With the rapidly increasing support of gays and lesbians, as individuals and as families, however, you've got to take the scope of who is "confused" a lot wider if you want to argue that equality is simply the result of befuddlement.
Enter U.S. Rep. Ted Yoho (R-Florida) who, at a recent town hall meeting, said, "I'm a Christian conservative. I believe marriage is between a man and a woman," to much applause.
He went on to complain about the Supreme Court overturning the Defense of Marriage Act. "It's a states' rights issue and the federal government, I personally think they need to stay out of it," he said.
Ah, yes. A states' rights issue. Hey, remember when "states' rights" was secret code for white people keeping black people down? I don't know, I just thought of that for some reason.
Yoho went on to say, "More importantly, I think it's a sad state of affairs in America today that we as a society are so confused that we have to redefine what marriage is. It's an institution that's been around for thousands years and I feel like it's ordained by God, and are we that confused as a country that we have to start redefining these things?"
There it is. The confusion argument. We're not becoming a more tolerant and accepting society, we're just confused! We must have accidentally hit ourselves really hard in the head with a rainbow flag or something.
You don't have to look very far into Yoho's other comments at that same town hall to determine who might have a head injury, however.
Take, for example, his claim that The Affordable Care Act is racist. Against white people. Because it imposes a tax on tanning beds. Which are apparently only for white people. Who want skin cancer. As is their right in The God Blessed American Constitution. I mean, obviously the tax has nothing to do with the health care costs involved in treating people who gave themselves cancer on purpose. It's because Obama hates whitey.
"It's a racist tax," Yoho told the audience. And they went nuts.
He went on, "I had an Indian doctor in our office the other day, very dark skin, with two non-dark skin people, and I asked this to him. I said, 'Have you ever been to a tanning booth?' and he goes, 'No, no need.' So therefore it's a racist tax and I thought I might need to get to a sun tanning booth so I can come out and say I've been disenfranchised because I got taxed because of the color of my skin."
So much brilliance there it's nearly blinding. First of all, "non-dark skin people" is totally how white people talk about other white people. All the time.
Secondly, fuck this guy for making light (seriously, no pun intended) of racial minorities being disenfranchised in this country. Especially since Yoho is from Florida, with a long and continuing history of racism and where tanning is free if you just go outside.
I hope Yoho does go tanning. And I hope he tans so much he gets purged from the voting rolls in Florida, like so many other "dark skin people" have been.
