Gays, Laws and Marriage

In way over my head, philosophically, but with all the laws being passed (or not), it is something I should probably think about.

Right off the bat, I admit to having some homophobic tendencies, as do most heterosexual American males. I would be mortified if people thought I was gay, I will be hating life if one of my kids turns out gay (though I'd forgive, that's right forgive), and the thought of gay sex is repulsive. Mind you, I am not repulsed by gay people, but the act. So for example, I can talk to gay folk about anything all day, except sex.

Oh, and I myself am not a normal man in that I am not turned on by seeing lesbian sex. I don't like sports either. Maybe I need help.

One of the problems I have always had with gay men is that I can't for the life of me understand it. Men are ugly and silly looking, even those that are considered handsome. I can understand women being attracted to men because nature wired them that way out of necessity, but men being attracted to each other simply must be a mistake. On the other hand, I can completely sympathize with lesbians. Not just because of the appearance factor, but because we men so often are complete asshats.

And now for my main anti gay argument.
For many years, I could convince myself to be non judgmental. I told myself that it's just another lifestyle and I shouldn't cast stones. Then one day, I got an honest to God "let's see what's going on in there big fella" prostate exam and my whole outlook changed in seconds.
I was in my 30's, and had been through exams in the Army and such. Over the years, several doctors had diddled my derrière with their dexterous digits, with little discomfort.
Now, I went to a doctor at a walk in clinic to check on my leaky John Thomas. The doctor was a woman who appeared to weigh 100 lbs soaking wet, and her thumb probably had the diameter of my pinkie.
She greased up the latex and inserted up to the knuckle or so I assume. Never had any of the previous doctors achieved the depth she did. Brothers, I'm telling you I nearly jumped into the opposite wall, and it was all I could do to keep from screaming and begging her to stop.
It was one of the most unnatural, bizarre and all around unpleasant feelings ever.
Close your eyes and imagine what it would be like to be tongued by one of those dual mouth critters from the Aliens movies. Got it? Now you have a general idea how I felt.
Then I realized that gays actually want things shoved up there! Big, honkin' luv pepperonis. Oh sweet mother of God, some stick Gerbils up there!
No way is this natural, no way is this anything remotely like what nature intended. The only possible explanation is that gays are wired way wrong, kind of like a neurological elephant man.

Ah, but would I hate an elephant man because he's misshapen and ugly? No.
Would I be upset if he moved in next door? No.
I would have no problem shooting the breeze with him on the phone or emailing and such.
I would not want him to be ostracized or attacked in any way.
But, I would not want to look at him. I would have problems with looking at him, and as wrong as that is, I am just that shallow.

So the analogy goes with gays in my narrow vision.
Move in next door, have a few drinks, brag about your new Mercedes, etc. Well, as long as you're not a jerk, that's the basic criteria for anyone after all. You're just another person and your sexual deviation (yeah that's how I mean it) is not important.
Just don't ever, ever, ever talk about your love life. It is, however, perfectly OK for you to make fun of my obesity and baldness.

On laws protecting gays, well I don't know.
It seems to me that existing laws protect against all sorts of discrimination and we don't need special ones for gays, but I could be wrong. I generally don't like adding more laws to the books, I think we have too much already.
I personally know of no incidence of a gay being passed over for a job or promotion, or ostracized at any place I've ever worked. Of course, it could be that there were gays there who hid it out of fear of such reactions.

Really, in order for me to support such laws, I'd have to be presented with actual cases of discrimination or harassment of gays, then be given an explanation of how the proposed laws would apply to the cases, and finally an explanation of how existing laws would apply, if at all. Of course, if the existing laws work as well as I suspect they do, I couldn't support more.
I'm sure Barney Frank is sincere, but I can't take him at his word, I need an objective argument.

On gay marriage, again I don't know.
Marriage is a union of a man and woman, not a man and man or woman and woman. I've believed that for years. Mainly, I've viewed marriage as a means of achieving a stable environment in which to raise children. The legal and religious ties bind at least as strong as the love, and have the added advantage of being constant. Since marriage is primarily a procreation thing, I reasoned, there's no place for gays in it.

Ah, but lately I've thought about people who are married but don't have kids. For them, it is the financial and/or emotional aspect of marriage that is important. Those that I've met seem to be doing well, and truly love each other, but in my former view, their marriage was a farce.
Well, I've changed my mind, and I no longer feel that marriage is strictly for child rearing purposes. This of course, opens me up to the possible validity of gay marriage.
However, I do have two other concerns that hold me back from full support.
One, we have civil unions. As far as I know, this carries all the legal protections of marriage. If gays are so worried about these protections, why push for marriage? Just deal with the unions. OK maybe marriage is important as some sign of acceptance. But since it's obvious that there is still so much opposition to gay marriage, why not settle for these unions for now? I know it's easy for me to say, but in 10 or 20 years, if the unions go well and there's little solid, secular ammo available, then it might be reasonable for gays to petition for the right to marry.

And that segues right into my second reason, cowardice.
Gay marriage is an entirely new concept. It has no precedence in this country. We simply cannot foresee all of the possible results of this, such as financial or legal abuses. And the general, perhaps uninformed, consensus seems to be that gays (at least men) are not the least bit monogamous, which would indeed render marriage a joke. I think this is one of the things religious folks fear. Bad enough we have about a 50% divorce rate now, what happens if gays make it a revolving door?
So if gays are successful and monogamous in the civil unions, then it'll be easier to convince folks like me that marriage is OK.
Of course, there is gay marriage now in some states. I say we could put a moratorium on the rest of the states and observe how well it works in those that have it. Maybe 5 years would be good enough, but I'm still thinking 10.

Easy for me to say, I know. I guess if the shoe was on the other foot, I'd be pretty ticked off too.

BTW, I haven't researched this much at all. For some reason, I just want to belt out opinions and "feelings" and then find out how close to true I got.