July 7, 2000

GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE

speakout

How dare you say those things!

As the Vermont Legislature worked in the spring to pass the civil unions law that took effect July 1, every newspaper in the state carried letters both pro and con.

Some of the letters against civil unions were stridently anti-gay, and eventually Sharon Underwood of White River Junction, Vt. could take no more. In late April she sent the following to her local paper, the Valley News of White River Junction and Hanover, N.H.

Her indignant reply to the insults and falsehoods she'd read struck a nerve, and the letter has reappeared, first in other New England papers, and then on the Internet. It has now appeared in publications from Alaska to South Africa.

by Sharon Underwood

Many letters have been sent to newspapers concerning the "homosexual menace" in our state. I am the mother of a gay son, and I've taken enough from you good people.

I'm tired of your foolish rhetoric about the "homosexual agenda" and your allegations that accepting homosexuality is the same thing as advocating sex with children. You are cruel and you are ignorant. You have been robbing me of the joys of motherhood ever since my children were tiny.

My firstborn son started suffering at the hands of the moral little thugs from your moral, upright families from the time he was in the first grade.

He was physically and verbally abused from first grade straight through high school because he was perceived to be gay.

He never professed to be gay or had any association with anything gay, but he had the misfortune not to walk or have gestures like the other boys. He was called “fag" incessantly, starting when he was six.

In high school, while your children were doing what kids that age should be doing, mine labored over a suicide note, drafting and redrafting it to be sure his family knew how much he loved them. My sobbing 17year-old tore the heart out of me as he choked out that he just couldn't bear to continue living any longer, that he didn't want to be gay and that he couldn't face a life with no dignity.

You have the audacity to talk about protecting families and children from the homosexual menace, while you yourselves tear apart families and drive children to despair. I don't know why my son is gay, but I do know that God didn't put him, and millions like him, on this Earth to give you someone to abuse. God gave you brains so that you could think, and it's about time you started doing that.

At the core of all your misguided beliefs is the belief that this could never happen to you, that there is some kind of subculture out there that people have chosen to join. The fact is that if it can happen to my family, it can

happen to yours, and you won't get to choose. Whether it is genetic or whether something occurs during a critical time of fetal development, I don't know. I can only tell you with an absolute certainty that it is inborn.

If you want to tout your own morality, you'd best come up with something more substantive than your heterosexuality. You did nothing to earn it; it was given to you. If you disagree, I would be interested in hearing your story, because my own heterosexuality was a blessing I received with no effort whatsoever on my part. It is so woven into the very soul of me that nothing could ever change it.

For those of you who reduce sexual orientation to a simple choice, a character issue, a

If you want to tout your own morality, you'd best come up with something more substantive than your heterosexuality.

bad habit or something that can be changed by a 10-step program, I'm puzzled. Are you saying that your own sexual orientation is nothing more than something you have chosen, that you could change it at will? If that's not the case, then why would you suggest that someone else can?

A popular theme in your letters is that our state has been infiltrated by outsiders. Both sides of my family have lived in Vermont for generations. I am heart and soul a Vermonter, so I'll thank you to stop saying that you are speaking for "true Vermonters."

You invoke the memory of the brave people who have fought on the battlefield for this great country, saying that they didn't give their lives so that the "homosexual agenda" could tear down the principles they died defending.

My 83-year-old father fought in some of the most horrific battles of World War II, was wounded and awarded the Purple Heart. He shakes his head in sadness at the life his grandson has had to live. He says he fought alongside homosexuals in those battles, that they did their part and bothered no one. One of his best friends in the service was gay, and he never knew it until the very end, and when he did find out, it mattered not at all. That wasn't the measure of the man.

You religious folk just can't bear the thought that as my son emerges from the hell that was his childhood he might like to find a lifelong companion and have a measure of

happiness. It offends your sensibilities that he should request the right to visit that companion in the hospital, to make medical deciIsions for him or to benefit from tax laws governing inheritance.

How dare he, you say. These outrageous requests would threaten the very existence of your family, would undermine the sanctity of marriage.

You use religion to abdicate your responsibility to be thinking human beings. There are vast numbers of religious people who

find your attitudes repugnant. God is not for the privileged majority, and God knows my son has committed no sin.

The deep-thinking author of a letter to the editor who lectures about homosexual sin and tells us about "those of us who have been blessed with the benefits of a religious upbringing" asks. "Whatever happened to the idea of striving . . . to be better human beings than we are?"

Indeed, sir, whatever happened to that?

milestones

Coley Michael Cummiskey, Frank Jared Hunnell to wed

Columbus-Typically, being gay and getting married don't always go hand in hand, but against what society has taught us, and what the government has dictated to us, Coley Michael Cummiskey and Frank Jared Hunnell are engaged to be joined in a union ceremony that will take place on Saturday, August 12, 2000, at 6:30 pm.

Commitment is one thing-but a wedding? Why bother? Because we humans love to mark milestones with celebrations. From baptism to a sweet-sixteen party to a retirement party, we take stock of our lives with rituals. By planning a wedding ceremony, you are participating in an age-old rite that honors the purest and most basic union between two people.

CUMMISKEY-HUNNELL

Coley Michael Cummiskey and Frank Jared Hunnell

A wedding is part of a universal language that says "turning point," and as human beings we need to feel a part of the pageant of history. Planning a "traditional" wedding is hard enough without having to worry about "Where are we going to find a church that will do the ceremony?" or "Which one of us is going to be listed as the bride when we go to register?” The more trouble we ran into, the more we wanted to share our experiences in planning our union ceremony.

The grooms are both young gay men living in Columbus who have been dating for almost five years. Jared, 29 years old, is a quality engineer for America Online. His interests include playing on his computer, buying gadgets, listening to Cher, playing with his cats, and not doing the dishes.

Coley, also 29, is a senior software engineer for UUNet. He enjoys surfing the Internet, buying furniture, worshipping

Martha Stewart, and abusing small animals. Both are founders of the Columbus GLB web site www.outincolumbus.com.

The ceremony will be held at the First Congregational Church at 444 E. Broad St. in downtown Columbus. Rev. Timothy Ahrens will be performing the ceremony. Areception will immediately follow at the Center for Science and Industries at 333 W. Broad St.

Through this union, we will begin a new life. This ́is also an opportunity for others to review, reflect upon, and renew the commitments in their own life. A covenant such as we experience in this union ceremony is not made between two people alone. It engages all of us and knits us together in a community. As we enter the next stage of our lives together, we can think of no better way to do so, than to be surrounded by our friends, family, and our loved ones.

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