Why support full marriage equalty?

A Call to Solidarity

Most people are familiar with the struggle of gays and lesbians to have the freedom to marry in the USA and many other places around the world. Some people can remember the struggle for interracial marriage in the USA. When someone cites the freedom for polygamous marriage or consanguineous marriage, some people dismiss those ideas. As disappointing as that is, it is not surprising.

Some LGBT people don’t understand the desire for polygamous or consanguineous marriage, often because the LGBT people discussing the issue aren’t interested in such relationships, or they find the very idea of them repulsive, and so they don’t see why those other relationships should have the freedom to marry.

Likewise, some people may want the freedom to polygynous marriage, but don’t understand polyandry or grouping, or same-gender marriage, or consanguineous relationships, or even interracial relationships, and find those ideas repulsive, and so they don’t see why those other relationships should have the freedom to marry.

And there are people involved in heterosexual consanguineous relationships who don’t want to get married and don’t understand or are repulsed by same-gender relationships or polyamorous relationships, and so don’t see the need for those groups to have the freedom to marry.

There are people who experience Genetic Sexual Attraction (GSA) who refrain from acting on their feelings and want to stop other people from acting on their GSA, or they don’t believe in or condemn FSA (Familial Sexual Attraction, which is between people who were not separated like with GSA), and don’t understand the need for consanguineous marriage.

Like many heterosexuals, some LGBT people do not want to get married, and may struggle to see just how important the freedom to marry is.

There are interracial couples in the USA who have exercised their freedom to marry, something that would have been denied to them not long ago, who do not see the need for others to have their freedom to marry.

All of these people have something in common. They all face denial of their rights, discrimination, and sometimes worse in many places around the world just because they don’t pass the sex-negative, heterosexual, monogamous, “racial purity” or nonconsanguineous tests set up by those who want to force everyone else to conform to their narrow view of sexuality and marriage, or want to keep other people from having what they have.

It’s all a matter of fairness and equality. Equality just for some is not equality. A person has the right to not only have a relationship with, but marry the consenting person or persons of his or her choice. It is time to allow everybody to exercise this right. We can get there if we have solidarity. Don’t just stand up for your freedom to marry; stand up for the freedom for all to marry. Don’t just be an ally for a friend’s right to a same-gender marriage; stand of the rights of all. That’s true marriage equality.

You don’t have the like what other people choose to do. If you don’t want a same-gender relationship, or a poly relationship, or an interracial relationship or a consanguineous relationship, or you do not want to get married under any circumstances, that is your choice and you have that freedom. But you should support the rights of other people to choose for themselves. Love is love.

The next time someone says the freedom to marry someone of the same gender will lead to polygamy or incest, instead of throwing other people under the bus, respond with something like, “What’s wrong with letting consenting adults do what they want with each other? I support marriage equality, period. Would you want someone telling you that you couldn’t get married?” We need to let people know that it isn't okay to discriminate. We need to reach out to everyone who is seeking the freedom to marry and let them know they aren't alone.

In addition to fairness, marriage equality will aid the health of those who will finally be able to marry. It will add stability to their relationships and increase stability in communities.

There are people you know - people in your family, neighbors, coworkers, police officers, postal carriers, firefighters, teachers, people of all walks of life - who don't have the freedom to marry the person or persons they love. That's not right.

Let’s all stand up for true equality: full marriage equality.

Tobe

 My boyfriend, Tobe <3 He is the Sweden to my Finland (literally ;) Well, "boyfriend", we are both agender :) Sorry, this propably doesn`t interest anyone else :D And you will get new chapter when exam week is over :)

Alex Foster chapter 18

The club was crazy. There was half naked, pierced and weirdly dressed people dancing on some song by Blood on the Dance Floor (I regonised it because Frank had used to listen them) and making out with anyone like it was the last day of their life. When I saw their glowing eyes, I realised it might well be.

They had all used some kind of party drug that stopped them from feeling tiredness, hunger or pain, and instead gave them insatiable sexual desire and euphoria. Sometimes they didn`t work and gave unpredicable emotions and aggression, that`s why they were called freakers. Suddenly young man with unnaturally blue eyes came towards us and said grinning: “Wow, you look shiny, Jan! I never thought you were into dress up games!” Janus rolled his eyes, “Shut down your screamer, Xavier. Pigs are after us, we need you and other Harlequins. Can you hide us?”

I raised my hands: “Hey, wait a minute. Who he is? I`m not going to trust a guy I don`t know.” Janus looked away, clearly embarrassed, and started: “He is Xavier, he gave me his sedatives for sex. He was much nicer than other dealers and let me sleep in his apartment, so slowly we get to know each other. I told him my life story and he told me how his parents had sended him to boarding school. He is bisexual and bi-polar, so of course he was bullied, and when he was 15 he had jumped off the rooftop, trying to kill himself.”

“I almost died for cement poisoning. I ended up in coma, brain damaged and most of my bones broken. I was in coma for three months, and during that time they gave me brain implant. It stimulated the repair of brain tissue, and allowed me to control my artificial limbs after I woke up, but as a programmer and hacker I soon figured out other ways to use it. I had lost part of my memory, and of course couldn`t study last two years again, so they simply connected it to computer and downloaded everything to my brain. “,Xavier told.

“When I get out of hospital year later, I started to develop better operation system and internet browser for the implant. With it, I can surf in Internet, make a phone call or send a text message using only my brain. I am also able to “talk” with anyone who has implant silently, inside our minds. Best part is that no one can manipulate you or send messages directly to your brain. The messages go to implant, and you can choose if you want to watch it. I`m currently trying to make an implant that would use quantum entanglement istead of radio waves. It would be impossible to hack it, and you couldn`t pretend to be someone else, even if you knew their private key.”

I stared at him amazed, and I could see that Frank practicaly worshipped him too. Janus wasn`t as pleased, though. “Okay, you can continue your science lesson some other time. We need some safe place to hide from cops, and I would rather have it today.”

Xavier

Alex Foster chapter 17

”Okay, we will go to Combat Zones,but what we are gonna do with A`rya? She can`t go outside with those wings and scorpion spike, we would get caugh immedistely.” Echelon remembered us. I thought about it for a moment and got an idea. ”Hey, are our roleplaying costumes still somewhere? We have to wear cargo jeans, hiking boots, leather jackets and shooting gloves anyway, in case we need to go to Wasteland. Let`s take some knives and bows with us, maybe masks too, and pretend we are going to roleplaying.”

Others agreed, so we changed clothes, packed survival equipment, and took old noisy train to Combat Zones. Before Oil War it was known as New Jersey, but now it was hard to regocnise anymore, the whole state had gone Camden.

The state had had high unemployment rate and lot of debt, and when oil and food prices had skyrocketed and corporations went bankrupt or left the city, the whole state, along with many others, had crashed. USA had tried to save it`s citizens, and went on all-against-all war with China, Russia, and many African and Middle Eastern countries, but though it won some countries it didn`t change anything. Finally in 2046, five years after oil had run out, USA was unable to pay it`s debt or feed it`s citizens. It went bankrupt and sold California and Mid West to multinational corporations, the rest states, with less natural resources but more people, went to China.

Combat Zones was the Edge, border between United America and Wastelands. This was poor, crime ridden area, known by gang violence and low police activity. Only small, unmanned planes and even smaller flying cameras, known as “flies”, watched the area. As we walked to night club called Dancing Devil, I sighed. I had never thought this would be the safest place for me to be.

Alex Foster chapter 16

Six months later, mum got out of jail, I guess she was pitied and actually her only crime was to do nothing. Still, I couldn`t understand how she was able to get custody of Nika, even though Nika didn`t trusted on her even the little bit what he trusted on me, and refused to speak or listen to the mum. In a week, it became clear that it didn`t work. Nika didn`t obey mum at all, and hung out in the city late in the evening unless I asked for him to come home and sometimes in spite of it. Mum still treated me like a ghost, if she didn`t yell to me about Nika`s behavior. 

In the school where I had went for three months, I faced name calling, laughing, spitting and beating for both of us. I didn`t care what they thought of me, they despised me without knowing me, knowing what I had experienced, but I didn`t let them hurt Nika. 

But classmates were not the only ones who gave me black eyes and broken noses and ribs. Mum had of course not stopped running at pubs and brought home the same sick bastards as before, I guess no one else would have even looked at her. Mum thought they were dream-come-true princes and didn`t believed they could have hurt Nika. The matter was not helped by the fact that Nika didn`t say anything, so both at home and at school I tried to defend Nika and tell about bullying and abuse, only to hear that I was a liar and picking a fight. 
  
It was a cruel and cold world, people didn`t care a shit about what happened to the poor brat, and Nika was not able to defend himself. I had to watch when he fucked up his school, and how the scars appeared in his wrists. The worst part, however, was when Nika three months later, in his 12th birthday, appeared late in the evening in my room completely drunk and tried to kiss me. I tried to forget what had happened a year ago, I pushed gently but firmly Nika farther and locked in the bathroom. 

I listened to almost half an hour Nika`s shouting, swearing, crying and confessing his love behind the door, until he finally passed out on the hallway floor. I carried Nika to our room and tucked him in the bed, and I realized that things couldn`t go on like this. When a couple of days later, Alex came to ask Morpheus` contact information and told me about his escape, I knew that it was our only chance to escape this life that wouldn`t lead to anywhere but to the bottom, to dead end from which the only escape is death.

Alex Foster chapter 15

I acted completely instinctively, reacted without thinking further; I grabbed Nika's hand when he got up and he spun around forcibly. I regretted my reaction immediately. Tears fell down his pale cheeks, endless agony and pain shined in his eyes. That was it - that's what I had feared and expected to see from Nika.

"You don`t have to ever forgive me, and  you are not even supposed to do so." I began, trying to search for the right words. "But I want you to understand that I`m really so fucking sorry for what I did. I should never have done it to you, I should never have touched you that way..." 

But the right words didn`t come. The right words didn`t even exist - no word spoken would change what has happened, and the few words didn`t mattered a shit compared to pain tearing him. My act couldn`t be explained or compensated in any way. 

"Don`t you fucking idiot get it?" Nika suddenly asked, frowned his eyebrows from disbelief, and snorted like he was talking to small child who didn`t listen when he was supposed. "You left me. You get away. No other thing have a fucking difference. I'm your fucking brother for God`s sake, same flesh and blood, and you left me here alone!" 

Then I realized for the first time that something was seriously wrong in Nika. He wasn`t angry about what I had done to him, but that I had left him alone. 



When the bathroom door slammed shut, I stood up. I hardly could have slept any longer, I was already nervous and embarrassed though it was only morning. I made cofee for us and dug breakfast from the fridge. Nika's face was, as usual, expressionless when he looked at meats, cheeses, breads, and cereals I had put on the table. Then he looked me in the eyes and grinned. 

"Yeah, you will be good housewife someday." Nika said amusement in his voice, and I could have laughed at the sheer surprise and joy. Pale face`s dimples had stood out just long enough that I knew they were still there, and before so characteristic smile had briefly shown in his eyes. My heart threw a cartwheel and I couldn`t help but grin back. 

"Don`t expect too much, you spoiled little brat.", I muttered smiling. Maybe this, after all, could still become something. 

Nika ate with a good appetite many loaves of bread, threw his coffee to his throat and get his backpack.  He threw his jacket on, put his shoes on quickly and carelessly, and shouted hello from the door. I stared after him smiling foolishly. 

Maybe I could still get my brother back. 



 

Alex Foster chapter 14

Nika's breathing slowed, his hand trembled slightly and light sigh escaped between his lips. I knew he had woken up, but I didn`t say anything. I squeezed my eyes close, and I tried unsuccessfully to get my heart to beat more calmly. The neck`s skin felt clammy and cold when Nika pulled his head further, and I felt something in my throat as his eyes drilled holes in my face. He raised his hand a little, put it in my chest, and just stared at me.

Time seemed to have stopped completely, I don`t know how long we layed here motionlessly, I pretending to be sleeping and Nika studying me with his eyes. After a period that seemed like an eternity, Nika suddenly pulled his hand away, sat with his back towards me and spoke.

 "I know you are awake."
 
I wanted to argue with that, continue to pretend I was sleeping, but still I turned my eyes to the t-shirt covered back.

"How did you know that?"  
"I make you nervous."

 I didn`t know what to say again. I had expected to meet completely different kind of person, I had expected fear, bitterness and disgust. I had imagined Nika would still be the same boy I remembered, but I was sitting in front of a complete stranger, young man whose voice didn`t tremble when he spoke to me. I could not read any kind of emotion from his face, and his eyes didn`t reveal anything he had in his mind. The atmosphere was oppressive and heavy, waiting.

"I don`t know what I should say."
Muffled laugh.
"You could apologize me for a start."

Ice cold stone dropped in my stomach , poison spread into the veins, and breathing became almost impossible.

 "I'm so fucking sorry about what happened," I whispered, feeling the familiar burning in the eyes and pressure in the throath. "I would give anything, fuck just anything, if I could get it somehow undone. I never, I never ... I'm so fucking sorry. "
 
Nika`s shoulders sank and he was shaking. I had never felt so bad before, and I would have wanted to run away. Leave. Get pissed and forget. 

"You left me," Nika whispered voice trembling. "Fuck you."