I don't know if everyone has heard about the four transplant patients in Chicago who got HIV from an infected donor, but the story has been floating around for a few days. The short of it is that a donor died, and his organs went to four people on years-long waiting lists. He had been tested for HIV, post-death, but the results were negative because he'd apparently contracted it within a week before his death. The whole occurrence is incredibly sad and also incredibly rare.

I read another story this afternoon about how one of the patients was not informed that the donor was considered "high risk," and that she had turned down a previous donor because of his "lifestyle." In the case of the infected donor, "high risk" = gay. And, in the case of the organ she turned down, "lifestyle" = gay. ...and that's the part where I get confused.

The article notes that CDC guidelines "say that gay men who are sexually active should not be used as organ donors unless the patient is in imminent danger of death." While I realize that HIV is a scary part of the homosexual lifestyle, isn't it also a scary part of the heterosexual lifestyle? For me, it boils down to a person's attitude toward sex and the precautions they take - not their sexual orientation. Maybe the gay community is at a higher risk for HIV, based on lots of numbers and stats collected throughout the years, but is it so much higher that they should be considered riskier than the average Joe Blow on the street?

I have plenty of gay friends who are not disgusting wh*res - in fact, two couples have been together a whole lot longer than most married couples I know, and they don't sleep around. Likewise, I know plenty of straight people who make me want to bathe in Lysol if I even talk to them on the phone.

Sorry for the mini rant, but it seems an odd distinction to make, and it annoys me that even in 2007, we're classifying people based on sexual preference rather than general ethics and moral attitudes.

Last year, Tennessee voted on a bill to ban same-sex marriage - or, more specifically, note marriage as being between a man and woman, since such language wasn't included in the state's laws. All over town, there were signs in yards that said things like, "Marriage: One Man, One Woman!" "Save marriage!" "...well, pardon me, but what about the abysmal heterosexual divorce rate in America? Doesn't that demean marriage far more than two women who love each other and want to make it absolutely official?

I wanted to set their little blue signs on fire.

Ugh.

And I'm a registered Republican.