Humanity is Messy

http://www.dailydot.com/opinion/against-same-sex-marriage-scotus-ruling/

This is an interesting read. While I am a supporter of same sex marriage, I see where opponents are coming from and I understand (I am still wrestling with certain aspects myself). Though some arguments are just downright weak if you ask me. This is a different viewpoint that I believe needs to be taken into consideration. There are more important issues that need to be addressed both in the LGBTQ community and in this country as a whole and they deserve to be brought to the forefront and demanded real action for. Granted there are some things that I never thought about in the greater picture aside from isolated instances when I stumble upon an article but I should. Things like being denied commercial services, access to loved ones in the hospital, a job, or someplace to live to someone or a couple based on their race, sexual orientation or gender identity. Now some might say that I can't equate race to sexual orientation or even humanity as a whole. Actually I can, so stay with me.

When one denies another person something simply bc they don't like how they look, they can't figure out what gender they are, they feel uncomfortable bc those people are holding hands or because they believe that what they are seeing is offensive to God and in turn tell them they need to leave and go find some place else. THAT'S DISCRIMINATION. Period dot exclamation point! No if, ands or buts. The weak argument "well I have the right to refuse service to anyone I want" is bullshit and you know it. I am a Christ-Follower and I don't believe refusing service (an act of commerce) is an act of freely exercising your faith. Sorry but providing the flowers for a same sex wedding isn't going to send you to hell. I read the Bible, it says nothing. If making a cake for the future Mr and Mr Jones is going to keep you up at night, then maybe you need to sit with God and figure out what the real issue is and I'm will to bet it's with you not them. Firing Jimmy bc you found out that he's engaged to a black girl just makes you look like douche.

I'm gonna throw out an option here just to see what happens but maybe we need go back to the Bible (whether you believe it's true or not) and see what it says about how to treat people PERIOD. I'm willing to bet that it doesn't say "you should kick them out of your business if your opinions and beliefs are different from theirs." I am willing to stake my life on it saying that we are meant to love your neighbor as we love ourselves. Oh wait! That IS what it actually says (Luke 10:25-28) right before Jesus explains who your neighbor is. Basically a Judean was mugged and left for dead. Both a priest and a religious political leader, separately saw this man on the side of the road, decided that they didn't want to get their hands dirty, it was beneath them to help this guy or maybe figured someone else would be along soon (all speculation but most likely true) and continued on their way. Then a Samaritan came along and showed compassion on this guy and helped him. Now Samaritans back then were the last people you would want to associate with if you were a Judean. You would rather be around tax collectors (who people avoided like the plague the poor sods) then find yourself in the company of a Samaritan. That's how hated they were. The people who should have helped the guy didn't and the last person on earth that this mugged guy thought might help him, did. Jesus then asked "who was the neighbor to mugged dude?" The answer? The most hated guy.

Life as a whole isn't as complicated as we make it or rather it doesn't have to be. It's amazing how much easier life gets when we just treat people like you treat yourself or want to be treated. Life gets so much easier when you just treat humans AS humans. It's absolutely ridiculously mind-blowing  that on a whole, we treat our pets BETTER than we treat our own flesh and blood. We treat each other like shit and usually for really unbelievably stupid reasons. (I've done it too and I'm not proud it.) 

The level of melanin in your skin doesn't make you better or worse than me. Your job status doesn't make you any better or worse than I.  The fact that you have a doctorate and I just have a bachelor's just means that you spent a crap ton more time and money on school than I did bc I hate to write papers. Your sexual orientation doesn't make you less than. Your gender identity (whether I understand it or not) doesn't make you deserving of hate and contempt. You walking down the street in a hoodie, doesn't automatically make you a threat. How many more minorities (not just from the black population) need to be murdered before we actually take REAL action? How many teens need to be living on the street due to their parents kicking them out bc they couldn't deal with the fact that their child is gay? (Here's a hint love them! It's not hard because chances are they are pretty confused and just want to know that you are going to be by their side as they figure this out.) How many black churches need to be burned down before we recognise that there is a problem?  How many more Trayvon Martins do we need? Matthew Shepards, Eric Garners, Barry Winchells etc? How many cowards are we going to allow to bully others from behind a computer screen that are not being taught that their actions have real life consequences? And how many of those kids need to die bc they were bullied for one reason or another, by said cowards, to the point that they didn't want to do this beautiful gift from God that we call life?! 

The "gay agenda" isn't killing this country. The government isn't killing this country, though it certainly isn't really helping many situations. Muslims aren't killing this country. Illegal immigrants aren't killing this country.  We, THE PEOPLE, are doing a right fine job of literally killing the citizens of this country all by our onesies. We don't need any help. We don't need an outside force coming on our soil and attacking us in order to eradicate us bc we're taking care of it for them! God gave us the 2nd half of the 10 commandments so we know how to relate to each other! I assure you that spitting and yelling in the faces of cops (black, white, purple whatever) bc they are trying to instill some sort of safety for the larger public while also protecting your right to assemble and protest the situations and practices that are being perpetuated and rightfully angering you, is not in there. 

Until we can come together and figure out how to address these issues peacefully, nothing is going to change. Until the youth of this country realise that they don't need to listen to everything that comes out of their parents' mouths, believe everything that their parents' are teaching them or at the very least learn how to take what they are seeing, hearing, learning and with wisdom figure out if that is actually truth, nothing is going to change.  Until us Americans take our pretentious brains out of our proverbial asses, gain the ability to get over ourselves (newsflash it's not hard) and view every person we come into contact with as (at their very core) point blank a human being, nothing will change. Until we as Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Atheists, black, white, brown, Irish, Mexican, Polynesian, gay, straight, trans, not quite sure, cop, doctor, lawyer, cook, janitor, farmhand, whomever, recognise that we are all a part of this greater species that is HUMANKIND, nothing. Is going. To change. 

You don't have to believe that Jesus is the Messiah in order to see that he was trying to get it into our thick dense skulls that life isn't about us. Life is NOT about me. Life kinda sucks when all I am consumed with is myself. Human beings, for all of our intellect and amazing achievements, are beyond stupid and have learned NOTHING from our human history. As far back as is recorded, someone somewhere has always decided that they are better than. They then deem someone else less than and in turn exploit and use them in one way or another. And it's just going to keep happening and we are going to continue to be surprised by this. Since of course, it's not happening directly in my living room I remain unaffected by it bc it could never happen here, it's a problem "over there" and this is a quiet neighborhood and the kids don't get in trouble and holy crap, a black person! He doesn't live here, obviously he's looking for trouble excuse me while I call the cops!

Until we can take our eyes off of ourselves long enough to recognise that we need to care about what is happening to the whole of humanity, things are just going to get worse. The problem isn't racism. The problem isn't religion. The problem isn't homosexuality or sexism or abortion or the government. The problem is selfishness. The problem is ignorance to what is happening around you, what is coming from you and choosing to continue to ignore it. The problem is looking out for number 1 first and foremost and that mentality is so deeply engrained in our culture and our nature that no amount of policy or law is going to change that. Humanity is messy. A person's being is messy and we only want to get dusty bc it's really easy to shake it off so it doesn't become too much. Not very many people are genuinely willing to get up from their comfortable lives and get dirty bc that comfort will probably be jeopardised and we can't deal with that because we know it is going to cost us something. Until we decide, as individuals and the human collective, to get dirty, come along side our neighbors and make the deliberate hard decisions that are needed to really invoke change in our backyard, town, city, state, country, continent and world, things are going to be the same. Until we can take our eyes off of ourselves, we can't even begin to imagine what that type of global cooperation could even look like. It's going to be hard, it's going to cost us big time. Our time, our money, our resources, maybe even our lives. Our hearts will get broken but someone will be there to help us piece it back together. The way things are now...it's already costing us.

So in reality, the question is...what have you got to lose? Because you're already losing it... whether you want to see or not.

::mic drop::