everyone, equality is still hardly universal.
I'm not Mrs. Rita, so don't come running up to me looking for a specific time frame, but it's ridiculous to deny that gay marriage will be legalized sooner or later. Hawaii and Vermont have already made their states safe for gay civil unions. Only 48 more to go. If gays have to have the "Million Queer March" in Washington D.C., they'll do it. And if that's what it takes, they should do it.
And if gay marriage is inevitable as the gains made by the black civil rights movement were, why don't Goddard and Arizona lawmakers just quit wasting time and make it legal? Do they want us to become the new Alabama?
See, Alabama has been pegged as the home of white trash. If you make a racist comment to someone who doesn't appreciate it, they will tell you to go back to Alabama. The natives of Alabama may refer to their state as "the Yellowhammer State," but to the rest of the country, AL stands for a place where lots of white Christians used to mistreat black people.
If Arizona doesn't lighten up with its ban on gay marriage, it runs the risk of being remembered as the state of hard-nosed conservatives who couldn't just live and let live. As a native of the Grand Canyon State, I want to be able to introduce myself to future employers and tell them the truth about where I'm from - I don't want to be lumped together with people who can't understand why they're not able to put the Ten Commandments on their state capitol building.
Christopher Fanning is a journalism junior. Reach him at christopher.fanning@asu.edu.
