I’ve been reading a lot of lies and misinformation in the conservative media lately or, should I say, more than the usual array, and it’s really got my panties in a big ol’ knot.  I’m talking about the ever elusive Gay Agenda that Evangelical and conservative types love to talk about like it’s an actual document that every gay boy and girl receives when they come out.

It’s like they actually believe that there’s a fraternity hazing, circuit party, and avante garde fashion show all rolled into a hedonistic free for all with guest DJs Samantha Ronson, Deadmau5, and Boy George. Personally, that actually sounds like a blast, but that’s not the point.

The latest update to the agenda, in case you missed it, is that homos now use kids to make themsevles seem more normal to society. I can only assume what these backward theocrats mean is that since we became equal under the law, much to their obvious disapproval, many of us have married, started families, and settled down for the long haul. Just like they do, yet we are still bombarded with the messages that somehow our relationships are destined to crash and burn, we are unfit to be loving parents, and we are lower class citizens because we love the same sex, and that makes their big bad sky daddy mad.

Last time I checked, heterosexual coupling was still a 50/50 proposition, at best, with half their marriages ending in divorce. It appears their definition of the sanctity of marriage is very different than mine.

Maybe they feel threatened because they are figuring out that all of the irresponsible venom they have spewed, and stereotypes they have perpetuated to scare their sheeple for centuries, is actually starting to become their downfall.

Hate is not a natural emotion. Hate lives in the darkness of fear, ignorance, and irrational paranoia. Intolerance and religious-based hate are manufactured constructs intentionally meant to create an illusion of us against them.

Unless there is a boogey man to hate, how do you rally your troops into lock step? It’s a millennia-old form of controlling the masses, and has been happening for so long that in many ways they know not what they do. Ironic, huh?  So, as an example for my son, I’m trying to turn the other proverbial cheek, but boy do they make it hard.

You see, I grew up in the deep south of the United States of ’Murica where guns, grits, and God used to be part and parcel of everyday life. There, in a tiny sun-soaked Florida beach town, a colourful big gay flower blossomed. I lived through the 1970s and ’80s confused, yet curious, about the pantheon of Christian religions within my own family, and the very different agendas they all possessed. In retrospect, it was the best teacher of tolerance and of differing views a boy could have, and it sure made for some wild family get-togethers.

One part of my family is classic Catholic. They smoke, drink, curse, gamble, and, at times, even cheat on their spouses. They are a pretty fun bunch, even though they are some of the most dysfunctional people I know. I always found it fascinating that their agenda involved going to Sunday Mass a couple times a month, throwing a few bucks to the parish, and making your confession a few times a year. For them, that was enough to get through to the next level. Sinning was easily rectified, and as long as you didn’t disagree with the church in public, you could get away with just about anything.

My Baptist family, who live in the rural part of Central Florida, have an agenda all about judgment. When I was a kid, they hated the Catholics with so much ferocity the mere mention of Mary, or a crucifix, was enough to potentially damn you to an eternity in hell. Try wrapping your head around that in Sunday school at the age of six, when you just received a new crucifix for your birthday from your other family. To be fair, pretty much anyone who didn’t subscribe to their narrative of fire, brimstone, and ultimate judgment was destined for Hell, so at least they hated on almost everyone equally, except of course for us homos.

They always reserved a special kind of hate for us, and by all accounts still do. For them, that pesky old devil waits around every corner and will get you if you aren’t filled up with the love of the Lord. I remember wanting to be filled up but, ironically, that didn’t happen until much later in life, and it wasn’t the Lord that I found salvation through.

Now the really interesting ones are my Pentecostal relatives. They now live on what can best be described as a commune in a drained out swamp in North Florida. They call it a neighbourhood, but to live in this particular hood, you have to become a member of their church and follow a strict agenda. No homos need apply or you might get burned at the stake, for real.

Some of their rules include: no outrageous colours, like purple, yellow or red, can be worn in public, and you must never wear any patterns. The devil wears plaid, not Prada there. Women can’t cut their hair, but they can colour it and, in a real twist, are encouraged to wear incredible amounts of cheap make-up. I guess their agenda says Jesus wants you to keep that flaxen blonde hair, smoky eyes, and pouty lips for eternity.

For the men, it’s not that bad a deal. At sixteen, you get to marry a teenaged girl with little to no formal education, and have absolute power over your families. As long as you donate a third of your income to the church and subjugate yourself to the preacher man, you qualify for a one-way ticket to heaven. If you decide at some point you tire of your wife, because you married a fourteen year old, just claim your wife is possessed by the devil because she hates you, and a divorce will be granted, and a new teenage wife may be chosen. What happens in the neighbourhood stays in the neighbourhood after all.

So here’s the real point. Everyone, gay/straight/bi/trans, religious or atheist, has an agenda. My big fat gay agenda goes something like this:  It’s not who you believe in, or even what you believe, it is how you treat yourself, your family, and the people you meet everyday.  Love and be loved, show respect and kindness, and if someone has an issue with that, they’re the problem.

My son will know unconditional love from two doting parents who will move heaven and earth to make his life a happy and successful one. There is far too much judgment going on in the world today and in some ways I blame social media for giving the haters a bigger voice than ever.

It is up to our community to support our own families, create our own values, and demonstrate that we are not that different from one another. We just have different agendas.