Just to make it clear: I have no problem that people have been discussing the political aspects and issues of gay marriage below. I take my cue from the happy couple themselves. Barely 72 hours after the wedding, George and Brad were on a local Los Angeles radio talk program discussing the issue. Why? Because of their concern that CA voters will overturn the ruling of the California state supreme court.
Food for thought: If in 1957, Arkansas residents could have voted on the issue of desegregation and whether to overturn the Supreme Court’s ruling declaring schools could no longer be separated by race…
…how do you think that vote would have gone?
I’m reminded of the exchange between Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones in “Men in Black” in which Smith’s character wonders why word of aliens isn’t made public, because “People are smart. They could handle it.” The response: “A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it.”
A group of learned individuals look at the Constitution and say, “This is wrong,” which is what they’re trained to do their whole lives. And the response of people is to be dumb and panicky because it threatens their narrow view of the way Life Should Be. And such narrowness of attitude, and such determination to destroy the rights of others to individual happiness, is inherently dangerous.
PAD
• 
I’m reminded of the words of Winston Churchill:
“Democracy is two wolves and a sheep discussing what’s for dinner. Liberty is the sheep armed with a gun and objecting.”
Proposition 8 – the gay marriage ban initiative – was losing by double-digits in the latest poll, and today even the conservative San Diego Union-Tribune came out against it.
I’ve been saying all along that once people realized how much money there was to be made from all the extra wedding ceremonies, the initiative didn’t stand a chance. 🙂
Proposition 8 – the gay marriage ban initiative – was losing by double-digits in the latest poll, and today even the conservative San Diego Union-Tribune came out against it.
I’ve been saying all along that once people realized how much money there was to be made from all the extra wedding ceremonies, the initiative didn’t stand a chance. 🙂
It really does help the fact that we’ve been living with gay marriage here for a few months. People who were iffy on the prospect can see that not a whole hëll of a lot has changed.
I’m fairly confident that desegregation would have lost the popular vote by a substantial majority in 1957 Arkansas – and in at least 25-30 other states. There is a popular misconception that the will of the majority is automatically wise and good. The majority has generally supported helping itself and screwing everyone else.
I am a wholehearted proponent of gay marriage, but I oppose the way it has come about in Massachusetts and California. When it’s brought about by judicial fiat, all it does is rile the hëll out of the opponents and leads to very, very ugly fights — as well as being, to me, a violation of the principle of democracy. Remember, the same Court that ruled on Brown v. Board of Education also gave us Dred Scott.
I’d much rather it be done on a state-by-state basis, through legislation or referendum. That assures that enough people support it to put an end to these legal challenges and ballot questions and whatnot.
Oh, by the way, PAD, have you seen this?
http://echosphere.net/star_trek_insp/insp_muddswomen.png
There’s four pages of ’em, and most of them are hysterical.
http://echosphere.net/star_trek_insp/star_trek_insp.html
J.
Well, I only see two options.. either you have a democracy where every person’s vote has equal weight, however smart or dumb that person happens to be, or you have a situation where some people are more equal than others… The only question then is who decides which category you end up in.
Cheers.
“Posted by: Peter J Poole at September 18, 2008 06:41 PM
Well, I only see two options.. either you have a democracy where every person’s vote has equal weight, however smart or dumb that person happens to be, or you have a situation where some people are more equal than others… The only question then is who decides which category you end up in.
Cheers. “
You forgot the third option. Modern democracies have constitution and supreme courts and checks and balances in order to prevent the tyranny of the majority.
Yeah, that worked so well for us in 2000….
That’s mistaking short-term for long-term. No system is perfect, and all systems will produce individual bad results. Sometimes those results are really bad, and the entire system starts to unravel, like what happened in 1860.
The US system is, on the whole, designed to resist all forms of change. It’s fundamentally “conservative” in the sense of “opposed to change.” Some states — like us here in California, where we have a surplus of direct democracy — have set up their local systems to be capable of quicker changes.
Changing the American government is akin to steering a supertanker. If you want to make a turn, you need to make an appointment well in advance.
Making constitutional change difficult is one of the counter forces to the will of the people your founder fathers built in to the system. But the system also offers the possibility of change through the system so that there would be other options for change other than revolution.
For the life of me, i don’t see any logically reason why gay couples should not be allowed to marry. Aside from a misread passage in a dusty old book.
What can be the counter argument except blind, ignorant prejudice?
A group of learned individuals look at the Constitution and say, “This is wrong,” which is what they’re trained to do their whole lives. And the response of people is to be dumb and panicky because it threatens their narrow view of the way Life Should Be.
Awesome. So I infer from this your support for the following decisions that were rendered by a group of learned individuals looking at the Constitution:
1) Bush v Gore (arbitrary recounts violate due process and equal protection)
2) Gonzales v Carhart (partial-birth abortion ban is constitutional)
3) District of Columbia v Heller (handgun ban violates the 2nd Amendment)
4) Crawford v. Marion County Election Board (Indiana’s voter ID act is legitimate)
The problem with that argument is that it proves too much. Why ever have a popular vote? Why not have a technocracy like Plato’s Republic? Fundamentally a democracy isn’t premised at all on its tendency to reach the right or best result. The premise is that people should get to choose the kind of society in which they want to live, and should have the right to set it up. Virtually everyone will agree that there has to be a protection for minorities built into such a system (because virtually everyone thinks that’s the kind of society you want to live in– one that doesn’t screw you over the instant you find yourself in the minority), but there’s always going to be some play around the edges in defining just how much protection the minority should have from the majority and in what ways. Ultimately the majority has to decide that. In your example above, the reason that Arkansas didn’t have a referendum on desegregation was the 14th Amendment and various Federal civil rights laws… all of which had been passed through Congress in democratic fashion. Our system generally works pretty well. We reach the right result surprisingly often. But even when the American people make a mistake (electing Jimmy Carter, for example), it’s their mistake to make.
And for the record, were gay marriage to come before me on a ballot, or in a proposed law if I were in a legislature, I’d be inclined to support it. One day maybe I’ll have the chance.
Well, I only see two options.. either you have a democracy where every person’s vote has equal weight, however smart or dumb that person happens to be, or you have a situation where some people are more equal than others… The only question then is who decides which category you end up in.
I’d like option #1, please. Preferably within the next 50 days or however long it is till the election. Signed, A Democrat in Texas. Hëll, maybe I’ll just write-in for Paris Hilton, since it won’t matter either way.
Speaking as an Arkansan — albeit one not alive in the 1950s — I can say that Arkansans *did* vote in favor of segregation. Amendment 44 to the state constitution was passed in 1956, and called on the state to take any actions necessary to oppose the Supreme Court rulings on desegregation. That included “interposing the sovereignty of the State of Arkansas to the end of nullification of these and all deliberate, palpable and dangerous invasions of encroachments upon rights and powers not delegated to the United States” and “to enact such laws…as may be necessary to regulate health, morals, education, marriage, good order and to ensure the domestic tranquility of the citizens of the State of Arkansas.”
Amendment 69 repealed Amendment 44 in 1990 — about 273,000 voters favored the repeal, and about 263,000 favored keeping the amendment where it was. I was a teenager in Arkansas at the time, and remember that the narrow margin of victory was attributed to the complete absence of advertising or promotions one way or the other. It is possible that some of the people voting against repeal genuinely wanted to bring back segregation, but I hope that number was a small one.
So, yeah, count me in as favoring a thoughtful judiciary.
My only thoughts on gay marriage (or any marriage, for that matter) is that any special privileges (tax, property, benefits, etc) should either be taken away from married couples altogether, or else extended to everyone (in that people could name any person as their beneficiary, regardless of their relationship). The whole “special benefits to married people” thing is unreasonably discriminatory against people who don’t choose that lifestyle; the government ought to have no business in people’s private lives.
I’m a huge advocate for gay marriage (and equal rights at work; after that, let ’em struggle with the rest of us) and am astonished that there’s so much opposition. Religious objections are fair, but the attempts to advance religious beliefs to laws affecting all are asinine. (To me, it’s like a Jewish group making it illegal for anyone to eat non-kosher foods.) The idea that marriage has always been unchanging and can’t survive changing is equally asinine: Marriage today is radically different from what it was, from the days of politically arranged marriages to the days when interfaith or interracial marriage were illegal. And so far, no state that’s allowed gay marriage has crumbled into dust or had a skyrocket in the divorce rate.
I’m sorry Peter, I just don’t see how discrimination against an external phenotype (such as one’s skin color), can be equated with a behavior (such as sexual activity). Society has always deemed some behaviors as “bad” or “good” since the dawn of time. The degrees of restrictions may have varied but societies have always put limitations on some forms of sexual behavior. I suppose one could argue that any or all laws prohibiting certain types of sexual behavior are either discrimantory or unenforceable.
Some may argue it is merely an issue of semantics. On many levels the Union of a man and a woman has its own unique characteristics (ability to reproduce, members of the opposite sex, male & female role modeling, etc.)that for people to argue that word “marriage” remain unique to describing THAT type of relationship, does not sound unreasonable to me. If the government wants to either create a separate unique descriptor for Male/Male or Female/Female relationships (even then I am assuming only two individuals are invovled, and have excluded relationships of 3 or greater…Pandora’s box I suppose), or recognize none then that seems to me to be more fair than just redefining an ancient concept. Once it has been decided that “Marriage” can mean whatever you want it to mean, than it become a meaningless concept.
Try that again. You’re starting from a wrong assumption.
I’m sorry Peter, I just don’t see how discrimination against an external phenotype (such as one’s skin color), can be equated with a behavior (such as sexual activity)
okay about discrimination of interfaith marriages? Is that okay? Religion is a behaviour
Peter David: A group of learned individuals look at the Constitution and say, “This is wrong,” which is what they’re trained to do their whole lives. And the response of people is to be dumb and panick…
Luigi Novi: Well, sometimes that group is learned and responsible. But it isn’t always. I’d like to think that it usually is, but there are certainly instances in which it hasn’t been.
jasonk: I’m sorry Peter, I just don’t see how discrimination against an external phenotype (such as one’s skin color), can be equated with a behavior (such as sexual activity)
Luigi Novi: It isn’t. It is the the discrimination that both groups face that is equated. In each case, the discriminator feels he/she can come up with some rationalization by which the withholding of rights from that group to do as they please with each other is logical and morally acceptable. In both cases, their arguments tend to be pseudoscientific, and can be boiled down to aesthetic discomfort. It is for this reason that in both cases, they’re wrong.
Luigi Novi:
It may not have been obvious but Jasonk was quoting Rudy, two comments above him.
Posted by: Luigi Novi at September 19, 2008 02:42 AM
Peter David: A group of learned individuals look at the Constitution and say, “This is wrong,” which is what they’re trained to do their whole lives. And the response of people is to be dumb and panick…
Luigi Novi: Well, sometimes that group is learned and responsible. But it isn’t always. I’d like to think that it usually is, but there are certainly instances in which it hasn’t been.
Micha: That’s why you have that nice seperation of powers flowchart. The power of supreme court justices comes from the people too.
—————–
David: “Our system generally works pretty well. We reach the right result surprisingly often.”
Micha: But sometimes the part of the system that works well is the supreme court.
———————–
Rudy: “Some may argue it is merely an issue of semantics. On many levels the Union of a man and a woman has its own unique characteristics (ability to reproduce, members of the opposite sex, male & female role modeling, etc.)that for people to argue that word “marriage” remain unique to describing THAT type of relationship, does not sound unreasonable to me. “
Micha: If the government is going to enforce semantics, and ensure the words have exact meanings, I would start with the word “bad”. You can’t have it meaning good and bad. It’s confusing.
And then take care of “cool” and “hot” please.
It’s about time the dictionary was legislated.
Rudy: “Once it has been decided that “Marriage” can mean whatever you want it to mean, than it become a meaningless concept.”
Not meaningless, the meaning changed, because the view of what’s the essential part of marriage marriage changed. The male-female thing doesn’t seem as important as the commitment, the forming of a household, the love, etc. The opponents of gay marriage think that same-gender relationship os bad, and they should admit it, instead of making the absurd claim that they are protectinng the meaning of the word marriage.
Rudy: “Society has always deemed some behaviors as “bad” or “good” since the dawn of time. The degrees of restrictions may have varied but societies have always put limitations on some forms of sexual behavior. I suppose one could argue that any or all laws prohibiting certain types of sexual behavior are either discrimantory or unenforceable.”
The question is what justifies restricting certain behaviors? Unless you assume the government can restrict any behavior it does not like for whatever reason. In your system, and the historical processes your system went through, it is usually considered wrong for the government to restrict individual behavior without good cause. Obviously, in this spirit of limiting the power of the government, it seems unjustified to restrict the sexual behavior of consenting adults, but it is deemed necessary to protect people who are not concenting or two young to consent.
Rudy: “I’m sorry Peter, I just don’t see how discrimination against an external phenotype (such as one’s skin color), can be equated with a behavior (such as sexual activity).”
Micha: It has already pointed out that this argument justifies descrimination against members of different religions or different political beliefs.
Awesome. So I infer from this your support for the following decisions that were rendered by a group of learned individuals looking at the Constitution:
1) Bush v Gore (arbitrary recounts violate due process and equal protection)
2) Gonzales v Carhart (partial-birth abortion ban is constitutional)
3) District of Columbia v Heller (handgun ban violates the 2nd Amendment)
4) Crawford v. Marion County Election Board (Indiana’s voter ID act is legitimate)
Do you see me scrambling to take action to find ways to overturn them? I may disagree with the reasoning of the courts, and even complain about them, but I’m not actively endeavoring to overturn them.
Unlike, say, individuals attempting to overturn gay marriage or, for that matter, the relentless forces that have been trying to overturn Roe V. Wade since the decision was first made.
PAD
I’m sorry Peter, I just don’t see how discrimination against an external phenotype (such as one’s skin color), can be equated with a behavior (such as sexual activity).
Well, first of all, homosexuality has to do with more than “behavior.” Behavior is learned. People are born the way they are, be it black, white, or gay. But that’s really irrelevant to the point. The point is that the same rationalizations are used for discrimination, be it on the basis of race or on the basis of sexual orientation.
Society has always deemed some behaviors as “bad” or “good” since the dawn of time.
If you mean people have been judgmental of their neighbors and taken biased and hurtful actions against them since the dawn of time, yes. It would be nice to think that we’ve evolved since then. Assuming you believe in evolution, which nowadays can’t be assumed.
The degrees of restrictions may have varied but societies have always put limitations on some forms of sexual behavior.
You insist on tying this solely to “sexual behavior.”
On many levels the Union of a man and a woman has its own unique characteristics (ability to reproduce, members of the opposite sex, male & female role modeling, etc.)that for people to argue that word “marriage” remain unique to describing THAT type of relationship, does not sound unreasonable to me.
Prejudice and bias never sounds unreasonable to the people who aren’t experiencing the bias.
PAD
Posted by Micha at September 18, 2008 06:51 PM
“Posted by: Peter J Poole at September 18, 2008 06:41 PM
Well, I only see two options.. either you have a democracy where every person’s vote has equal weight, however smart or dumb that person happens to be, or you have a situation where some people are more equal than others… The only question then is who decides which category you end up in.
Cheers. “
You forgot the third option. Modern democracies have constitution and supreme courts and checks and balances in order to prevent the tyranny of the majority.”
Playing Devil’s apricot here, but isn’t that ‘third option’ just option two with clearer identification of who/what decides which category you’re in? And isn’t the ‘tyranny of the majority’ the cost of democracy?
If turkeys want to vote for Thanksgiving and Christmas, should they be over-ruled by the smart folks who know better about what’s in their best interests? Doesn’t every dictatorship in the world claim to have its peoples best interests at heart?
Cheers.
“The US is not a democracy, it’s a Republic”
I don’t know where that quote comes from. But a true democracy is simply rule of the people, which usually means the majority. In a Republic (or constitutional monarchies) you have forces that counter the powerr of the majority. One is that you elect representatives — that gives the system a partial aristocratic tinge. The 2nd is constitution (or common law in your country) that gives the past, tradition, certainpower. But you also have seperation of powers and the dependancy of powers, so the power of the justices also depends on the people. In the American system you also have an almost monarchic aspect to the system with the President.
Polybius called it a mixed system, when he was talking about Rome. It’s supposes the combine the advantages of democracy, aristocracy and monarchy, and avoid the disadvantages of rule of the mob, oligrachy and tyranny. The seperation of powers stuff was a later addition. Also, Madison outsmarted the flaws of democracy by having such a large mass of people vote. It avoids some of the problems in city-states. Although wouldn’t it have been cool if we all went to assembly like in Athens. I think the Swiss have it in some places.
Intolerance of gay marriage is a behavior. Let’s make it illegal for you to marry since, by your own account, prohibiting marriage of those exhibiting a behavior is no inconvenience to you.
Scott Adams had the best breakdown on the problems of democrocry I ever read. Paraphrasing, it was something like this.
Take an issue that the public is evenly divided on (Gay Marriage for Example). Now, take the 100 smartest, most educated people in the world, and have them vote on it. 1 of 2 things would happen.
1. Their vote would be divided as well, showing that intelligence and education are irrelevent to Democracy.
or.
2. They’d be 100% in agreement on the issue, which shows that intelligence and education ARE relevent but are negated by the masses.
Either way….
Peter J. Poole: “Well, I only see two options.. either you have a democracy where every person’s vote has equal weight, however smart or dumb that person happens to be, or you have a situation where some people are more equal than others… The only question then is who decides which category you end up in.”
No. Micha is correct: what you’ve posited is a false dilemma. Democracy doesn’t necessarily mean everything is up for a vote.
At one time, you would have been right. Democracy used to mean one and only one thing: a system of governance where authority rested in the hands of an assembly of all citizens who chose to participate.
The definition of democracy has since expanded. In addition to the form of democracy described above (now known as “direct democracy”), the word also encompasses representative democracy, which is a practice where sovereignty is exercised by a subset of the people chosen on the basis of election.
So the fact that the Bill of Rights cannot be altered by popular vote does not preclude the U.S from being a democracy. It is not anti-democratic to decide that certain fundamental rights are not subject to the whim of the majority.
Micha: “I don’t know where that quote comes from. But a true democracy is simply rule of the people…”
Not anymore. As I explained above, the word democracy now encompasses what used to be known as a republic.
Peter it appears that if they took a vote on the east coast, asking if people in Arkansas ( and I’m just guessing anywhere in the south) were/are smart were/are hillbillies/rednecks/trash were/are worth as much as those on the coasts, the vote would be No they are not smart, Yes they are hillbillies and rednecks and trash, and hëll no they are not worth nearly as much as us.
For someone promoting less discrimination you sure do seem to have have low opinion of others.
I’m sorry Peter, I just don’t see how discrimination against an external phenotype (such as one’s skin color), can be equated with a behavior (such as sexual activity). Society has always deemed some behaviors as “bad” or “good” since the dawn of time. The degrees of restrictions may have varied but societies have always put limitations on some forms of sexual behavior. I suppose one could argue that any or all laws prohibiting certain types of sexual behavior are either discrimantory or unenforceable.
The question is: why must any sexual behavior be restricted? The fact that “societies have always restricted certain types of behavior” doesn’t give any society the moral right to restrict just any type of behavior. When certain types of sexual behavior are restricted, it should be (always a very loaded word, that) because they are harmful. Same-sex relationships harm…what, exactly? Aside from many people’s mental comfort zones? Homosexuality is not the same thing as pedophilia, bëšŧìálìŧÿ, incest or rape. Two consenting, informed adults entering into a committed relationship cause harm to no one. Discriminating against them is a poor use of society’s energy.
Legislate against sexual behaviors that actually hurt people. Let same-sex couples live their lives like honest people.
Some may argue it is merely an issue of semantics. On many levels the Union of a man and a woman has its own unique characteristics (ability to reproduce, members of the opposite sex, male & female role modeling, etc.)that for people to argue that word “marriage” remain unique to describing THAT type of relationship, does not sound unreasonable to me. If the government wants to either create a separate unique descriptor for Male/Male or Female/Female relationships (even then I am assuming only two individuals are invovled, and have excluded relationships of 3 or greater…Pandora’s box I suppose), or recognize none then that seems to me to be more fair than just redefining an ancient concept. Once it has been decided that “Marriage” can mean whatever you want it to mean, than it become a meaningless concept.
Why should the characteristics of reproduction and male/female role modeling be enforced in the legal definition of marriage? In no humane society are married couples required to bear offspring, nor can any marriage law dictate how spouses approach their roles in the relationship.
Allowing same-sex couples the same legal rights as heterosexual couples, and even giving it the same name, is not the same thing as “deciding that ‘marriage’ can mean whatever you want it to mean.” It doesn’t mean that I can suddenly decide that my co-worker is my wife and therefore be excused from testifying against her. It doesn’t mean that I can claim my brother is my spouse and therefore claim his property as my inheritance if he gets killed in a plane crash. It means that two grown-ups of the same gender can file for a legal recognition of their relationship. That’s a far, far cry from having it so that a single girl like me suddenly has nothing different in her life from the average married woman.
Furthermore, the world is not going to disappear in a puff of smoke because we redefine an ancient concept. Human beings created the concept of marriage, we have already adjusted the definition many times and in many places, and we can continue to do so. The “traditional” definition of marriage, no matter what one insists is “traditional” in our culture, is just that–a part of a culture, and cultures are created by people, not handed down from God or developed in nature. If people never made changes to their own cultures, especially in “ancient concepts,” we would never have grown out of the Stone Age.
Hmm. You got me thinking, Bill Myers (always very bad). The phrase I learned was, “… and to the Republic, for which it stands.”, not “to the Democracy…”. Never thought about that one before, but I think I have to agree.
Posted by: Bill Myers at September 19, 2008 10:25 AM
Micha: “I don’t know where that quote comes from. But a true democracy is simply rule of the people…”
Bill Myers: Not anymore. As I explained above, the word democracy now encompasses what used to be known as a republic.”
Micha: See, a slippery slope. Words changing there meaning at a whim. First marriage, now democracy. where will it stop.
Micha: “See, a slippery slope. Words changing there meaning at a whim. First marriage, now democracy. where will it stop.”
Oh, I KNOW. Society is eroding, I tell you. Just yesterday I heard that women now have the vote and are allowed to own property, too. Also, I see men are ignoring basic hygeine and wearing their own hair rather than powdered wigs. What is up with THAT?
Posted by: Susan O at September 19, 2008 10:50 AM
“Hmm. You got me thinking, Bill Myers (always very bad). The phrase I learned was, “… and to the Republic, for which it stands.”, not “to the Democracy…”. Never thought about that one before, but I think I have to agree.”
The idea of the Roman Republic (or the Galactic Republic) was definitely on the minds of the founding fathers, which is why you have a Senate on Capitol Hill with this kind of architecture.
I don’t know when they started talking about your system as a democracy. Probably when the word stopped having negative connotations.
————–
Bill, as far as I’m concerned things have been going down hill since the middle Ages. Although the 17th century Dutch Republlic was pretty cool. The guy in charge was called a Plenapotentiary. I think it would have been nice to have plenapotential elections instead of presidential.
The real reason people are against gay marriage.
The Talk
Dad: Hury up and get dressed in your Sunday clothes we’re going to a wedding.
Son (8 years old): We are?? whose wedding.
Dad: Uncle Bill’s.
Son: Uncle Bill??? Who is marrying him?
Dad: uh..um…his best friend.
Son: Who is she?
Dad:….aarrr …uuhh. its his bestfriendFrank(hushed tones)
Son: Frank? But…oh….does that mean I can marry my best friend MArk?
DAD: ARRGGHHHHH
Support gay marriage. its the Christian thing to do.
Take an issue that the public is evenly divided on (Gay Marriage for Example). Now, take the 100 smartest, most educated people in the world, and have them vote on it.
Right off the bat I’d be nervous about the premise that the best educated people would obviously be the best choice. There were some interesting articles in Skeptical Inquirer that showed that people become more likely to believe in the paranormal as they become better educated.
(The study is referenced in an article today in the Wall Street Journal that looks at the religious element in this, particularly in the wacky views of avowed atheist Bill Maher, who thinks that one can’t be religious and rational, a pretty bold statement to make from someone who doesn’t accept germ theory.)
If turkeys want to vote for Thanksgiving and Christmas, should they be over-ruled by the smart folks who know better about what’s in their best interests? Doesn’t every dictatorship in the world claim to have its peoples best interests at heart?
Oh, a flag on the play! The ref’s call: Reducto ad absurdum. Logical fallacy. Ten yard penalty and first down for the opposition.
PAD
And such narrowness of attitude, and such determination to destroy the rights of others to individual happiness, is inherently dangerous.
Thanks for explaining my motive to me. Guess my whole intention is simply to deny someone happiness. Not.
The reality is there are many ways laws are made for the common good. Everything from requiring seat belts to banning (in most states) prostitution.
I am sure some would argue against these very laws. I get that. But they are not intended to “deny someones happiness.” It is done (rightly or wrongly) because of a concern for the greater good.
But I don’t expect you to give me that much of a benefit of the doubt. You have your mind made up. So enough said.
Iowa Jim
Reductio ad absurdum aren’t logically false. They are considered valid conditions for mathematical proofs. What they may be — like logic — is unfaithful to reality.
Iowa Jim: “The reality is there are many ways laws are made for the common good. Everything from requiring seat belts to banning (in most states) prostitution.”
It’s interesting that you chose to lump in seatbelt laws with anti-prostitution laws. Seatbelt laws can be justified by the provable risk of harm that results from not wearing seatbelts. Laws against prostitution cannot be justified in the same way; prostitution poses no risks that aren’t already inherent in having casual sex with strangers, an activity which is perfectly legal.
Homosexual marriage is no more harmful than heterosexual marriage, a legal activity. Your attempts to argue otherwise have fallen apart upon close examination by others.
Iowa Jim: “But I don’t expect you to give me that much of a benefit of the doubt. You have your mind made up. So enough said.”
Ah, yes, the old “if you’re not going to play right I’m going to pick up my toys and go home” response.
You’re advocating that homosexuals be treated as second-class citizens, using arguments that have been exposed as illogical, and citing “facts” that have been exposed as blatantly inaccurate. If you can’t come up with an argument that can withstand logical examination, whose fault is that?
Peter it appears that if they took a vote on the east coast, asking if people in Arkansas ( and I’m just guessing anywhere in the south) were/are smart were/are hillbillies/rednecks/trash were/are worth as much as those on the coasts, the vote would be No they are not smart, Yes they are hillbillies and rednecks and trash, and hëll no they are not worth nearly as much as us.
Thus proving my point: That asking peopel en masse what they think isn’t always the fairest way to address something.
For someone promoting less discrimination you sure do seem to have have low opinion of others.
Nice point, but irrelevant. My statement regarding Arkansas had nothing to do with Arkansas of the present day. I asserted that back in 1957, if the people of Arkansas had been polled, they would likely have voted to keep schools segregated. Would you care to refute that? Because I’m basing my belief on the fact that the Supreme Court actually made the ruling for desegregation in 1954, and after three years of Arkansas refusing to cooperate he had to send in Federal troops to enforce the Supreme Court’s ruling. The picutres of troopers escorting black children into schools while protestors massed and screamed leads me to conclude that the voters of Arkansas would have shot down the Supreme Court’s ruling if they could. If you have something concrete upon which to base an opposing view (editorials of the time, letters to the editor of the time, etc.), feel free to trot them out. Such evidence would impress me in a way that your snide insinuations do not.
PAD
Thanks for explaining my motive to me. Guess my whole intention is simply to deny someone happiness. Not.
My God, does anyone other than Borat still use “not” as a one word sentence? Furthermore, I don’t think your motivation is to stop someone from being happy. That’s just a byproduct. I think your motivation is that you’re just a bigot. You don’t like gays; they skeeve you out. And that’s fine. That’s your business. I feel a little sorry for you, but beyond that, it’s of no relevance. Where it becomes relevant is when people like you, because of that bigotry, take actions that wind up stopping others from being happy over something that will have no personal impact upon you. If someone would be happy because they ran over you with a car, that’s a direct problem for you. If someone would be happy because they want to spend the rest of their lives with someone of the same gender, that’s not a problem for you, or even your business, unless you choose to make it your business. Which bigots such as you have done and continue to do.
The reality is there are many ways laws are made for the common good. Everything from requiring seat belts to banning (in most states) prostitution.
Okay. And you have to prove that gay marriage somehow harms the commonweal. You have thus far provided no arguments that make sense to anyone who isn’t skeeved by gays.
Here’s what you need to do: You have to find me a hundred straight married men who, upon learning that Mr. Sulu married a guy, are going to turn to their wives and say, “I’m dumping you, moving to California (or Massachusetts), turning gay and marrying a man.”
Even simpler, find me ten married men who will do that.
Or one. Start with one. Find me a single case where that has happened anywhere in the United States.
I am sure some would argue against these very laws. I get that. But they are not intended to “deny someones happiness.” It is done (rightly or wrongly) because of a concern for the greater good.
And in this case, it’s wrongly. I have no doubt that bigots like you truly believe it’s being done for the greater good, just as bigots of the 1940s believed that stopping black men from marrying white women (and vice versa) was being done for the greater good. That doesn’t make your beliefs less bigoted, or your actions less wrong.
But I don’t expect you to give me that much of a benefit of the doubt. You have your mind made up. So enough said.
In what respect is enough said? You have failed to credibly refute a single point I’ve made. You have failed to provide a single instance of proof that gay marriage is a serious undermining of straight marriage. You have failed to provide any arguments that are not rooted in bigotry, suspicion, hatred and fear. So much fear that you’re afraid to keep discussing it because you must be realizing by now that you haven’t a reasonable or rational leg to stand on.
It is painfully obvious that, for instance, divorce is a far more credible threat to marriage than gay marriage is for the simple reason that divorce laws can destroy straight marriages while gay marriage cannot. So go ahead and try to convince me that divorce should be outlawed. You might even be able to make a credible argument for that because you can base it in facts and figures.
But when it comes to outlawing gay marriage because it presents a threat to society, you’ve got nothing. No facts. No figures. Nothing except fear, and an argument that boils down to this: I believe it because I believe it. The sort of circular reasoning that bars any outside thoughts to enter. That’s just sad and pathetic and, unfortunately, all too typical.
PAD
Peter:” People are born the way they are, be it black, white, or gay.”
Peter, you are grossly overstating the realtionship between genetic inheritance and homosexual behavior and for you not to make a distinction between an external characteristic ,such as skin color, and that of a behavior, such as homesexual activity, is disingenuous. I hope you will re-examine how you have formulated this opinion. Have a nice weekend and thanks for the robust discussion.
Peter, you are grossly overstating the realtionship between genetic inheritance and homosexual behavior
Evidence, please.
I don’t think Peter’s the one who’s oversimplifying.
I think you should review the evidence from biological research over the weekend and re-examine how you’ve formed your opinion.
John: It may not have been obvious but Jasonk was quoting Rudy, two comments above him.
Luigi Novi: Ack. Sorry about that.
Iowa Jim: Thanks for explaining my motive to me. Guess my whole intention is simply to deny someone happiness. Not. I am sure some would argue against these very laws. I get that. But they are not intended to “deny someones happiness.”
Luigi Novi: They never say that that’s their intent, because no one ever admits to having such an intent. Such positions are always camouflaged behind motives that with a more benevolent facade. The very bane of the tendency to discriminate against others is the blindness of the bigot to this behavior. But denying someone else’s happiness is indeed the effect that banning gay marriage has.
Iowa Jim: It is done (rightly or wrongly) because of a concern for the greater good.
Luigi Novi: Prove that the good you mention is not based purely on your personal sense of aesthetics and sensibilities, and can be objectively measured in such a way that the “good” is visible to everyone, and the happiness that you would deny homosexuals can be rationalized.
Iowa Jim: The reality is there are many ways laws are made for the common good. Everything from requiring seat belts to banning (in most states) prostitution.
Luigi Novi: Again, show me the result of gay marriage that is comparable to not wearing a seatbelt.
As for criminalizing prostitution, that is also based on religion/aesthetics. The states and countries that do allow it don’t seem to be suffering for it.
Iowa Jima: But I don’t expect you to give me that much of a benefit of the doubt. You have your mind made up.
Luigi Novi: I’ve made my mind up because I’ve evaluated the facts and arguments presented by both sides, and because I try to form my opinions, particularly on social issues, based on internally consistent reasoning and a desire not to meddle in someone else’s life. But all my conclusions are held provisionally, and are subject to change, if you can provide reasoning that would require me to do so. The fact that I don’t is because you haven’t, and can’t, since there is no justifiable reason to ban gay marriage, and your evidence/arguments are easily exposed as false, and not because my conclusions are either prejudicial or immutable.
Some may argue it is merely an issue of semantics. …snip… Once it has been decided that “Marriage” can mean whatever you want it to mean, than it become a meaningless concept.
Linguistically speaking, all words change their meaning through time, and ultimately, all words “mean” what the general community decides they mean. This is true in every human language – we do not get our “meanings” from any outside source. So unless you think every single word in English is a meaningless concept, I suggest you rethink your premise.
Peter, you are grossly overstating the realtionship between genetic inheritance and homosexual behavior and for you not to make a distinction between an external characteristic ,such as skin color, and that of a behavior, such as homesexual activity, is disingenuous. I hope you will re-examine how you have formulated this opinion.
I say it based upon the indisputable fact that homosexual behavior exists in nature. What am I supposed to believe? That lower orders of animals engage in male-on-male sexual activities because they heard George Takei got married or they’ve been watching too many shows on Bravo?
I’m aware that scientific examinations on the topic remain splintered, but I’m certain that if such research continues–and it can be de-politicized–it will continue to provide substantive evidence that backs up what observation and common sense already dictate: That people are what they are, with particular leanings and preferences towards which they have a birth-generated disposition.
And I don’t appreciate your assertion that I’m lying.
PAD