Lesbian & Living in Mississippi

NOTE

This morning on your show, you addressed a bill that was passed in Pennsylvania about gay rights to not be harassed. I just wanted to give you my viewpoint on this one.

I am a 23-year-old lesbian living in Jackson, Mississippi, with my 40-year-old mate. I am not one of those gay people that try to cram it down your throat. I am a tax-paying, Christian, American citizen. My neighbors don't even know that I am gay. I feel like my personal business is just that.. MY BUSINESS! But when it comes to being harassed, I wish Mississippi would pass a bill prohibiting the harassment of gays. I don't want special treatment, I want equal treatment. I have been fired from 2 jobs because of being gay. I wasn't prancing around telling everyone, I just wouldn't lie when asked. I am not pushing it on anyone, but I also am not ashamed of who I am. I am an average American citizen like anyone else. The U. S. has laws protecting women, blacks, handicapped, Atheist, and Satanists, but I can be asked to leave a restaurant, or be fired from a job just for being gay. I think we should have a law protecting us from things like this just the same as the other groups do. After all, I am paying taxes like other people, not on welfare, not molesting children, not being a deviant. I work for a law firm and I am out there trying to help less fortunate people. My mate and I adopted 2 families for Christmas, and neither one of us have had as much as a traffic ticket, ever. Why should we NOT be protected from harassment?

ANSWER

Let me begin by saying, what you do with your personal life IS your business and I think the Supreme Court would agree. With that said, let me also specify the terminology of PERSONAL is referenced to sexual relationships that are consensual between adults. In other words, just because it's in the privacy of your bedroom, that doesn't immune you from arrest and prosecution from selling or using drugs, sexual deviancy with a minor, etc. Other than that, I'm on your side, as long as you don't push your lifestyle on others to justify your behavior as normal.

To say that you are just an average person may be true in all aspects EXCEPT your CHOICE of sexual preference. The fact is the sexual preference you've chosen is not biologically normal by any natural, cultural or statistical standards anywhere on the face of the earth. I could use the same argument for the small number of people in this nation who parachute out of a perfectly good airplane or those who are confirmed nudist. They also may have a sparkling record as a good driver and Good Samaritan, but the fact is they have still made some statistically ABNORMAL choices in their lifestyle.

As to your being harassed and fired from two jobs because you are gay, that's a shame. In MS, you are in the same boat as heterosexuals being fired. What difference does it make if you're fired because your boss doesn't like you being atheist, Mormon or gay? Surely working in a law office you've got to know that your bosses know THE LAW. I'm on your side on this one too. If you're doing your job and not billboarding your lifestyle, if everything else associated with your work was average or above average and you were fired when asked about your sexual preference, then YOU along with every other Mississippian, need work to change the laws of this state. That's where your efforts should be directed, NOT FOR SPECIAL PROTECTION OF A SEXUAL PREFERENCE.

If a woman acknowledges that she and her husband are members of a wife-swapping club and the law firm where she works fires her, should she ask for special protection? You could always base your argument on the fact that it's done by consenting adults in the privacy of their bedrooms? But what about the rights of the law firm? Does that even matter? Sure it does. Their decisions have a direct bearing on the company, the employees, the employees' children, their clients and sometimes even the community.

The reality is this, the same laws that brought the ax down on you, because of your sexual proclivity, have also cause pain and suffering for heterosexual Front Row Christians and many others. You've heard often that you can not legislate morality; in your case the solution was not a new law, but a new law firm.

As for you not pushing your lesbian lifestyle on others, the same cannot be said for those who speak for your movement. It is most unfortunate that the homosexual-lesbian groups in this country do not share your view. I think they do more harm than good when special laws are demanded but not needed. It tears at the very fabric of credulity to explain how taking an innocent life of a homosexual requires special punishment, in comparison to the punishment given to those taking the life of an innocent heterosexual. Justice should be served equally because of taking a human life, not the color of skin or the sexual orientation of the victim. That's just common sense.

And finally-and I say this sincerely-If you want to change the law, then do it as a taxpaying Mississippian...not as a lesbian Mississippian!

Paul Gallo

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