Just maybe, some sanity will return to this country which has been divided terribly by people I consider extremists "in the Name of God", or what in my nightmares remind me of the movie "the Kite Runner", which depicts the Taliban in Afghanistan, how monsterism sprung forth from their religion, and how they are total hypocrits as well. And don't forget 9/11 also, in the Name of God.

In particular, I think of my 3 gay friends. One was "totally suicidal at 21", fearing he would be abandoned by friend and family alike. Another, a guy who probably would feel bad if he stepped on an ant, was "one trigger squeeze away" from blowing off his head at 17, rather then face his father over coming out. Another gay man - when he came out, his parents wanted him "to commit suicide so they wouldn't have to kill him themselves". All of these people are perfectly decent, hard working citizens, any of whom I would be proud to call my son, though we are unrelated.

Homophobia is one of the great shames of America. Most of it stems from the expectation of "maleness", or macho-ism, in a man, who from time immemorial did the heavy lifting in society, and ruled over the woman. It got incorporated into the bible, the only book of its time. And there is evidence biblical mistranslations lose the original meaning that only the man who acted like a woman in a gay relationship was guilty of sin, which I think proves the point about machoism. And, please think about this one - isn't part of the "culture of war', mankind's greatest failure, based on the expectation of macho-ism, eg the army recruiting slogan of "be all you can be" (dead also?)? Perhaps we might remember Vietnam and the slogan "what if they gave a war and nobody came”.

I'll believe the evangelicals (yes I am aware that in some middle of the road churches the evangelicals are the liberal branch) when I see them step up to the plate for legal equality and true love and acceptance of our gay citizens, as equals, not something between irrational hatred and grudging acceptance as long as they are out of sight, out of mind.

And it has been true over this country's existance that conservative churches have been opposed to almost every social justice initiative, e.g. ending slavery, letting Blacks vote, letting women vote, integration of our armed services, and ending the ban on interracial marriage. Now their focus seems to be on their next victims, gay people.

And as more and more gay people come out of the closet, we will recognize that "the closet" was nothing but a terroristic means of keeping gay people hiding who they were, on pain of ostracism from society and family. And that is just a variant on how black people, easily identifiable, were kept in political, social, and economic isolation for a hundred years after the civil war by segregation. The terrorism of the closet is little different, it will change. The moral question is why so many people had to suffer so much in the past.