Yet Another Reason to Open Fire

I didn't start out trying to hate gays, but it's getting harder and harder not to.

Before Congress, apparently, are yet more "gay rights" bills that place personal comfort over constitutional liberties. One of these, I think, is fairly harmless. It's a repeal of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy. Honestly, that decision should be left up to the military. Of course, the danger is that this will be quickly followed by legislation about appropriate behavior toward gays in the military, which would be an epic mistake. But we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

The two that I have a problem with are (1) a so-called "hate crimes" bill that covers offenses motivated by gay-bashing, and (2) a measure outlawing workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation. As for the first one - there is no such thing as a "hate crime." There are just crimes. Assault is no better or worse if prompted by discrimination than by, say, a profit motive (mugging), or jealous rage (domestic dispute), and it is inappropriate to have a bill suggesting otherwise. It will be argued that gays deserve some kind of special protection because they are "more likely" to be randomly beat up on the street. But come now, visibly wealthy people are also "more likely" to be mugged than people wearing rags. If you would not support a bill extending special protection to the wealthy from mugging, then you should likewise not support a bill extending special protection to gay people. We all take our chances, and we all (thank God!) still have Second Amendment proections that allow us to even the odds. As for the second, this is yet more intrusion by the federal government into our private lives. All of us are (or should be) well aware by this point that for every real instance of discrimination there are at least ten cases filed just because some dumb, lazy worthless employee who happens to belong to a federally protected group didn't get promoted as quickly as they would ideally have liked to be.

I grow increasingly tired of this crap, which means I have less and less patience with people who support this kind of government-sponsored bullying. And since, as far as I can tell, a minimum of 80% of gays support this legislation, it invariably means I end up hating them as a (political) group too. But what can I do? They're trying to police my opinions, and that ain't cool, folks.

Dear President Bush: now is a good opportunity for you to dust off that much-neglected veto pen again.