By this time I think the majority of America agrees that the repealing of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” was a great step in the right direction. Just in case you need a refresher: Don’t Ask Don’t Tell was an asinine idea because by suppressing identities to fabricate a sense of peace, it catered to people’s intolerances instead of challenging them. The real solution, of course, is: ask, tell, and get over it.

Right, so, how is “Born This Way” — the amazingly effective, powerful campaign that has improved so many lives — in any way, shape, or form comparable to “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell”? First let me clarify I don’t disparage the spirit in which the campaign was created nor the activists who worked so hard to see it through. Rather, I have a problem with the reason the campaign was so successful, the reason why America was so receptive to its message: because it allows for a moral cop-out, one of those loopholes I was referring to earlier. The way you were born should really have nothing to do with gay rights. Sex between consenting adults shouldn’t be of anyone’s concern regardless of whether they were born that way. “Born This Way” is a faux-progressive crusade similar to “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” because saying “Oh we’re cool with it as long as no one talks about it,” is pretty much the same as saying, “We’re cool with it seeing as you have no other choice, because you were born that way.” That’s a moral cop-out. It’s hacking the emotional prerogative of pity. Worse, it sets up a dangerous precedent that gay men and women are somehow incomplete or born with something missing — so we must feel sorry for them — but I don’t think pity will earn equality.

The premise of “Born This Way” suggests that gayness is an affliction, a secondary position in life. It’s not an affliction! It’s not something that needs to be excused! It’s your body and I don’t care if it’s how you were born, or if you’re sexually fluid and it’s what you choose later on in life. I’m saying it should be your human right to have consensual sex with whomever you want.

“Born This Way” allows people the loophole of begrudging equality on the pretext that gay people have no other choice. It’s essentially someone saying, “Bless his heart, he’s gay, poor child, I support him, but God would I never wish it on any child of mine.” I’ve heard this condescending sentiment again and again from people who are empathetic and supportive of gay rights, yet still maintain a patronizing view of it as something inferior. Now people always want to counter this with, “well, am I supposed to wish that my child is gay?” No, stop. Why are you projecting sexuality onto your unborn child? If you want to wish something you should probably just wish that your child is born into a world where he or she is free to express themselves in whichever way they see fit. And you should maybe contribute to making that world a reality.

In my mind the ultimate goal of gay rights is for people to see homosexuality or any sexuality (or lack thereof) as a completely equal alternative free of the condescension implied by support conditional on the idea that none of the “better” options were available. When you think about the idea that bisexuals “have a choice” per se, you might begin to see why this mentality is a problem that most certainly contributes to that twelve-percent figure. People are so wrapped up in the idea that homosexuality is inferior in some way that bisexuality confuses them because they can’t comprehend why you would choose homosexuality when heterosexuality is on the table. Their unsurfaced prejudice makes them assume you’re secretly gay, because in their minds no rational being would choose the inferior sexuality unless of course, they had no other choice.