LOVED HER? Unconditional love does not come with an asterisk or any fine print. And with the archaic world viewpoints that this father harbored for so many years and tried to drill into his daughter's head, it is a pity that he grapples to those beliefs even more strongly than that "love" for his daughter. Believe me, ma'am, you're better off without that poison in your life. If you'd like to watch the entire segment, click the video below.
We as humans all fear rejection. Some are lucky to get small doses of it, and some people like me get a cheap vodka-bottle sized serving all at once. Those parallels between this woman's relations with an interracial boyfriend are very similar in my life. Based on a simple choice of not practicing a religion that I had shoved forcibly into my mouth since my youth and chose to not continue to follow in my adult years, I was completely rejected from the gene pool that raised me.
I can remember it like yesterday. Right after Matt and I became engaged in July 2009, we were called to my parents' house for a "serious talk." During this one-sided ultimatum, we were ordered to get married in the Catholic Church before leaving California as to not "life in sin." (Too late, by the way, since we had already been living together for a year and a half.) They had already spoken to a priest for us; in ironic fashion, the same priest who had refused to bless my first motorcycle because it was a "dangerous thing to have." We were scheduled to go to an emergency marriage prep class that weekend and be wed in two weeks. My mother even told me we were going dress shopping.
Of course we downright refused, which sent my father into a 5th grade temper tantrum and stomping up the stairs to go pray or something and my mother berating me for the next 30 minutes about "why I chose to not be Catholic anymore," as if that was a crime to have a choice of what I believed in. What they didn't know was that we were adults preparing to start our new life together and wanted to do it our way. I had not been living in their house since my first year in college; what did they know about me and the life I led since they never asked me how I was or cared, for that matter? My parents only started jumping on the bandwagon of unfounded panic when it was revealed at our engagement party (which they were fortunate enough that we even invited them to attend) that we were moving to Ohio to preserve whatever savings we had left after we both lost our jobs. In this knee-jerk reaction to my well thought-out decision, I realized that they were trying to save whatever control of me they thought they had left, which had disappeared years ago.
The last words that my mother and father to both said me and Matt as they threw us out of the house was "Have a good life. You do not have our blessing." To this day, I don't speak to my biological parents at all; I got tired of all the hate spewing in the name of Catholicism and salvation. But my door is open. My cell phone's on. I'm easily searchable on multiple social networks. Have at it. In fact, I'll even give you a head start just by clicking here.
Whether it be an issue of race, gender, religious beliefs, it is better to be hated for who you are than loved for being who you are not. The easiest way to anger the entire world is to compromise yourself and try to make everyone else happy. Stick to your guns, be strong in who you are, and those who actually care about you will continue to support you, regardless of what changes in your own world.
Face it, parents. The kids you spawn aren't put on this planet for tryouts to be a spitting image or clone of you. If that is your ultimate plan, then consider putting away your baby-making parts and reconsider procreating before you eventually damn your future offspring to a life of confusion and resentment. Accepting change and the diversity of the world is highly recommended, because your kids are going to do it for you whether you like it or not.
P.S. That forced shotgun wedding scenario was one of the most awkward scenarios I've ever dealt with when it came to my parents. Yes, it even upstaged the incident where I was pulled out of my school for a week with the threat of being transferred to another one and later forced to sit in a plastic-covered dining room chair in the middle of the living room listening to concentration tapes, just because I was getting Bs in 3rd grade after having skipped 2nd grade. Wow, I was a failure of a kid back then too.
