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
• 
The debate about whether homosexuality is a choice or not has always seemed like a red herring to me. I personally believe it’s not a choice, but why should it matter anyway? Isn’t freedom all about choice? Consenting adults should be able to do whatever they want with each other.
Rudy: “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.”
Rudy, I have a number of gay friends and I even had a gay family member (now deceased) once. None of them are gay because they chose to be so. None of them are gay because they woke up one morning and chose this “behavior” over being heterosexual. They were born that way just as someone else, continuing Peter’s argument, might be born black.
Ask most gay men or women when they first realized that they were gay, or at least “different” from the rest of the crowd, and they’ll often tell you that they knew since their early teens. Maybe younger.
I have a friend who’s the about same age (37) as I am. While I was watching WKRP and The Dukes of Hazard and plastering my walls with posters of Catherine Bach and Loni Anderson, he was trying to figure out why people were so hot and bothered by those two. Now, when the Duke boys were on the screen…
And it’s not just antidotal. There’s more and more scientific evidence of this fact found everyday. Homosexual men actually have completely different chemical/biological responses to various pheromones than heterosexual men, the thymus gland in homosexuals actually shows chemical differences to those of heterosexuals, some studies have shown that the mothers of homosexuals have certain factors in common in regards to their levels of estrogen and so on.
The simple fact is that people who are legitimately gay were born that way. They didn’t choose it and they’re not simply deciding to engage in a certain type of behavior for the hëll of it. And given the fact that so many of them end up losing friends, family and, at one time, the ability to live without threat of being beaten half to death for being who they were; what makes you think that anyone would just do this to engage in gay “behavior” for the hëll of it?
People are gay because they’re born gay and have about as much choice in the matter as people who are born to a certain skin color. To discriminate against them because of that is flat out wrong.
Iowa Jim: “Thanks for explaining my motive to me. Guess my whole intention is simply to deny someone happiness.”
No, your intention is not to deny someone’s happiness. But this is the consequence of the position you hold. And so far you have not presented any compelling argument to deny homosexuals equal rights other than the fact that you want to enshrine the inequality of their relationship in law by preventing them from calling it marriage.
And why is it justified to treat that relationship as unequal and homosexuals as unequal? Because in the past they have been treated that way? Because it does not conform with the meaning of a word in a dictionary? Because it undermines society?
Do you realize what it means to label a certain group as a threat to society? More so because that claim has no real basis. The only threat they pose is the threat that their relationship will stop being considered inferior,that threatening a long held prejudice that existed in society.
————-
Rudy: “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.”
You are wrong on two counts:
1) Homosexual attraction, like skin color, is not a matter of free choice. How do I know that? Simple. As every heterosexual knows, heterosexual attraction is not a matter of free choice (also acording to the bible). So basically you support discriminating against gays for who they are, just like blacks. Moreover, if in the case of the sexual attraction to children we can justify discrimination on the ground of protecting children, tou have presented no good reason to discriminate against homosexuals other than that penuses seem to be shaped to fit into vágìņáš. For some reason you decided that this biological fact is actually a clue from god that homosexuality is wrong, and you want this view enshrined in law. Somehow, the fact that homosexuality exists in nature at all is not considered a clue from god.
2)Even if we view homosexaulity as voluntary (acting on the attraction is), it is completely irrelevant to your argument, simnce it is no more justified to to discriminate against a voluntary behavior for no good reason, than it is to discriminate against a genetic feature.
You are also being disingenuous because the 2nd point has been pointed to you already by several people here, but you didn’t bother answering any of them.
—————–
PAD: “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.”
Iowa Jim could take that bet. The more legitimacy homosexuality receives in society, more closeted homosexuals, many of them married, decide to come out of the closet. From Iowa Jim’s point of view this is bad on two counts:
1) He probably sincerely believes that this people were not gay until they were tempted by the option, and had that option still been considered illegitimate they would have remained straight. We, of course, believe that they were always gay, and their marriages were mere facades.
2) I suspect that Iowa Jim prefer that people remain in a fake heterosexual marriage than come out of the closet, just in order to maintain the illusion of homosexuality as something wrong and inferior.
—————
“As for criminalizing prostitution, that is also based on religion/aesthetics.”
That issue is a little more complicated. Having heard the feminist arguments against prostitution I think that it cannot be justified to restrict prostetution as such on the ground of them being consentual adults. But in the real world it seems that a large part, quite possibly the majority, do not fall into that category. Some are minors, some adicts, some captives, some might have acted voluntarily but are threated by their employers in ways that in other cases we would consider as violations of labor laws. There is also the issue of protecting people from risk that is the justification for seatbelts. As for the effect of society, it seems that both sides of the debate can provide research to justify their claims.
——————
Posted by: Jerry Wall at September 19, 2008 09:10 AM
“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….”
Almost every political position under the sun can boast that it has the support of extremely educated people — geniuses even.
But I wouldn’t say that inteligence and education don’t matter in a democracy. Whatever your political position, you don’t want ignorant idiots working on its behalf, I think.
That issue is a little more complicated. Having heard the feminist arguments against prostitution I think that it cannot be justified to restrict prostitution as such on the ground of them being consensual adults.
I have to admit, I think George Carlin pretty much put a case-closed spin on it when he said, “Sex is legal. Selling is legal. How can selling sex be illegal?”
Oh, Jerry Chandler: The word is “anecdotal,” i.e. evidence that is gathered via anecdotes. Not “antidotal,” a word that doesn’t exist to my knowledge.
PAD
“I have to admit, I think George Carlin pretty much put a case-closed spin on it when he said, “Sex is legal. Selling is legal. How can selling sex be illegal?”
In theory this simple answer would be enough. But the reality of prostitution is not that simple. It is women shipped in craters from eastern Europe and held by criminals and forced to have sex. It is crack addicts. It is homeless runaways, often minors.
Personaly I think feminists are wasting time arguing about prostitution on the theoretical level instead of dealing with the actual phenomenon that should worry them. In theory there is nothing wrong with the idea of prostitution. But the reality is all too often very ugly. I think drugs should be legalized and all the wasted energy should focused on fighting human trafficking.
“Oh, Jerry Chandler: The word is “anecdotal,” i.e. evidence that is gathered via anecdotes. Not “antidotal,” a word that doesn’t exist to my knowledge.”
Oops… Yeah, I know.
And “antidotal” actually it is a word. I just have no idea why my brain slipped a gear there on the two words. Antidotal is of, relating to, or acting as an antidote.
http://cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/omd?antidotal
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/antidotal
“Oh, Jerry Chandler: The word is “anecdotal,” i.e. evidence that is gathered via anecdotes. Not “antidotal,” a word that doesn’t exist to my knowledge.”
Oops… Yeah, I know.
And “antidotal” actually it is a word. I just have no idea why my brain slipped a gear there on the two words. Antidotal is of, relating to, or acting as an antidote.
cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/omd?antidotal
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/antidotal
Well, that was a paraphrase of it, Peter, as you yourself noted when you used that argument in a BID column years ago, except that now you’re putting it in quotes. For those unfamiliar with Carlin, the exact quote is a bit saltier. 🙂
“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”
Great Zot, Rudy, where do I start?
First, at one time, slavery was legal and just Okey-dokey with God, thank you very much.
The local lord o’the manor taking a peasant girl on her wedding night was legally enforced.
Lynching a black man…nudge-nudge wink-wink say no more.
Teaching a black man or women to read or write was illegal.
And all of these things changed.
Nobody is saying children should be allowed to marry (as they once were). As for homosexual/lesbian “behaviour” between two consenting adults, Pierre Trudeau once said that the state has no business in the nation’s bedroom.
Great Zot, Rudy, where do I start?
Manny, do you speak Albanian? Or does Zot mean the same thing in other languages?
To get back on-topic, I don’t think it even matters all that much what “causes” homosexuality. Or what causes any sexual orientation, for that matter. Nobody ever “chooses” to be a part of a group that has to deal with discrimination ranging from minor harassment to loss of livelihood to outright violence. The root of the differences, however, is immaterial. The point is that homosexual “behavior” doesn’t bring about any harm. George and Brad, Ellen and Portia aren’t hurting anyone by formalizing their relationships the way they’ve done. Barring them from that legal recognition was harmful to them and many other people, and there is no moral or ethical justification for society’s withholding that right. “This is the way it’s always been done in society” is not a reason. Cultures, traditions and institutions are all practices that human beings create and perfect, and they are practices that we can change and abolish, as well. If a culture and its traditions and institutions do not allow all people the freedom to live up to their full potential, then those traditions and institutions must be reformed or abolished where applicable, and that culture must change.
Posted by Red Monster at September 19, 2008 08:13 PM
Great Zot, Rudy, where do I start?
Manny, do you speak Albanian? Or does Zot mean the same thing in other languages?
Hi, R.M. (may I call you R.M., you don’t wanna know what Red Monster means in my life…)
My first Wiccan High Priestess was part Albanian, and when asked who our god was, and being unable to get through to the poor door to door salvation peddler that we have both a god and a goddess and they have many aspects, she finally said “Oh fine, he’s the Great Zot!!!”. She never explained her amusement to me before her death 10 years ago.
I’m sure it’s something not meant for religious discussion, but I saw it used in the “B.C.” comic strip, and thought she got it from there, given the late writer’s religious views.
Ellen and Portia aren’t hurting anyone by formalizing their relationships the way they’ve done.
Portia de Rossi. * sigh * Finding out about her was the biggest hit my fantasy life had taken since I learned about Jodie Foster.
PAD
Posted by Peter David at September 19, 2008 08:39 PM
Ellen and Portia aren’t hurting anyone by formalizing their relationships the way they’ve done.
Portia de Rossi. * sigh * Finding out about her was the biggest hit my fantasy life had taken since I learned about Jodie Foster.
PAD
That they secretly dig Wang Chung? 😉
I’m sure it’s something not meant for religious discussion, but I saw it used in the “B.C.” comic strip, and thought she got it from there, given the late writer’s religious views.
I’m not quite sure what “B.C.” had in mind, but Zot is also the Albanian word for god. I speak it as a foreign language. That’s why I asked.
Portia de Rossi. * sigh * Finding out about her was the biggest hit my fantasy life had taken since I learned about Jodie Foster.
She’s obviously off-limits in real life, but who says ya can’t fantasize? :p
You know, I’d argue some of the points here, but Luigi and PAD always do such a good job that I’m unnecessary. If doing so, I’d also make a point of being as logical and dispassionate as possible.
But, I’m not doing those things, so here it is: As the father of an adopted child, as a man who chose to adopt because he and his wife are physically incapable of producing children, it makes me furious that anyone would ever suggest that a marriage that cannot produce children is somehow illegitimate. My marriage is legitimate despite the lack of my DNA running around in child form, thank you very much.
Quit using “And they can’t have kids!” as an argument against any kind of marriage, gay, straight, or otherwise. It’s a BS argument.
Thanks,
Eric
Posted by Eric Qel-Droma at September 19, 2008 09:54 PM
Quit using “And they can’t have kids!” as an argument against any kind of marriage, gay, straight, or otherwise. It’s a BS argument.
Thanks,
Eric
Eric, I’m right there with ya. A while ago I had the experience of listening to some truckstop Einstein, without seeming to stop for breath say that:
1) Same sex partners cannot have children ergo the partnership could not be legitimately called a marriage.
2) That now “they” want to adopt so they can “pretend” to be married.
I asked if medical science somehow managed to find a way to allow same sex couples to conceive, would that change his narrow mind.
He started to talk about NASCAR at that point.
That’s like blaming Al Capone on booze rather than prohibition. Rendering the criminality implausible as the shelter of the abuse you refer to seems detached from reality.
” Portia de Rossi. * sigh * Finding out about her was the biggest hit my fantasy life had taken since I learned about Jodie Foster.
PAD”
And you fancy yourself a creative individual…
See, I had no major problems with this information. In fact, it actually made things better. I mean, hey, there are four of them now. Granted, I had to do some creative editing where her real life girlfriend at the time was, but that was a minor quibble.
Still, I can understand how you might not want to risk such thoughts. Considering the circle of friends you sometimes run with you’ve a far greater chance than I of actually meeting the woman in real life and having a Steve moment.
For those of you who don’t know what a Steve moment would be in this discussion: Coupling, Season 1: Episode 4.
It’s 2 minutes into (2/3), but if you’ve never seen it before it’ll only make sense if you take the time to watch (1/3) from the beginning and then move on to the Steve moment.
(1/3) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sERk_T9lJrk&feature=related
(2/3) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUB335yiZ40&feature=related
~8?)`
Any legislating about gay marriage is silly. Gay marriage doesn’t break any laws, so it’s legal, period. To create laws to stop people from doing things that impact other people absolutely none is stupid.
It should be treated with no more scrutiny than a football player changing his name to Ochocinco.
Quoting Bill Myers..
“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.”
Hmmmm.. I sense a flaw in your definitions. If 90% of the heaving masses are against something, how can the subset of the people chosen on the basis of an election support it and still be a representative democracy?
Answer, because it’s best fit democracy, where most of the legislation supports most of the democratic popular view, most of the time.
Which may be as good as it gets.
But it does lead to the conclusion that some are more equal than others when it comes to ruling against the “whims of the majority” when it’s for the Greater Good…
Cheers.
A. The constitution can be changed, it’s just very hard.
Nobody is more equal than anybody else. What you have is mechanisms that act as a counter to the power of the majority, but there are no people (kings, aristocrats, clergymen) who have a privilaged status. Their power also comes from the people.
Peter J Poole: “Hmmmm.. I sense a flaw in your definitions.”
I can’t account for what you “sense.” I can only tell you that I’m using the word correctly. Per Webster’s New Universal Unabridged Dictionary, a democracy is defined as “government by the people; a form of government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system.” (Emphasis mine.)
This is a pet peeve of mine. Why do people argue about the definition of a word without first looking it up in a good dictionary?
Peter J Poole: “If 90% of the heaving masses are against something, how can the subset of the people chosen on the basis of an election support it and still be a representative democracy?”
Because a representative democracy qualifies as such if the duly elected representatives are, y’know, duly elected. As long as there is a free electoral system, a government qualifies as democratic, even if the duly elected leaders do something unpopular.
Peter J Poole: “But it does lead to the conclusion that some are more equal than others when it comes to ruling against the ‘whims of the majority’ when it’s for the Greater Good…”
Yes. Yes it does. Thank goodness for that. Otherwise, women might never have been given the vote, and we might never have eliminated Jim Crow laws.
Very well said, Eric.
“My God, does anyone other than Borat still use “not” as a one word sentence?”
Yes, unfortunately. Along with “whatever” and other annoyances.
… Peter, you are grossly overstating the realtionship between genetic inheritance and homosexual behavior …
Ok, so the fact that my best friend from age 5 onward is gay had nothing to do with genetics but the fact that we were the only two kids the same age in the entire neighborhood, and my tomboy girlishness rubbed off on him after so many years? Even though he had a brother to copy from as well?
Yes, it IS true that many genetic predispositions need a certain catalyst to set them off (especially things like cancer genes), but sex drive is so far back in the primitive hindbrain it is almost impossible to eradicate it (males that are castrated as adults can still have sterile sex. Children with IQ’s two points above decerebrate will still gain a sex drive at puberty. Even retarded children can be homosexual). Sexual orientation is not even passed on genetically, but a result of individual cases – sons of gay men are at no higher risk of becoming gay than any others, no more than your mother seeing a rabbit while pregnant gave you large ears.
Behavior – eg, nailbiting – is learned, but is an expression of a genetic tendency to anxiety. So is hair twirling, lip biting, and grimacing, all those tells poker players love to discover. How the genetics of homosexuality are expressed – “butch”, “drag queen”, monogamous or not, is the observable individual behavior, not the issue itself. Comparing the genetic inheritance of homosexuality to the inheritance of skin color is absurd, as skin color itself can never be a behavioral expression (no stereotypes allowed).
Bill, I think we’re bringing out the worst in each other, again. 🙂
I’m not debating the definition of the word ‘democracy’, I was pointing out that a ‘representative democracy’ is not instantly 100% representative of every opinion held by all of those who elected them, which you’ve agreed with, and which I then put in context as maybe being as good as it gets…
Which leads to the other thing you’ve agreed on, which is that sometimes people in power make decisions that are not necessarily what those who put them in power would want.
Which I’ll agree is sometimes a good thing.
But I think it should also be a slightly worrying thing.
Which is all I really set out to say…
Cheers.
Just once, I’d like to see a reasonable, rational argument against gay marriage. I still have yet to come across one that remotely qualifies as such.
Even the argument in the voter information guide I just got in the mail essentially amounts to “change is bad,” with some thinly veiled homophobic remarks thrown in (“We should not accept a court decision that may result in public schools teaching our kids that gay marriage is okay”).
What completely baffles me are the arguments centered around “traditional” marriages being best for the children. Um, even if that were true (which it clearly isn’t), gay people are allowed to have children. Gay people are allowed to ADOPT children. No law banning us from getting married is going to change that, so it’s a moot point.
Really, it’s not gay marriage that threatens these people. It’s homosexuality itself. Anything that seeks to add any amount of validity or propriety to homosexuality is deemed a threat. It doesn’t matter what it is. Gay marriage is just the easiest target.
“Posted by: Peter J Poole at September 20, 2008 02:05 PM
“I was pointing out that a ‘representative democracy’ is not instantly 100% representative of every opinion held by all of those who elected them,”
Which leads to the other thing you’ve agreed on, which is that sometimes people in power make decisions that are not necessarily what those who put them in power would want.”
1) Representatives are not delgates, Their job does involve applying judgement to situations ratherthan just presenting the opinion of the voters.
2) But they do have to consider the possibility of not getting elected again, if the people who sent them feel that he choices they made did not reflect their will or interest. (at least in theory)
3) Representatives also have a harder time if they don’t have popular support.
“which you’ve agreed with, and which I then put in context as maybe being as good as it gets…”
Well, it’s possible to give the public more influence by using referenda more often. Public opinnion is also a power, although not as much.
“But I think it should also be a slightly worrying thing.”
There are two other aspects in which the voice of the people is obscured somewhat.
1) There is a limited choice of representatives. Not everybody can be a representative. It requires money, influence etc.
2) In the American system a lot of votes go down the drain because winner takes all. If a state is red or blue then the democrat or Republican minority can end up not represented at all.
From my own experience, I can say I was either born gay, or have had this condition triggered at a very early age. I had some homosexual and transgender desires when I was 9-10 years old, maybe even before.
I didn’t have any older gay parent or friend or even a gay character seem on TV at the time that could have “influenced” me.
If you don’t believe it’s genetical, it is still something that is formed at a very early age, and isn’t necessarily triggered by any of the things conservatives would suspect.
If it’s a psychological condition, I think conservatives should be prepared for the possibility that what triggers homosexuality might as well be a sort of aversion thing. Meaning, it’s not seeing gays marrying on TV that will make their kids gay, it’s seeing Dad coming home drunk and stinking and shouting, and maybe deep inside the mind of the 5-year old scared boy he is thinking “I don’t want ever to be like Daddy.” And the idea of a heterosexual relationship as painful and self-destroying being hard-wired early on in the kid’s psyche.
Particularly, I believe it’s a biological tendency. But if I had to look for a psychological explanation, I’d say a deep-seated thing that manifests early on in a person’s life is more likely to originate from trauma than from any desire of a kid to imitate a behaviour seem on TV by adults.
No offense, but I really feel like I could present the most iron-clad argument proving gay marriage does do harm to society and it wouldn’t matter. So it hardly seems worth the effort to try. You called me a bigot the very first time I ever even dared to disagree with you on this issue years back, so it is hardly a matter of you knowing me, my personal feelings towards those who are gay, or my lack to prove my case that leads you to that conclusion. It sure seems like you have your mind made up that anyone who feels gay marriage is wrong is a bigot.
Iowa Jim
Peter J Poole: “Bill, I think we’re bringing out the worst in each other, again. :)”
No, I’m quite confident that what I posted was fair and appropriate.
Robert Fuller: “Really, it’s not gay marriage that threatens these people. It’s homosexuality itself.”
He shoots he SCORES!
Members of the anti-gay movement often complain about a “homosexual agenda.” What they’re really complaining about is the refusal of many homosexuals to continue to accept second-class status. “Homosexual agenda” is often a code-word for “homosexual existence.”
But just as you needn’t wear a white hood to be a racist, you needn’t be of the “gays will go to hëll” crowd to be bigoted towards homosexuals. I know people who claim they are willing to “tolerate” homosexuals as long as they don’t “flaunt” their sexuality. As though two men kissing in the park is any more “flaunting” than a man and woman doing the same. This sort of bigotry may be more subtle, but make no mistake: it’s bigotry just the same.
No offense, but I really feel like I could present the most iron-clad argument proving gay marriage does do harm to society and it wouldn’t matter. So it hardly seems worth the effort to try.
That’s the can-do attitude that exemplifies the American spirit!
Jim, please: That’s pathetic. Even for you. “The most iron-clad?” You haven’t presented one yet that’s wearing so much as aluminum foil. You’ve offered no proof that gay marriage can harm society. No empirical evidence. Nothing. Nada. You’ve offered opinion without foundation. No facts. No figures. No logic. Nothing. And now you’re not going to bother because “it wouldn’t matter” even if you did? Bûllšhìŧ. I call bûllšhìŧ. You’re not offering an “iron-clad” reason because you haven’t got one. There isn’t one. Not one that makes sense to any rational way of thinking.
You called me a bigot the very first time I ever even dared to disagree with you on this issue years back, so it is hardly a matter of you knowing me, my personal feelings towards those who are gay, or my lack to prove my case that leads you to that conclusion. It sure seems like you have your mind made up that anyone who feels gay marriage is wrong is a bigot.
Well, I’ve yet to see a reason against gay marriage that isn’t steeped IN bigotry. I don’t simply say, “Anyone who thinks gay marriage is wrong is a bigot.” I read the arguments against it which are steeped in intolerance, hatred and discrimination, feel that they are bigoted sentiments, and therefore decide that the people spouting the opinions are in fact bigots. If opponents of gay marriage want people not to think they’re bigots, they might want to take the step of not saying bigoted things. Unfortunately since there is no rational reason to oppose it, bigotry is all that’s left.
PAD
Iowa Jim: “No offense, but I really feel like I could present the most iron-clad argument proving gay marriage does do harm to society and it wouldn’t matter.”
I realize this was directed at Peter David and not me. It’s also pretty clear you consider me beneath your notice. So I’m probably wasting my time addressing you, but I’m willing to take that risk because I think discussions like this are important.
Each time the illogic of your arguments is exposed, or your “evidence” is revealed to be false, you fall back on the complaint that everyone’s mind is closed and no one is giving you a fair hearing. Nothing could be further from the truth.
People are picking apart your arguments because they are not iron clad. Most of us are reading what you write, thinking about it, and saying, “No, this is not logical and here’s why.”
For example, you’ve stated that giving homosexual marriage the same legal status as heterosexual marriage threatens the latter institution. But when pressed, you’ve been evasive and offered “evidence” that was proven to be inaccurate.
First, you stated the push for gay marriage “really is an insistence that heterosexual marriage is no longer seen as healthy and good.” When pressed, however, you were unable to cite anyone claiming such a thing.
Next, you tried moving the goalposts. You claimed you “meant” that “The moment you say homosexual marriage is no different than heterosexual marriage, you deny that heterosexual marriage is preferable and best.” When asked to substantiate that claim, you said, “I am arguing that marriage is NOT what we define it to be anymore than I can say a man is actually a woman.” But that idea is demonstrably false. The definition of marriage can vary by culture, and has changed over time. Today in the U.S., marriage requires two willing partners to be legal. That isn’t the case in cultures where women’s rights aren’t respected.
Again, I suspect you consider me beneath your notice. But in case I’m wrong, I’m going to throw down the gauntlet, sir. If you truly have an iron-clad argument, if what I’ve stated above is simply misguided, then help me to see where I’m going wrong.
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.
Why not? If you really think there’s been a miscarriage of justice, why not try to fix it? Do you think Brown v Board of Education was wrongly decided because it was the result of people actively endeavoring to overturn Plessy v Ferguson? The Supreme Court used to strike down minimum wage and maximum hour laws left and right because they interfered with individuals’ and businesses’ rights to make contracts. Should social activists have just shrugged and gone away when Lochner came down?
Clearly I think the answer is “no” to all of the above.
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.
I have some bad news for you then. The US Supreme Court already ruled that there’s no federal right to gay marriage. I don’t suppose you endorse relentless forces that might try to overturn that decision either?
Oh, a flag on the play! The ref’s call: Reducto ad absurdum. Logical fallacy. Ten yard penalty and first down for the opposition.
As someone quickly pointed out, a reductio ad absurdum isn’t a logical fallacy. To the contrary, its rhetorical strength derives entirely from applying the internal logic of someone else’s argument correctly. Done correctly, it should show that the original argument was logically flawed, because it ultimately leads to a contradiction; or that the original argument was normatively flawed, because a logical application of its premises leads to a result that is either repugnant or devoid of common sense.
Done poorly it degenerates into a straw man argument, which might have been what you had in mind. To make it work you have to actually be faithful to the argument you’re criticizing; taking a stupid or weakened paraphrasing undermines the whole exercise, because it isn’t really useful to point out the errors in an argument your opponent didn’t really make.
I tend to use similar strategies fairly frequently. I think it’s a very good strategy to say, “You claimed X implies Y. Yet in situation Z, you conclude not-Y. There does not appear to be any meaningful distinction between X and Z. Can you explain the inconsistency?” Your opponent should then either have to admit that there is a flaw in his logic, or introduce additional premises to distinguish between X and Z. It’s a good strategy IFF the two examples are in fact quite similar, and Y would in fact be an undesirable result in Z.
I just tried this strategy on one of your claims.
1) You made a comment about “a group of learned individuals” interpreting basic laws, and equated attempts to overturn that interpretation, in at least this context, as people being “dumb and panicky.” (X := appellate court interpretation, Y := efforts to overturn = bad)
2) I listed a few SCOTUS cases that I suspected you’d disapprove of, and pointed out that your earlier claim would suggest that they should be left standing. (X := SCOTUS interpretations, !Y := efforts to overturn = good)
3) You responded basically by reasserting your original claim, that while you might disagree with the opinions you weren’t “scrambling to overturn them.” (Y := efforts to overturn = bad)
4) I pointed out that I’m glad Thurgood Marshall disagreed with you. (!Y := efforts to overturn = civil rights movement = good)
I think you have a problem. In Re Marriage Cases, Gonzales v Carhart, and Plessy v Ferguson are all appellate opinions that various people have claimed to be atrocious. In at least the last one, I really don’t see how you can avoid endorsing attempts to have it reversed. You can’t distinguish Marriage Cases from Plessy by a normative claim that the former expands rights while the latter contracts them, because Carhart also contracts rights and you already disavowed scrambling to overturn it. So far you’ve avoided inconsistent logic, but I think if that logic is applied consistently to “separate but equal” you end up with a normatively unacceptable result. I think you either have to introduce a new premise to distinguish Plessy from Carhart or make a normative argument about why lobbying to overturn judicial rulings is at least sometimes bad, or both.
My position is clearly that efforts to overturn are acceptable political strategies. If you really think a legal precedent is screwy, it’s perfectly appropriate to use lawful means to limit or overturn that interpretation of the law. I think I’m a little bit safer in my argument because I’m willing to agree that it’s a valid tactic whether I agree with the campaigners (Plessy/Brown) or not (DC v Heller).
And yeah, my last comment about SCOTUS rejecting a Federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage is kind of a trap. It’s obscure but it’s out there. I was kind of curious to see if anyone would challenge me on it, but I’ve decided that was kind of mean.
I wrote “2) I listed a few SCOTUS cases that I suspected you’d disapprove of, and pointed out that your earlier claim would suggest that they should be left standing. (X := SCOTUS interpretations, !Y := efforts to overturn = good)”
That should have been “(Z := SCOTUS interpretations, !Y := efforts to overturn = good)” to be consistent. I shouldn’t write while sleepy.
Jim the nice things I said before. I want to take them back.
The only thing that allowing gay marriage does is send a message that being gay is not a bad thing.
This is not 2000 years ago where the chances of child death and stillborns are so much higher than today, that you needed to procreate as much as you can because chances are half the kids won’t survive long enough to have kids of their own.
This is just my opinion but I think all homophobia is about the fear guys have of being penetrated.
I used to work in a movie theatre and there was a change room. One evening the light switch accidentally got hit and it went dark for about 10 seconds one guy absolutely flipped out. we all thought he was ascared of the dark. turns out he was just scared of being in a dark room with other men. Like someone was going to take the opportunity to rape him.
I was like dude do you have women throwing themselves at you where ever you go? No? then why assume that Men would that much more attracted to you then women.
I’m reminded of Harlan Ellison’s recounting of visiting San Quentin.
I want to quote it because I think it explains it perfectly. From The Harlan Ellison Hornbook The Essay Death Row, San Quentin part one.
[i]As we walked, the barred windows that filled one entire wall of a dorm to our left began to show men staring out. then hung on the bars and watched, and then they began to whistle.
I have heard a sound like that only once before in my life. At a concert for the Rolling Stones that was mostly young boys. It was not the hig-pitched screaming offemale groupies, but a lower throatier moan, pierced by whistling.
That was the wave of sound that washed over me.
Never having had, or having even been approached to have, a homosexual liason, and thus never having thought of myself as fair game for other men…I suddenly realised the horror and dismay experienced by women for whom a walk past a hardhat’s construction site is a degrading experience.
To those men, I was a sexual object, a potential catamite, what Hammett called a gunsel. My áššhølë was suddenly, for the first time in my life, something more than an orifice used to void my bowels. My mouth was being looked at in a very different way than ever before. I was frightened, and chilled, and wanted to turn and run.[/i]
Lesbian sex is more tolerated than gáÿ šëx. Not by much depending on where you are, but I think it’s safe to say that.
Why? because the lesbian isn’t a ‘threat’.
I think in the homophobic mind,men are under the irrational belief that gay men look at them the way they might look at a woman, they are used to be in control, and the idea of someone taking that away scares the hëll out of them.
It’s irrational and I think deep down it has a lot to say about how that person views women.
The argument that marriage is natural, has been like this for centuries or longer. However it’s only recently that the idea of marrying someone based on a personal connection, for hundreds of years it was a buisiness arrangement. And in this arrangement the man was pretty much dominant.
Gay marriage throws that out of what doesn’t it? Even more than currnet marriages. It’s a marriage of equals, (there may be some financial discrepancies) but in the sense of the relationship they are equal, before they could be called spouses they were partners.
Is that why heterosexual marriages should be preferable? Because in heterosexual marriages there is an implied inequality? I wear the pants in the relationship? etc etc…
Is that what you’re afraid of that Billy may decide that he can stay at home and take care of the kids while his wife works because when he was growing up his friend Stan had two dads and one of them stayed at home and that was really great to have a dad around the house all the time?
Give us something Jim. Something other than procreation as a reason.
C’mon if you’re so convinced it shouldn;t be that hard.
David the Lawyer: “Done poorly it [reductio ad absurdum] degenerates into a straw man argument.”
Are you sure this isn’t the only case when we would call it reductio ad absurdum? The example of you using the technique might be a reduction but not really ad absurdum.
David: “My position is clearly that efforts to overturn are acceptable political strategies. If you really think a legal precedent is screwy, it’s perfectly appropriate to use lawful means to limit or overturn that interpretation of the law. I think I’m a little bit safer in my argument because I’m willing to agree that it’s a valid tactic whether I agree with the campaigners (Plessy/Brown) or not (DC v Heller).”
I could be wrong, too lazy to scroll up, but didn’t this discussion start because you said it was wrong to use the courts the get gay marriages recognized?
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Iowa Jim, I don’t think you are a bigot in the sense of a person who beats up gays or something like that. But it does seem that you either have a prejudiced view of gays (as bad and unhealthy and a danger to society), or you are caught in a bind because of your religious beliefs.
So far you have only proven one thing, that gay marriages threaten the notion that heterosexual marriages are superior and homosexual relationship inferior. That’s true, but I (and others) dispute the claim that heterosexual marriages are better. Clearly, for homosexuals heterosexual marriages are not superior. I also dispute the claim that by claiming equality with heterosexual marriages, homosexual marriages somehow devalue heterosexual ones. It is true that there are things we do tolerate in the name of individual liberties that possibly devalue the institution of marriage — like divorce (maybe), people who marry and divorce many times, people who marry for 10 minutes, shotgun weddings and adultery, to name some (in the case of divorce I’m not sure unhappy marriages help the institution). But I don’t agree that homosexual marriages fall in that category, and I don’t really think that these things reduce the value and happiness of individual marriages, whose value seems determined by individual aspects.
You made a claim about the problems of single parents and children joining gangs. I’d hazard a guess that the children of middle class gays or of middle class single parents are not the ones who join gangs. And that the circumstances that cause children of single parents to join gangs have little to do with gays and a lot to do with poverty and other forces that threaten families.
I said: Iowa Jim, I don’t think you are a bigot in the sense of a person who beats up gays or something like that. But it does seem that you either have a prejudiced view of gays.
To which I want to add that I certainly might hold prejudices toward gays as well as others. That’s almost inevitable. The point is to try to get over them, or at least not act upon them. restricting the equality of gays certainly falls under the category of acting upon prejudices.
Susan O: “…Bill Myers (always very bad).”
No, not always. 😉
Bill Myers:
Naw, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. I meant making me think is always bad. I’m blonde. It hurts.
Susan O: I knew what you meant. But it looked funny out of context and I like the funny.
Iowa Jim; I think some of the replies to you have been needlessly antagonistic. Your making an effort to engage with people you disagree with and that deserves some respect. In their defense, when you’re arguing that, essentially, a group of people should stay as a kind of second class citizen, those who are either in that group or sympathetic to its members can hardly be expected to respond generously.
I think you’re wrong about this. You think that allowing gays to marry will make marriage more meaningless, a problem that I think we all agree has been fostered by too easy marriage and too easy divorce. There’s also the attitude among many young people that marriage is not necessary or even bad for a relationship–the hollywood stars who have lived together for years, had kids but talk about how 1-a “piece of paper” won’t make any difference and 2- getting harried will somehow ruin the good thing they ahve going (points 1 and 2 seem to contradict one another but that’s why they get paid to act, not epistmology).
Now here come gays who are telling everyone that marriage is great, it completes a relationship, it’s the highest expression of love. etc. That’s some of the nicest stuff about marriage anyone’s said in a long time (Seriously, listen to the average sit-com and see how many snide cracks about marriage there are. I suspect most comedy writers struggle making alimony payments).
And also consider how encouraging gays to live their lives would also minimize the terrible situation many people have found themselves in–being married to someone who, unbeknown to them, is struggling with their sexuality. Even if I didn’t like gays I Do like my sisters and I would not want them to end up in a marriage with some guy who is living a lie just because he feels it’s the only way to get accepted.
A good argument can be made against polygamy, in my opinion. I have yet to see a convincing one about gay marriage and, for the reasons I’ve given, I think one can argue that both society and the institution of marriage will be strengthened.
I would caution my allies on this opinion however. Gay marriage was hardly on the radar not too many years ago. For all the righteous indignation many of us hold now for anyone who doesn’t see the obvious light here, most weren’t worried about gays and marriage until Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act (and I can’t recall the pejorative “bigot” being applied to Clinton, Joe Biden, Tom Harkin, Chris Dodd, aul Wellstone, etc. Why not? How are they different from Iowa Jim–other than the fact that they had the power to make their prejudices law of the land and did?).
David the Lawyer: “Done poorly it [reductio ad absurdum] degenerates into a straw man argument.”
Are you sure this isn’t the only case when we would call it reductio ad absurdum? The example of you using the technique might be a reduction but not really ad absurdum.
I suggested that one part of PAD’s argument implies that Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund should have left Plessy v Ferguson alone. I think that’s pretty absurdum.
I could be wrong, too lazy to scroll up, but didn’t this discussion start because you said it was wrong to use the courts the get gay marriages recognized?
That wasn’t how the thread started. The discussion was going on the first “George and Brad” thread before I jumped in. But yes, I do have problems with using courts to rewrite domestic relations laws. I see it as two distinct issues (though your mileage may vary).
1) The courts shouldn’t have gotten involved in the issue at all because of the political questions doctrine, which simply states that some issues are better left to the political branches, which are directly responsible to the people through elections. It’s not cases in which the courts feel they *can’t* act, but cases in which they elect to exercise restraint. If the political branches make an error the error can be fixed by veto, or veto override, or if all else fails in the next election, but for all practical purposes, Supreme Court constitutional decisions are unreviewable, and for that reason the Court prefers to tread lightly, often to the point of being chicken and ducking issues wherever they can, like with the Pledge of Allegiance case. When they can’t duck the issue entirely, they can resort to a quite valid “political question” explanation for not resolving the issue themselves. For example, “The Judicial Branch should not decide issues affecting the allocation of power between the President and Congress until the political branches reach a constitutional impasse.” Goldwater v Carter 444 US 996 (1979) Most state constitutions are easier to amend than the US Constitution, so the cost of correcting a mistake is different, but it still leaves the argument that the judicial branch should stay out of some fundamental issues “until the political branches reach a constitutional impasse.” “Gay rights” has been a live political issue for decades now, so there’s no reason to think that there’s any kind of impasse. On top of that there’s a long tradition of the courts deferring to state policy making on marriage. I’m much more critical of the courts for getting involved than I am of the litigants who are using the tools available to them.
2) Given that, I don’t think it’s at all inconsistent for me to claim that people should be free to use the political process to fix something that the courts should have left to the political process to begin with. Even on issues where the political questions doctrine doesn’t apply, I still think it’s always appropriate to lobby for a law you think is necessary. I thought it was stupid to campaign for a flag-burning amendment, but I think the campaigners had the right to advocate for a law that I think would be stupid.
Are you sure this isn’t the only case when we would call it reductio ad absurdum? The example of you using the technique might be a reduction but not really ad absurdum.
Actually I may have misunderstood your question. The argument isn’t called a reduction to the absurd because the person making the argument does it absurdly (e.g. straw man arguments). It’s called that because the goal is to point out that the original claim you’re arguing against plays out in absurd ways.
I think it takes monumentally brass balls to try and equate the civil rights movement, which was designed to try and expand and equalize individual rights through judicial and congressional means, with voters actively endeavoring to legalize bigotry and restriction of individual rights by voting to formalize bigotry.
I’m saying that the voters actively endeavoring to overturn, undercut or do an end run around the CA Supreme Court is not only unwise but stems from an act of bigotry. That rather than give consideration to the Court’s saying that the Constitution doesn’t allow for bigotry, the response is to try and slap in a law that puts bigotry into place. I’m saying that they should be taking the opportunity to reexamine their own prejudices; instead they’re only using it as an excuse to try and overwrite existing law with those same prejudices.
And your response is to cite instances where civilians put together a civil suit that wound up going–where?–to the Supreme Court. Do you see the disconnect there? I’m objecting to people trying to replace the reasoning of the court with their own, and you’re coming back with instances where the legal system was utilized to redress a wrong done generations earlier by justices long dead.
In other words, I’m saying that the California voters are out of line trying to replace a learned reading of the Constitution with their own bias, and you’re responding with, Well what about these earlier examples where lawyers and justices combined with organizations designed to expand individual rights in order to get the Supreme Court to overturn a sixty year old decision?
I have to think that you know and understand the difference, which either means you’re deliberately being obtuse, or you just think this is an academic exercise. Except there’s roughly ten percent of the population for whom this is not simply an academic exercise.
PAD
And your response is to cite instances where civilians put together a civil suit that wound up going–where?–to the Supreme Court. Do you see the disconnect there? I’m objecting to people trying to replace the reasoning of the court with their own, and you’re coming back with instances where the legal system was utilized to redress a wrong done generations earlier by justices long dead.
So overturning a bad decision through another lawsuit is okay but not through legislation? Because then you’ve got to rethink the 14th Amendment, which was passed legislatively at least in part to overturn Dred Scott. And that wasn’t a wrong done generations earlier. It was a wrong done 9 years before the amendment was proposed in Congress, 11 before it was ratified.
There is a huge difference between the Fourteenth Amendment and the proposed Federal Marriage Amendment. The first one was one of the triumphs of our nation’s liberty, and the second is a horrible idea. But that has absolutely nothing to do with an interested party substituting its own judgment for that of a court. Because substituting almost anyone’s judgment for Chief Justice Taney’s would be an improvement.
I have to think that you know and understand the difference, which either means you’re deliberately being obtuse, or you just think this is an academic exercise. Except there’s roughly ten percent of the population for whom this is not simply an academic exercise.
Law is never “simply an academic exercise,” but it’s always an academic exercise with real world implications. It was an academic exercise when the SCOTUS punted on the Pledge of Allegiance because the person filing the suit didn’t have the right qualifications to file the suit. It’s an academic exercise when SCOTUS interpreted the timing requirement for filing equal pay lawsuits in a way that made it very hard for women to file valid lawsuits. It is important to have rules that people can rely on, even when rules lead to unfortunate results in individual cases. And one of those rules is that, in a democracy, people get to vote on how society is structured. The Defense of Marriage Act and the Civil Rights Act came through Congress in exactly the same way. The Fourteenth Amendment and the proposed (and probably dead) Federal Marriage Amendment were proposed in Congress in the exact same way. I don’t disagree that one of them is a better idea than the other, but don’t try to argue that overturning court opinions is a valid tactic for people you agree with (NAACP) but not with people you disagree with (bigots). We’re talking past each other. You’re talking about reaching the right substantive result. That’s fine, but you keep phrasing it like you’re talking about what’s procedurally right– “replacing the reasoning of the court with their own.” People do that all the time in a democracy. They have that right. They should have that right. Even people with crappy reasoning. The Constitution guarantees everyone the right to petition the government for the redress of grievances. Not just good grievances and not just grievances that aren’t caused by bad judicial opinions. That’s not simply an academic exercise. It’s a foundation of self-government.
Attack them all you want for being wrong and standing in the way of other people’s civil rights. That’s a good point. I’ll join you. But you can’t seriously attack them for exercising their own civil rights. You come across as something of a free speech absolutist. Shouldn’t the entire First Amendment apply to people you disagree with? That’s not simply an academic exercise either.
On a completely unrelated topic, that 10% figure came from a very bad Kinsey Institute report. The real number is closer to 2. It doesn’t really matter though; invidious discrimination against 2% of the population is 2% too many. But then again, I’m an obtuse academic.
Bill Mulligan: “There’s also the attitude among many young people that marriage is not necessary or even bad for a relationship–the hollywood stars who have lived together for years, had kids but talk about how 1-a “piece of paper” won’t make any difference and 2- getting harried will somehow ruin the good thing they ahve going (points 1 and 2 seem to contradict one another but that’s why they get paid to act, not epistmology).”
The Hollywood stars who rejected marriage have grandchildren by now. The younger generation of stars seem to be marrying all the time these days.
——————–
Bill Mulligan: “I would caution my allies on this opinion however. Gay marriage was hardly on the radar not too many years ago. For all the righteous indignation many of us hold now for anyone who doesn’t see the obvious light here, most weren’t worried about gays and marriage until Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act (and I can’t recall the pejorative “bigot” being applied to Clinton, Joe Biden, Tom Harkin, Chris Dodd, aul Wellstone, etc. Why not? How are they different from Iowa Jim–other than the fact that they had the power to make their prejudices law of the land and did?).”
I’ll admit that the issue of gay marriage wasn’t obvious to me from the beginning. I think my first reaction was one of prejudice. But by demanding the right and forcing me to think about it, gays caused me to realize that there is no good rreaason to deny them marriage other than that the idea is weird to me.
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David, you’re right about reductio ad absurdum.
———————-
David: “I do have problems with using courts to rewrite domestic relations laws.”
I am familiar with the argument. It is not invalid. But the civil rights movement faced the same criticism for using the courts to affect change. But could change have been made withoout them? I remember reading MLK’s response to this. But I don’t know where it is.
David: “”Gay rights” has been a live political issue for decades now, so there’s no reason to think that there’s any kind of impasse.”
Actually doesn’t the fact that the issue has not been resolved in the political arena after all these years show that American society is at an impasse on this subject?
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David: “On a completely unrelated topic, that 10% figure came from a very bad Kinsey Institute report. The real number is closer to 2. It doesn’t really matter though; invidious discrimination against 2% of the population is 2% too many. But then again, I’m an obtuse academic.”
What is the source of the 2% number, and what makes it more reliable than the previous?
That’s my problem with the mixture of academics and politics. It’s as if each side can find the right researches to reach the conclusions they need on any disputed subject. At the end, if you dopn’t have the skill to check the data, science becomes not much more helpful then opinion.
——————
Jason: “I think in the homophobic mind,men are under the irrational belief that gay men look at them the way they might look at a woman”
I have a theory about that, that addresses this question and a bunch of other issues.
I think humans send and recieve signals from each other on a unspoken level, like posture, appearance, behavior, tone of voice, smaells. Some of the signals are related to sex — peole looking attrractive (on the involuntary level), or they may fllirt or do other things that are received as sex related signals. In any case, this track of cmmunication is a major part of human life. But gays disturb the system. They are literally getting their signals crossed, giving and receiving the ‘wrong’ signals, which hetrosexuals find very troubling. I think the same reason is the cause for some gender relation problems. Men tried to marginalize women because they couldn’t get over the idea of having in their tree house somebody who is also sending and receiving the opposite sexual signals. The Taliban are so worried about thesesignals, they cover women completely. The entertainment, fashion and advertisement industry figured how to make money from marketing those signals. Some feminists worry that women are compromising themselves because of these signals.
Anyway, that’s my theory.
Thank you for substituting your own wording for mine. I didn’t say they didn’t “have the right.” People have “the right” to do anything within the law. People have the right to act like total dìçkš, as certain individuals on this board have proven. What I’m saying is that simply because they CAN doesn’t mean that they SHOULD. Any action that boils down to trying to deprive someone of their own right to do something when it’s harming no one is inherently wrong-headed and mean-spirited.
You bet your ášš I’ll attack them for exercising their own civil rights when they’re doing so for the single and sole reason of imposing their own bigotry and narrow-mindedness upon people who are guilty of nothing except wanting equality.
PAD
No offense, but I really feel like I could present the most iron-clad argument proving gay marriage does do harm to society and it wouldn’t matter. So it hardly seems worth the effort to try. You called me a bigot the very first time I ever even dared to disagree with you on this issue years back, so it is hardly a matter of you knowing me, my personal feelings towards those who are gay, or my lack to prove my case that leads you to that conclusion. It sure seems like you have your mind made up that anyone who feels gay marriage is wrong is a bigot.
I say bring it on. Give us your most iron-clad argument against the legalization of gay marriage. Really. Let us see it. Tell us a) what exactly is expected to happen, b) what kind of harm would result to society from that and c) how that can be traced back to legal same-sex unions.
Honestly. What’s this iron-clad argument that we have yet to hear? Go ahead and lay it out for us. I don’t see why that should be an undue strain on your personal liberties. If GLBT folk and their allies have to go to such effort to achieve the same protections under the law and the same liberties of speech, movement, expression and family that straight people have, then you can go to the effort of showing us why those protections shouldn’t be extended.
And if we tear that argument apart, it’s not because we have our minds made up that anyone who disagrees with us is a bigot; it’s because the argument still doesn’t add up.
Oh, and one more thing? Leave your wounded tone out of this. Discriminating against gays is at least as much a behavior as actually being one of those gays, and far more of a choice. Don’t make me break out the tiny violin because we’re all being so mean to you.