Gay Marriage: Equal Rights or Special Interest Lobbying?

(first appeared in a forum discussion at AlterNet)

I've dropped out of this debate due to my own exasperation. But if you don't mind, allow me to posit a broad outlook concerning the potential acceptance of gay, lesbian, and transgendered human beings.

I sense that, unlike many historical attitudes towards homosexuality, civilization today (especially here in America) is in a state of collective adolescence, and it may be possible that the image of gay marriage is a perceived threat that springs from a kind of growing pain that will likely work its way through most western cultures in spite of the broad firewall attempting to stem this tide.

To me, this is not a linear world we live in. This is not an either/or world we live in. The spectrum of individual human development is not constrained by any grid or system of fairness that one might wish to cling to or superimpose onto others in order to make sense of things. Certainly we are all trying to find order with every action we take, whether known or unknown to our own rational minds. And the search for acceptance beyond oneself is a well-traveled path to a kind of life management that allows one to expend more energy on and attention to productive work best suited to their own inner passions, talents, and abiding curiosities.

America's grand experiment is based on the trust in the possibility, the ability of the individual to create a new and unique perspective within a dynamic, diverse society is it not? And throughout our history have we not demonstrated to ourselves and to the world that by reducing or eliminating constraints on individuals that once were accepted, and naturally so, by any given period's cultural code of acceptable behavior, we became more enlightened, more powerful through inclusion?

So it seems to me that both the yearning for and the resistance to gay marriage are part of this adolescent culture's growing pains. That conflict requires friction until certain watershed moments shake us, both individually and collectively, out of what may be our fading, rigid, and yet dangerously cornered assumptions of what "true" order is. Fear of change, along with both poorly-formed and well-reasoned arguments against change have always been a part of the cycles of life haven't they? The intensity of these arguments generally points, like a signpost, to an impending rotation into the next cycle, if my understanding of the work of Erich Fromm comes close to being accurate ~

Bold self examination and exploration are what may be called for in order to grow beyond this particular impasse, and move closer to inclusion concerning equal protection for gay, lesbian, and transgendered human beings. Polarized factions will certainly define the debate, but the wilting, the implosion of current concepts that may be ready for the dustbin should allow the friction to eventually subside and new growth to begin taking root.

I invite anyone visiting here to evaluate the validity or flawed nature of my thinking. I remain confident that by utilizing authentic reflection on the matter at hand, we can see our way to a new and manageable model of co-existence.