Originally published in The Orlando Sentinel, March 26, 2017

For true human equality, you need the white guys.

In the big scheme of things, social justice is a war, and equality fights for women or blacks or gays are battles. A marginalized group can demand anything it wants day after day, but if the majority doesn’t join in, they can’t move forward.

In the march toward equality, there are three possible outcomes:

1. The minority takes over
2. The minority loses and becomes more marginalized3
3. The majority comes to understand the minority’s pain, agrees to solutions and works to bring them about

Of those outcomes, only No. 3 makes sense. Convincing old white guys is the goal even if they caused the problem.

Women cannot achieve true equality unless men agree, jump on board and help make it happen. Gays need straights. Muslims need Christians. Blacks need whites. Either we move forward together or we don’t move forward at all.

There’s power when a woman stands up and says she’s triple-whammied by being Latina, gay and a woman. But there’s also power when a white guy in a business suit commits to seeing past all three labels.

Whites can empathize and understand some of the day-to-day affronts blacks face, but they can’t live it. The most sensitive white guy may cringe to hear yet-another tale of a black woman shadowed by store security, yet it won’t be top-of-mind the next time he walks into Wal-Mart – but a commitment to equality doesn’t require personal suffering. It only requires open eyes and empathy.

What if one minority fails to support another?

What if an evangelical African-American believes homosexuality is a sin? “I have a legit reason” could lead him to treat another marginalized group – gay brothers and sisters – to the same type of discrimination he faces. Should religious blacks do nothing or, contrary to fundamental religious beliefs, stand shoulder-to-shoulder with gays?

My opinion: Everyone should march for everyone else’s rights. We should all join the fight for social justice, and like NATO and Europe, an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us – even old white men.

The two issues at play here – the ethics of gayness, for example, and the right to be gay – have nothing in common. The former is religious; the latter is an American value written into the Constitution. We can vehemently hate the way someone lives his life yet still fight for his freedom to live it. There is no hypocrisy in that; there is no ethical disconnect.

The battles must be fought, but the war is the prize. March for women, advocate “Black Lives Matter,” dance on gay pride days, hoist a beer at Oktoberfest.

We’re stronger when we work together.

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