Go read this article before reading my post. Hospital Forces Lesbian to Die Alone; Judge Gives Stamp of Approval | Asterisk.

I will say this upfront. I am delirious on cold meds and am currently feverish, so if there are grammatical errors or I just ramble like a crazy person, forgive me.

I also want to make several things clear with full disclosure. I live in Miami. I live not far from this hospital. I used to volunteer during high school in the radiology section of a sister hospital (Deering Hospital at the time, now called Jackson South). I was born in Puerto Rico, raised Catholic and have lived in Miami since 1987 (age 3). I can tell you without a doubt that these people aren’t rednecks. Alois Zauner, Carlos Alberto Cruz and Jennifer Piedra are not the names of Caucasian people. These are Latin Americans raised in a culture with a majority of them either Catholic or non-religious raised with Catholic values. My own parents still look down on black people and are even more derogatory to gays. This isn’t white people hating on gays. This is systemic homophobia ingrained in an entire segment of the planet thanks to hundreds of years of indoctrination by the Catholic church, other similar religion and perpetrated by parents generation after generation.

I have tried to change my parents way of thinking. Even my own brother is homophobic with a hint of indifference towards them. While Michael Jordan is his idol and hero, he still sees the majority of black people as a bit above sub-human, namely for economic reasons. Just take a look at how I reference black people myself. Do I write black people, Black people, African-American, what? These are things that generation after generation are instilled into children by our parents because their parents taught them the same. If you have no idea what I am talking about, think about those who are violent to their spouses or children. More than likely they grew up in an abusive home and have never known anything different. It’s about equivalent.

You know what has saved me thus far? The internet. Miami and South Florida is split along ethnic lines based on a combination of race and economics with an eco-chamber effect. I want to say this article surprises me but it doesn’t. The only way you will ever change this is to give children as they grow up more exposure to other people and cultures. Gun owners will know what I am talking about. I was terrified of guns. As I became more familiar with them it because easier and better to be around them. Unless we change the way parents think and raise their children, things like this will never stop. This obviously applies to all humans but I wanted to give you specific examples about this situation.

This is why we need to either give everyone the right to marry regardless of race, ethnicity and gender or make marriage a two step process. A legal and religious (if chosen) affair much in the same way many other countries in the world already do.