IT'S NOT A CIVIL RIGHTS ISSUE

Governor Paterson recently called for the redefinition of marriage to include homosexual and lesbian couples claiming this to be a civil rights issue.

The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. must be rolling in his grave!
Mr. Paterson, himself an African-American, should have a better understanding of what constitutes a civil rights issue. Sadly, he denigrates his own heritage by associating the civil rights struggle of the African-Americans with the current trend to legitimize an immoral lifestyle. Governor Paterson insults the African-American community, and the memory of The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. by placing the gay rights movement on the same level as the civil rights movement of the 60s.

Civil rights movements are characterized by the defense of an oppressed minority, a people who demonstrate disadvantage in three areas: economically, politically and socially.

In every area the homosexual community enjoys not only equality, but superiority. They earn more, they have greater political clout, and they are, in fact, the only protected social class in America today.

They are not an oppressed ethnic minority, and it is an offense to legitimate minorities to place a group characterized by deviant behavior in the same class.

Homosexuality is not an immutable characteristic of one’s identity such as race, or as defining of one’s identity such as religion. There are no “ex” African-Americans, but there are thousands of “ex” homosexuals who have changed, and have chosen to develop healthy heterosexual relationships.

If you want to properly include gays and lesbians in a class it would have to be in a class made up of people who are addicted to destructive behaviors, such as drug addicts, or alcoholics. Just like these addictive lifestyles, homosexuality can be nearly impossible to change without divine help, but as the evidence clearly indicates, change does happen. To this end we must always demonstrate love and compassion toward those who are bound by homosexuality.

Albert J. Williams-Meyers, a professor of Black Studies at SUNY New Paltz, knows civil rights. He had this to say,

"In terms of the civil rights movement of the '60s and '70s, there isn't much parallel there at all. People from the African continent were brought to America as slaves because of their skin color. Such factors don't figure into the discrimination that affects gays and lesbians.”

The Rev. Sylvester McClearn of Newburgh, NY was part of the black civil rights era. He said,

"They are not deprived of anything. They are rich people. They are middle class. They are all kinds of people coming from all walks of life, not just poor people. They are a special interest group that is fighting for what they want."

This is not a righteous fight for “marriage equality” as the gay community claims. They have equality already. They have as much a right to marriage as anyone --marriage being the union of a male and a female unrelated by blood. They don’t have the right to redefine marriage to suit their deviant lifestyle, and in doing so, making marriage more common, thus devaluing the institution itself.

This is not a civil rights issue, and it must not be so framed. It’s about legitimizing an immoral lifestyle, and changing the institution that has served as the foundation of civilization. It must not be changed, or our posterity will reap the unintended consequences of our immorality.

The “Father of Our Country,” George Washington, in his 1789 inaugural speech, reminded us that,

“The propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained.”

We must demonstrate moral leadership, or we will continue to see a decline in the quality of life in America. We must continually work for the expansion of civil rights, but we must never encourage, by our public policy, civil wrongs.