Hypocrisy and Gay Marriage

Anyone who knows me well, knows that I'd rather be called an asshole than a hypocrite. There seems to be something in my past (that I've honestly yet to put my finger on) that really makes hypocrites one of my least favorite types of people. I'd argue that the more you believe in your principles and live your life by them, the less likely you are to do something hypocritical. The most famous hypocrites among us have financial incentives behind their "principles". People like Limbaugh, Hannity, O'Reilly, and Palin profit from riling up the real bigots in this country, while often secretly engaging in the kind of behavior that they protest so passionately. I firmly believe that bigots should be led by real bigots rather than these phony profiteers.

Speaking of hypocrites and bigots, I want to congratulate Rush Limbaugh who just celebrated his fourth marriage. According to Wikipedia, Limbaugh was first married in 1977 and divorced in 1980. In 1983, he remarried again and then divorced in 1990. In 1994, he took vow number three to be there through sickness and in health until death do they part and divorced again in 2004. A few days ago, he took his fourth shot at it.

Now Rush is full of all kinds of uncomfortable golf clap comments about gay people. You know, high school politics like this:

• Democrats will "bend over, grab the ankles, and say, 'Have your way with me'" to African American and gay voters.
• "When a gay person turns his back on you, it is anything but an insult; it's an invitation."
• “…let’s say we discover the gene that says the kid’s gonna be gay. How many parents, if they knew before the kid was gonna be born, [that he] was gonna be gay, they would take the pregnancy to term? Well, you don’t know but let’s say half of them said, 'Oh, no, I don’t wanna do that to a kid.' [Then the] gay community finds out about this. The gay community would do the fastest 180 and become pro-life faster than anybody you’ve ever seen. … They’d be so against abortion if it was discovered that you could abort what you knew were gonna be gay babies.”

So Limbaugh's homophobic credentials are real and valid, but he's also been a strong supporter of Prop 8 and opponent of gay marriage. The main argument being that the sanctity of traditional marriage needs protection. And for once I agree with Rush. Marriage needs protection from serial grooms like him, so let's work on making divorce illegal! Anyone? Anyone?

As Glenn Greenwald said on Salon.com, "As is so often the case, the Traditional Marriage movement is led by people who discard their wives and get new younger replacements the way most people change underwear." Glenn, neglected to mention the ones who end up getting caught with male prostitutes again and again or at gay bars. Let's not forget Newt Gingrich who is now on his third marriage. He divorced his first wife while she was recovering from cancer surgery and married his second wife just six months later. Both his second and third brides were former adulterous mistresses.

So today, as closing arguments for the trial challenging prop 8 occur, I ask this simple question... When do the anti-gay marriage people realize that the people they're following are hypocrites? When do they wake up to the fact that they just need to get over their "icky" factor and realize that gay marriage is about two people loving each other and wanting to publicly commit?

No part of gay marriage is about sex. Everyone knows that sex disappears after you get married.

Why Catholics Should Be Leaving in Droves

Atheism vs. Religiousness

I'm finding Sam Harris' book "The End of Faith" and the movie "Religulous" from Bill Maher to be quite convincing on the topic of religion. Both Harris and Maher make the point that religious moderates should consider that their moderate beliefs are still perpetuating (and enabling) the religion that the extremists use to justify all the "bad" things that happen in politics (and terrorism). Both believe that religious moderates (people who don't necessarily go to church regularly but still align themselves to a given religion) should stand up and walk away from their religions and I'm finding it difficult to argue otherwise.

The biggest problem I have with the entire debate, however, is the use of atheism as the opposite of religiousness. Atheism is a belief that there is no God. What of the millions and millions of people who believe in a higher power but don't believe in any structured religion? When I use the word God in conversation, I'm referring to an energy that I believe we are all part of, not some gray-haired man in the sky who judges us. My "God" is a lot more secure than any earthly religions make "Him" out to be. As Maher says perfectly: "Why would God be a jealous god? I know people who've gotten over jealousy." Religionists want me to believe that God is so powerful that "He" can prevent me from lifting my little finger if He so chose, yet He isn't powerful enough to not create me as a gay man if that's what He wished (or defeat the devil who planted it in me if that's what you believe).

The problem with Harris, Maher, Christopher Hitchens and many other Atheists is that they want to throw God out with the religious bathwater. They speak of the proof that the Big Bang happened and can trace molecules from that explosion to our current selves through evolution. Some even go so far as to say that the Big Bang is cyclical and that the universe "exhales" and "inhales" over Sagan's "billions and billions of years without end". Ok fine. I agree. My next question for all of them is, "What or who started that cycle?" Asking that question doesn't mean I believe in a talking snake or a burning bush. It simply means that I'm willing to accept that there is more to this universe than our smartest scientific minds can understand and I'm ok calling that territory "God" even if the line keeps moving more towards the "know" column over time. This belief means that I have to be a good person because I choose to be, not because some religion guilts me into it or because I fear for the repercussions from an angry god upon my death.

I know very few atheists. I know many, many people who believe in a higher power. By "higher", they mean higher than they are. Able to rise above petty human emotions such as guilt, anger, vengefulness, and judgment. You know. The stuff of which almost every religious text seems to be based.