I have one good friend. He is gay. No, he is not a friend that I ever attempted to avoid. In fact, I go to him whenever I need guidance and advise about the choices I make in life. If anything, he’s the busier one among the two of us. I set up appointments to make sure I keep in touch with him. He doesn’t gossip. He doesn’t fling his fingers around and bitch about his colleagues or friends to me.

He doesn’t have an obsession with muscles. He is not effeminate, nor is he masculine. He is successful, very successful, I would say. He’s a Hindu, but he has studied Islam. He has been a Christian missionary. He doesn’t have anything against religion. He never deviated from the path of God. If anything, he has more spirituality than I do. But people think I’m normal, whilst he is not.

Why, Malaysia?

I know of this one organisation - an organisation where hundreds of people call in everyday seeking for help. No, they are not seeking pardon from Lord for who they are. But they call in to have their voices heard, beneath the cloak they wear everyday when they walk to be part of the society.

They are on the brink of destruction. They feel like jumping off buildings. Some lost their jobs because of who they are. Some lose friends, family. Most are stripped off their dignity. They want to slit their wrists. So they call in, hanging on to one last final thread. All they want to hear is one thing- that there are others like them out there. They are not alone. But this organisation does not operate openly. They do it quietly, like an unwanted stash hidden somewhere under the surface of a society. When we sleep, there are plenty of tears here, stories of unrivalled misery and difficulty.

Isn’t it supposed to be very easy? Like they say, it’s a disease, a disorder of sorts that stems of deviating from a right path. Maybe when they lose jobs and are shunned to a corner, they could just wipe their tears and seek remorse? Go back to being ‘normal’? But still they don’t see a life for themselves in such situations. They see it as the end.

Why, Malaysia?

I do not know the answers to what’s right or what’s wrong. I’m not pretending like I do. If these acts are indeed wrong, why aren’t we letting God decide? Why are we trying to do God’s job? Is it okay to hurt and shun another person who did no harm to you, or to any other person for that matter, just because you ‘think’ it’s wrong?

I look up at them. Yes, I do. Probably some might even think there’s nothing we can learn from them. Probably there is. Because we take so many things for granted in life. We coast through life without as much as swimming or in some cases, not even bothering to know what a struggle actually means.

Society has its uniforms, and we wear it everyday, making rounds and repeating our daily routines. And when we fall into a pit, like most of us do at some point of time, we whine and grapple to find a holder that can hoist us back up. We have the luxury of choosing our struggles. They probably don’t.

Can you imagine being stopped from loving someone? To love someone but unable to hold their hands? Or even loving someone with the knowledge that you can’t plan a future with him or her?

Or maybe if you think they are wrong to be who they are, why not live your life well and dignified to demonstrate that your path pays dividends? Why make a noise when others are not in tandem with you?

Probably because we are scared. We are afraid of that little of change, that little bit of acceptance. We are afraid because we might look in the mirror and feel our struggle is nothing compared to theirs. That our lives resemble cowardice compared to theirs. So we make them as our struggle.

But in this process, are we learning? If you are normal, you might not need to accept them, but the least you can do is to always open to your mind to what you can learn from your surroundings. Isn’t that the whole purpose of life itself, to learn and evolve with time?

No, not all gays couples comprise of effeminate and ultra masculine combinations. Not all transsexuals bitch and whine. Not all of them come from a poor upbringing. Then again, are we forgetting that even among us normal people, there are negative and positive characters?

Why, your thief, your carjacker, your acid splasher; are they not ‘normal’ people? Do we use some select characteristics to paint the same picture on an entire group of people? If that’s the case; all of us are robbers, murderers, and molesters, no?

What picture comes to your head when we talk about homosexuals? Is it that of a man kissing another man, or a woman kissing another woman?

That’s called sex. The word gender has a different meaning. If you think of sex while talking about gender, are we a generation who have completely thrown the crucial element called ‘love’ out of the window?

We marry and divorce as easy as the passing clouds. But they fight hard to keep even a single relationship going. To be accepted by friends and family. Why are we on our high horses? Do we know, or feel, what they went through or are going through?

Even if that is a disease, do you look down upon a person who has cancer?

Why, oh why Malaysia, are you so ignorant?

Ram Anand is a writer and novelist.