Tongue in Cheek
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Tongue in Cheek Who's the Cutest Couple? |
by Kevin Isom
Have
you noticed how cute John Kerry and John Edwards look together? With the
photos running in the newspapers of them facing each other, only inches
apart, smiling broadly, and looking at each other with a look that almost
screams "I love ya, honey" - I thought at first I might be looking
at more photos of a happy gay couple wed in Massachusetts or Canada. Kerry
looks like the dashing, prematurely gray, more reserved member of the
couple, while Edwards exudes life-of-the-party exuberance. If I saw them
at a party, I'd want to talk with them.
That led me to thinking about
how George W. Bush and Dick Cheney look together as a couple. And they're
not too bad either. There's a definite father-son thing going on. Sort
of a June-December romance. I could easily imagine Cheney sitting back
with a cigar and a whiskey, while the younger Bush, wearing a cowboy hat,
rides around on his pony (more on ponies later). Picture them with Cheney
in a leather harness and Bush in leather shorts and a collar (leash optional),
and the image is complete. If I saw them in a leather bar, I wouldn't
be surprised. (Side note: Is it okay to make fun of a sitting president?
Or a standing one, for that matter? When he publicly argues that I and
other gays and lesbians should be second-class citizens when it comes
to marital rights, all the while he also says that he respects us but
merely has a difference of opinion with us? You decide.)
While we're on the subject of
cute couples and differences of opinion on the right of gays and lesbians
to marry, I'm noticing lately that in the gay marriage debate, a lot of
so-called conservatives seem to be fixated on - well- human and animal
coupling. Think I'm kidding?
John Smoltz, the Atlanta Braves baseball
player, is in hot water for commenting that if we permit gay marriage,
then what's next - bestiality? I thought this might be just an isolated
incident until I heard the esteemed William F. Buckly, Jr., who was referred
to as the father of the modern conservative movement by TV host Tim Russert,
use the same rationale - that if we permit gay marriage, there's nothing
to stop us from permitting bestiality. Apparently, this is a common argument,
because I then in radio channel surfing heard Rush Limbaugh make the same
comment. And Timothy Dailey of Focus on the Family has said the same sort
of thing in a brochure titled, "The Slippery Slope of Same Sex Marriage."
It's mind-blowing, really. That
all these conservatives really believe that gay marriage is somehow akin
to bestiality. Aside from the patent offensiveness of their comments,
there's a practical application. If the real concern is bestiality, and
if gay marriage is somehow a steppingstone down the slippery slope to
legalized bestiality, then why aren't the conservatives out there promoting
a Constitutional amendment to prohibit bestiality? Sort of a "Bambi
is for Eatin' - But Not THAT Way" legislation.
But alas, great minds, it seems, think
alike, and a mainstream columnist beat me to it. Jay Bookman, writing
in the Atlanta Constitution, suggested in a recent column that the Federal
Marriage Amendment (FMA) be changed to the Federal Animal, Relationship
and Marriage (FARM) amendment. He also discussed, with some glee, that
indeed in 1993, an apparently rather lonely man in Missouri by the name
of Mark married his pony, Pixel, in a private ceremony, as noted with
some alarm in Dailey’s slippery brochure. (Apparently, they made
quite the cute couple.)
Now, of course, Pixel was a female
horse ("A horse is a horse, not a wife, of course," was Bookman's
headline, by the way), so that at least Mark's marriage was heterosexual.
My guess, however, is that if Pixel had been a boy pony, there wouldn't
be just a mention of the "marriage" in a brochure. Why, if Pixel
had been a boy pony, I suppose that all hell would have broken loose from
Focus on the Family. ("Female ponies is for ridin', NOT males!")
Which leads me to conclude that
the real issue the so-called conservatives are concerned about is SAME-SEX
bestiality. I'm amazed that I didn't think of it before.
So I'm willing to offer a compromise.
Let's all agree to ban same-sex bestiality NOW, and let's leave gay marriage
alone. Is that slippery enough for you?
Kevin Isom is the author of It Only Hurts When I Polka and Tongue in Cheek and Other Places, available at bookstores and online. He may be reached at isomonline@aol.com or www.KevinIsom.com