On Wednesday, September 14th the Massachusetts’ state legislature, in a joint session of both houses, voted against a proposed amendment to the state constitution that would ban gay marriage, essentially assuring same-sex couples the same legal rights as other married couples. This vote postponed until at least 2008, the earliest that opponents could enact another amendment, further legal challenge to the same-sex marriages that were legalized in Massachusetts last year. While the religious right rended their garments and gnashed their teeth, thoughtful and insightful people pondered the situation on a more national scale.

The desire to limit the rights of gay and lesbian citizens is no different than last century’s attempt to limit the legal rights of minority citizens. It is based on fear or the unknown, rather than established fact. While for decades some of our leading “scientists” (for example, Harvard’s Louis Agassiz) promoted as scientific fact that African-Americans were genetically inferior to the white citizenry, many of today’s religious leaders say that a same-sex marriage is “wrong” and “against nature.” As genetic science advances in the coming years, we will prove that gay and lesbian people are no different th