I have met
people who are gay, bi, and or
transgender, who tell me,
sincerely, that our LGBT rights
are not the only issue that
influences their voting choices.
Indeed. There's healthcare
equality, marriage equality,
women's equality, tax equality,
racial and ethnic equality,
educational equality, and voting
equality, among others -all
things being equal; and then
there's national security, when
to go to war, trade imbalance
and outsourcing jobs overseas,
not to mention The Economy and
separation of church and state;
and other minor details like
that.
I've met
other folks, living under the
rainbow, who just waive their
hands dismissively and tell me,
"Oh, I don't pay any attention
to politics..." That just
makes my eyes bug out.
Isn't our
diversity wonderful? I
just want to scream.
Recently, I
met a guy at a gay senior dinner
(I'm a gay senior) who announced
to me that he was a far right
conservative; but that my being
solidly left in my views turned
him on; he liked me, he told me.
He was trying to pick me up.
At the age of 66, I've heard
every kind of pickup line there
is; but this was creepy. I
got up, grabbed my prune juice
cocktail, and changed my seat!
It has often
been said that this election in
particular provides a clear
choice between totally different
visions of American progress.
One party's platform blatantly
states total opposition to gay
rights. The other party's
platform boldly states clear
support for our freedom to
pursue all the rights and
benefits that our fellow
citizens enjoy.
As a member
of the 47% of Americans who rely
on our government continuing to
keep promises made long ago in
my life, I'm voting for the
party and presidential candidate
who intend to keep those
promises rather than cutting
costs by throwing me under the
bus. I don't see myself as
a 'victim' nor as a freeloader.
I'm a disabled veteran. I
worked all my life and paid
taxes; not millions or billions
tweaked by tax lawyers, just
enough to keep me in cheap
toilet paper like other ordinary
folks. While people I knew
were running away to Canada, or
lying and saying they're gay to
get out of going to Vietnam, I
left college and volunteered; I
lied about being straight to be
allowed to serve my country.
I served for ten years. I
have spinal degeneration from Huey
jumping, I had cancer, and I'll
spare you hearing about the
rest. There's a shitload
of young American veterans today
who volunteered to serve in Iraq
and Afghanistan who are severely
disabled due to their
patriotism, bravery, and
courage; and they call them
freeloaders? Bloody Hell!
I was born in
America to refugee parents who
fled Nazi genocide to live here
in freedom. Yet, when I was a
toddler in the late 1940s,
things weren't so equal for
everyone in America.
Racial, religious, ethnic, and
gender discrimination abounded
in jobs, justice, freedom, and
housing. In 1948,
President Truman integrated our
armed forces by Executive Order.
It took some twenty years, from
that time, for civil rights to
be enacted into law. As I
grew up, during those years, the
concept of equality for all
Americans slowly began to become
a reality. Americans
served together, schools were
integrated to ensure equal
education, housing laws were
enacted to prohibit
discrimination; and most
significantly, voting rights
legislation enabled equal
representation at long last.
My immigrant parents
taught me that, "There is
nothing more precious than
American Freedom." And
that freedom was being fought
for in the world I came of age
in. The markers of my
teen-aged generation were
watched by us on black and white
TV, in the Autumn of 1963, as
weeping Americans lined the
railroad tracks to watch the
funeral train pass following the
assassination of President John
F. Kennedy; the third Selma to
Montgomery March in the early
Spring of 1965 where we saw
white police assault black
Americans; and the murder of the
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
in 1968. Unknown to us in
that time, but historically
significant, was the birth of
Barack Obama, in 1961, who would
become the 44th President of the
United States and end a century
long ban on gay military
service. A year earlier,
in 1960 when I was thirteen
years old, I participated in my
first march for civil rights on
a peaceful picket line at a
local mall in suburbia where I
grew up. I was hit
in the head with a rock.
A friend and
I formed a civil rights advocacy
discussion group in our school
back then. We invited a
black civil rights activist to
take the railroad out from the
City to our distant northeastern
suburb to speak with us.
We gave him ordinary directions
to walk or take a taxi the three
miles from the train station to
our school and come in the
building's front door and up to
our meeting classroom on the
second floor. That
was when we learned our lesson
about the world he lived in, as
he patiently explained that no
taxi driver would let him in his
car; and he could not simply
stroll through our suburban town
on a sunny afternoon and walk
into our school, the police
would be called if he did.
That was the America I grew up
in fifty years ago; when the man
who is now President of the
United States could not have
come to the town where I lived without
being questioned because of his
color.
As for
homosexuals, back then you could
be arrested and jailed simply
for gathering in a group, your
name could be published in the
local newspaper, and you could be fired
from your job, and evicted from
your home. If you talked
about marrying your same sex
partner, people would think you
were stark raving mad. In
the military, you'd be murdered
if anyone found out, or you'd be
dishonorably discharged and
disgraced, unable to get a job
sweeping the floor anywhere.
A lot has
changed and I'm so glad to have
lived to see it all and be able
to live openly in pride now.
Some of the changes are very
recent, just in the last few
years, enacted or advocated by
our current President.
There is still a lot that needs
to change. We are not done
yet. Current service
members are still denied equal
family benefits, simply because
of whom they love. Our
marriages, legal in just a few
states, are forbidden to be
recognized by the federal
government. One party
wants to move forward and
progress to give us full
equality. The other party
is united in wanting to
permanently impose backward
policies of discrimination.
You choose. Its your vote,
its your life, its your freedom.
Denny Meyer,
former SFC USAR