After hearing some very good news this last week, I went down to my local DMV office here in California and asked for driver’s license.
Those mean, bigoted DMV workers wanted me to take a driving test. Actually, I’m sure they weren’t all bigots, but were just doing that the mean bigots in authority had told them to do – kind of like Nazi soldiers.
Anyway, they wanted me to take a driver’s test. Well phooey on that. I have known since I was a little boy that I don’t like driving. It just doesn’t appeal to me. The first time I rode a bike, though… wow… bells went off in my head. I knew I was bicyclist.
I was able to join a bicycling club at school, and that helped me feel better about myself. I got picked on and teased by those guys with those souped up cars. They just don’t understand anyone different from them.
So there I was – I wanted my driver’s license, and these DMV employees wanted me to drive. I told them I didn’t want to drive. I had no desire to drive. But I’ve had the same bicycle and have been committed to taking care of it for a long time now. Other people get driver’s licenses. I should be able to get one, too. After all, my love for my bicycle was no different than someone else's love for their car.
They offered me a California I.D. card. They told me it will get me many of the same things as a driver’s license.
What?!? Separate but equal??? I was being treated like a second-class citizen, simply because of my love of bicycles. Why should I have to drive a car to get a driver’s license?
The told me driving was a privilege, not a right. But I’ve seen all of these car drivers getting driver’s licenses. Why should I be denied one just because I don’t like cars?
The good thing is, I know the California Supreme Court is on my side. Someday soon I will be able to get a driver’s license from the people of California, even though those people don't approve, for me and my bicycle.
My next stop will be to get my licenses to practice law and medicine, though I have an aversion to taking tests and blood. Why should I be denied the same respect that doctors get? I will also be stopping at the VA to get some veteran's benefits. Why should be I be denied those, just because I am a pacficist? That one might be tough, seeing as how it is a federal thing. I will also be applying for grants for ovarian cancer research for men. I mean, they can't discriminate on the basis of sex, can they?
Sunday, May 18, 2008
5 comments:
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I think responses that start with "haha" or "lol" should be saved for 13 year old girls on MySpace...BUT, honestly, your post is forcing my hand...lol
ReplyDeleteCalifornia -- like Sweden, except without ABBA. :-p
ReplyDeleteThe metaphor doesn't quite work for me. Lots of people have "driver's licenses" and are terrible and irresponsible with it. Plenty of "bicyclists" are more committed to their mode of "transportation" than their driving counterparts.
ReplyDeleteUntil the country passes laws officially recognizing that marriage is a contract two people make, promising to provide a stable environment to raise children (or creates some specific and required family making license with education and training and frequent retesting) - who cares who marries whom; my personal relationship with my spouse in not effected by another couple; or more accurately, it is more effected by cheating spouses or couples divorcing for silly reasons that amount to "we didn't take the vows seriously," than gay people getting hitched.
Nevertheless, I enjoyed your satire!
:) What gay/lesbians want is equality, not special treatment.
ReplyDeleteTo be as miserable as the straight breeders.
I personally as a gay man, don't care to "get married" like a traditional male/female.
I do understand that as it is now- if you are a same sex couple, you don't have the same benefits as the straight married couple. Like ability to see your/or make decisions for a spouse in a hospital. Health benefits are another etc.
The domestic partner laws/legislation some states have isnt quite enough.
Its like telling me, "you can sit in the bus, but not in the front, you gotta sit in the back".
And I know that California may ultimately pass legislation to make it clear that marriage is only between a man and a women, just like other states have done, will see.
Like i tell my straight friends, look I aint competing with you to get women. Thats a good thing for you.
I ain't a women hater and I've never wanted to be a women either.
But some can sure be bitchy,bossy and pushy..lol
But so can some gay guys. But we as men are more visual, can be less emotional and sensitive. We know that sex and lust are not love:)
I maybe a gay man, but im still a man and will side/protect my fellow straight male brothers.
I love Howard Stern and Tom Leykis :)
Love and Hate Los Angeles,
ReplyDeleteThanks for commenting here after I commented on yours.
I do not see how a court could find a “right” to a state-issued license. That goes for heterosexual couples, too. The state (which represents the people) chooses to issue licenses, but is under no obligation to do so, because true rights do not obligate others without their consent. The people of a state issue licenses for specific purposes when certain criteria are met. This is true for businesses, nonprofits, drivers, hunters, various professions, so on and so forth.
The state has an interest in licensing marriage, as in between a man and a woman that it does not have in the pairing of two women or two men, and so it does. It doesn’t issue marriage licenses because there is a “right” to them.
Which brings us to “equal access”. I know it is not a satisfying answer, but you have always had the same access to getting a marriage license that I have. I understand that you have not wanted to exercise that access, but it doesn’t mean that it wasn’t there. I can assure you that when we went to get our marriage license, nobody asked us our sexual orientation. Now, if two men can get a marriage license, that will ALSO be equal access for both of us. I just see no compelling reason for the state to change the licensing in the first place.
Let me be clear that I believe you should be protected from personal and property crimes just like me – I do not condone so much as harassment against anyone, let alone assault or vandalism. I’m glad we live in a country where you (just as I am) are free to live with whomever consents to live with you, draw up contracts, convince employers to extend benefits, convince businesses to cater to you, and to have a ceremony and commitment with the consenting partner of your choice – or not.
I have been completely comfortable being the token or minority straight guy at a party or in a group that is hanging out. So please don’t get the idea that I wish you ill or think of you as any less of a man than myself. (Frankly, I take the rare pass by another man to be a compliment, and in my single days knew that the more gay men around, the more straight women there were for me to choose from.) It is just that 1) I don’t see the reason to extend marriage licenses to same-sex couplings (especially in California, where there are strong domestic partnerships), and 2) I do not like how the court did this, because even I were to agree with the ends, the means are a dangerous precedent.
I would never tell you that you have to sit in the back of the bus. But if we were in a bus, I would need to hear a compelling reason before agreeing that we should all move into a different vehicle.