BDS

Actually, I have nothing against marriage, or against gay marriage, for that matter. I'm just pointing out some unfair things about it.

In fact, we couldn't stop lovers from making promises to each other if we tried. If there's one thing lovers love to do, it's make promises. They whisper them across pillows, they carve them in the trunks of trees, and they publicly avow them in churches.

However little they keep these promises, they are following some basic impulse in making them. Go for it, I say.

As far as specific rights accruing to married couples: I don't buy it. Single people (like me) can have custody rights. In fact, we often do. And of course spousal benefits ARE a legal issue: that's one reason gay people want to get married. Although the contract is between the employer and the employees, the language of the contract (i.e. We pay for your spouse's health insurance) is often so worded as to depend on the laws of the State. Since the state decides who can get married, who gets the benefits becomes a legal issue.

Actually, I don't think gay marriage is an important issue. If gay people want to get married, go for it! I'm just playing the contrarian, and pointing out some of the negatives about gay marriage; indeed, about assimilation in general, and marriage in general. One problem with minorities becoming assimilated is that the vibrancy of mutliculturalism is lost. This was certainly recognized by black civil rights activists who wanted equality, but not assimilation. Culture is a complicated thing. One way to destroy the gay sub-culture is to discriminate against gay people and force them into hiding. Another way is assimilate them and persuade them (in part through legal and financial benefits) to adopt the trappings and moralities of the mainstream. I'm not sure which way is most effective.

p.s. to Bumble Be: All laws are "discriminatory" in that they discriminate against people practicing particular behaviors. Laws against theft discriminate against thieves; laws against sodomy discriminate against sodomites. The question is not whether we should discriminate (most of us believe we should), but, instead, what behaviors should we discriminate against?

deep6sleep

If same sex marriages are formally recognized by government it will in essence endorse, for these marriages, the same priviliges reserved for the traditional family. This would not benefit the general welfare of our society.

Once the door is open, and the definition of marriage is changed, it will leave anyone, father/son, sister/sister/, and so on, to form "marriages" and individually define what famiy is. Where do you draw the line?

rlogan

Yes.

yes

and yes.


Not to mention the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924. Also a vote.



The state should not be sanctioning marriage. It is a private contract.

The state has no compelling interest in either my genes or my dick.

abe smith

just foregoing here are what anti-homosexual bigots frequently fall-back to, in trying to justify their bigotry, while they try to avoid admitting to it..

If you're going to argue against same-sex marriage because it sticks in your craw & you just can't stomach it , feel free to do that. It's afree country, and the Federal Constitution, the Mother of us all, makes legal your right to your disgust and to your expressing that.

Your arguments from peronal disgust will be more effectual.... perhaps,... if you do not weaken those with specious "reasons".

Stephen_BostonMA

So then we should have two classes of citizens: those in "traditional" families and "non-traditional" ones? And we should give privileges only to the first group? Give me a break!

According to a Business Week cover story (October 20, 2003):
Sorry, but I don't think that 50.7% should be getting a bigger slice of the pie. Increasingly, the 49.3% is not standing for it.We draw the line at where society is harmed. Societal attitudes have become increasingly relaxed regarding homosexuality, but not regarding incest. There's a reason for that; people know the difference between the two. Some families may be upset to learn that a family member is gay. Yet their pain is quite different from the emotional distress caused when a daughter is molested by her father. Imagine how destabilized families would be if a sister grows up knowing that her brother has his sights on her as a potential future spouse.

Clutch

I totally disagree, for the following 27 reasons to which you must reply with counterarguments or else spontaneously combust:

Yahzi

It never ceases to amaze me how much effort people will invest in denying other people something that doesnt' cost them a penny.

For all you simple-minded bean counters that seem to think that the state must reserve as much special privilege for breeders as possible, consider this: one thing a state provides is justice. Of what good is it to raise kids in an environment where they recieve .01% more benefit from social perquisites when they can plainly see those benefits came at the cost of robbing other people?

I'd rather have less money, and more justice, for my kids. How about you?

Of course, once you convince these bigots that straight but childless marriage is equally damaging to the breeder's special status, they all claim they're ready to ban infertile straights from getting married. Except of course you know perfectly well that if the gays shut up about it, nothing would ever come of it. Those breeders would go right on tolerating infertile marriages like they always have. They only complain about infertile marriages when gays want to get married, and they stop complaining about it the instant gays stop. Gosh. Do you think maybe, just possibly, there could be some kind of link?

Why do so many people think arguments are like stage props, to be brought out on cue, and then discarded and forgotten as soon as the audience applauds?

You know, they said exactly the same thing back when we were legalizing mixed-race marriages. But then, for all I know, you're against those too.

You've fallen on your slippery slope, and now your pants are down. We would rebut and crush your arguments, but we are too busy laughing at you.

Yahzi

See how it's the "best" scenario now? But note, that in this sudden zeal to achieve moral perfection, the concept of justice is lost. When it comes to the pragmatic raising of kids, we can't afford anything less than the perfect ideal: but when it comes to social justice, why, those homos can survive with a little discrimination.

It's easy to win the game when you get to set different goal posts for each team.

For your information, the best environment for a child is its biological parents. Step-children and adopted children die at a measurably higher rate than biological children. So out with remarriage and adoption!

Having two loving parents is better than having two indifferent parents. I think it is self-evident alcoholism produces indifferent parents. Any idea how many kids are growing up right now in a house with an alcoholic?

Having two parents is better than having one. Any fucking idea how many kids are growing up in single-parent homes right now?

Having two gay parents is better than having none. Any goddamn fucking idea how many kids are growing up in fucking orphanages right fucking now?

But I forget myself: this was never an argument about facts. It was about your iron-clad conviction that homos are not worthy of the same respect and acceptance that straights are, no matter how they act.

Yahzi

So you're telling me that since my wife and I don't have kids, our marriage doesn't count.

[removed]

For the record (meaning, for those of you sorry specimens that can't get married), marriage is about the legal, moral, and personal notion of commitment. I am legally responsible for my wife's debts. This is not a duty imposed on me by law; but rather, a legal recognition of what I have already freely proclaimed. My wife is legally capable of handling my affairs, even including turning off the feeding tube when I am lying in a hospital. Again, this is merely the legal recognition of the agreement I already publicly made.

The law deals with marriage not for my sake, but for everyone else's. I don't need the law to know my wife and I have these rights and duties to each other: but doctors, lawyers, etc. need a hand in discerning between those that they should give these rights to and those they should not. Just like the cops let you drive if you have a license, and not otherwise: your moral duty to be a good driver precedes your state recognition of that moral duty. For crying out loud, it's even called a marriage license.

Bumble Bee Tuna

Could you name a single piece of this "overwhelming" evidence? Last I saw, all the studies note how there isn't any significant difference between children raised by gay couples and by straight ones. Is this an instance of you asserting something because you think it seems like it should be true, rather than it actually being true? Have you ever seen a study that demonstrated your assertion? Last conservative op-ed piece I read on the subject acknowledged that all 21 studies they could find on the subject found no difference, and they had to cling to a single meta-study that looked at the other 21 and came to the conclusion that there were a few minor differences, namely in sexuality, and in nothing else. The interesting thing is this- one of the results of this meta-study was to say that daughters are more likely to be sexually active, and sons are less likely to be sexually active. So, what is "good"? Less sexual activity? Well, since your claim is that we must only support the family structures best at raising children, I guess from now on all sons must, by government mandate, be raised by homosexuals. It's in their best interest.

I'm curious how you draw the line. You are interested in children being raised in the "best" environment only. Well, wealthy parents statistically do better than poorer parents. Should we not let poor people get married, either, since they're not the best family structure? How about single parents. Currently, there are quite a few of those. But, you have stated that the best family structure is a mom AND a dad. So should we ban single parenthood, since it's not the best situation? Apparently, your compassionate interest in the well-being of the children is in hiding, and only comes to the front when you think about gay marriage, which is somewhat funny since gay marriage doesn't have a whole lot to do with children. Marriage isn't suddenly going to give gay men the ability to get pregnant.

The foundation of your argument, that marriage is some government program to promote children, is a bit silly, anyway. Marriage exists as a government institution because people get committed to the other, and created a demand for it.

Your posts are high on assertions, low on substantiation. Work on that.

-B