Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Hate Must End!!

For the past week or so, I have been greatly troubled by the reports of four teen suicides within the last month. These amazing young people were brought to the brink by no less than the people around them making their lives miserable through teasing, taunting, and flat out rejection of the kinds of people they were or were not. Perhaps what troubles me most is the fact that I very well could have been one of them fifteen years ago and probably would have been had I not discovered the internet.

The problem we are facing stems from a lack of social progress in this country and quite frankly, it's disgusting. You hear about how harshly GLBT people in socially oppressed countries are treated by their own governments and hear people in the "free" world talk about how terrible it is that people in those places are put to death or have limbs chopped off. In my opinion though, we are no better and in fact may even be worse in that our teenagers, our future, don't have to go any farther than their own homes or classrooms to be shamed into taking themselves out of life's equation. They do not need the government to step in and do it for them, because in our system, hatred and rejection is allowed to do the job on it's own.

The loving churches of the world are of no help either. Sure, they'll love you and treat you like extended family, until you tell them you're not changing who you are to be around them. I cannot make this any plainer, GOD DOES NOT REJECT GAY PEOPLE! God doesn't reject ANYONE! To say that he does negates everything the Bible tells us that God is. Sure, it can be left up to interpretation and the leaders in our churches would have you believe theirs is right. MINE isn't even right probably! The point is, God is not something to be boxed in by a leather bound book. I could burn a bible today, die and go to "heaven" tomorrow, it IS that simple.

The Bible is meant to be a tool of love not a tool of conversion, not a sword to enforce moral values that are more often than not simply the values of the person standing behind a pulpit more than they are God's, and certainly the Bible is not a means of justification to practice hate. We are all equal in the eyes of our creator, understand what I'm saying! We are not all sinners in the eyes of our creator, we are all EQUAL! Things like the Bible are meant to open our minds to possibilities not limit our lives to stigmas and dogma. It is meant to make us self aware of our spirituality, not put limits on how to properly obtain our spirituality.

Fear and lack of understanding, those are the two most pressing issues our society has to conquer. It isn't just one country either, or one issue, but many. For as long as we are content to put borders and boundaries between our cultures and nations, we will be doomed to repeat a cycle that in it's very nature promotes rejection and hostility towards one another based on each side of the wall fighting for dominance. One world government, one world spiritual view, I say bring them both on so that we can start promoting UNITY across the entire planet and get out of this centuries old rut of fighting over issues that divide and never unite people.

We must come together and become ONE PEOPLE with diverse individuality if we are ever to overcome the adversity of the times in which we now live. For my part, I reject hate. I do not believe in unconditional love, I believe in universal love. if someone pains me to a large degree I can forgive but I do not believe we are supposed to ignore that pain to the point of forgetting it as if it never happened.

Intolerance and rejection are the two biggest sins we have to deal with as a society. If you reject the idea that gay people are equally entitled to love and happiness just as they are, then you reject me. Agreeing to disagree is no longer an option in this world when our young people are backed into corners that end in darkness and death. The right wing will teach that in order to prevent this horror from happening, we must practice prevention. Teach people harder that being who they naturally are is wrong and make them see that light and we will prevent the violence. This is wrong.

Teach that the light is already inside of each and everyone us JUST AS WE ARE or don't bother teaching anything, because any other approach makes your words useless jabber. Until we learn this urgent message of universal love and acceptance, we shall never evolve beyond the point where we are now. For thousands of years we have killed and violated one another as a race. Thus, that is what we continue to reap in the 21st century. How many times have you heard people gay or otherwise put down or harassed and done nothing? How many times have you shouted "amen!" to the condemning messages from behind the pulpit?

If you have done those things, then you may as well count yourself responsible in some small way for the deaths of these and those we do not hear about. It is time to end the hate and it is time to fight strong messages of negativity with even stronger messages of brother and sisterhood. Let those who practice intolerance be warned by our collective voice that we shall not stand idly by in the shadows and allow these things to continue.

My most heartfelt condolences go out to the families who have lost loved ones to hate, rejection, and intolerance. May you find some measure of healing in you attempts to bring understanding to your tragic loss.

I encourage EVERYONE to take part in whatever programs you can to put an end to the hate. May you all be blessed.

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