Hi!

This Post is NOT directed at or to anyone here
in particular, but I have been following this
thread here for a while and this is my Two cents:

I'm a 46 year old gay man. I lived with a man for
seventeen years. We lived on his 100 acre farm in Maryland.
He was a great friend, like a father to me. He was 30
years older than I, and taught me about a lot of things.
He was killed in an accident on January 31, 1998, when
the 3,800 pound tractor he was riding turned over and
crushed him. He died almost instantly. His last words were,
" Oh, God. "

Well, there was no will. I had to call his family.
I could not have the one who loved me most cremated without
THEIR permission. They were his family, who he rarely saw
because he was Not fond of them. I was just the [censored]
who spent the last 17 years of his life with him.

The family broke things, stole things, and in general
harrassed me so badly that I left the house My partner
and I had lived in for the better part of two decades
before any kind of hearing for custody of the farm
could begin. They were especially angry with me because
they thought their Uncle was wealthy, which he was NOT,
and had their hearts set on inheriting tons of money.
Instead they got an old house, and a lot of debt.

I did not cause the debt. My partner was in Debt bigtime before I met him. I DID help pay for a lot of things
there, and had been helping to fix the debt on a monthly
basis.

My reward for all this, Because My longtime companion
had NOT written a will was to be treated like [censored].
If the USA had had same sex marriage laws, we could
have been legally married, and I would have automatically
been entitled to the house and the land it resided on.

I do NOT want " Special Rights. ", I did NOT choose to
be gay, I just am. Who among you reading this can remember
the EXACT day you CHOSE to become heterosexual?????

I just want the SAME rights as Heterosexuals. I pay my taxes, I pay my bills on time. I have to worry about illness and taking care of my cats and the high price
of everything and being lonely same as heterosexuals
must do.

There is only ONE line in the Bible against Homosexuality,
yet there are at LEAST 300 rules for heterosexuals.
Now attitudes about women and racial stereotypes have
changed over the centuries, why cannot attitudes about
Gays and lesbians change?? I refuse to believe that God,
who loves us ALL, would create a minority only to have them
predestined to enter eternal damnation AUTOMATICALLY, in spite of any and all good things they accomplish as individuals or as a Group. Hitler? Saddam? Osama>?? yes,
if their truly IS a Hell, then my friends, they are either
already their or heading for it.

Me? I like men - Older men - and I refuse to believe I'd
go to hell for THAT.

The guys who killed that poor Sheppard guy a Few years
back, now they are evil.....But it is MY business what
I do with a man behind closed doors. But many cannot
respect that. Their is NOTHING obviously gay about me,
but I have been beaten up and hospitalized a few times,
had the word " FAGIT " painted on my garage door, etc.
( Oh, and you'd think that the moron who did that to
my garage door would at LEAST have spelled the word
properly! It's FAGGOT. : )

So, No, if THOSE are my SPECIAL rights, to be treated
like THAT, No thanks, I do NOT want those rights.

All I want is the same rights as Heterosexuals. To be married to a Man I love who loves me back. To have legal
rights AUTOMATICALLY concerning decisions that may need
to be made about my partner's health and internment,
and property rights. For me, and for the MANY other Gay
men and women who want this, too.

Happy Holidays to all!!!

"I offer you a Vulcan prayer, Mr Suder. May your

death bring you the peace you never found in

life." - Tuvok.