I reread the posting about the large protest against the legalization of gay civil unions several times and, each time I did, I found myself increasingly troubled by the whole thing.

The same day the post about the Costa Rican protest went up, the state of Massachusetts rescinded an archaic 1913 statute that declared interracial marriages performed in Massachusetts in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; Massachusetts, I believe, was the only state in the Union to allow inter-racial marriage, to be null and void in the other states where inter-racial marriage was illegal.

Just as it did with gay marriage in the early 21st century, Massachusetts was on the cutting edge of breaking down racial barriers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

But what is troubling to me about the whole gay marriage/civil union debate, be it here, in Costa Rica, or elsewhere, is the often venomous vitriol both camps in the fight hurl at one another.

I was pleased to read in the costaricapages post that the Catholic Church in CR has been very civil and respectful of gay people as it spells out its reasons for opposing the legalization of civil unions between gay Costa Rica couples. Although I don’t really understand what the Church’s opposition to legalizing civil unions is, given that no one advocating for that legalization is insisting the Church recognize those unions.

Think about it. A heterosexual couple here in the States that gets married by a Justice of the Peace are not “married” in the eyes of the Church.

So, why is the Costa Rican Church injecting itself into this debate when the unions being legalized are “civil” not secular or religious in nature? The Church is under no obligation to recognize such unions, nor should it be.

But back to the vitriol and what just transpired in Massachusetts.

Opponents of gay marriage saw the 1913 statute as a firewall against what they claimed would be a “tsunami of radical homosexuals” flooding Massachusetts to get married so they could then return to their home states, many of which, via their state constitutions, have legally defined marriage as the union between one man and one woman, and use the courts to advance their “anti-family, anti-Christian” agenda.

Now it’s true, proponents of gay marriage viewed getting the 1913 law repealed as the first step to allow gay couples who were non-Massachusetts residents to legally marry here, and then return to their home states to, indeed, challenge the legality and constitutionality of those state laws that prohibit same gender marriage.

It is, from a legal and constitutional perspective, a very sound strategy.

But with that, many marriage proponents here in Massachusetts were as ugly in their rhetoric toward the opposite camp as marriage opponents were toward them.

Words like “hater”, “bigot”, “homophobe”, and “closet cases” reverberated everywhere.

I noticed that such rhetoric was presence on a website I visited via costaricapages that was posted as a comment following Erin’s original posting of the protest story.

This stuff has to stop.

Decent people, on both sides of this issue, and there are many, need to say “Enough is enough” to the name calling and fingerpointing.

No one is asking the Catholic Church or any other denomination for that matter, to recognize civil gay marriages or civil unions.

No one.

All committed gay couples are really asking for is the establishment of legal protections similar to those afforded married straight couples so that when it comes to issues of taxes, health care decisions, inheritance, and family, they are able to make those decisions for themselves.

Religion and name calling, from either side of the aisle, have no place whatsoever in this debate, in the U.S., Costa Rica, or anywhere.

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Filed under: Reader Opinion & Stories on August 1st, 2008