So, after sitting on this nearly a year...

[nbaeker]

I've decided that it's time to post something from an email I sent. The scenario is this: the guy who was our speaker at camp last summer is a friend of mine on facebook. After a particularly intense discussion about GLBT rights, he made a comment that.. well it was too much. I have a large *large* number of friends who are gay and who are

Comments

[mmc12]

That was really well thought out and I admire you for sending it. Our best "couple" friends (the ones we trade babysitting with and spend lots of time with, our kids are the same ages) are two married women. Where we live, they are as legally married as we are, but it takes a lot of courage, even in our relatively tolerant area.

I was raised in a very homophobic climate. My parents taught me to respect other people just the way they are, but other family members say horrible stuff and don't even think about who they could be hurting -- you may be assured that 90% of my family is in massive denial that my FIL is gay, although he has been out for nearly 20 years! His partner died of AIDS twelve years ago. I am so sad he did not make it long enough to be a grandparent to my kids.

I do not put up with crap from my friends list or anybody else who spouts this stuff, but I have never been confronted in a hostile manner about it, either. ((hugs Nicole)) I only have one family member on FB who has actually said something to me, and he is a fundamentalist minister's son; (and my cousin's husband) and we have civilly agreed to disagree. he knows I am going to post GLBT supportive stuff and I know he is probably going to gnash his teeth over it but I'm done worrying about it.

I hope that just by humanizing people who are different in his eyes, he may come to realize that there is really nothing to be paranoid about. Thanks for fighting the good fight ((hugs))