What does citizenship in this country guarantee? In my youth, I naively thought that meant equal rights. I believed the words without analyzing the reality. Then my eyes were opened when . . .
-- A teen-aged boy my mother and I worked with was given higher wages because our boss said, "he needs spending money." My mother was the sole support of our family and had a much more responsible position; even I had more experience and responsibility.
-- When a neighborhood girl got pregnant, she bore the shame and responsibility and the comment was, "boys will be boys."
-- When our black friends went home on leave during the Vietnam War, after fighting in that war for our country and after the civil rights movement, they were still told to use the "colored" bathrooms and doors.
Now the gay and lesbian community would like their relationships to be valued as highly as heterosexual ones, but different oppressors are in action to mark their intimate relationships as not good enough to be recognized and given equal rights and responsibilities.
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Times have changed but the oppression and attitudes of superiority have not, only the group of oppressed citizens and their persecutors. I can still hear the opening of the old "Dragnet" television detective show: Da, da, da, da: "The paint has been changed to protect the woodwork" -- same injustice, different victims.
Cathy Peck
Bemidji
