LGBT

I have been struggling with how to approach because it is a subject I feel strongly about... in recent months I have been in situations where someone has spoken out loudly against the LGBT community. I have been following along here on Patch with a recent posting of the new law protecting transgender people here in Connecticut. 

In this day and age I am not understanding why so many people are still so uneducated about people's sexual preferences.  Transgenders are not pedophiles, they are people who with all their being believe they were put in the wrong body.  One transgender pedophile doesn't make all transgenders pedophiles... just as one "straight" pedophile doesn't make all straight people pedophiles.  If a pedophile dresses as a transgender to enter a bathroom to hurt a child, that person is still a pedophile, they are not transgender.  How do you discriminate against an innocent group of people (transgenders)  for what another group of people (pedophiles) do? 

I would like to try and understand how any person can believe they can make choices for another person based on their own experiences... "they were born a man or woman and can be nothing else",  "they are disgusting human beings", "they need psychological help"; such hateful words and feelings.  Once you are using the words "they" and "them" you have entered those waters of bigotry. Why put so much of your energy into those negative feelings?  Such a waste of time. 

For some reason this melting pot called America always has to have a class of people we as a society discriminate against; whether it be color of skin, place of birth or choice of religion or the lack of choice or disbelief of religion.  When does the hatred end, when do we all live together peacefully?

My grandfather had it right... he may not have understood certain aspects of people but he never let that hinder him from learning about them or accepting someone as a human being.  My most remembered and repeated Grampy quote is "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all." Grampy loved the hair bands of the 80's, he liked the Beatles, The Stones and Elvis; he never stopped learning and growing... he found value in even the smallest things. Such a more peaceful, happy, fulfilling life.