The Heart is a Free Country
A parent being interviewed on on TV recently, protesting about LGBT issues being on the school curriculum, made the point that being sexuality is a lifestyle choice. How ignorant some people can be, I ask you! Sadly this parent is not alone in thinking that. LGBT is not a human choice but a human condition; not an illness, but part of what makes us human beings who we are, the differences that help shape our character, personality and whole lives. Why can't some people see that?
Fortunately, all of us are blessed with that toughest of all cookies, a human spirit, able to help us find our way in life, and where necessary, rise above its worst... if we choose let it rather than surrender to certain dogma and conventions that prefer to go walkies with dinosaurs; in that sense, yes, we do have a choice.
I have no regrets about being gay. My deepest regret is that so many other people are blind to its not being a life choice. It was this that kept me in a dark, lonely closet from the age of 14 to my mid-30's and eventually resulted in a nervous breakdown from which it took me some years to recover.. I would not wish the likes of that closet to my worst enemy, and the only way to get this across to the least gay-friendly heterosexuals is through education...is it not?
Parents will have their views and are entitled to share these with their children; share, not dictate. Children deserve an opportunity to learn about the kind of life into which they are growing, and be free to make up their own minds. If enlightenment is the key to a kinder, better world. education has to be the key to any such enlightenment. Education has never been about imposing points of view on children, but giving them an opportunity to ask questions, discuss, argue, whatever... in an impartial environment. (This is my problem with Faith Schools, not the Faith, but the lack of impartiality.) It is a rare parent, indeed, who is impartial about what they tell/teach their children.
It is not only gay lovers who write to me about estrangement from families caused by their choice of life partners. More often than not, families come round, but it can take time and it’s tragic if true to say that more often than not, they don’t. Mind you, just the likes of yours truly invariably need time to adjust to the realisation we are gay, so too do family and friends; many a division has been caused by knee jerk reactions.
Labels: bigotry, choice, culture, Freedom, human nature, human spirit, humanity, hypocrisy, identity, love, mind-body-spirit, nature, personal space, poetry, positive thinking, prejudice, religion, sexuality, society
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