Every human endeavor for improvement or just getting one’s way involves the "cave in" factor. When will the opponent cave in to your wishes? This is true at your work, your romance, your church, your local civic club, politics, and even sexual seduction. (At Right: Michelangelo’s statue Victory in Florence, Italy.)

In our struggle for full civil rights for gay people, we have to keep in mind the coming “cave in” event. One day (or year) it will just happen. State laws will change and conservative politicians will have to look for more important issues to beat on. There have been many not so small cave-in events along the way: Stonewall, legal gay marriage in Europe and Canada, gay marriage in two US States, etc.

But there is still strong opposition from conservative, disingenuous politicians who want to be elected at any cost. And of course there is the hell fire opposition of the religionists. A cave in with the latter group will be long after everyone else has accepted equal rights among gay people.

A new approach is needed toward religious homophobia. Instead of warring with a group that is far larger, powerful, and richer than we gay people are, we need to acknowledge their right to believe that we are wrong, sinful, and probably going to burn for a billion years in their mythical hell. They do have a right to believe any such nonsense as they wish, BUT having acknowledged their right to damn us, we must convince them of our right to enjoy all the privileges that our tax paying dollars should grant us, including marriage. We, like the Colonial Americans, should be shouting "No taxation without representation."

Maybe hastening the "cave in" or victory for gay rights could be accomplished by treating our religious opponents in a "Christian" matter, even though they cannot seem to do the same for us.