Quodlibets: A Moral Problem

I don't read the letters to the editor in Time magazine very often (or Newsweek for that matter) because I get pretty pissed off at the seriously stupid people who get their letters published. (In the interest of full disclosure, I once had a letter published in Time. I was 19 and the article I responded to was about the educational trend of mainstreaming, and the practice of abolishing Honors classes; that pissed me off. I liked my Honors classes.)

Sometimes, though, when the cover article is very interesting to me (such as the recent cover article about "The Battle Over Gay Teens"), I'll peruse the letters to see how people are responding. For the most part, the responses to the aforementioned article were respectful. John Cameron Mitchell wrote in about the characterization of his movie, "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" and several people pointed out that things are better but things can be better still. But I should know better, because one letter just infuriated me.

"I was very disappointed with Time's cover. I am so tired of people trying to force us all to accept homosexuality. It is really sad that you can't read a magazine, watch television or go to a movie without finding some form of homosexual innuendo. What is the deal? Are there no longer any morals? At what point will America stand up and say, No more?"

No more what? No more gay people? You can't get rid of homosexuality, even though the 'ex-gay' movement tries (though, if this woman had read the article, she would read some conflicting views of homosexual rehabilitation. Because, you know, it doesn't fucking work. But that's something else.) unless you get rid of gay people, and that's too fucked up to even think about. If she's advocating a return to mass arrests of gay people, and a return to the closet of the 40's, 50's, 60's and so on, she's an idiot. If she's so offended by gay people, she should turn on Fox News and watch it 24 hours a day. That would be safe.

And as for the morality part of the equation, she's right. In one way. This country is facing a moral problem, but the moral problem isn't homosexuality. It's not sexuality at all. The moral problem is politicians. The moral problem is that millions of Americans can't afford food, that children starve in one of the most developed countries in the world. The moral problem is that millions of Americans can't afford basic medicines. If they have an emergency, they're fucked--and now they can't even declare bankruptcy. The moral problem is that the politicians keep enriching the rich and fucking over the little guy. An honest work-week of 40 hours is not enough to keep afloat in many cases. That's a goddamn moral problem.

There are people who are playing fast and loose with the lives of Americans--both here and abroad. We're fucking with the Earth on such a major scale that she's throwing deadly Hurricanes at us faster than we can keep up with. These are moral problems. When men embezzle millions and millions and millions of dollars from the companies that employ them, thus ruining the lives of the peons working for them, that's a moral failure. Rape and murder and theft are moral problems. Wife battering and child abuse, elder abuse and even blatant abuse of animals--those are moral problems.

Who you fuck, that's not a moral problem. When you love someone, that's not a moral problem. Allowing homosexuals a modicum of dignity, that's not a moral problem. Helping them jump out of the closet that kept them imprisoned for decades is a triumph. It's a fucking moral triumph.