Gay Marriage

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My problem is that you attack their faith more often than you attack their agenda. I suspect that the same thinking that leads you to do so likewise leads you to assume that anyone who disagrees with the homosexual agenda is anti-gay and a homophobe. (But please, prove me wrong.)

Scrat,

What are you talking about? This is me, Lola. I do not believe that everyone who disagrees with the homosexual agenda is anti-gay or a homophobe. Whatever gives you this idea? I'm not sure what you mean when you say that I attack their faith. I don't agree with it and I know that they use their faith in an effort to coerce others. I attack their agenda and I am alarmed that they are this well organized because I consider a win by this group to be a huge loss for the cause of civil rights for all Americans. It's that simple. Re-think this please.

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scrat

Sorry you lost that post...maddening, I know.

It appears that, to some degree, we are talking past each other. You've taken time and care in your posts, and I appreciate that...it's not uncomplicated discussion we are attemting here. I've understood from your initial posts that you aren't in opposition to gay marriage.

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1) I am not arguing against same-gender unions, I am pointing out what I see as the weakness of your arguments. I happen to believe there are good arguments for same-gender unions (I have quite a few of my own), I just don't find you to be making them, because you either prefer to demonize those who disagree with you, or genuinely cannot see them as thinking people with a different point of view.

Truly, I know of none. I know of many passionate arguments, but no 'good' (or logically valid) arguments. A common argument tossed up, for example, is that homosexuality is not 'natural'. Which is why I linked the 'squeak' piece in my intro, to show how the 'natural' argument is non-sensical.

But let's clear up one point. I'm not making an ad hominem attack here. I'm not suggesting that any idea which issues from a faith group (say, catholicism or american evangelism or mennonitism) must be wrong. Nor even that any such idea is likely to be wrong simply because of its source. That would be a fallacy, and further, I don't believe it.

I am claiming that the arguments advanced against homosexual behavior/marriage (all that I've seen) are ubiquitously fallacious, not because of where they come from, but because they are fallacious.

Further, because this is a matter which involves a very real threat to the liberties of a portion of the community, it has an importance greater than many other issues. For example, if there was a move afoot, propagated by some organized body, to promote scrabble over electronic war games for kids, no liberty issue would be involved, and such a movement wouldn't gain my or others' attention.

But this is a liberty issue. So the propagation of a movement which seeks to reduce the liberty of others and does so using fallacious arguments, becomes itself an appropriate target for debate. We were correct to take the KKK to task in the past, or the White Supremicist movement now.

Faith groups surely have many redeeming qualities which those other two groups do not, and for the most part, I think their intentions are good. But either of those two factors are simply irrelevant.

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So Scrat, if anyone disagrees with you by pointing out the burden of evidence against you, that constitutes both sarcasm and an insult? What rot . . .

No, i'm not constrained to one or two options which are all that your narrow views suggest to you.

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If someone is that thin skinned they best not take any blood thinners as they could leak.

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Blatham - Excellent comments. Sorry if I've gotten your position wrong; it isn't by intent. Cool

There's a lot to agree with in what you've written, but I still take issue with the notion that there is no reasonable argument against same-gender unions. Focusing on the protection of children issue, there are sources that suggest children are not harmed by living and developing in such households and others that suggest they are harmed. I don't doubt that you would find reason to discard any of the latter, but I find it equally likely that those on the other side of the question would find fault with studies that supported you. For either them or you to claim that no such studies, reports, etc. exist is to state something that is not true.

Again, theirs is not a compelling argument to me, since the types of households likely to offer children a less than perfect environment are too numerous to list, and I would not want the government attempting to prevent marriages in every case where the union might produce a less than ideal household.

Thanks for your courteous and reasonable arguments!

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No, it is by no means certain that Walter chose to be sarcastic. Apart from the fact that his native language is not English, which may have lead to your confusion (although i vote for the big chip on your shoulder), his style is humorous irony. The possibility you've never canvassed is that Walter was neither sarcastic, nor insulting, but that you simply read it that way, because you come here with a burden of resentful sensitivity in the first place. Yelling with capitalized letters does nothing to strengthen a weak argument.

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By the way, referring to me as a pinhead, although certainly part and parcel of what passes for debate at your shop, is technically a violation of the terms of service.

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I wrote the following letter as part of the petition drive sponsored by People for the American Way to communicate my urgent appeal to my Senators to oppose the Federal Marriage Amendment, which is being prepared in Congress and blessed by the President. My letter also went to two newspapers, three newspapers, and one radio station -- the Pacifica affiliate -- in Houston. Anyone who wishes to use any part of it to write their own representatives, or contact their local media, is welcome to do so without attribution:

I wrote:

The subject of gay marriage has received widespread media coverage as a result of the actions of a few brave people in San Francisco. There, in defiance of state law, Mayor Gavin Newsome has enabled civil disobedience to challenge the codified moré that homosexuals cannot be allowed to wed.

Once upon a time in America, people of different races were prohibited from marrying. Even Protestants and Catholics, longer ago than that, were likewise forbidden. Eventually the logical fallacy of the denial of this basic right tumbled in upon itself and the Puritans relented, saving their bigotry for whispered salons and the occasional public outburst.

Now Republicans in Congress are readying, and President Bush is prepared to endorse, a federal constitutional amendment requiring discrimination against same-sex couples and their families.

Election-year pandering to extremist religious fanatics aside, this legislation is wrong. And bad. For at least three reasons:

--Amending the Constitution to require discrimination would be unprecedented. By codifying discrimination, the Federal Marriage Amendment would contradict the principle of equal protection for all and undermine the integrity of our Constitution. And so narrowly defining the definition of marriage would simply undermine our democracy, and would bind future generations to the current perceptions of a limited segment of our society.

--Adopting the proposed amendment would prevent courts from exercising their constitutional power to protect individual rights. This ominous precedent would have far-reaching and long-lasting effects on citizens' liberties.

--The amendment defies fundamental principles of fairness and equality. Because they are not allowed to marry, same-sex couples are currently excluded from more than 1,000 legal protections and benefits of marriage provided by state and federal laws. Excluding couples from these protections because of their sexual orientation amounts to discrimination; that bigotry contradicts the principle of equality on which this nation was founded.

The gay-marriage movement has now achieved a sort of critical mass, of varying intensity, in statehouses from coast to coast. There will be many states in the South which will never allow this sort of thing to occur, but will be compelled by the Constitution to recognize marriages sanctioned elsewhere.

Our politicians here at home need to reminded that homophobia has no refuge in the law.

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Quote:

Focusing on the protection of children issue, there are sources that suggest children are not harmed by living and developing in such households and others that suggest they are harmed.

Scrat

Well, that's the thing. Which sources? How might their scientific worth be evaluated? What consequences, in a free and democratic state, ought to follow?

First, the community would need to see a predominance of independent and objective studies (of high scientific calibre) which demonstrated that same sex couples were significantly more likely to raise children with emotional/social problems attributable to being raised by parents of same gender.

If we had that, and I see no evidence that we do, we would be left with some general socioligical 'truth' like 'alcoholics are more likely to raise children with problems than are tea-totallers' (a claim for which there is ample evidence).

Yet, even in that case, we intuitively understand that establishing laws which disallowed alchoholics to marry would be an unacceptable intrusion by the state into the liberties of its citizens. "Nanny state" would be a proper descriptor of such legistlation.

You and I are in agreement on this last point...the intrusive government point. Others, as we have both mentioned, are not, and wish the government to be precisely that intrusive. But not on alcoholism, where the science is at least in their favor, just on homosexuality, where the science is not in their favor.

That's prejudice. Gotta fight it.

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All we need to do is look at the juvenile justice system to see that heterosexual couples can screw up the responsibilities of child rearing in so many different ways, why is the federal government looking at gay couuples rearing of children? Or of gaining equal rights under the law? Where's the common sense? Bigotry is ignorance no matter how you spell it.

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ps

Let me add...

In order to fight it, we need to understand it. Any endeavor to understand the generation and maintenance of this predjudice has one looking straight at certain faith groups.

And as this prejudice, where put into law (or maintained in law) IS a threat to liberty, equality, and freedom, then it follows that citizens can correctly say, "this church is forwarding predjudice, and is a threat to liberty".

There is no goal on such a citizen's part to dismantle that church, or to outlaw it, or even to shut it up. The goal is only to prevent it from damaging liberty.

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..

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blatham wrote:

Quote:
Focusing on the protection of children issue, there are sources that suggest children are not harmed by living and developing in such households and others that suggest they are harmed.

Scrat

Well, that's the thing. Which sources?

See, I told you so. :wink: Seriously though, I find us more in agreement than not. I do find your position a bit too enamored of itself, but I suppose that's true of a few of my own positions from time to time.

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PD and CI:

Should the government allow a brother and sister to marry? If not, why?

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Scrat wrote:

Setanta wrote:
By the way, referring to me as a pinhead, although certainly part and parcel of what passes for debate at your shop, is technically a violation of the terms of service.

Then I respectfully suggest you stop acting like a pinhead, and thereby causing said terms of service to be violated. :wink:

Seriously though, shut up already and get back to the topic. You don't see Walter whining about this. Why are you?

I'm not whining about anything, and you simply demonstrate your idiot propensity to slander those with whom you disagree, because you lack the mental wherewithal to sustain the feeble cogitations which pass for thought in your benighted cranium for any appreciable period of time. So long as you persist in demonstrating your idiot propensities, i will persist in pointing them out to you. You made a snide remark to another member about her signature line--and you were as wrong as wrong can be. Walter pointed it out you, and you tried to make out that you had been insulted, without being able to demonstrate that that was the case. Now you resort to your typical childish insults when it is constantly thrown up in your face. I continue to throw it in your face, because you continue to demonstrate that you only come here to raise contention, and that you lack the rhetorical skills to sustain your points, and therefore descend into personal invective. The nastiness you display with regard to your farcical contention that you were insulted is characteristic of your style in the discussion of the topic at hand--you attempt to characterize anyone who disagrees with you as stupid or dishonest. So, as long as you respond with insults, i will continue to point out to you the poverty of your thought-processes, the evidence for which is your reliance on invective.

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Whine, whine, whine... Rolling Eyes

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Call it whining if you like--that does not make it so. It is typical of you that you see slights from others on the silliest pretext, but when you clearly slandered someone else, and it is pointed out to your, you characterize that person as a whiner. This is because you lack the mental wherewithal to accept criticism, correction, or disagreement.

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I was thinking about this issue the other day, and a thought occurred to me. (That happens from time to time when I'm thinking.) It seems to me that the whole mess with this marriage issue stems from the blurring of the line between the benefits bestowed upon individuals by the civil marriage license and the actual marriage. Why not split the two?

I think it would be far better if states offered some form of domestic incorporation contract into which any group of adults could enter. To this would be attached whatever benefits the state wished to bestow upon those entering into committed relationships. ANYONE could enter into this type of contract; friends, siblings, coworkers... since the focus would be on the desirability of establishing and maintaining a shared household rather than a relationship based on love and sex.

Marriages would then be left entirely to churches, synagogs, mosques or any other entity that chose to offer such a personal, spiritual ceremony of commitment and love. The question of whether the government "allowed" same-gender marriages would be moot, since the government would not be in the "marriage business". Gay couples would be welcome to marry through whatever institutions chose to perform and acknowledge gay marriages.

Anyone got any thoughts on this idea? While I realize we aren't going to "un-ring the bell" and replace the current system with another, I do think this idea is superior to the way we handle marriage as a melding of a civilly defined and spiritually based entity.

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Setanta - Your bias is showing. There was NOTHING "snide" about my comment to ehBeth. I thought her quote was wrong, and thought she'd want to know. I shared the info as I would have with a good friend. Whatever else you read into it is a function of your personal animus towards me. Nothing more.

Now, I am going to continue discussing the TOPIC of this thread with others interested in doing the same. I'll leave it to you to do whatever you think is the best use of your time.

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Scrat wrote:

I was thinking about this issue the other day, and a thought occurred to me. (That happens from time to time when I'm thinking.) It seems to me that the whole mess with this marriage issue stems from the blurring of the line between the benefits bestowed upon individuals by the civil marriage license and the actual marriage. Why not split the two?

I think it would be far better if states offered some form of domestic incorporation contract into which any group of adults could enter. To this would be attached whatever benefits the state wished to bestow upon those entering into committed relationships. ANYONE could enter into this type of contract; friends, siblings, coworkers... since the focus would be on the desirability of establishing and maintaining a shared household rather than a relationship based on love and sex.

Marriages would then be left entirely to churches, synagogs, mosques or any other entity that chose to offer such a personal, spiritual ceremony of commitment and love. The question of whether the government "allowed" same-gender marriages would be moot, since the government would not be in the "marriage business". Gay couples would be welcome to marry through whatever institutions chose to perform and acknowledge gay marriages.

Anyone got any thoughts on this idea? While I realize we aren't going to "un-ring the bell" and replace the current system with another, I do think this idea is superior to the way we handle marriage as a melding of a civilly defined and spiritually based entity.

I've been advocating this position ever since this issue became an issue.

The government has absolutely NO BUSINESS in the marriage business.

If the government (if the people) see a benefit in unions of some sort -- go for it. But "marriage" is for churches -- and if churches want to bless marriages between humans and pigs -- so be it. If they want to deny their blessings except to a few -- so be that too.

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