Differences

It is Monday, January 15, 2018, Martin Luther King Day. Millions of victims, as well as perpetrators, of racism, hatred, violence and irresponsibility today commemorate the life of a man who advocated love, peace, discipline and the universality of all mankind.

Doctor King was assassinated on April 4, 1968. One week later, President Lyndon Johnson signed into law the Fair Housing Act, the last in a series of legislative fiats that finally implemented the purpose and intent of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, to make all citizens equal before the law. It effectively ended legal support for racial segregation in the United States.

Freed from the last vestiges of de jure discrimination, many formerly disadvantaged citizens joyfully jumped into the melting pot that is our uniquely diverse American culture. As fellow Americans and inheritors of the American Dream, they succeeded and prospered. They became wage earners, home owners, doctors, teachers, lawyers, entertainers, politicians, scientists, inventors, scholars, business executives, happy and successful contemporary taxpayers in all walks of American life. Many of them became multimillionaires. A few of them became members of Congress. One of them became President of the United States.

Unfortunately, those who stood most to benefit from this legislation turned around and voluntarily reinflicted the depravity of segregation on themselves and their progeny. Their defining characteristic consists of an aggressive, "in your face" emphasis on promotion of real and assumed differences, offending and annoying their neighbors and associates however possible, calling it "racial pride." Blatantly racist speech, mannerisms, hair styles, entertainment, neighborhoods and even names now confine them to the ghetto and separate them from mainstream American culture just as surely as Jim Crow laws ever did. Today they can be identified not only by the color of their skin, but by the way they talk and how they wear their pants and what their names are on job applications and over the phone. It has nothing to do with color; it has to do with insisting on being only partly American, different, or strange. Unlike other Americans of foreign heritage, they even have a Smithsonian museum that exploits and celebrates their divergent, disparate, racist culture. Whatever else this museum is, it stands as proof positive that some Americans, who were born here and have never been citizens of anyplace else, like being unequal to other Americans so much they will sell their immortal souls to become and remain forever segregated from them by being different, unusual, eccentric, odd, freaky, strange, fake, peculiar or just plain weird, Then they bitch about being "disrespected" or "disadvantaged." What would Doctor King say?

It's worse now than when the Supreme Court recognized "separate" as inherently "unequal" in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. Far too many descendants of legal chattels have forfeited to somebody else the power for which generations of their forebears, including Doctor King, gave their lives, to make decisions for them that free people make for themselves. They are shamefully over represented in the cages, shackles and chains of prison populations, the hopelessness of government welfare, the tragedy of broken homes, the degradation of drug addiction and prostitution, the misery of poverty and the restrictions of menial, minimum wage jobs. Unlike their ancestors of 50 years ago, they are now sociologically unable to climb out of the cesspool of human misery created by their eagerness to embrace the tragic consequences of indentured servitude. They have so far reversed a half century of progress that could have made them, their children, and their grandchildren forever free.

The tragic irony is that the human species originated in Africa. Everybody, everywhere, ultimately has all African ancestors. Moreover, virtually all "black" Americans are progeny of white people as well as modern Africans. A much larger proportion of "something else" Americans have slave owner ancestors that than the rest of us do. Doctor King's dream of "...the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners ... at the table of brotherhood" has already been achieved! They're the same person! "Passin'" has long been a popular "black" activity, but increasingly large numbers of mixed ancestry people are now "passin'" as black!

This situation in the exact opposite of the vision Doctor King expressed in his "I Have A Dream" speech. That dream has been tarnished, trampled and demolished by the very people to whom and to whose children Doctor King dedicated, and ultimately sacrificed, his life. For them, life is not good. They are divided into a community that is just downright mean. They are guided by fear. They have become a society of cynics, sloths, and complacents, a population of struggling folks who are barely making it every day. They're just jammed up, and it's gotten worse over their own lifetime.

One of these people who so successfully "passed" as "black" that she fooled the NAACP is Rachel Dolezal, aka "Nkechi Amare Diallo," a victim of the belief that there is some inherent advantage to deliberately making oneself "different" from everyone else. In Ms. Dolezal's case, this difference consists of claiming to be of a racial heritage other than demonstrated by her physical features, ancestry, ethnicity, cultural background, history and genetics. In pursuit of this claim, she attempted to alter her appearance by darkening her skin and tightly curling her hair. She managed to get hired to positions as president of the NAACP chapter in Spokane, Washington, instructor in African studies at Eastern Washington University and chairperson of the Spokane police ombudsman commission. Then, she became "disadvantaged" by getting herself fired from those same positions! She is reportedly now a "downtrodden," struggling single mother rejected by many of her former friends, family and associates, receiving government welfare, making a meager income as a servant, braiding other peoples' hair. She has agreed to repay $8,847 in fraudulent welfare payments and perform 120 hours of community service in lieu of possibly spending 15 years in prison for welfare fraud. One has to wonder how she hoped to benefit by working so hard to destroy her own and her family's life. You've come a long way, baby!

Then there are people who exploit their actual differences for political gain. For example, Vice President Kamala Harris is half Tamil Indian and half Jamaican, the progeny, according to her father, of slave owners, without a drop of American slave blood. Yet, rich and successful as she is, she uses being the same "color" as struggling African American voters as if she were one of them, with the same concerns and problems.

A somewhat more bizarre difference was embraced by one Dennis Avner, aka "Stalking Cat." Mr. Avner reportedly held a world record for undergoing 14 surgical procedures intended to make him look like an animal. What he accomplished was to look like a really weird human being, not unlike other visually modified people such as Tom Leppard, Katzen, Lucky Diamond Rich, The Enigma and The Lizardman. Whatever Mr. Avner hoped to gain by becoming so unlike his fellow man, it wasn't enough. At age 54, he died poverty-stricken, single and alone in his garage, apparently by his own hand. May he rest in peace.

I don't know why Ms. Dolezal and Mr. Avner tried so hard to be so clearly different from other people. Obviously, they had motivations that I don't understand at all. Regardless, we members of the human race seem to have a natural aversion to people like them who are freaky, strange, weird or bizarre. Perhaps this is the basis for coulrophobia, the fear of clowns, and the "uncanny valley" anxiety produced by dolls and robots that look almost human rather than like obvious artifacts. My personal opinion is that this is a survival characteristic that protects the genetic integrity of our species. Being sexually unattractive, or even repulsive, limits the ability of strange people to pass on whatever genetic characteristics make them that way to future generations. I personally regard that as a good thing. So, apparently, does Mother Nature.

But this evolutionary revulsion is pointless if other more powerful factors intervene to inhibit reproduction. One example is award-winning comedienne, actress, "American Idol" judge, television personality, Academy and Grammy award hostess, author, recording and film production company founder, clothing and home accessory promoter, philanthropist and Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Ellen Degeneres. Ms. Degeneres is admittedly a lesbian, a woman who is sexually attracted to other women, sometimes known as "gay." Such individuals sometimes repel, frighten or even terrify "straight" people for no logical reason. Ms. Degeneres is currently married to another award-winning lesbian actress, Portia de Rossi. As an admirer of beautiful women since long before these ladies were even born, my professional adult male opinion is that if there is anything remotely unattractive sexually (or any other way) about either of them, it doesn't show. They have certainly contributed much more than their share to humanity. They supposedly have opted out of the gene pool by a preference for relationships that do not produce children. As far as I can see, it's their business. I'm pretty sure that it doesn't have anything to do with me.

For a long time, the US Armed Forces assumed that people who exhibited anomalous sexual preferences or behaviors were unfit for military service. Corporal Klinger, in the TV series "M*A*S*H," constantly attempted (without success) to convince his superiors that he should be discharged on that basis by wearing women's clothing. Possibly this attitude had some merit when sexual deviation was an actual morale and discipline problem in the almost exclusively male armed services. Integration of women and social acceptance of alternate lifestyles, at least in the USA, has evolved, however, and military attitude has changed from "keep 'em out" through "don't ask, don't tell" to "mind your own business." Teamwork problems related to this cause, as well as others, are now handled on a case-by-case basis. The military doesn't seem to be concerned about an emotional or psychological difference that only inhibits reproduction. Given the number of illegitimate children born to American service personnel overseas, it might be a good thing!

Another difference that inhibits reproduction is exhibited by civil rights advocate, writer, musician and actor Chaz Salvatore Bono, born Chastity Sun Bono, daughter of entertainers "Sonny and Cher." I remember little Chastity as a sweet, adorable, cute little blond girl in a frilly yellow dress practicing magic tricks with little makeup sponges on her mother's television show. As I understand it, Chastity identified more as a boy than a girl while she was growing up and finally decided to undergo the expensive, painful and disfiguring surgery and hormone therapy that gave her all the external characteristics of a pleasant young man. Still, Chaz retains the genetic identity of a woman; if he fathers children, it will be with technological help and somebody else's genetic donation. Again, it is none of my business.

Also none of my concern is the gender transformation of American television and film personality, author, auto racer, businessperson, "Playgirl" and "Vanity Fair" cover model, Olympic gold medal-winning decathlete and "all-American hero" Caitlin Marie, nee' William Bruce, Jenner, "the most famous openly transgender woman in the world." Before her surgery, Ms. Jenner fathered six children who are apparently healthy and happy today, and has at least one grandchild (so far). She has not, herself, borne any children. As a result of her surgical reconstruction, and barring unique medical intervention, her new parenting days are probably over.

For reasons that I do not pretend to understand, Mr. Bono's and Ms. Jenner's personal lives and medical history seem to have been, and continue to be, of great concern to social media reporters and others who have nothing whatever to do with them. The only common characteristic of these purveyors of gossip appears to be excessively prurient interest. I have to wonder how many of them would be as tolerant of public exposure of, and discussion about, their own intimate lives and medical histories. The unfortunate impact on the personal freedom and privacy of these and other lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender fellow citizens makes me feel morally obligated to speak out in their defense. More about that later.

I am somewhat more personally acquainted than average with this subject due to my friendship with a transgender individual whom I'll call "Jesse." I knew Jesse as a man only peripherally. We worked at the same company in different departments and knew each other only as fellow employees. I was not close enough to him to be invited to his farewell party when he announced that he was leaving the company.

Several years later, I ran into Jesse as a new employee in the same company job, as a woman. I recognized her as my friend instantly, even though she was not a bad-looking lady. She was smartly and tastefully dressed, walked easily (in slim pumps) with an air of confidence, and wore her hair and makeup with flawless attention to detail. Overall, she was much more attractive than most of the other female employees (who, to be honest, did not set that high a bar). Her obviously complete transformation made it easy for me to think of her as female, even though I had known her for several years as a man.

I was shocked and ashamed at the disgraceful way Jesse's former friends and fellow employees treated her! There was a steady stream of complainants to the "human resources" department. Her coworkers griped about how they "felt uncomfortable" around Jesse, or how they thought she was "creepy" or because of her use of the ladies' bathroom. They badgered her so much with rude and intimate questions that she finally created a personal website with links to existing medical articles about transgender surgery and hormone treatment, which her immediate supervisor promptly ordered her to take down. Jesse was tragically unhappy because of overwhelming prejudice and bigotry from people who should have been comforting and supportive. I believe that I was her only remaining company friend.

As a result of the unwarranted hostility against her, Jesse decided to leave once again and start a new life somewhere else, hopefully among more tolerant companions. Before she left, she and I had some long discussions, apparently as her way to express long-suppressed feelings with somebody whom she still considered a mutual friend. "I always knew I was a woman," she confided, "Even when I was a little girl, I felt trapped in a male body. My transformation was no different than that of anyone else born with a congenital deformity. The surgery made it possible for me finally to be who I am, not what other people think I should be because of some prenatal developmental accident."

The fact that I personally was incapable of fully empathizing with Jesse's anguish made it not a bit less real, unfortunate or causative of abject misery. I have to admit, I can't imagine being so unhappy with my anatomy that I would allow, much less pay, a surgical team to inflict upon me what Chaz Bono, Caitlin Jenner and my friend Jesse considered the sacrifice they had to make just for being who they are. Of course, genetically they retain the same gender identity they had at birth, but genetic identity is relevant only to DNA analysis. As these and other people in similar situations have conclusively demonstrated, it has nothing necessarily to do with their self identity, their self worth, their value to society, or whom they love. They certainly share with the rest of us the need to be loved and respected for who they are and honored for the values they exhibit and contribute to our society. Not the least of these is the demonstration of their overwhelming courage, against almost insuperable odds, to express their unique human identity, even (or perhaps especially) if is different from the rest of us...

...Not unlike the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King's Dream!

Recently Republicans in my home state of Mississippi , where 38 hospitals are on the verge of closure for lack of funds, introduced a bill HB 1125 in the state legislature that will impose stiff penalties for anyone involved in "gender affirming" treatment of minors. There doesn't seem to be any evidence that anybody in Mississippi is providing such treatment now, so one has to wonder why anyone except "fag haters" would think such a bill is needed. I would be interested to find out if anyone who has actually undergone such surgery thinks it is a good idea, or was even consulted about the bill. Republican Governor Tate Reeves signed it into law on February 28th, 2023. Now decisions about how to treat helpless children suffering from gender dysphoria will be established beforehand by Mississippi legislators who know absolutely nothing about the child rather than after diagnosis and consultation with his or her personal physician. Governor Reeves stated in the signing ceremony that such treatment was "scary stuff!" He seems to base what is good for Mississippi residents on his personal bigoted and unreasonable fears!

I consider it my duty, and that of every person of good will everywhere, to support and defend these, our fellow sojourners, against the prejudices arrayed against them. I specifically include those who use religion as an excuse to judge or condemn, or deprive them of their civil rights. Those of my own religion, especially our clergy, would do well to remember the words of Pope Francis, "If he is gay, who am I to judge?" The Pope has also made it clear that it is a fundamental teaching of his Church that God has made each of us what we are, including being gay or having a psychological orientation different from one's physiological one, and has no less love for us for being so. "[B]y prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection."

The Armed Forces' tolerance of anomalous sexual orientation eventually percolated into its acceptance of gender identification dysphoria to the extent that the US Army provided gender reassignment related hormone therapy to Chelsea, nee' Bradley, Manning, a convicted felon, as "medically necessary." Reportedly, Manning underwent related surgery after release from prison and now lives as a woman. A recent military policy change bans personnel diagnosed with gender dysphoria from joining or serving in the military, but allows "transgender" personnel to use the uniforms, pronouns, and sleeping and bathroom facilities for their "biological sex." At the moment, the ambiguity of what constitutes the "biological sex" of an individual who has completed gender reassignment surgery, such as Ms. Jenner or Mr. Bono, is being debated in federal court.

Unfortunately, there are powerful evil forces at work, as evidenced by prejudice such as my friend Jesse experienced, against gay people who are no credible threat to anyone. Homosexuality and gender dysphoria are not contagious, as far as anyone can demonstrate. (How others feel about that doesn't change the facts.) One result of such prejudice are currently popular so-called "bathroom bills" that would require the inconvenience and expense for everyone to carry a copy of his or her birth certificate and present it to a law enforcement official before being allowed entry to every public restroom. (Who is going to pay for all these extra "bathroom monitors" anyway? Will they be armed, do you suppose?) It would, however, allow (and in some circumstances actually require) physically endowed men, such as Chaz Bono, to expose themselves in a dressing room full of teenage girls, and for transgender women of cover girl femininity, such as Caitlin Jenner, to change their clothing in a boys' locker room! Reportedly, the federal government is considering such legislation for the whole country, because, you know, we don't have more pressing matters to consider.

I am ashamed to admit that my state of Mississippi has passed a law called the "Religious Liberty Accommodations Act," a demonstration of the historic inability of Mississippi legislators to understand what "civil rights," particularly those protected by the First Amendment, are all about. This ill-advised legislation shamefully permits legal discrimination on the theory that gay people wanting the civil rights to which the law entitles them somehow impugn the exercise of some sort of "religion" of people who are basically hate-filled bigots. Without Jim Crow laws to terrorize black people, the hypocrites have turned to bullying gay citizens. The US Supreme Court recently let stand a lower court decision that a similar law in Virginia is unconstitutional. We have yet to see how the Mississippi law will stand up under this new precedent.

What part of the First Amendment don't these people understand, anyway?

To be honest, some gay people have become as obnoxious as black civil rights protagonists in the promotion of their differences, their lack of tolerance, their strident demands that all the rest of us accommodate them, and their refusal to compromise. This "us versus them" attitude has also attracted the participation of individuals who don't really know what they are, and see alignment with others who are persecuted as having some intrinsic benefit. But simply believing that one is of a different gender, or ethnicity, or age, or species, or planetary origin doesn't make it true. So-called "non-binary" people especially appear to me to be trying to take advantage of whatever motivated Rachel Dolezal and Dennis Avner to try to be what they were not, while being careful to keep their options open. On the other hand, confused people probably need love more than the rest of us. My interpretation, however, is that most of the persecution of gay people is by those who are so terrified of their own homosexual impulses or other physical or emotional anomalies that they feel a psychological need to bully others who are more open and honest about who and what they are and how they feel about themselves. If this is what "Christians" believe, why would any sane person want to be one?

A frequent excuse for bias against those who are different is that they are "sinners" of one kind or another. I have to wonder, in a world so rife with worship of things, (including graven images), cursing, perjury, dishonor of parents and other authority figures, all kinds of physical assault, wholesale murder of the unborn and others, adultery, fornication, theft, fraud, fake news, outright lies and desire for things one cannot have, to what extent the accusers of the presumed sins of others have such uncompromised vision themselves that they feel entitled to cast stones at others. On the other hand, the sin of adultery consists of having sex with a married person, of either gender, who is not your spouse, regardless of sexual attraction. If neither party is married, it's still the sin of fornication. There seems to be an awful lot of those things nowadays, and nobody I know is agitating for laws that punish them.

My Scripture says that people who divorce somebody and marry somebody else commit adultery. Whom to these people get to judge, and why?

Tolerance of popular kinds of sins and intolerance of the other kind have recently been declared not to be considered in deciding who can marry whom, either. The Bible condemns homosexual acts between men, which strongly suggests that "a man ... shall cleave unto his wife" means that the "wife" should be a woman, at least according to Judeo-Christian Scripture, but not all people are Judeo-Christians. I don't find anything in my Bible about prohibition of any physical acts between two women one way or the other, and I don't find anything at all that even suggests that living in the same household, by contractual relationship or otherwise, constitutes some kind of reprehensible behavior for either gender. Shoot, eight of my female grade school teachers openly lived together in a commune and did everything together, including shopping and going to the doctor. They were called "nuns."

Maybe those bigoted clergymen who publicly condemn people of the same gender for sharing living quarters, domestic chores, living expenses, and property titles for reasons that seem good to them ought to take a look at Matthew 7:1-5 and Luke 6:41-42 again and ask some more intelligent person to explain it to them. This is, of course, after they get over the trauma of choking down that camel!

I used to know a couple of old ladies who did everything together. They lived together, ate together, watched TV together, took baths and walks together and slept in the same bed! One of these old ladies was a golden retriever, now deceased! I wonder if those prejudiced preachers would claim that the woman was some kind of "sinner," or that the dog was!

In the United States, at least, civil marriage is a contract between consenting adults of either or both genders that neither requires nor prohibits any act between them other than that involved in getting married in the first place. I have occasionally heard arguments in my church against civil marriage between men and men or women and woman by clergy who truly believe that civil law should be based on their particular religious beliefs. The fact is, we Catholics have had a different view of marriage than many other people for a very long time, and we haven't required other religions to change their ways to conform to ours. We considered some people legally married actually single, and vice versa "in the eyes of the Church." We don't expect others to have the same view of The Lord's Supper or ordination of clergy; I don't see that those other's view of what we would call the Sacrament of Matrimony is any of our business unless we live in Vatican City. The truth is, people of both genders get married for all kinds of reasons nowadays. Being married has lots of financial, legal, social and other advantages that have nothing to do with sexual activity, otherwise old or crippled people like me could never get married. Besides, chastity is chastity, whether your thing is men, women, children or goats!

The institution of marriage is of much greater antiquity than the existence of anybody's formal religion. This intrinsic marriage bond is taken for granted in Genesis 2:24, and elsewhere in the Bible. For Catholics, and many other religions, the wedding, the ceremony that proclaims the marriage, includes religious connotations that imply other, or maybe more, than a physical, emotional and psychological bond. This is why the ceremony is often conducted, or mediatiated, by clergy. On the other hand, a civil marriage is, in fact, a civil union, with rights, privileges, duties and responsibilities that have nothing whatever to do with religious persuasion of the people involved unless it is also some kind of religious ceremony as well. The Pope has publicly declared that homosexual persons have a right to a family, the legal identity of which is established and protected by a civil union.

While I'm on the subject, I don't find anything in my Bible that forbids one person having multiple spouses, either. Jesus didn't seem to have anything against it. For what it's worth, I think that is a rule of some other religions as well as mine, and of current US laws, not a Scriptural one. I have heard various members of the clergy defending this idea by references to Genesis 2:24, Matthew 19:5-6, Mark 10:7-8, 1 Corinthians 6:16, and Ephesians 5:31, but if Carol and Alice are married to Bob, Carol is also married to Ted, and Alice is also married to Jim, I don't see how Bob and Carol's son Joe, Bob and Alice's daughter Patricia and Ted and Carol's son Buster are any less "one flesh" than anybody else's kids. That also goes for each of Jim and Alice's twins Betsy and Jimmy.

I would be interested in anyone who thinks he has found a Scriptural basis for "only between one man and one woman" to email me and educate me as a work of charity.

One definition of "gay marriage" is the lifetime legal union, in mutual love, support and fidelity, between one gay man and one gay woman. I'm for that! So, I think, should we be all!

Besides, Christians are commanded not to condemn "sinners" (especially if the alleged "sins" are just assumed, not positively known), as an enemy, but to admonish them as brothers. I don't see any logic to "admonishing" the brothers only to others - or in public.

If these people really were Christians, one has to wonder why they would act as if they were unaware of Matthew 5:43-46, 7:1 and following, Matthew 19:19 and 22:39; Mark 12:31-33; Luke 6:27, 32, 35 and 10:27; John 13:34-5 and 15:12, 17; Romans 12:9-10 and 13:8-10; Galatians 5:6 and 13-14; Ephesians 4:2 and 5:2; Philippians 1:9; 1 Thessalonians 3:12 and 5:8; Hebrews 10:24-25 and 13:1; James 2:8; 1 Peter 1:22 and 3:8; 1 John 3:11, 18, 23, 4:7-8, 11-12, 20 and II John 1:5.

Can't we all just get along?

John Lindorfer