Court may review Texas sodomy law
OK, a show of hands here, kids.... How many of you even knew that Texas has a "Homosexual Conduct Law" on the books? Why would we? If you're like me, you've probably assumed that what happens behind closed doors and between consenting adults is no business of the state. Well, in Texas, you'd be dead wrong.
Here in Texas, there is a vocal, bigoted minority of Right-wingers that think this law is just fine the way that it is. To them, any sexual contact between members of the same sex is sinful and immoral, and as such deserves to be deemed illegal. My response to that is simple: if you don't like or approve of that sort of behavior, don't engage in it. Leave other people, who may or not think differently from you, alone.
The law is on the books, which means that police departments and district attorneys are bound to enforce it. If you ask them, though, most find enforcing the law to be both wasteful and distasteful. Is this REALLY how we want to allocate our limited law enforcement resources? Should it be the role of the state to regulate consensual behavior between two adults? Is that the America we want to live in?
I would suspect that, even here in Conservative Texas, the majority of voters wouldn't mind seeing this law disappear off the books. Unfortunately, the Republican-dominated Legislature is ultimately controlled by the extreme Right-wing religiously-oriented Republican Party. Tolerance and charity are not exactly hallmarks of the Texas Republican Party, which is farther to the right than even folks like Shrub. Unless more centrist Republicans can convince the Right-Wing nutcases to expend their political capital on other issues, it will likely be some time before Texans will be safe in their own bedrooms.
