Tim Kelly states that there are three criteria to justify civil rights protection and that people who are gay don’t qualify. He states that they have to have suffered oppression, that they exhibit an immutable characteristic and that they are politically powerless.

Gay people have suffered oppression by the legal system. In some state, our private consensual sexual activities are outlawed, a status the Supreme Court religiously upheld in 1986.

There are laws specifically targeted at gay people that proclaim we don’t have the same rights as “normal people,” and they do pass. We are summarily denied housing and employment. That is oppression.

Although I’d never proclaim being gay as a religion, it is certainly as immutable as religion, which rightly receives protection under civil rights laws.

While people debate whether homosexuality is changeable, no one debates that religion is, yet it is still protected.

As for politically powerless, consider the number of gays in this country against the number of gay legislators, and you will see that we are significantly under-represented. Further, many legislators promote an agenda that is decidedly anti-gay.

Look what happened in Arizona when Representative Blewer considered homosexuality to be “the lower part of the human evolution.” Say that about any other group in a legislative session, and a recall election will happen so fast no one will have time to blink.

Say that about gays, and you receive applause.

By Tim’s standards, gays certainly do deserve protection. Since giving it to gay people takes it away from no one else (there isn’t a finite amount of civil rights to go around), it is the right thing to do.

Gary Rimar

Resident

Washington, Mich.