Gay Rights and Drug Law Reform

The issues I'm concerned about right now are lesbian and gay civil rights, and drug law reform. No, I don't want to get married to another guy, and no, I'm not much of a drug user (except a little wine or beer now and then), but these are civil rights and legal issues that need to be addressed by our society.

If we don't work to ensure the comfort and wellbeing of each segment of our society, we risk creating a "dis-ease" that can then affect all of society, in the same way that a symptom of unhealth in one's body, ignored, can cause ever and ever greater symptoms until it may reach a critical point at which it demands attention. It is much better, in one's own body and in society, to address the problem before it becomes critical and requires all that much greater a response.

Same-sex marriage will be legal at some point--better sooner than later. Denying a certain class of citizens who share a particular characteristic the right to marry (strictly in a legal, not religious sense) whomever they wish and whichever gender they wish, is bound to fail in the courts. It would be like society trying to forbid Mormons or Christians from marrying whomever they please. It doesn't matter whether being gay is "a choice" or is genetically determined or influenced. One's religion and religious beliefs are also a choice, and no one would dream of taking rights away from a group of people because "they chose" to be Mormon or Christian or Muslim.

Drug laws, specifically marijuana laws, desperately need reform. We are populating the prisons with a huge number of people who have done nothing more aggressive or antisocial than to smoke a marijuana cigarette and leave a little lying around the house in a small plastic bag. This is ridiculous.

And the DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration) must be brought into control so that it is not threatening and bullying states that have medical marijuana laws, and arresting and prosecuting grandmothers with glaucoma and people with AIDS and other diseases who are just using marijuana to treat some bad symptoms.

People derisively say that marijuana is a "recreational drug." Well, so are tobacco and alcohol, and you don't see a huge noise about making them illegal. Marijuana has proven health benefits which make it better than either of those other two. And marijuana should not be placed nor considered in the same category as other very destructive drugs such as crack cocaine, meth and heroin.

Drug law reform for marijuana and civil rights for everyone including gays and lesbians are both important issues that our society and government must address. If we don't do it soon, we'll still have to do it later, and sooner is better than later in terms of cost, efficiency and long-term comfort. The only legal resolution possible that will last is for society to have a "live and let live" policy and view regarding gays and lesbians, who must be free to pursue their own happiness, and marijuana smokers, whose fondness for the weed is no more diabolical and is less damaging than a fondness for tobacco or alcohol.