I am from India (currently living in NY) and I find it really surprising that it was only 50 years ago that there was race discrimination in US. My college friends are all over the world (UK, rest of the Europe, Germany, Australia etc.) and based on my conversation with them, USA is the place with least amount of 'racism' against Asians (I put racism in quotes because there is no blatant, in the face racism in USA. It's more about subtle racism against Asians). In a place like NY, it's practically non-existent.
The photos of overt discrimination against African-Americans in 1962 remind me of the overt discrimination we are seeing against gay people today. I hope a similar retrospective in 50 years will see people saying "I find it surprising that there was discrimination against gay people at one time."
I don't see any similarity between the two. Blacks were trying to obtain equal rights. The right to marry same sex is one that no one has, not just gay people.
Interracial marriage was certainly illegal for a while and anyone arguing that it should have stayed that way would probably be deemed a racist, right?
If marriage is supposed to have something to do with love (which hasn't always been the case historically), saying that someone can't marry another person they love because of their race is a racist law. Given such a law, you could say "No one has the right to marry someone of another race, it's not just black people!" That would be missing the point.
Saying someone can't marry another person they love because of their sexual orientation is almost exactly the same thing.
"I don't see any similarity between the two. Gays were trying to obtain equal rights. The right to be a black man and vote is one that no one has, not just black people."
Straight people have the right to marry. Gay people don't. Same exact issue. If you're not gay, you by default don't need the right to marry same-sex, just like if you're not black, you don't need the right to be black and vote.
Actually everyone except blacks could vote. Contrary to popular belief, gay people can marry, just not same sex. This isn't a statement against same sex marriage, I'm just making a subtle distinction. Gay people have never experienced the maltreatment that blacks have in this country.
Now I'm wondering if blacks could vote if they dressed up in whiteface and pretended to be white to fool the voter board. You know, denying everything they are. Just like a gay person marrying the opposite sex.
Gays have benefited from the liberalism and civil rights movement in that the majority of the population doesn't hate them for being different. But you can't deny that they're being harrased, beaten, killed, pushed to suicide, thrown from their homes, and subjected to punishments designed to "fix" them. It's doesn't have to be "black had it worse", the point of the matter is gays have it bad.
I'm not trying to put words in your mouth since you didn't come out and directly state your viewpoint, I'm just trying to show how fallacious the words you did say are. Especially when we're on the verge of starting things down the right path. Both blacks and gays have been are are being violently persecuted for something they can't change. Telling gays to marry straight is highly offensive.
I did not tell anyone to marry, let alone tell gays to marry straight. I never said that gays weren't treated badly. I also never said that gays should pretend they are not gay to get married. Nothing I said was false or was meant to slight gay people.
My comment was a response to someone comparing the two plights. For me, the differences are worth discussing.
Gay people have never experienced the maltreatment that blacks have in this country.
Then you come back with:
I never said that gays weren't treated badly.
Gays have been routinely beaten up and occasionally murdered for decades. Many have been rejected by their own families.
Freehunter is right, of course -- this is not about comparing who is the most persecuted, as if only the winner of such a comparison had the right to complain about it. It's about seeing prejudice for what it is.
I think that if you really looked at what a lot of gay people have gone through, you would not so facilely deny any similarity between that and what blacks have experienced. Of course there are differences; they are different situations. But there are also very substantial similarities. It appears that you don't want to look at the similarities, and I think you should ask yourself why not.
EDITED TO ADD:
You should really talk to some gay black people. The ones I have spoken to about this have all said the experiences aren't very different at all.
Let's move this to a different preference and see how it looks. Imagine you were saying:
"The right to write with their left hand is a right that no one has, not just left-handed people."
Do you not see how that would be unfair, not to let people write with whichever hand they prefer, just because the majority happens to be right-handed? What would justify imposing the majority's preference on the minority?
I know we still have a ways to go before we're a country free of racism, but it still makes me really proud to hear you say that about America.
Thank you for coming to the US. I think of the United States as a country that belongs to the whole world, and it really makes me happy when people from other countries like America enough to move here.
As a visitor from India, you're making our country a stronger, better place. I hope you decide to stay.
50 years ago the american civil war was only 100 years ago (does that make sense?)
Strangely the sixties doesn't seem that long ago for me personally. I wonder how the contemporaries of Kennedy thought about 1912, when there were few cars/planes, no radio, no television, no talking movies, no color polaroids, William Howard Taft was president and Europe/Russia/China/Japan was ruled by Emperors.
I guess I was not clear in my comment. In no way, I was implying that India is better than USA. My surprise stemmed from the fact that based on my current experience, it seems odd that it was barely 50 years ago that race discrimination was rampant. I would have thought that those things would have put behind 100 years ago for USA to be where it is.
It's worse than you might imagine. The federal Fair Housing Act was passed in 1968. Before that time, it was legal to have a "covenant" that prohibited blacks from living in certain neighborhoods (housing developments). It was some years after 1968 that it actually started being enforced with some vigor.
You can still talk to older people (say, people in their 60s) in Los Angeles, who chose the house they now live in because that neighborhood allowed blacks, asians, or mixed-race couples to buy property, and other nearby neighborhoods did not allow it.
In other words, even these blatant and widespread effects of racism are not past history by any means.
Note: I'm not disagreeing with what you've said, just trying to add some historical background.
