.: the { frank } spot :.

Sometimes, I just can’t believe the world around me. Every day, I see people who just don’t get it. It doesn’t matter the topic, there are people who have the wrong idea. Or are too self-involved to notice the bigger picture, or see what’s really important in the world. Today, those people are the folks who are fighting for gay marriage.

I’ve been working on a tough blog entry for a few weeks now. It’s about torture, and all that goes with it – the national focus, the moral and ethical debate, the legal considerations. Truly, one of the hardest things I’ve ever tried to write about. And certainly an issue that deserves our attention. But every time I look up from torture, I get smacked by someone waving the gay marriage flag, and trying to push that issue into the center of the table.

I’m here to push back.

Now, let’s be clear: I’m not writing to opine on the subject of gay marriage. I’m writing because I’m irritated by the debate. The country is in serious trouble – right now! – and gay marriage isn’t any of the reasons why. I know it’s an all-important issue for the gay community, and equally so for those who oppose it. But it’s not an issue that deserves center stage today. Frankly, no matter how important the gay community and its activists claim it is, it’s an issue that barely registers when viewed alongside (pay attention here!) staggering unemployment, foreclosures and homelessness, foreign wars, the pervasive use of state-sanctioned torture, international nuclear proliferation, and the human misery we call Darfur and the Middle East. Considering those things, I have a hard time conceiving a top five priority list that includes even a passing hallway conversation about the rights of gay people to marry. In fact, I’d be mortified if our new president spent any time at all on the issue right now. Yet, the gay marriage advocates keep pushing it into the spotlight: “The President isn’t working fast enough on this. He’s had almost 100 days and he hasn’t fixed it yet! Let’s go picket and protest! Let’s get on the nightly news! Let’s force the issue NOW!”

Did I mention that I’m appalled?

Okay, so they want their time at the top of the issue heap, and on the president’s calendar. I get that. But which other issue of the day should take a back seat to theirs? Which humanitarian or national crisis is less important than gay marriage? That’s really the question here. How does a gay marriage advocate see fit to elevate this issue above – well – pretty much anything that has the President’s attention? Every time someone steps into national view with an urgent gay marriage agenda, all I can see is a kind of blind selfishness and self-importance: “Hey, America – I need the President to stop working on everything else so my friends, Bill and Steve, can get married next week!” Yikes. Perspective, anyone?

Here’s some: Shut the Hell up and wait your freakin’ turn!

Sorry. I know that’s not very nice (and not very FrankSpot-ly), but it’s a pretty apt way to express my feelings on this. We’re trying desperately to crawl away from the brink of absolute national ruin, and we’re being snared and diverted by people without an ounce of perspective, or an ability to understand priority. People who clearly don’t know the difference between “no” and “not yet;” people who say they voted for Obama, but don’t trust him to address the issue like he promised; people who forget that there are only so many hours in a day, and only so much that can be addressed in those hours. That in itself is almost unbelievable. And it pushes me away from sympathy for their cause, and leaves me in a coarse mood. The notion that the Prez should forego ending wars, saving our houses, and creating jobs, so two women in Muncie, Indiana can have rice thrown at them next Saturday, is ridiculous. The ground of our society is still crumbling beneath us like a landslide – so fast that every time I pull into my driveway, I wonder where I’m going to put the For Sale sign that already seems a tangible part of my inevitably unemployed future, and where I’m going to park when my daughter and I are living in my car. How can anyone expect gay marriage to trump the issues that give life to that kind of hopelessness? Why would anyone want it to? What kind of person pushes marriage rights to the top of the pile when children are living in hatchbacks? Or when friends and family are dying in distant deserts and mountain ranges? Or when race and religion are justifying torture in dark, wet rooms? How can anyone champion that kind of selfishness? How can anyone be that blind?

The truth of the day is this: the gay marriage battle will continue – be assured of that. (And it won’t be won or lost quickly. So even if the president takes it up tomorrow, you shouldn’t plan on catching a bouquet anytime soon.) But, as a wise man once said: “Only a fool fights in a burning house.” Look around, folks: America is on fire. America is the burning house. You knew that when you voted last year. So instead of trumpeting how unfair the world is because your idea of marriage hasn’t been legally validated, grab a bucket and help. If you can’t do that because you’re too full of yourself and your cause, at least step back from the counter, and wait until someone calls your number.

I’m out.