Letter: Proposed ordinance not diversity but divisiveness

From: Michael O’Hara

Nashville

I seldom write letters to the editor, however your recent articles on the Opinion Page of June 3 merit a response.

The subject is the proposed ordinance to protect those residents of a different sexual orientation than most. To be clear, I am a retired homebuilder, and I have done thousands of dollars of business with folks who I was aware may have been of such orientation. I never asked; they never offered; it had nothing to do with our business transactions.

I do not believe that such a lifestyle is natural, but I believe what folks do in the confines of their homes, as long as it is not harmful to another, is no one’s business but their own. I certainly do not wish to be told about it, nor would I want to know anyone’s personal sexual habits.

The Rev. Dennis McCarty is certainly entitled to his opinion. I, of course, do not agree. I am a retired white male, and I am a special class of people. I have rights, too. I am also a veteran of a foreign war, a disabled veteran with three Purple Hearts. That, too, is a special class of people. I have rights, too. I am Irish and I am divorced. I am a special class of people, and I have rights, too.

I am also a Christian believer who believes in the Holy Trinity and please do not tell me the New Testament is silent about this; it is not. But that is my choice. It is what makes me special.

I noticed McCarty was afforded just over one-half page of full color for his opinion piece. I wonder who might have sponsored that. I know color isn’t cheap. To reinforce the opinion piece was the short column below disguised as good news/bad news by Ann McFeatters, who is a syndicated columnist by the left-leaning Newsday Inc. Ten paragraphs in she finally gets to the point when she announces (old news) that Ireland has approved legalizing same sex marriage. Before she states the obvious, however, she indicates it is “traditionally one of the strictest and most conservative religious countries” — obviously not the case.

There are many like myself who are tired of the special treatment. There are anti-discriminatory laws on the books. Everyone is special. All are God’s children, black, white, brown, straight, bent, crooked, disabled, atheist, gay or whatever. We do not need a special ordinance to protect individual classes of people. What happened to the “melting pot”? What about assimilation?

This has to be one of the most divisive schemes I have seen to date. This is not diversity; this is divisiveness.