If you are in favor of extending legal rights and privileges to those members of society who are not accepted as the “norm,” then you will be delighted to hear about what Michigan and Texas have done for their citizens. In many states, those persons who are “blind” are denied many basic rights merely because of their vision-alternative lifestyles, such as the right to drive a car or fly a plane. But the good people running both Michigan and Texas have seen the error of their ways  and have made it legal for those without sight to drive in those states, provided they wear their seatbelts.

Ha ha! I am kidding of course. Neither of those states allows the blind to drive. When one considers the potential harm which might befall not only those persons exercising their legal rights, but also those who are in the car with them or in adjacent cars, you can see why they would not put such a ‘right’ into law. It’s also unlikely that many, if any blind persons would WANT to drive. No, Michigan and Texas know better. However, they have both given the blind the legal right to hunt with firearm or crossbow.

And this time, I am not kidding.

Michigan and Texas are two of many states which have given those who cannot see what they are shooting the right to go out and shoot it anyway. When you consider the fact that hunting involves the use of a potentially deadly weapon, and the fact that a significant number of the blind (according to recent statistics) cannot see what they are shooting at, it seems to me that offering this kind of legal ‘right’ may not be the gesture of freedom and kindness that it was meant to be.  My gut instinct: this is a good way to get people killed.

If 2% of Hunters are 61% of Accidental Hunting Deaths…

Before I go on to explain how blind hunters relate to homosexuals wanting to marry, let me draw to your attention the statistics from the last chapter. Just one example: The Center for Disease Control estimates that men who have sex with men accounted for just 2% of the population in 2009, but accounted for 61% of all new HIV infections.  HIV causes AIDS, and AIDS is a horrible way to die, for which there is no cure. Already more than 600,000 people in America alone have died from it, and possibly a million more have HIV/AIDS right now and will someday die from it. In the mean time, many are giving HIV to other men. Blind persons are legally allowed to hunt in at least six states, and I can’t find anyone dead on account of this. Not one.

Now, let’s pretend that isn’t true. Let’s pretend that I could show you that not only do an alarming number of blind hunters injure or kill themselves and others by hunting, but that the majority of the blind have no interest in hunting. Would you support the fight to make blind hunting legal? Or would you say, “We’re fighting to protect a legal right that most have no interest in exercising! And those that DO go hunting put themselves and others in serious danger.” Because, if you did say that, someone would accuse you of hating blind people. I’m just warning you.

The Ugly Truth in Numbers

What follows are stats to show that homosexual relationships do not last, commonly include infidelity within relationships, and do not commonly lead to marriage even when the legal right is given to them. I’ve shown you the self-inflicted gunshot wounds and the trail of bodies of hikers and other hunters linked to this lifestyle, now you will see that we’re offering a legal right that most have no interest in exercising.

Gay Relationships Don’t Last

A study from Norway and Sweden (which have sanctioned same-sex partnerships since the 1990s) found that within five years of entering a legal union, “gay male relationships are 50 percent more likely to break up than heterosexual marriages, while lesbian relationships are 167 percent more likely to break up than heterosexual marriages.” On these stats, does it not seem the fight is ultimately over homosexuals’ right to be divorced?

Or to put it another way, is not the fight for gay marriage ultimately the fight for divorce lawyers to get richer?

Gay Fidelity is Rare

Perhaps it’s just the married homosexuals in Norway and Sweden whose relationships don’t last? No, the trend continues around the world. M. Pollak [1] found that “few homosexual relationships last longer than two years, with many men reporting hundreds of lifetime partners.” University of Chicago sociologist Edward Laumann argues that “typical gay city inhabitants spend most of their adult lives in ‘transactional’ relationships, or short-term commitments of less than six months.” The Gay/Lesbian Consumer Online Census of nearly 8000 homosexuals (2004) found that only fifteen percent described their “current relationship” lasting twelve years or longer. A study of homosexual men in the Netherlands published in the journal AIDS (2003) found that the “duration of steady partnerships” was one and a half years.

Paul Van de Ven et al.[2], found that, of 2,583 older homosexuals, only 2.7 percent claimed to have had sex with one partner only. The most common response, given by 21.6 percent of the respondents, was of having 101 to 500 lifetime sex partners. Similarly, a survey conducted by the homosexual magazine Genre (1998) found that 24 percent of the respondents said they had had more than a hundred sexual partners in their lifetime.

The Dutch study [3] of partnered homosexuals found that men with a steady partner had an average of eight sexual partners per year. A Canadian study of homosexual men who had been in committed relationships lasting longer than one year found that only 25 percent of those interviewed reported being monogamous.

Gay Couples Don’t Get Married

If homosexuals and lesbians truly desired the same kind of commitment signified by marriage, then one would expect them to take advantage of the opportunity to enter into civil unions or registered partnerships. This would provide them with legal recognition as well as legal rights. However, it is clear that few homosexuals and lesbians have chosen to take advantage of these various unions (same-sex marriage, civil unions, domestic partnerships), suggesting a difference in commitment compared with married couples. Only 9% of heterosexual couples in California rejected the institution of marriage, while over 80% of the homosexual couples rejected “marriage” when it was offered to them in 2008. In Massachusetts, the number of same-sex “marriages” between 2004 and the end of 2006 represented only 52% of the number of same-sex cohabiting couples in the state identified by the 2000 census. By contrast, 91% of opposite-sex couples who lived together were married. In other words, 48% of same-sex couples rejected “marriage”, a rate more than five times higher than the 9% of opposite-sex couples who did so.

In the Netherlands, the first country in the world to legalize same-sex civil “marriage”, the figures are even more dramatic. A 2005 report indicated that only12% of same-sex co-habiting couples in that countryhave married, with another 10% in what are called “registered partnerships.” By contrast, 82% of heterosexual couples in the Netherlands (as of 2004) were married. This means that 78% of the same sex couples in the Netherlands have seen no necessity for legal recognition of their relationships at all, while only 18% of opposite-sex couples have similarly rejected marriage.

I think the point here is obvious. To follow my metaphor- imagine that I could demonstrate that most blind persons have no interest in having a hunting license, and that those that do get one are far less likely to ever have it renewed once they get it than the sighted, and that those who go shooting (Licensed or not) wind up injuring or killing themselves or others FAR more often than the sighted do. Would we be fighting over their right to go hunting? I don’t think we would. We’d offer them a fishing license and call it a day. Even if the blind persons we know and love REALLY wanted to go shoot a deer, we’d love them enough to say, “For your own good, and because I love you- no. But I’d be happy to take you fishing some time!”

So who loves homosexuals more? Those that are willing to see them go fishing (Or better yet, help them restore their sight so they can hunt safe and successfully) or those who say, “Odds are you’re going to kill yourself, but if it makes you happy, then load that gun and get out there and shoot something!” I would like to suggest that it is those of us who want to see them come home alive (and who want to see them regain their sight) who actually are showing them the most love- even if they can’t see us doing it. Metaphorically speaking.

[1] In his study of male homosexuality in Western Sexuality: Practice and Precept in Past and Present Times (1991)

[2] In their study of the sexual profiles published in Journal of Sex Research (1997, 2000)

[3] Published in the journal AIDS