Friday, March 29, 2024

Columnists ideas were outdated

The First Amendment gives us the marketplace of ideas. Even the ignorant have their say. Reasonable citizens sort out the arguments and come to a decision on issues based on this dialogue.

In John La Fleur’s “market,” the produce is rotten. He does himself in with one sentence: “How does one justify advocating the formal recognition of one type of sexual behavior while scorning another?” How, indeed?

I was never a victim of incest, but I am a lesbian. I didn’t choose to be a lesbian. I didn’t wake up one day, look out the window and say, “Today is the day I will become a lesbian.” Tell us the exact date, La Fleur, that you woke up to declare yourself heterosexual.

The pitiable picture you paint of gays and lesbians turning to homosexuality after unfulfilling heterosexual relationships is so outdated. Since 1973, the American Psychiatric Association declassified homosexuality as an illness or a condition requiring treatment.

Fifty percent or more heterosexual marriages end in divorce. The research shows that the majority of male pedophiles are heterosexuals. How does that square with your theories?

I came to MSU to work in the largest, most highly ranked Department of Advertising in the nation. Its international reputation is stellar. I’m also helping to build a public relations specialization within our college. MSU policies toward same-sex partners were another selling point.

Students in my classes see a professional with 21 years of media and corporate communications experience, undergraduate and master’s degrees, another graduate degree in a second major and a Ph.D. and all of it wrapped up in - guess what? - a lesbian.

I had other job offers, but I’ll never regret coming to MSU. I’ve met wonderful students, caring colleagues in my department, college and the entire university. Students in my classes know I am gay. Through public relations, organizations deal with diversity within our culture. Students also need to see positive role models of gay people, given the ignorance and prejudice your column so beautifully illustrates. You, La Fleur, do not have the privilege of conferring acceptance or normality upon me or anyone else. We each do that for ourselves.

Gays and lesbians want equal rights? If we give them equal rights, everyone will want them! And in America, we can’t have that!

Last week Coretta Scott King came to campus. King quoted Horace Mann: “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity

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