Beets, Gay Marriage, unsupportive "Queer Allies", and Letters

Below is a response in the form of a letter that I sent to Bulgaria after he posted re: a heated exchange with someone on the internets who “has gay friends,” but doesn’t support gay marriage. This is after he’s explained to me that he’s sick of people calling it an “abomination,” which is a term he reserves for things he hates, like beets. Another of his friends told him that was decidedly dietary, and why not refer to shrimp as an abomination? His reply, of course, was that he likes shrimp. I took this as permission to draw the dietary law card and play it as an example of wrong-headed de-jure segregation by and for religious reasons (aka, the reasons cited by crazy lady of the internets). Here is my ten cents, more or less as sent to him:

Dearest Bulgaria,

I always find it helpful to draw a line between the various religious prohibitions on diet and actual harm of the body due to true civic law... After all, a person can eat pork by accident and feel guilty for the rest of their lives, but if one is thrown in prison for having sex with their live-in (who is unmarriageable given current laws), it's a different kettle of fish. However, to the idiot who unknowingly chaws the ham sandwich, it's not so clear-cut...

See, it's not so much that this hypothetical Homo Sapiens Religiosa doesn't believe others should be able to make their own choices. In fact, if you query the AVERAGE religious nut, and walk them through your argument, they'll end up agreeing with you, only slightly pissed about it. But the full-blown "Oh, God, I'm going to hell for eating a ham sandwich" type can be a little different, if only because they're SO AFRAID they'll go for the ham sandwich again. Therefore, to their convoluted logic, it must forevermore be denied them, for their own good, and too bad if that unfairly affects others.

Now, here's where things really get complex... The (previously lapsed) diet freaks are also very concerned about people they love/care about/are religiously required to look after not making the same dietary choices they themselves slather after. Everybody else is ALREADY a pervert, as far as they're concerned, so other as to not deserve consideration. Funny thing is, as soon as a loved party goes to a non-Kosher Deli, they're suddenly a pervert, too, and no longer welcome in the community. See, it all boils down to choice. Apparently, the only people who are willing to suck it up and deal with the consequences of their actions are the perverts. Homo Sapiens Religiosa, on the other hand, has proven him-or-herself to be a dangerously weak-willed sop of a human time and time again.

Why? Sometimes it seems that choices aren't meant for people who operate under too many taboos. We're all just high-functioning monkeys at the end of the day, and some of us (obviously,) are simply more high-functioning than others.

Now, where’s the Pork? And what about a side of beets?

Love,
~Aeffchen