Wake Up and Smell the Coffee!


A letter to Ann Landers


24 March 1999: Wake Up and Smell the Coffee

I received the following note over the email transom. As a regular reader of Ms. Landers, I was more than appalled. The activist plea, the letter, and inevitably, my instant response to her via her website.

I don't support marriage (same sex or not) but I support writing letters to the homophobic and bigoted Ann Landers...

Of interest to activists supporting the right to same-sex marriage... Ann Landers came out against allowing children at such ceremony's in yesterday's paper. Following is the text of the letter and her response.

Dear Ann:

My husband and I have been married for 15 years. We have a wonderful marriage and two terrific children. The problem I am writing about involves my husband's brother. He is gay.

"Rick" is a great person and a devoted uncle to our children. Until now, we haven't had a problem with Rick or his live-in companion, "Dennis." Our children think of Dennis as their uncle's friend. The two of them have been together for 20 years. Everything was fine until Rick and Dennis decided to get "married" and asked our 9-year-old daughter to be the flower girl at their wedding.

I am raising my children to believe that marriage is a sacred union between a man and a woman. I do not want my daughter to participate in Rick's wedding. My husband feels the same way. In fact, he doesn't even want to go. So far, the only comment my daughter has made is "I am too old to be a flower girl."

I am not prejudiced against gay people, Ann, but I do not condone that lifestyle, either. Please tell me what to do.

--Dilemma in the Dairy State

Dear Dilemma:

Gay couples who wish to have a ceremony to celebrate their union should not be asking a 9-year-old to participate. It would be too confusing. A service for those in the inner circle would be OK, but please, no children.

Tell your brother-in-law that your daughter will not be participating.

(P.S. I agree with her that a 9-year-old is a bit beyond the "flower girl" range.)

Dear Ann,

I am appalled at your homophobic reaction to "Dilemma in the Dairy," wherein you think it is inappropriate for a nine-year-old to not attend her beloved uncle's gay marriage ceremony.

Children are a lot smarter than you think. If she's as close to her gay uncle as her mother says she is, she probably already knows that uncle's friend is more than a friend.

The "problem" is not that they gay couple want their niece their. The problem is that the woman didn't see the gay relationship as a problem until they gay couple demanded equal footing, and the parents clearly never leveled with their daughter.

Like I said, children are pretty smart, and they know a loving couple when they see it, regardless of the gender pairings. Parents teach them what's right and wrong, what's legitimate, and what is not. Perhaps if parents weren't so terrified of sexual issues, they wouldn't pass along discomfort and homophobia to future generations. At a time when gay people are still being killed simply for being gay, isn't it time to start teaching kids to value loving relationships regardless of their orientation?

Kids are smarter than you think. They are born open and loving. Adults teach them to limit, separate, and hate. The closet is a convenience for the straight couple, not the gay one.

--Seth J. Bookey
New York City

Posted: Wed - March 24, 1999 at 02:16 AM        


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