Human Rights

I guess I have been thinking more and more about our nation’s history and about historical figures, specifically about Martin Luther King Jr’s I Have a Dream Speech: “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” We see the same judgments being made today, only this time it is about gender and sexual orientation. This is not an attack against religious people, for everyone in this country has the freedom to choose their own religion (and might I add, some people disagree with this law, but it is still a law). It just breaks my heart that people decide they have the right to consider themselves superior to another because of differences.

During Martin Luther King Jr’s time, just because a person’s skin was darker than another’s skin tone, this made it acceptable to treat them as though they were not human, as though they did not have feelings, as though they didn’t have dreams. Until 1920, women fought for their right to vote, to be seen as equal enough to men to be able to have a political say in their future and their country’s future. And, yet, 92 years later, we are still fighting to be 100% equal to white men. Almost 100 years later after being granted the right to vote, we still have a male dominated Congress who spend a fair amount of time talking about whether or not women have the right to decide for themselves whether an abortion is appropriate for their circumstances or whether they need birth control or if birth control is even a right to have regarding their health. I guess men just have so much experience being women that they know what is best for those with vaginas, huh? Throughout history, there have been questions as to whether or not people who have a dominant left hand should be fixed as well. Lefties would have their left hands tied behind their back during school to force them to write with the “correct” hand. Being chastised or discriminated against because genetics won, in each of these cases. One doesn’t choose to be born black or white, or a man or a woman or left handed or right handed. One also doesn’t choose to be homosexual or heterosexual.

And though we still are not rid of our prejudices we have fought against in the past., today, we find ourselves in that same situation; except it isn’t a person’s skin color that makes one inferior it is their sexual orientation.

Why do we continue to allow history to repeat itself? Don’t we, as human, have the ability to adapt and to learn from our past mistakes? In the past we were able to see, unfortunately, after a lot of pain and suffering, that some beliefs were mistaken. How long before we see them now? Will we ever allow ourselves to truly see others as 100% equal with ourselves, or will we always deem ourselves superior and stomp on those around us? When will we walk beside each other as friends, or as equals? Will those who say a particular sexual orientation is wrong, consider this: the Declaration of Independence states life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are basic human rights. If marrying someone is part the journey it takes to get to that person’s happiness, then it is a basic human right, whether it is a man marrying a woman, a man marrying a man, a woman marrying a man, etc.

Everyone needs to stand up and fight for everyone’s rights. You never know when your rights will be the next to be questioned. I have friends and family who are homosexual, bisexual, transgender, and “normal” a.k.a heterosexual. I love them all. I will fight for their rights as if they were my own, as should everyone else.

*Kristen