Re: Vermont Letter

  I am not
  sending this to piss anyone off or to change anyone's mind. It's
  something that just needs to be seen.  I read this and felt that it was
  a very moving, haunting, and probably one of the best letters that was
  ever written about this subject.  It's truly amazing.  This woman should
  be commended for her bravery.  I wish that more people would just
  understand how precious life really is. Please read this with your heart
  as well as your head.  If you want to make a comment please keep it as
  brief as possible.  The moderators will greatly appreciate that.
  
  > 
  > This editorial is from Sunday's Concord Monitor.
  > Sunday, April 30, 2000
  > By SHARON UNDERWOOD
  > For the Valley News (White River Junction, VT/Hanover, NH)
  > As the mother of a gay son, I've seen firsthand how cruel and misguided
  > people can be.
  > 
  > Many letters have been sent to the Valley News concerning the homosexual
  > menace in Vermont. I am the mother of a gay son and I've taken enough
  > from you good people. I'm tired of your foolish rhetoric about the
  > "homosexual agenda" and your allegations that accepting homosexuality is
  > the same thing as advocating sex with children. You are cruel and
  > ignorant. You have been robbing me of the joys of motherhood ever since
  > my children were tiny.
  > 
  > My firstborn son started suffering at the hands of the moral little
  > thugs from your moral, upright families from the time he was in the
  > first grade. He was physically and verbally abused from first grade
  > straight through high school because he was perceived to be gay.
  > 
  > He never professed to be gay or had any association with anything gay,
  > but he had the misfortune not to walk or have gestures like the other
  > boys. He was called "fag" incessantly, starting when he was 6.
  > 
  > In high school, while your children were doing what kids that age should
  > be doing, mine labored over a suicide note, drafting and redrafting it
  > to be sure his family knew how much he loved them. My sobbing
  > 17-year-old tore the heart out of me as he choked out that he just
  > couldn't bear to continue living any longer, that he didn't want to be
  > gay and that he couldn't face a life without dignity.
  > 
  > You have the audacity to talk about protecting families and children
  > from the homosexual menace, while you yourselves tear apart families and
  > drive children to despair. I don't know why my son is gay, but I do
  > know that God didn't put him, and millions like him, on this Earth to
  > give you someone to abuse. God gave you brains so that you could think,
  > and it's about time you started doing that.
  > 
  > At the core of all your misguided beliefs is the belief that this could
  > never happen to you, that there is some kind of subculture out there
  > that people have chosen to join. The fact is that if it can happen to
  > my family, it can happen to yours, and you won't get to choose. Whether
  > it is genetic or whether something occurs during a critical time of
  > fetal development, I don't know. I can only tell you with an absolute
  > certainty that it is inborn.
  > 
  > If you want to tout your own morality, you'd best come up with something
  > more substantive than your heterosexuality. You did nothing to earn it;
  > it was given to you. If you disagree, I would be interested in hearing
  > your story, because my own heterosexuality was a blessing I received
  > with no effort whatsoever on my part. It is so woven into the very soul
  > of me that nothing could ever change it. For those of you who reduce
  > sexual orientation to a simple choice, a character issue, a bad habit or
  > something that can be changed by a 10-step program, I'm puzzled. Are
  > you saying that your own sexual orientation is nothing more than
  > something you have chosen, that you could change it at will? If that's
  > not the case, then why would you suggest that someone else can?
  > 
  > A popular theme in your letters is that Vermont has been infiltrated by
  > outsiders. Both sides of my family have lived in Vermont for
  > generations. I am heart and soul a Vermonter, so I'll thank you to stop
  > saying that you are speaking for "true Vermonters."
  > 
  > You invoke the memory of the brave people who have fought on the
  > battlefield for this great country, saying that they didn't give their
  > lives so that the "homosexual agenda" could tear down the principles
  > they died defending. My 83-year-old father fought in some of the most
  > horrific battles of World War II, was wounded and awarded the Purple
  > Heart.
  > 
  > He shakes his head in sadness at the life his grandson has had to live.
  > He says he fought alongside homosexuals in those battles, that they did
  > their part and bothered no one. One of his best friends in the service
  > was gay, and he never knew it until the end, and when he did find out,
  > it mattered not at all. That wasn't the measure of the man.
  > 
  > You religious folk just can't bear the thought that as my son emerges
  > from the hell that was his childhood he might like to find a lifelong
  > companion and have a measure of happiness. It offends your
  > sensibilities that he should request the right to visit that companion
  > in the hospital, to make medical decisions for him or to benefit from
  > tax laws governing inheritance.
  > 
  > How dare he? you say. These outrageous requests would threaten the
  > very existence of your family, would undermine the sanctity of marriage.
  > 
  > You use religion to abdicate your responsibility to be thinking human
  > beings. There are vast numbers of religious people who find your
  > attitudes repugnant. God is not for the privileged majority, and God
  > knows my son has committed no sin.
  > 
  > The deep-thinking author of a letter to the April 12 Valley News who
  > lectures about homosexual sin and tells us about "those of us who have
  > been blessed with the benefits of a religious upbringing" asks: "What
  > ever happened to the idea of striving . . . to be better human beings
  > than we are?"
  > 
  > Indeed, sir, what ever happened to that?
  > 
  > Sharon Underwood lives in White River Junction, Vt.
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