February 28th 2011

Alastriona Lott
Gay Rights Should be Human Rights in the Lands of Freedom

What is humanity? Must we ask that? It is one of the oldest questions we have and it still isn't

answered. Is being human the same as being a homosapien? This upright, tailless monkey? Or is it

something deeper, something more. Some would say it is the ability to conceive of these questions, or

the idea of Gods, surely it isn't the ability to love? The ability for compassion driven not by need to

reproduce or survive but for the sake of feeling the other person's love, without lust, in that person's

eyes. The only others we see this in are elephants and certain unique chimpanzees. Perhaps it is telling

that the call of these creatures calls to us as well. Compassion is a driving force in humanity, and is

what we mean by “true love”. I think that a person no matter how strange is human if they can show

compassion. You could be an alien from Sirius B disguised as Elvis Costello I would not care, as long

as you didn't hurt anybody and showed compassion then I would be proud to call you human.

Compassion is a key component of all world religions as well and therefore there are many things that

make no sense in these religions' treatment of gay and lesbian persons. I intend to prove that the

treatment given to homosexual people living in the modern world is appauling, confusing, and illogical.

When surveying language you will always find idiot bigotry embedded into it and while we are

taught that Shakespeare was racist for using the term Ethiope (a Greek term meaning Burnt Faced,

Hermia was running around outside on midsummer day for heaven's sake! Of course she has a burnt

face), language has evolved such derogatory phrases such as that's so gay, lame, retarded, or that's so

white all implying weakness and all around terrible conduct. We seem to have a need to find someone

to blame, to discriminate against, and since these days a person gets in real trouble for mentioning any

race except caucasian, first nations, and mongoloid races, we turn to those members of society that

cannot defend themselves. Do we really need that? To know that someone else has it worse than us?

Because we force them down? We shouldn't need that. We use discriminatory laws to keep them down,
such as the “Defense of Marriage Act” which lets individual states decide whether or not to

acknowledge gay marriages and also denies them social security survivor's benefits and the tax benefits

that heterosexual couples get. On the other hand homosexual couples endure a lot of physical,

emotional bullying for something that they cannot change. It is true that the most important freedom is

the freedom to take consequences but the justifications that people use to hurt homosexual people are

no more true than those that people use to validate antisemitism and the actions taken are no less

condemnable.

There is a statement that gets thrown around every time gay marriage is mentioned “Gay

marriage would cause social chaos”. How did these people come to this conclusion? Why would a

loving constructive relationship based on mutual respect ever cause social chaos? Because the two are

there for each other in their old age, taking much strain off nursing homes and government funded care

groups? Or is it because these people are able to gain the same legal tax benefits as the homosexual

couples? Is it the fact that they are able to support each other in the event of a layoff? How can these

things cause social chaos? These same people who quote this line back themselves up with, “the family

is the natural unit of humanity”. Well based on this there should be more order to the world if even Gay

people are allowed to marry, populations should be even easier to keep track of if this statement holds

true. Perhaps people should think before letting their hate, and fear do the talking.

The loudest organized groups that oppose gay rights are religious groups, mostly Christian. This

is actually very strange and illogical since their messiah, their in fallible Christos, the anointed with

wisdom, said nothing about this except to be tolerant of all people, any believers can obtain heaven in

Christianity. However there is a verse in Corinthians that condemns homosexual persons... or so we

have always interpreted it. Paul does indeed mention homosexual people alongside prostitutes and

incestuous relationships, but he talks about “homosexual offenders” not “people guilty of

homosexuality” Paul was a roman and so to him homosexuality was par for the course it wasn't a

crime. Just as today heterosexuality is no crime but rape is heinous, so can homosexual rape. He talks
with the tone of “You say...” he does indeed tell us what the Corinthians say that gay people did, they

said that these people were transgressors, problematic and other such inflammatory things. But this is

just telling the people he is writing to what they say, and what is the point in this. The important lines

come afterwards where he essentially tells them “You however are violent, You are greedy, You would

hurt them, You would twist holy writings. If you are to judge them, then first fix these flaws in

yourselves.” the fact that people are so keen to quote the first statement and ignore the second is

depressing. The very documents people quote as proof of their validity are against the abuse of any

other person. Jesus said “Give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's” therefore by

extension give to the gay man what is the gay man's. Give him rights.

These are illogical, confusing and appauling ways to treat any other person. Humans are worth

more than we think. Soon we must recognize that the tailless monkey is not a human but people who

support, and love other people are human. Homosexual people are on the whole very compassionate

and understanding. If not more than the heterosexual people who condemn them. Reciting badly

thought out propaganda they never stopped to think it through. Quoting scripture that they do not

understand to celebrate their intolerance. Why aren't we thinking? Why aren't we asking? Who deserves

human rights... Everyone.

Biography
Alastriona Lott was born in Southern Ontario as all her
ancestors for five generations have been. She is as
Canadian as it is possible to be while still being of
European decent, however she was never patriotic, and
often jokes that it is hard for a Canadian to be patriotic
because they have too many rights, too much
information, and too much privacy to be patriotic.
Alastriona lived a good life and her childhood was
comfortable. She was always smart and addicted to
attention, and she had to deal with the fact that this did
not gain her any friends all through childhood so she
became a solitary child. This means she turned herself to
obsession after solitary obsession.
She reached Green belt in Goju Ryu Karate and earned
first place in several tournaments.
She has a passion for religious studies, history, and
politics.
Her brother was born and soon autism was diagnosed,
This moderated her competitive and vain disposition to a
point where her empathy mostly outweighs her need to
show off. She still feels a need to be praised but she
watches how she says things because she has to.
All through elementary school she was pushed by
teachers towards a certain other student who had brains and perfect behaviour rather than Alastriona's
habit of staring out the window, this girl smiled at the teacher and worked quietly quickly and over the
expectations. Alastriona however was bored and rebelled in this trivial work. The result was that she
always compared to this perfect student, and just felt broken. Freud said that the early years shaped the
rest of the life and Alastriona only realised that she felt broken recently, with the realization came a
shedding of burdens and a realization that she was in charge of her own happiness. She no longer feels
ill will towards the girl, since that girl was probably as broken as she was.