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Letter to Members of
Congress regarding "Sexual Orientation Hate" Laws
Dear ___________,
Please oppose the
"sexual orientation" and "gender identity" hate crime bill when it comes
to a vote in the Congress. The net effect of introducing such categories
into federal law will be to intimidate persons who love homosexual
persons but don't love the error of homosexual behavior into shutting up
or face an attenuation of their civil liberties. Hate crime legislation
will do nothing to reduce anti-homosex violence against homosexual
persons. A homosexual person is far more likely to die of disease
associated with homosexual practice than become a victim of an
anti-homosex bias crime. The real effect of a "sexual orientation hate"
law will be to codify in law the view that any opposition to homosexual
practice, no matter how loving, is rank bigotry. It is not right that I
and my children should be regarded by the law for all intents and
purposes as the moral equivalent of a racist. An impulse to engage in
bodily discordant sexual behavior with a person of the same sex cannot
be equated with race and sex, which are 100% heritable, absolutely
immutable, primarily non-behavioral, and thus essentially benign
conditions. An orientation to something, no matter how steeped in
congenital causation factors, is not a moral argument. Pedophilia
(pedosexuality) and polyamory (polysexuality) are sexual orientations
too, but congenital causation factors don't make these conditions
morally acceptable. Protecting the freedom of my family to hold our
convictions on this issue without being classified by the law as bigots
is the most important political issue for me that you will vote on this
year. See my fuller write-up on the subject of so-called hate-crime
legislation at
http://www.robgagnon.net/HateCrimesBill.htm.
Thank you,
Robert Gagnon, Ph.D.
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