I don't get it

I just don't understand everyone's hang-up with gay marriage. What difference does it make? My daughter was raised without an awareness one way or the other about gays. They exist. Just like trees, clouds in the sky, birds, men, women, christians, jews, the list goes on. She is a great mother a good christian, a good citizen, a good tax payer and she still doesn't care of notice whether someone is gay. It did not challenge her faith or her concept of family to know that gays exist.

Gay couples are just like any hetero couple. They are as much a family as hetero couples. They love and care just as deeply. They help their kids with the homework. The biggest difference is that gays are probably better at teaching their kids tolerance of others because they have to teach them how to handle someone treating them and their family with lack of tolerance.

They have all the negatives of being a couple/family ... disagreements, keeping relationship from falling apart, sick partners/family members, money problems. Let's allow them some of the benefits too.

I am disappointed that politicians try to play both sides by saying they are FOR civil unions but AGAINST gay marriage. It's the same thing people. If churches don't want to perform a marriage ceremony for gay couples, that is the church's right. But we have separation of church and state in this country, so they have the right to go to a courthouse and get married just like I did. I don't call my marriage a civil union just because it occurred at a courthouse. I'm married. Period.

People seem to think they are SAVING the definition of family by denying gays the same basic human rights that hetero married couples have. Like the right to inherit property. The right to make medical decisions for an incapacitated partner. The right to have family health insurance. Gays are not challenging what a family is ... they are enforcing it. The care for each other just like we do. They support each other just like we do. They pay taxes just like we do. They join neighborhood watch groups just like we do. They take their kids trick-or-treating just like we do. It's not like their lives are different than ours.

The rolls are basically the same, they are just being carried out by 2 men or 2 women. It really is that simple. We need to stop reading more into it than it is. We need to stop teaching our children intolerance, you are just making their adulthood more difficult for them. This is the world they will live, work and marry in. You are crippling their coping skills by focussing on people who are different.

Everyone who cares, you are free to be negative and make your childrens' lives more difficult as they move into adulthood in a world that is not what you teach. Your church will support you, so that's where you should hide. But I ask that you stop trying to deny people their rights based on religeous belief. That is NOT what this country is about. That is NOT what this country was founded on. That is NOT good manners.

I know that in these scarey times since 9/11 people have run hysterically towards religion. It's been done before and it will be done again I'm sure. And that's wonderful. That's what our faith is for. It helps us though difficult times. But it is very important that we don't go overboard with it. Stop blaming lack of religion in schools and government as the source of our problems. That is DEFINITELY NOT the case. I am 56. I was raised without prayer in school and I am not gay nor a terrorist. I learned prayer where I was supposed to learn it ... in church and home. School was for facts and arts ... and phys ed. That's what our ancestors came to this new land for ... religeous freedom. They separated church and state so that people weren't judged and treated by their government based on religion.

I think they were pretty smart. I look at countries that have been fighting for generations and the biggest difference that I see is that they have not separated religion from politics. That makes politics much more personal and volatile. I do not want that for this country or my grandson. I want him to have the same experience that I had and that his mother had.

This is a great country. It has been a great country for over 200 years. I think what we've been doing so far has worked pretty stinking well. Let's not mess it up. Ok? Disagree with me about whether or not gays are just like us. But please, don't mess with my country. I like my country just the way it is ... a melting pot that has been set up to be as impartial towards its citizens as possible.