Homophobia in Cheese Land

People don’t cotton much to gay folks in the great State of Wisconsin.

Not only is gay marriage strictly prohibited in Wisconsin, there is also a law on the books that makes criminals of any residents having the temerity to “go out of state to contract a marriage that would be prohibited within Wisconsin.” Violators of that statute “can be fined up to $10,000 and/or imprisoned for up to 9 months.”

Theoretically then, if two otherwise law abiding friends of the same sex residing in Wisconsin decide they’re in love, and go to Massachusetts to get married, they automatically become outlaw fugitives in their home state for the heinous “crime” of unlawful wedlock by flight.

"Only a marriage between one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in this state. A legal status identical or substantially similar to that of marriage for unmarried individuals shall not be valid or recognized in this state," proclaims an amendment to the Wisconsin state constitution.

You see, a majority of cheese heads up in Wisconsin don’t want peace loving gays to marry; don’t want gays to be married, period; and don’t even want gays thinking about enjoying anything near the same legal status as heterosexual married couples.

The Wisconsin authorities apparently feel that gays, who inherit their sexuality at conception, having no choice what-so-ever in the matter, aren’t fully fledged human beings entitled to the joys and benefits of matrimony.

Gays, then, just aren’t considered “persons” within the meaning of the 14^th Amendment of the United Sates Constitution, like you and I would be in Wisconsin.

By some egregious means and methods, however, a Democrat controlled legislature, in 2009, somehow got a law passed that gives citizens in same sex relationships the right to visit their partner in a hospital.

This so-called “domestic partnership registry” law would require gay domestic partners to register with the state for permission from the government to visit their sick loved one in the hospital.

Can you imagine that? The people of Wisconsin don’t even want gays visiting each other in a hospital unless they get special permission from the government. How in the name of reason and humanity can human beings regard fellow human beings so cruelly and mean spirited?

But wait a minute; it gets even worse! Recently, Wisconsin Governor, Scott Walker, (R), told a judge that his office wants to stop defending the new law. The governor doesn’t want to defend a law that allows gays to visit loved ones in a hospital.

That law is unconstitutional, says Walker. He thinks that allowing gays hospital visitation privileges gives them a legal status which is just too “identical or substantially similar to marriage.” So he told the judge in his legal brief that allowing gay partners such rights “does not serve the public interest," and he insists that the state should not have to pay attorneys to defend it.

On top of all that, the Wisconsin Family Action (WFA), a socially conservative and fiercely homophobic anti-gay organization, is also challenging the law in court on the grounds that letting gays visit each other in the hospital violates the Wisconsin constitution because it permits them a "legal status identical or substantially similar to marriage."

“We can’t have gays enjoying the same legal status as straights in Land of Cheese,” they croak in unison from the court house steps.

God bless America!