Gay Civil Rights: What Does The Future Hold?
There has been a big rise in civil hate crimes in America, much like the times in the sixties. There is also a lot of discrimination against people due to some defining trait. The people who suffer these consequences are those who chose to be different in sexual orientation or gender identity. By being different, the apparently are letting in a ton of trouble.
It will take a long time, as the history of gay rights has taught us, to get equality and perfect gay civil rights. One example of the battle is seen in how hard gay people have to fight to have a family. Various states do not see gay marriage as a real definition of marriage. It is not a legal contract in any circumstances. Even if two people really do love each other, society dictates that they cannot join as the rest of us do.
Laws protecting the civil rights of homosexuals are getting much better right now. There are some new laws regarding living and employment conditions that prohibit discriminating against homosexuals. This is giant progress for gay civil rights, but it does not promise that homosexuals will have the same opportunities to succeed as straight people do. For example, some employers are exploiting loopholes in the laws, mostly in "right-to-work" states.
We may see crimes against gays going down, but that is no reflection of the actual state of things. Gay civil rights are by no means hammered out perfectly, and thousands of victims still feel ashamed and afraid to come forward and claim that crimes have occurred. This results in an incorrect statistic, as most of these crimes are either not reported or are reported as a different type of crime.
Perhaps the biggest opposition to the gay movement is the conservatives. These people are generally the ones who believe in the old way of doing things and are hesitant to change. These opponents are usually based heavily in some religion where gays are unnatural and hated for choosing to be gay. People are being killed for this line of thought daily.
Little by little, civil rights for homosexuals are altering and are becoming a part of the public consciousness so that they may actually afford a greater degree of protection from violent and non-violent bigots alike. And while the country may never see true equality in this area, there is much to be learned from the civil rights struggles of the 1960s. People must also begin to discuss this subject more frequently, because it is always easier to combat any discrimination when it is out in the open.
In our present day and age, these crimes are occurring against those that chose a sexual orientation or gender identity outside the norm. By doing this, they may accidentally invite a lot of hate into their lives. The history of gay rights shows us that it will be a long and tedious project to obtain total equality and equal gay civil rights. The battle that many of these people are fighting is seen in the war that gays have fought to simply be a family. Many areas still do not see gay marriage as a legal binding contract.
Published March 11th, 2008
Filed in Politics
