Something is wrong when the Supreme Court and tens of thousands of all-American beer drinkers join together for some good old gay/trans bashing.
Apparently, according to the Supreme Court, discrimination is acceptable as long as it is based upon sincerely-held Christian beliefs. I’m not sure what Christian beliefs involve turning away your neighbor and figuratively stoning them. This seems to contradict the concepts of love, acceptance, and inclusion that Jesus Christ taught. Perhaps I need to read the Bible more.
And, apparently, all it takes for God-fearing beer-drinking patriotic Americans to run away from a lifetime of drinking Bud Light is for a skinny little white boy/girl to start drinking their brand. So what if the entire LGBTQ+ community starts drinking Bud Light? It’s just beer. If this is enough to threaten your sense of masculinity and sexuality, then you have some real issues. Don’t worry, you can’t catch trans from drinking Bud Light.
But something is wrong as well when we are compelled to celebrate LGBTQ+ for a month, when we can get ourselves fired for using the wrong pronoun, when acceptance of differences between people is no longer enough if not accompanied by a righteous and apologetic statement of support and guilt.
The problem with all of these minority/sub-culture groups, whether based upon religious belief, racial identity, or sexual orientation, is that acceptance by society at large is not seen to be good enough by their activist leadership, who demand special treatment and special recognition and special privileges for whatever group that they claim to represent.
True acceptance and inclusion by society would be good enough for most people in these groups. That way, they could live their lives the way they see fit without the tyranny of other people’s opinions, not to mention the threats of violence and the possibility of incarceration directed towards them just for being who they are.
Unfortunately for them and for us, their voices are ignored in favor of those who have internalized every grievance, every act of oppression, and every historical slight. For those who feel such pain, there will never be enough healing, and the rest of us are made to suffer for it.
And let us not forget to mention those self-serving activists who have made a career out of giving voice to grievance, who ride the gravy train of special treatment demands without having a defined destination, more than happy to make the rest of us ride with them and pay their fare.
Who deserves special treatment? Small children, the elderly, the mentally challenged, the physically disabled, the very poor. And even then, the special treatment that is given should be commensurate with, and appropriate for, the actual need.
Special treatment must be given with a sense of compassion, and should not be accompanied with cynicism and corruption, and an eye on making special treatment into a profit center.
As a general observation, minority/sub-culture groups neither need, benefit from long-term, or deserve special treatment.
They, along with everyone else, deserve equal treatment and equal opportunity. The opportunity to succeed, to fail, to make fools of themselves, to be heroic.
Discrimination, just like equity, is antithetical to a free, fair and just society, whether it is used to justify unequal treatment or used to demand special treatment.
Vigilantly ensuring that everyone is given equal treatment and equal opportunity throughout our society is a much better use of our time and energy, and is something that most people will intuitively understand and support.
I’d drink a Bud Light to that.