California Voters Approve Gay-Marriage Ban

OK:

Hawkeye, I demand you stop being such a whiny victim about who gay people can or can't marry. What's it to you?

I am using "victim" in the sense of the belief that an injustice has occurred that requires the remedy of special protected status. Since I neither seek nor require special protection this term does not apply to me. I seek to promote my opinions and beliefs into the majority view, I do not seek to nullify the majority using the 'I am a victim" argument.

I have no idea what you are using as your definition of "victim", but clearly we are not talking about the same thing.

It's "special protected status" when minorities get the same rights as the majority?

Most of us would refer to it as "equal rights" hawk.

But they are not asking for special protected status. They're asking for the same status as anyone else.

The confusion over the word "victim" is precisely what is at issue here. You're using it to be nearly synonymous with "complaining about a perceived wrong." By that definition, you're sure a victim.

they are asking to redefine an institution, and the people of California told them no.

Claiming a protected status with the right to overrule the majority as I define victim has nothing to do with fighting for what is right, except to recognize that there will always be a struggle within the collective to define and control the direction of the collective. Right now claiming to be a victim is a nearly automatic winning card, I would like to see us change that.

Marriage is a legal contract recognized by the state. They are denied the right to enter into that contract with the adult they choose. Just because something is an "institution" in your mind doesn't give someone the right to discriminate. Slavery was an institution. Do you think slaves were just whiners wanting protected status different from those that weren't slaves?

Simply claiming to be a victim doesn't mean a damn thing in a court of law. It must be shown there actually is discrimination that violates the law. I think Sozobe has you pegged. You are nothing but a "whiney victim" of a legal system that works differently than you want it to.

That seems to be your metric here -- if the majority is for it, you can't complain about it.

The same person who was working for civil rights is a victim when 49% of Americans supported it and not a victim when 51% of Americans supported it. That makes no sense.

(I only just realized the exquisite irony here. Mr. Rail-against-the-collective is defining a victim as the one who disagrees with the majority, and says so. I guess this makes him a first-class victim since the majority disagrees with him re: at least age of consent, if not drug laws, I forget about that one...)

Yep...

More than likely you get to that point by defining "victim" as "one who objects". However, feel free to define terms and support your argument with my positions and words. Failing that your opinion is worthless.

I am all for Minority rights, Robert and I once had a long argument on the subject, but the primary minority right is the right to be heard and the right to attempt to build the minority view into the majority view, it is not the right to nullify the majority because the minority does not like what was decided except in rare cases.

I have always had a vaguely disturbed feeling about the whole trial court proceedings, and a brief skim through Judge Vaughn Walker's opinion does little to allay that feeling.

I could never figure out why the judge ordered the parties to present testimony or why he didn't simply rule on issue as a matter of law. Judge Walker explained in his opinion that there were "significant disputed factual questions" that prevented a summary disposition of the case (p. 10), but I'm not sure why the factual questions came into issue in the first place. These are, after all, civil rights that we're talking about -- the US supreme court, remember, said that marriage was a fundamental civil right in Loving v. Virginia. Given that fact, I'm not sure why it was necessary to take testimony in this case at all.

The four individual plaintiffs, for instance, testified how they had felt discriminated against by Proposition 8. For instance, two of the plaintiffs "testified about the effect Proposition 8 campaign advertisements had on their well-being" (p. 23). Frankly, I can't begin to imagine why that would be relevant in this case. Entitlement to a civil right is not contingent on whether some people feel discriminated against. Likewise, the parties presented testimony on whether, in effect, Prop 8 was a good idea or not, but that also seems beside the point: some of the rights guaranteed by the Bill of Rights probably aren't good ideas either, but that doesn't make them any less rights.

The judge, in taking testimony on whether or not the gay marriage ban was justified, more or less took the role of a legislative committee weighing the merits of a particular piece of legislation. In normal circumstances, a judge can determine the intent behind a piece of legislation by examining the legislative record. But this wasn't any piece of legislation, it was a citizen initiative, and the citizens don't need a reason to pass an initiative. By taking testimony on the proposition, the judge, in effect, was creating a legislative history for something that neither had a history nor, because of the nature of citizen initiative, needed such a history. That, in my view, is fundamentally at odds with the judiciary's role and it seems to me that, in this respect, criticisms of Judge Walker as acting in a legislative role are well-taken.

The rest of the opinion gives a good illustration of why we don't want the judiciary to act in a legislative capacity. In this case, the judge found that the plaintiffs' witnesses were credible, while the proponents' witnesses were not. That may very well have been true, but I find it hard to accept that my rights would depend on whether a particular witness in a trial was credible or not. For those who applaud the result, they should bear in mind that, if the proponents of Prop 8 had chosen better witnesses or the plaintiffs had chosen worse ones, the result might have been different. And that should be troubling, because our rights shouldn't depend on who has the better witnesses.

A more thorough reading of the opinion might resolve some of my doubts, although I don't know if I'll make it through all 136 pages any time soon. And make no mistake, I think Judge Walker ended up at the right destination. I can't help thinking, however, that he got there by the wrong path.

"...except in rare cases."

And what are those rare cases? How are those rare cases different from this one (except for the "ew" factor, which as far as I can tell is your only actual objection)?

That is not my definition, we could have a better conversation if you would work on your reading comprehension skills.

Interesting.

The impression I have from a quick skim of reports is that part of what they're trying to do here is to create some ideological framework to take this all the way to the Supreme Court.

Now, a judge shouldn't be participating in the "they." By "they" I mean the lawyers. But perhaps it was a six of one, half a dozen of another situation and he decided to go along with it because of the implications? I don't know.

I hope that doesn't become a problem/ sticking point. I agree with the goal, and don't want anything muddied on the way.

. It would be nice if both the left and the right could come to agreement that we need to move the Judiciary out of the business of doing the work of the legislature.

This paragraph illustrates your ignorance perfectly. The purpose of the Bill of Rights is to protect individuals from majority prejudice, not to enforce it. A small minority of people support the ideals fo the KKK, for instance; but this matters not at all because the Bill of Rights guarantees their right to be idiots. By your twisted logic; the majority should be able to trample their constitutional right to gather and speak their demented minds.

"...right of self determination through majority rule..." Do you have any idea how oxymoronic (not to mention moronic) of a concept that is? Pssst. Your supposed lifestyle would be among the first things the majority would outlaw, if your demented rambling had any merit. Of course, said majority would just be enforcing your right to self-determination through majority rule.

And the idea that SCOTUS is somehow obligated to weigh in on anything is equally laughable (as well as wholly unsupported by the ENTIRE history of the Supreme Court.)

the Bill of rights was never suppose to be allowed to scuttle the main project of democracy. The tail now wags the dog, and we all suffer as a result.

True, I have my own bias about this... It is part of the declaration of independence, it is part of civil rights. THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS...

It is not equality to allow some people happiness and deny others the same happiness. Either abolish marriage or allow it for all consenting adults the right to marry the person (singular) of their choice.

Some people marry and they divorce and when they remarry the should have the right to marry who they feel is the best person for them. The law shouldn't be dictating which sex they have to love. Just because the Mormons can pay huge sums of money to scare people into responding inhumanely does not take away from the truth that the pursuit of happiness is for all not not just a select few.

There was a time when the general population also voted to keep blacks enslaved too... Is the electorate always right? HELL NO! They were certainly WRONG about keeping blacks enslaved for so many terrible years... The electorate was WRONG about keeping women from voting too and they are wrong in California about not allowing gays the sacred right to follow their dreams and their hearts to the happiness that others are free to enjoy.

Wow that is so unfortunately true. I would not deny this same right to straight people if gays were the majority... Please continue I am enjoying the reading.