Actor Rupert Everett, who made controversial comments about gay parents, has been receiving hate mail and death threats despite being openly gay.  What he said was “children need a father and a mother.  I can’t think  of anything worse than being brought up by two gay dads”.   Yes, his comments concerning gay, male parents was insensitive and controversial but he is entitled to his opinion. “He told the Telegraph, “I’ve now had all this  hate mail and there have been death threats, too.  All the queens out there now  have it in for me.  I’m loathed by them.  I’m having to take evasive action.”  What’s so disturbing about this, is the people who are supposedly the most liberal, the progressive liberals, apparently only favor free speech when it’s in support of what they believe.  But if free speech is to mean anything, all of it must be protected regardless of whether it’s popular.  There are those in the gay community who believe you’re either with us, or against us, and that is unjust and unfair.  There happens to be many gay and lesbian couples who just want to live their lives without having to be poster people for gay causes.  I have friends who live in New York City far from the Greenwich Village because they don’t want to segregate themselves into a community.  They just want to go to work, make money, go on vacation and live their lives without everything having to revolve around a cause.  And that is their right although it might be frowned upon by gay and lesbian activists.  Never is it acceptable to threaten violence simply because someone voices an opinion.  So I would fully expect someone of prominence from the gay and lesbian community to speak out against this type of abhorrent behavior.  But so far, the silence has been deafening.