I’d like to thank Molly Shannon for the introduction, the Family Equality Council for having me here, and every other person involved in this struggle for tolerance and acceptance – it’s your work that’s making a difference, for families, and for the children they’re raising.
For the children. That’s a phrase I hear the other side use a lot, and you know what? They’re right, just not in the way they think.
The fight for gay rights IS about the children. It’s about having access to the same laws, the same benefits, and the same protections, so those children can have every advantage and chance to succeed in life. It’s about not having to worry about being bullied at school, or while walking down the street.
It’s about living in a stable home with parents who love each other, and who just so happen to be the same sex, because every scientific study done shows no disadvantage or flaw to being raised by gay parents.
It’s about the world our children are going to live in, and the attitudes of the people in it. Will our children grow up with tolerance and respect, treating others the way they’d like to be treated? Or will they grow up with discrimination and hate, divided from those around them, subject to the same stupid cycle of anger and strife, the same racism and sexism we’ve overcome before?
That’s why I wrote my letter. That’s why I spoke out. And that’s why I’ll continue speaking out against every single hypocritical jackass who tries to use “for the children” as a shield for intolerance and bigotry, as a mask for their own personal vendettas and small minded pettiness, because those people aren’t thinking about the children at all.
They’re thinking about themselves.
So I say forget those people, those sanctimonious self righteous toads.
I say live your own life, however you want to live it. I say love who you want, because it’s nobody’s business but your own. I say treat others the way you would like to be treated, with compassion, dignity, and respect – the way human beings are supposed to act.
Above all, I say think of the children, not with fear, but with love.
Thank you.