as yours?"

"I don't know, Mike... Any religion is good, up to a point, I "How about the Chinese?"

suppose...

"Oh, I love the Chinese. I know a waiter; he's so cute! He works in that restaurant on Fourteenth Street."

"Do you think the Siamese are just as 'cute'?"

"I don't know any Siamese, Mike."

"That settles race and religion. The ones you know, you like, the others you're not so sure of; Marie... how about the way a person feels inside; how about a minority group that feels differently inside, from the way you feel; and thinks differently from the way you think... about certain everyday things...?"

"Like what?"

"Oh, like people who can't live the exact same kind of life that you, and the majority of others, are living. These people want to express their inner feelings differently... Would you have as much respect for their deep inner feelings as you have for your own...?"

"Deep inner feelings...?"

"Emotional differences, Marie. People who express themselves, or their emotions, differently from the way you express yours, say like, the minority group known as Homosexuals .

She glanced up at him sharply. "Homosexuals aren't a minority group." "They sure are, Marie!"

"But they're... different . . ."

"So are Siamese and Moslems..."

"But these people, the Siamese and the Moslems, are decent. Homosexuals immoral..."

are.

"Not all of them, Marie. Some Moslems are immoral too, but not all of them."

"But Homosexuals practise... perversion..."

"Do they? Who told you that?"

"Why, everybody knows that, Mike."

"Really? I never heard about it. I thought that doing what comes naturally to an individual was nature; I always thought that perversion was something else; something unnatural, low, evil, debased..."

"But that description fits Homosexuals, Mike."

"Does it? How do you know so much about them, Marie?" "Why, everybody knows about them..."

"Everybody does? On the contrary, Marie; I think the average person, the Heterosexual, knows very little about the Homosexual, his life and his feelings. In fact, I believe that the average Heterosexual needs a lot of educating along these lines. One knows very little about the other. The Homosexual is forced to live in a Heterosexual world; therefore, perhaps, he knows a little more about his brother Heterosexual, than his brother knows about him. The average Heterosexual knows very, very little about his brother Homosexual..."

"Please, Mike... Don't refer to them as... brothers."

“Okay, Marie; I'm sorry. We'll drop the subject. I didn't mean to upset you. I really am sorry."

"You didn't upset me, Mike; it's just that I hate to hear you defending those 'queers' so much."