The Politics of Fear and Same-Sex Marriage

When a political group uses fear to scare people into persuading them to support its cause, it's only because it lacks justification for its reasoning. The National Organization for Marriage (NOM), is desperate because it can see the writing on the wall. There has been a turning point in this country, no matter how slowly, and it's only a matter of time until same-sex marriage is more common throughout the United States.

The Bush administration was also a huge proponent of using the politics of fear. They too had no justification for many of their decisions, including the Iraq War. And so what did they do? They scared the public into believing their propaganda. Remember when we had terror threat level warnings flash across our television screens telling us when we should be fearful, and just how fearful we should be? The red level was the highest threat, followed by orange, etc. New York stayed at a constant orange level for many years. But did you also notice that after George W. Bush was reelected, the terror warning levels disappeared from our television sets? Think about it. He didn't need to scare us anymore because he had already gotten what he wanted, his reelection.

The same is true for NOM. They are using lies and scare tactics to get the public on their side. This television ad is running in several states, including New York and New Jersey. The reason, because they estimate that these states are some of many which are considering same-sex marriage next. Their tactic, scare the people and have them put pressure on their elected officials.

The truth is that same-sex marriage does not threaten any one's heterosexual marriage or relationship. If the marriage to my same-sex partner threatens your marriage or destroys the institution itself, then there is a much larger problem at hand. If your heterosexual marriage is that fragile, what does that say about you?

NOM has spent millions of dollars on this ad in an attempt to derail future same-sex marriage laws. Instead of spending so much money on baseless ads such as this, they should spend the money on promoting the benefits of marriage (straight or gay) and create ads that are against divorce (the real threat to marriage).

Our country is in the midst of dealing with a severe recession, two wars and a debilitating health care system. Americans want these problems resolved, not false distractions. Just as the rest of America finally came around and rejected the fear mongering of the Bush administration, so too will there be a backlash eventually on NOM's fear based propaganda. Quite frankly, I think the majority of America is rather tired of being scared into action, even if their opinions on same-sex marriage haven't yet caught up with doing the right thing.

Same-sex marriage is about civil marriage and obtaining the same legal rights and responsibilities as heterosexual marriage. That's it. It's not about forcing religions to accept or perform these unions. Although, some might have you believe differently.

One more thought: A majority group should never be allowed to limit the rights of a minority. If this were the American way, we would still have slaves and Jews (and gays) would still be imprisoned and killed in concentration camps. Think about what true equality means.