Stem-Cells, degenerate Gay Lesbo rights, Abortion, Janet Jackson's boob..what's the problem ??
POSTED BY: JaynezTown
UPDATED: Sunday, December 1, 2024 16:44
VIEWED: 31108
PAGE 1 of 2
some say Gay/Lesbo becomes a slippery slope, morale decay boobs...if you allow you might become worse than French?
Still can't believe these issues became the main part of the election while
Quote:
..Stuff like the rising debts in the USA, the mess in Iraq, the jobless rates , medicare costs , bin Ladens terror and N Korea getting Nuclear weapons was ignored as a real issue in politics and the election..
Before you any of you ask
I don't need stem-cells to cure my in-grown toe-nail, I'm not part of the gay fanclub and I don't like Janet Jackson or need to get an abortionSo what's the big deal with stem cells used for medical research ? People like Christopher Reeve and Mrs. Reagan have spoken against the presidents position, people like them very
publicly supported research. Education is clearly associated with opinions on stem cell research with many people from university thinking it is the correct path to take however some evangelicals are strongly against stem cells because of issues of morality while they would strongly support the invasion of iraq, as one person said Stem cell hypocrisy - what about the infertility technique that causes unused embryos to be destroyed or IVF procedures - It is these excess embryos which are frozen and destroyed/discarded. . an election on Morality while many are tortured in Camp X-ray and thousnads are bombed in Iraq
such hypocrisy !!
I've no objection to homosexuals, I wonder why people make it such a big issue, I mean seriously why should we care whether people are gay or not? Then there was Tennessee county where a teacher was famously tried in 1925 for teaching evolution in the Scopes "Monkey Trial" was this time trying to outlaw homosexuality. Remember the chaos at Rhea County where Commissioner J.C. Fugate introduced the measure during a commissioners meeting . "We need to keep them out of here," Fugate said of homosexuals, telling the Associated Press he was reacting to recent headlines featuring same-sex marriages. Before the Bush/Kerry election Voters had said the issue of gay marriage will be a very important factor for them, and it looks like Bush got a lot of votes from Tennessee county, Separation of Church & State is OUT..An election decided on stem cell paranoia and targeting the liberties of gay people
On Abortion - I don't think anyone their right mind is pro-Abortion, people are pro-choice and pro-choise for women. If a womman is ill, or she is raped or incest occurs or there are many other factors such as this involved then I think she should have the right to choose...nobody is really on a pro-Abortion election stance they are pro-choice
Janet Jackson's boob - it happened ! big deal ! Yes indeed it was a big deal for Powell's Son at the FCC and Faux news
Real issues in this election were ignored, the rising cost of fuel , heating and oil, the crisis in Iraq and the missing WMDs in Iraq, the unemployment rates - there have been more jobs lost than in any four years in the US since the Great Depression and sadly a new record with some of the worst deficits ever. Another import new item has surfaced the most wicked and biggest SOBof our times, Osama bin Ldean, is indeed very much alive and well and videotaping in his own personal blockbuster studio again! The Iranians have not agreed to suspend uranium enrichment, the IAEA says there are still doubts concerning Iran's nuclear ambitions including the nature of work on advanced centrifuges and plutonium separation experiments that were kept secret from the agency there are many in Washington who feel Iran is trying to get hold of more weapons such as Nuclear bombs. There a nuclear crisis with North Korea their statements have been often cryptic in the past but sometimes quiet clear...with N.Korea basically saying at times in the past " come on USA, come get us you son-of-bushes, we've got Nukes and we're going to build more" . With North Korea threatening to bolster its atom
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I think that the main thing we saw in the US election is that America is a very big place with a lot of people in it. Some people want one thing. Some people want something else.
Within these groups you have people who are ignorant of the real issues. You've the people who think that there actually were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and that the US found them. You've the people who think the Goventment only sent troops to Iraq to secure the oil for US corporations.
The general concensus around the world right now is that American's are dumb. I don't think that this is the case - I think that they're just ignorant of the real issues because their media dominant culture feeds them a lot of second hand information in a lot of ways.
When they then have to make a political choice they have to process all this information so that they can make what they think is the right choice. For most people processing this information into a final decision means making a choice based on what they feel rather than what they know. That's why morality plays such an important role with the things you mention.
Take homosexuality as an example. It's a scientific fact that homosexuality is normal and natural. To put a fine point on it - there are gay animals. But that can be a lot of information to process so rather than someone making a decision based on what they know - they make a decision based on what they feel.
Or to look at it in a different way - alot of people (including people in the US government, so for the average person......) don't know how terrorist cells operate. So they don't know how to feel about the way in which the government fights them. But - Janet Jackson's boob during the super bowl when kids are watching!!! - That's something they know how to feel about and that they have the means to fight.
Real education isn't just about learning new stuff. It's about learning how to process information and, sometimes, about learning a little empathy. So, the real way to get people focused on the problems in America and the World is to educate them in a way that's not forcing them to walk on only one sidewalk of a one way street.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Not all Americans are ignorant of the issues, and many are VERY deeply ashamed of how the election turned out.
One article I read said that one of the big reasons people voted for Bush is that he was a churchgoing man. Oh, my. Of all the reasons to vote for a president, that should rate near the bottom of the list.
Bush does not represent ALL the American people. He may represent the country, however badly, but a very large number of us don't claim him as ours. It's an embarrassment.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
There are many reasons why americans are ignorent of the issues, but the main one is that most americans are mentally lazy and don't care.
Most of the people didn't watch the debates (not that they were large sources of factual information, but...). Most people didn't read the canidates web sites. And most of all very few people took the time to check 3rd party information sources.
It takes time and effort to make an informed decision. You needed to read the web sites and realize that each candidate is presenting 1/3rd of the facts, the 1/3rd that supports their position. You needed to watch the presidential debates and realize that they're going out of their way to demonize the opposition. You needed to sort through 4 paragraphs of propaganda to optain one fact and make decisions based on the facts compared to your personal views.
Most people don't do this. So how do most people make their votes? They watch the political ads. "John Kerry wants to kill babies, I'll vote for Bush." "George Bush wants to get rid of my Grandma's social security check, I'll vote for Kerry."
They pick one issue and vote based on that "I like God, Bush likes God, I'll vote for him".
Or they vote straight party. "I'll vote for Kerry cuz I always vote for the democrat"
Most people complain about how all of the political ads are attack ads, that's what they dislike most about any race. But the campaigns run them because people respond to them.
I typically avoid political threads online because they just turn into flame sessions but I talk to alot of people in real life about this stuff. It amazes me how little effort people put into voting. Some people who I've talked to didn't even know what issues they cared about, much less where the canidates stood on the issues.
I hate to limit peoples rights to vote but I would almost be in favor of having some basic tests for voting. You could even publish the tests online ahead of time. If you don't put the effort in to have a basic understanding of what's going on or what the election is about, then you don't get to vote.
I know that'll never happen but it drives me up a wall when uninformed people decide the direction for the country.
anyway, that's my 4 cents worth.
Professor...
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Leafy:
Not all Americans are ignorant of the issues, and many are VERY deeply ashamed of how the election turned out.
One article I read said that one of the big reasons people voted for Bush is that he was a churchgoing man. Oh, my. Of all the reasons to vote for a president, that should rate near the bottom of the list.
Bush does not represent ALL the American people. He may represent the country, however badly, but a very large number of us don't claim him as ours. It's an embarrassment.
...and Bush isn't even a {real} religious person. He's a poser. He was a drinker, smoker, womanizer and layabout till just after he was forty. Then he wanted to get into politics, so he became a born-again something or other (presbyterian I think), to enhance his political career, he got married and of course he was so devout that he changed his religion to his wife's religion. (baptist or methodist or some such, I forget which) When asked who his favorite philosopher is, GW replied, "Christ." That's real nice and all and may get those of us who haven't read the Bible, but Christians kniow that the taechings of Christ are not philosophies. that gw thinks they are, shows what he knows.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
The reason why we haven’t blow the living #$&% out of North Korea or Iran is because they are so conveniently close to several major waterways critical for international trade. At any time Iran could sortie several Surface warships (Several US Built), Aircraft and or Submarines in to the Strait of Hourmez to deploy mines and cut off the flow of oil to the west. You have any idea how hard it is to clear mines when there is the threat of air, land based missile or sub surface attack on the clearing vessels? In a word IMPOSSIBLE.
North Korea is very close to both the Taiwan Strait and Japan. They operate around 40 submarines that could at any time be sent to interdict oil shipments to Japan or cargo ships exporting goods from Japan to the West. If the lights go out in Tokyo the US doesn’t get any cheap VCRs or TVs or Cars ETC. The US will need to divert oil shipments from the US to Japan- and that’s assuming we can delouse the area around several Japanese ports taht can handle VLCCs and can be defended from Sub Surface intrusion. To accomplish this at least two Carrier Battle Groups and several attack subs would need to be deployed to aid the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force in sweeping the east cost of Japan of threats. Do you have any idea what kind of public outcry there would be if the DPRK scored a lucky hit on a Burk Class DDG? Or a Carrier? That little poorly placed bomb on the USS Cole would be a pinprick compared to what a SEAT-60 torpedo can do. Were talking the biggest battle since Leyte Gulf here, don’t get me wrong we’ll whop @$$ but there will be some serous attrition among the ASW forces.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I totally agree. There was nothing of substance in this last election - issues that needed to be addressed were left on the wayside for issues that make better stories (and political friends). Oil's a big one... it'll be a problem long before we run out. As soon as demand > supply, it'll be too expensive to be a solution anymore.
On an unrelated note, I think political forums need a buzzer like in the game "Taboo." Whenever a politician cites morals or religion as the basis for law and legislature, the buzzer just needs to go off. "Sorry. Church and state, dude. Care to try again?"
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by JaynezTown:
So what's the big deal with stem cells used for medical research ?
I've no objection to homosexuals
On Abortion
Janet Jackson's boob
Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law.
-Thomas Jefferson
What do you think ??
I think the bible is pretty clear on each of those issues. But Jefferson is wrong. Common law goes back centuries and often finds its origins is the very Christianity Jefferson is talking about. Even throwing the bible aside the pre-1800 common law that Jefferson is talking about would specifically prohibit abortion, medical experimentation at the expense of life, homosexuality, and lewd conduct.
An example of Common law from a recent issue. Clinton pardons Mark Rich in exchange for money on the eve of Bush taking office. Is this illegal? No. Why? Common law. The President's pardon power can be traced through the ages to the opinion of one Lord Coke who in turn finds its origins in the bible. The Supreme Court agreed and said a pardon could be granted for "any reason" including personal and political. An interesting side note is that the pardon could have been recalled by Bush, but was not. Pardons are not valid when signed (like appointments aka Marbury v. Madison), but are deeds which must be delivered and accepted, with acceptence being an admission of guilt which could give rise to civil liability (both of these come from common law). Rich's pardons could not have been delivered before Bush took office, so had Bush known to do so he could have called the Marshal delivering the documents and turned him around. Funny, but none of the talking heads knew the first thing about pardons back when this was an issue.
H
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Stem Cell Research:
First, I’m a proponent of it.
Second, the President did not ban stem cell research. The president banned the use of federal dollars to fund embryonic stem cell research. This means that embryonic stem cell research can continue funded by state dollars or private dollars. Furthermore stem cell research can be funded by federal dollars if it is using either pre-harvested embryonic stem cells or adult stem cells. There is an ethical knot with the use of human embryos to supply medical research. Anyone concerned with the benefit that stem cell research might some day provide should understand the need to prevent the issue from becoming politically entangled with such a divisive and controversial issue as abortion.
Gay Rights:
The problem with gay marriage is that the American people were basically given an ultimatum. Give up traditional marriage or else. That resulted in a backlash. It was very poor politics on the side of the gay rights activists. They chose to use threats and offensive presentation, when they should have been trying to reach out. They demanded understanding and recognition of their problems, but dismissed a long held and sacred tradition of the American people, and that hurt the gay rights movement far more then it helped.
Abortion:
This will always be a controversial issue.
Janet Jackson’s bood:
This was just rude. And dumb.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by ManiacNumberOne:Quote:
Originally posted by Leafy:
Not all Americans are ignorant of the issues, and many are VERY deeply ashamed of how the election turned out.
One article I read said that one of the big reasons people voted for Bush is that he was a churchgoing man. Oh, my. Of all the reasons to vote for a president, that should rate near the bottom of the list.
Bush does not represent ALL the American people. He may represent the country, however badly, but a very large number of us don't claim him as ours. It's an embarrassment.
...and Bush isn't even a {real} religious person. He's a poser. He was a drinker, smoker, womanizer and layabout till just after he was forty. Then he wanted to get into politics, so he became a born-again something or other (presbyterian I think), to enhance his political career, he got married and of course he was so devout that he changed his religion to his wife's religion. (baptist or methodist or some such, I forget which) When asked who his favorite philosopher is, GW replied, "Christ." That's real nice and all and may get those of us who haven't read the Bible, but Christians kniow that the taechings of Christ are not philosophies. that gw thinks they are, shows what he knows.
sounds nuts
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I think using the Bible as a legal document gets you into trouble. You'd have to start killing children who disobeyed their parents and married women who were raped by somebody not their husbands.
Jesus turned a number of Old Testament teachings on their ear. He was, to my mind, the original long-haired hippy preaching love not war.
And even in the Hebrew Bible, the OT itself, there are deliberate contradictions in the text. Man and woman were created together, but no, first man was created and then woman later-- I don't think the people writing all this down were confused. These stories are meant to be metaphors for human experience. That's why, if you read say, Job or Ecclesiastes, you get a very different message than if you're reading Ruth or Kings. The book is supposed to capture diversity in order to appeal to all people the authors (people writing the word down) could think of.
As for rules set down in the Bible, the Bible has text that specifically condones slavery and specifically condemns wearing two kinds of material together. It has rules permitting things you and I would never cosider moral. I'm not saying the writers intended for people to be immoral.
I don't think they even wanted people to follow all of the rules and laws set forth in the Bible, at least, not in the OT; there are so many that are self-contradictory. I think the contradictions were meant to make people stop and think about what they were doing. I personally believe the hundreds of rules were meant to keep people busy so they wouldn't be getting into trouble. Those rules were meant to be impossible to follow, so that people were always working hard to be better. Trying to follow hundreds of rules will teach anybody humility pretty quickly, and it certainly forces anybody who cares about it to think long and deeply before acting.
The founding fathers of this country (arguably all of them, but certainly at least half) had very unconventional ideas about religion. Some were atheists. All of them agreed there must be a WALL between matters of church and state, to protect religion from the state and to protect people from the state and from religions other than their own. Of course the founders were born with a Judeo-Christian background. So what? You and I have a history of stealing from and murdering the native people of this land in our background, as citizens of this great country. That doesn't mean we love that aspect of our collective past. On the contrary, we defy our past. We struggle each day to be closer to the truth about that and other issues.
In governing ourselves, we are called upon to use our consciences and our minds in forming the laws of this country. As individuals, we may interpret things differently, but we may not impose our personal points of view on others. We are bound to create and enforce a code of law that tramples as little on individual freedom as possible, preserving equality and justice for all people.
The Bible is not and was never intended by the founders to be anything other than a religious text read freely by the people who wish to do so.
To address the question in the title: I don't understand it either, but people are just really threatened by what they don't understand, and they seem very resistant to learning about anybody different than they are. As Jon Stewart put it, "People are just really freaked out by the idea of dudes kissing." Even though dudes kissing (or getting married) don't affect anybody else at all. I don't get it.
People also would rather be sentimental than scientific about when human life begins and when a new life ceases to be a small clot of differentiated cells and begins to be a person.
Personally, for myself, I am very sentimental about that. I'm a mother of three and I've had a miscarriage and the second I knew I was pregnant, to me, it was a baby in there. But I don't have four babies. I have three, and I had one pregnancy that all of the wishing and wanting in the universe couldn't make into a baby. Science tru
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Hero:
Quote:
Even throwing the bible aside the pre-1800 common law that Jefferson is talking about would specifically prohibit abortion, medical experimentation at the expense of life, homosexuality, and lewd conduct.
http://www.singmind.com/singleminded/200301/choice.htm
The Roe v. Wade decision in effect restored American law to a condition more resembling the British common law, the ancient legal traditions that evolved over several centuries and that would ultimately form the basis for British statutory law. Under British common law, abortion of a fetus before ''quickening'' was not a crime. Quickening was the first recognizable movement of the fetus in the womb. Prior to that, the fetus was considered to be part of the mother, and its destruction therefore not a crime.
There is some debate as to whether abortion after quickening was also a crime under common law ...
http://www.btinternet.com/~DEvans_23/legislat.htm
Prior to 1803 English Common Law permitted abortion provided it was carried out before 'quickening', the point reached at about 20 -24 weeks when it was believed the soul entered the body. Abortions performed after quickening were an offence under British Common Law, but there were no fixed penalties and the woman having the abortion was not necessarily held responsible.
http://www.emedicine.com/med/topic5.htm
Before the 19th century, most US states had no specific abortion laws. The provisions of British common law took precedence, and women had the right to terminate a pregnancy prior to viability.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Gay Rights:
The problem with gay marriage is that the American people were basically given an ultimatum. Give up traditional marriage or else.
Ok, in a seriousness, I've never understood this. And when I ask no-one has given me an answer. It's like when I ask, a tumble-weed goes by. So, here it goes...
How? How does allowing gays/lesbians to marry force heterosexuals to give up traditional marriage. Because, as far as I know, heteros will still be able to marry as they have seen fit since records have existed.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
Ok, in a seriousness, I've never understood this. And when I ask no-one has given me an answer. It's like when I ask, a tumble-weed goes by. So, here it goes...
How? How does allowing gays/lesbians to marry force heterosexuals to give up traditional marriage. Because, as far as I know, heteros will still be able to marry as they have seen fit since records have existed.
Okay. I'll take a stab at this. In my mind, a lot of the opposition came from the conflation of a lot of different things. For many people, marriage is a religious institution predominantly and a political institution only slightly. When they get married, it is by their minister or priest or rabbi or imam, etc. The political implications of marriage (in other words, the laws that apply to couples that are married) are less important than the fact that, to them, this is a union between them and the person they love blessed by their higher power.
So, to those people, when they hear homosexual marriage they think that their church will be forced to marry homosexuals. And so they feel that their own marriages will be diminished, especially if their church has a strong stance against homosexuality. (Part of it, from my perspective, is prejudice - "I don't want to have anything in common with those people."). They see this as an example of the government sticking its nose where it doesn't belong.
What they fail to take into account is that, from the other side of the aisle, this is a fight about civil rights. For people fighting to get government recognition of homosexual unions this is mainly about getting couples the same legal rights as heterosexual couples.
So the use of the word marriage is unfortunate because there are often both political and religious implications. From my point of view I think the government should get out of the business of marriage altogether. I have written this elsewhere but I'll repeat it here, I cringe inwardly every time I hear a minister or priest use the phrase, "By the power vested in me by the State of California, I now pronounce you man and wife." I would much rather see marriage as a religious institution ONLY - your marriage license is issued by your denomination and is symbolic - has no legal meaning whatsoever. Then you would also sign up for a civil union and register through the government to get the legal rights currently afforded to married couples. That way the push would be for homosexual civil unions.
Those in favor of homosexual unions are fighting for homosexual couples to have the same legal rights as heterosexual couples, NOT to force religious denominations to marry homosexual couples against their beliefs (although I'm sure there are activists who would like to dick with organized religion in that manner - but I would hope they are marginalized within the overall movement and only represent a small minority - anhd I could've just invented a straw man anyway
). And it's not enough for it to be a state by state battle because there are federal laws that apply to married couples in addition to state laws.One of the many problems with the proposed Defense of Marriage amendment to the Constitution (aside from just the more general problem of legislating limits on the citizenry into the Constitution) was that the language was so vague that it could've been interpreted to forbid even civil unions to homosexual couples nationwide.
So I've run out of steam...
---------------------
"What sort of raw meat do you people feed your cruiser captains, Hamish?" - Queen Elizabeth III of Manticore
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
@SoupCatcher:
Although I percive the same mentality in "them" as you do, my question still remains unanswered.
How does homosexual marriage tear apart "traditional" marriage?
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:As far as you know. It’s the whole slippery slope thing. If you’re going to argue that the state must support marriage between opposite sexes, then how do you argue against state supported polygamy or incest? Gay marriage activists jump through hoops trying to avoid responding to this argument, but it is a valid concern. When marriage becomes no longer about the rearing of children, but rather becomes about affirming personal feelings then it becomes a failed institution. To a certain degree that is already happened. Already, heterosexuals attempt to eliminate from marriage aspects of responsibility and commitment, which has led to increases in divorce, but I would argue that it has also lead to increases in the crime rate, domestic violence and overall degradation of society. The institution of gay marriage is simply a continuation of that, the ultimate elimination of the responsibility factor. Marriage is no longer about family: an institution granted special privileges under the law in order to function to rear and support children and elderly, but rather has become a state honored certificate affirming sexual relationships, a right to fuck license, if you will.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
How? How does allowing gays/lesbians to marry force heterosexuals to give up traditional marriage. Because, as far as I know, heteros will still be able to marry as they have seen fit since records have existed.
But the real problem is not so much the marriage between gays and lesbians but rather the insensitive and aggressive manner in which the gay rights community dismissed the majority of Americans who take traditional marriage seriously. And in that, perhaps gay marriage is actually done society and traditional marriage some good, because people, angered by this arrogant manner in which gay rights activists seek to impose their way of life in the mainstream have begun to fight back using their right as the majority to impose law.
Ultimately, however, to save marriage, society will need more then laws, but to affirm the responsibility of family as the central focus of marriage and not the relationship between two individuals seeking conformation of their sexual gratification. And ironically, (and I feel hopefully) may actually pave the way for a more responsible emergence of gay marriage.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
If you’re going to argue that the state must support marriage between opposite sexes, then how do you argue against state supported polygamy or incest?
Let me just put this troglodytic argument to rest.
Oh wait, I can't. Given the arguments for gay marriage, this is a logically inescapable conclusion.
Do I think people who are homosexual deserve all the rights and privileges of all human beings?
Yes
Do I think people who are homosexual should be granted special dispensation to alter language and institutions at their whim?
No.
There is not and never has been such a thing as a sacrament that sanctifies a matrimonial union between two members of the same sex.
So repeat after me:
There's no such thing as "gay marriage".
There's no such thing as an "unborn child".
These are what is known as oxymorons. People who use them are known as just plain old ordinary morons.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:Quote:
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
How? How does allowing gays/lesbians to marry force heterosexuals to give up traditional marriage. Because, as far as I know, heteros will still be able to marry as they have seen fit since records have existed.
As far as you know. It’s the whole slippery slope thing.
No, not really. I'll explain below.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
If you’re going to argue that the state must support marriage between opposite sexes, then how do you argue against state supported polygamy or incest?
This is the boggie-man that the anti-gay rights people have brought up time and time again. There is no slop here. No-one is trying to bring back polygamy (which is still practiced in many countries around the world by the way), nor is anyone even talking about incest.
Clearly, no western nation would go back to polygamy as all the people that live here (and in many others around the world) look to it as "not good" to say the least.
There are many other reasons besides the social "icky" of incease. Genetic deveristy being one of them. This isn't even going to be a possibility, so don't bring it up.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Gay marriage activists jump through hoops trying to avoid responding to this argument, but it is a valid concern.
Only in the paranoid dellusions of some peoples minds.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
When marriage becomes no longer about the rearing of children,
Pardon me, but it's been this way for many decades. And what about couples that can't have children or choose not to have children? Should they then not be able to be married? After all, they can't have a family or chooses not to, and if marriage is all about family then why allow them?
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
but rather becomes about affirming personal feelings then it becomes a failed institution.
This was always part of it. Or are you advocating people marrying people that they don't love. Marriage is about two people whoe love eachother, making the commitment to spend the rest of there lives together, period. So, what does it matter if they are gay or not?
When it comes to people that think this way, I really believe that they really don't see that this isn't a change in what marriage is, it an extention.
It takes nothing away from the institution of marriage.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
To a certain degree that is already happened. Already, heterosexuals attempt to eliminate from marriage aspects of responsibility and commitment, which has led to increases in divorce,
With this, you've just told me what a predujuce biggot you are. To even suggest this is pathetic. Have you even met a gay/lesbian?
The devorce rate in any country is not a function of homosexuality, but a function of the immaturity of the people who get married. I mean, how do you justify Joe and Jane getting devioced if they've never even met a gay/lesbian?
Why would deny even the right of a people to prove to you that they do have committed relationships?
I think that this is really a scape-goat for those that don't what to accept the responsibility of there own actions or the actions of people in there own sect of society. You must blame it all on "them" whoever "they" are.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
but I would argue that it has also lead to increases in the crime rate, domestic violence and overall degradation of society.
You have causality backwards. It isn't that increases in crime rate, etc contribute to the degradation of society. It's that the degradation of society has contributed to increased crime rate. There would of course be a feedback in there.
So, the problem now is, what is causing the degradation of society? I woul
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
As far as you know. It’s the whole slippery slope thing. If you’re going to argue that the state must support marriage between opposite sexes, then how do you argue against state supported polygamy or incest?
I have this crazy idea that says you should argue the pros and cons of the situation in front of you before you tackle the ones well in the future.
The slippery slope crap is a vastly overused dodge. First it's inter-racial marriages, then inter-faith, now homosexuals, but look out, polygamy, incest, cats and dogs living together, mass hysteria!! END OF THE EARTH - GAME OVER.
Pfeh.
Quote:
When marriage becomes no longer about the rearing of children, but rather becomes about affirming personal feelings then it becomes a failed institution.
Strange. I've seen marriages that uphold the raising of children over personal feelings. The results are not pretty, to spouses or children.
One enables the other. The feelings enable the rearing of children, well-kept and well-loved. To center marraige on children is a mistake that often leads to misery.
Quote:
To a certain degree that is already happened. Already, heterosexuals attempt to eliminate from marriage aspects of responsibility and commitment, which has led to increases in divorce, but I would argue that it has also lead to increases in the crime rate, domestic violence and overall degradation of society.
I would agree.
Quote:
The institution of gay marriage is simply a continuation of that, the ultimate elimination of the responsibility factor. Marriage is no longer about family: an institution granted special privileges under the law in order to function to rear and support children and elderly, but rather has become a state honored certificate affirming sexual relationships, a right to fuck license, if you will.
If heterosexuals have already begun to start the destruction of marriage, then you claiming that gay marriage is the ultimate ruin is laughable at best.
The statement also presumes that homosexuals have no capability to form a family, that the only relationship possible is that of sex bunnies. To my eye, that gives me far more insight into the demons of your real thoughts on this. You have a nice well-constructed rhetoric that I'm taking apart here, I do admire that. I have a hunch this is the gut, the source of your arguement though.
Quote:
But the real problem is not so much the marriage between gays and lesbians but rather the insensitive and aggressive manner in which the gay rights community dismissed the majority of Americans who take traditional marriage seriously.
The majority of Americans have divorces, last I checked. I don't know where your majority comes from. Imagination perhaps?
Quote:
And in that, perhaps gay marriage is actually done society and traditional marriage some good, because people, angered by this arrogant manner in which gay rights activists seek to impose their way of life in the mainstream have begun to fight back using their right as the majority to impose law.
You'll pardon my chuckle - it wasn't so long ago that the mainstream was "imposing their way of life" on this little minority. Turnabout is fair play, after all, and might of majority rarely makes right. Or have you forgotten the dozens of laws overturned that outlawed homosexuality? Fight *back*? Where did you think this little battle started?
Quote:
Ultimately, however, to save marriage, society will need more then laws, but to affirm the responsibility of family as the central focus of marriage and not the relationship between two individuals seeking conformation of their sexual gratification. And ironically, (and I feel hopefully) may actually pave the way for a more responsible emergence of gay marriage.
I agree with this, if not the condescending ending.
Radhil Trebors
Persona Under Construction
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
This is the boggie-man that the anti-gay rights people have brought up time and time again. There is no slop here. No-one is trying to bring back polygamy (which is still practiced in many countries around the world by the way), nor is anyone even talking about incest.
Clearly, no western nation would go back to polygamy as all the people that live here (and in many others around the world) look to it as "not good" to say the least.
A sect practiced it recently in Canada and the US, actually. Some group clinging to Mormon orthodoxy. Not sure if they've been broken up yet.
Although, any reasonable person would call what they're doing "brainwashing", "abuse", and "rape" before they call it polygamy.
Radhil Trebors
Persona Under Construction
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Unfortunately, I don't really have time to sift through these giant point and counter-point style posts right now, so I'll simply say that in fact with the recent politicization of the gay marriage arguments, there have already been attempts by polygamists to seek state sanctioning of their polygamy. So this slippery slope exists and is currently in practice working its way through the courts as we speak.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
This is the boggie-man that the anti-gay rights people have brought up time and time again. There is no slop here. No-one is trying to bring back polygamy (which is still practiced in many countries around the world by the way), nor is anyone even talking about incest.
Incidentally, I am in favor of extending state sanction to marriage between homosexuals. And perhaps when society has matured a little more we can. But today, we condemn a man for refusing a court order to remove the Ten Commandments from a court house, but not a Mayor who commits 5000 counts of a felony by signing marriage licenses he has no right to sign. The media can't seem to recognize that the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church was not an example of mass pedophilia, but rather gay perverts abusing the priesthood to impose themselves on impressionable young men, in the same way that straight perverts have been known to impose themselves on impressionable young women. The gay community cannot seem to express themselves without stripping down to a pink thong and dry humping each other on a float in full view of children or openingly having sex in the parking lot of Disney World. And when anyone criticizes the gay community they are labeled homophobes, when in reality there is a lot about the gay community that needs to be criticized and aired out before we pull it into the mainstream of American families. Society simply does not seem to have the framework or the maturity to deal with this issue right now.
As far as the civil rights comparison goes, there isn’t one. The civil rights problem (Jim Crow, Loving vs Virginia, etc) was about inequitable application of the law. The law was being interpreted or applied differently based on skin color. In the case of gay marriage the question is about the introduction of new law, not the inequitable application of current law. Gay people are not being prevented from marrying. They are perfectly allowed under the law to marry in the same exact manner as anyone else. So it is clearly not a civil rights issue, but an issue of the introduction of new law extending current marriage law, and that is something that must be dealt with through legislation.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
"As far as the civil rights comparison goes, there isn’t one. The civil rights problem (Jim Crow, Loving vs Virginia, etc) was about inequitable application of the law."
On a state level, Jim Crow WAS the law of the land. This was not unequal application of existing laws, these were laws passed specifically to discriminate against Coloreds and Negroes.
http://supreme.lp.findlaw.com/supreme_court/landmark/plessy.html
"After the Civil War, the South enacted black codes to keep their former slaves under tight control. For example, some states prohibited blacks, who were not a party to a suit, from testifying in court. Others subjected blacks to criminal penalties for breaching labor contracts. In contrast, whites were only liable in a civil suit for the same action. To strike down these black codes, the nation passed the Fourteenth Amendment (July, 1868), which prohibits states from denying "to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plessy_v._Ferguson
"After the end of Reconstruction in 1877 with the withdrawal of federal troops, these efforts (of equality) were increasingly being reversed. With the end of federal control over southern governments and with the end of northern interest in protecting the rights of blacks, southern state governments began passing "Jim Crow" laws designed to prohibit blacks from using the same public accommodations as whites."
By the ruling of Plessy v Ferguson (May 1896), the US Supreme Court upheld state apartheid laws.
http://supreme.lp.findlaw.com/supreme_court/landmark/plessy.html
"On June 7, 1892, Homer Plessy, a 30-year-old shoemaker, boarded a passenger train of the East Louisiana Railway and took a seat in the "white" railcar. When he refused a conductor's orders to move to the "colored" railcar, Plessy was forcibly removed and jailed.
Plessy argued that the Louisiana statute violated, among others, the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution. After the state courts found the railcar statute to be constitutional, Plessy petitioned the United States Supreme Court, which upheld the lower court rulings.
"The object of the Fourteenth Amendment was undoubtedly to enforce the absolute equality of the two races before the law, but in the nature of things it could not have been intended to abolish distinctions based on color, or to enforce social, as distinguished from political equality, or a commingling of the two races upon terms unsatisfactory to the either ... if the two races are to meet upon terms of social equality, it must be the result of voluntary consent of the individuals."
The lone dissenting vote was cast by Justice John Marshall Harlan. In his dissenting brief, he wrote, "I am of opinion that the statute of Louisiana is inconsistent with the personal liberty of citizens, white and black, in that state and hostile to both the spirit and letter of the Constitution of the United States."
"it must be the result of voluntary consent of the individuals" The problem with this point is that by having ENFORCED separation of whites from others, there could not be even voluntary association. But I guess that bit of logic escaped the Supremes of the day.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
As to another one of your 'points':
Quote:I would be happy to have some of whatever you are smoking, dude!
Gay people are not being prevented from marrying. They are perfectly allowed under the law to marry in the same exact manner as anyone else.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Ok. You guys know I'm long-winded, but tonight I had really hoped to spend a little time with my hetero hubby (hubba hubba!), so I really will be brief.
The people who are making an argument against gay marriage have no argument of which I am aware, at least, none that holds water.
Marriage for hundreds of years had nothing whatever to do with love. It had to do with linking families for political or business purposes through the generation of offspring. If you were lucky, you found each other tolerable or occasioanlly quite compatible, but those were the exception, not the rule.
Love came into the picture fairly recently, as in, after the colonization of America. And our concept of family has changed with the times as well, today being surrounded with almost frilly ideals of love and support and companionship rather than the heavier duty and free-labor-provider it used to be.
Today, marriage and family are, for most Americans, defined in an ideal sense as bonds of love, fidelity, mutual affection and support. Money is not supposed to mean anything anymore, although our legal system has ensured that it will always be the elephant in the room that nobody talks about.
But I am here to tell you that gay and lesbian couples who wish to get married aren't just in it for the sex. After all, they can get the sex anyway. And they're not just in it for the tax incentives, insurance benefits, and legal life-partner simplifications that come with the package, although those are nice to have as I'm sure we heteros could quickly tell them.
What do they want out of it? The same things that we all want: the symbolic (and legal) joining of two people, their hearts and lives, in the sight of God if they wish (their God loves them no matter who they are, your God will not be forced to participate), for the purpose of living out their lives together in mutual affection and support, perhaps to raise families (yes, amazingly, gays and lesbians can still have offspring and even raise them without *gulp* eating the young!), just as I do with my husband.
No churches will be forced to marry people if they don't want to. (Do you think gays or lesbians even WANT to be married in the midst of such misunderstanding and contempt as they would find in the pulpits of anti-gay churches?) But Unitarian Churches, and the other freedom-loving churches like them, will finally have the same legal weight behind ALL of their ceremonies that Methodist or Lutheran churches carry behind all of theirs. This is not hostile takeover of a righteous hets-only club. This is a call for equality. And it must be fought for and won.
There is no such thing as a weed.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Your post is a fine historical discussion of Jim Crows laws, but the fact remains that the Jim Crow laws were examples of an inequitable application of law. These laws being the law of the land does not imply that they offer equal protection. These laws specifically targeted certain groups and that is an inequitable application of law. It is a violation of the 14th Amendment.
Originally posted by rue:
On a state level, Jim Crow WAS the law of the land. This was not unequal application of existing laws, these were laws passed specifically to discriminate against Coloreds and Negroes.
Quote:I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I don't smoke. Show me a law that says that a man cannot marry a woman because one or both of them are gay. To my knowledge, no such law exists. The current marriage law is applied equitably.
Originally posted by rue:
As to another one of your 'points':Quote:I would be happy to have some of whatever you are smoking, dude!
Gay people are not being prevented from marrying. They are perfectly allowed under the law to marry in the same exact manner as anyone else.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Gay people are not being prevented from marrying.
Oh, I get what you're saying. Gays can marry just like anyone else - heterosexually! You're right, man. There is no law that keeps them from heterosexual marriage. I can picture it - a gay marrying a lesbian is all right because marriage is about having kids! Wow. What a concept. That's deep.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
)was about inequitable application of the law
Not about inequitable laws, eh? OK, You don't smoke. Whatca drinking?
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Yes. Exactly. Now you’re catching on. Marriage has a definition in our society. It has had that definition for a very long time. And until now has never been questioned. Suddenly now, you want to change that definition. Fine. Get legislation for it and I’ll probably support it. But the fact remains, that the gay marriage issue is NOT a issue of the inequitable application of law, but the ADDITION of NEW law to expand the current definition of marriage.
Originally posted by rue:Quote:
Gay people are not being prevented from marrying.
Oh, I get what you're saying. Gays can marry just like anyone else - heterosexually! You're right, man. There is no law that keeps them from heterosexual marriage. I can picture it - a gay marrying a lesbian is all right because marriage is about having kids! Wow. What a concept. That's deep.
And the answer to your second question is Scotch. Single malt.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Was there a legal definition of marriage as 'between a man and a woman' before this became an issue? Not that I know of. While states have recently passed laws defining marriage as between a man and a woman (kind of like the discriminatory Jim Crow laws that were enacted in the south), it is those restrictions which are new.
I like Ben Nevis myself.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
The federal definition of marriage was common law until 1996. Show me an example of same sex marriage before then or law that in any way recognized same-sex marriage. The concept of marriage has always been between opposite sexes. The idea of same-sex is alien to the definition. That's why it is always qualified as "gay" marriage or "same-sex" marriage, it is never just marriage, because marriage has always implied opposite sexes. This isn't something that was invented in 1996, and it's disingenuous of you to imply so. The legal definition of marriage follows logically the historical and cultural definition going back to pre-historical times. The idea that this is a "new" development is lunacy and completely contrary to the facts.
Glenfiddich Special Reserve. 12 year or preferably 18 year old. I like to go to Scotland at least once every 2 years to buy it from the distillery in Banffshire.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
The federal definition of marriage was common law until 1996.
Not that I'm a stickler, but a reference would be helpful.
I discvered during the Microsoft trial that most people voiced strong, certain opinions who knew exactly zip. (I read all the posted testimony on the DoJ website as well as the laws in question b/c the news reports were pathetic.) People in general have very little interest in, or respect for, actual facts when they assert their opinions. And yes, everyone's entitled to them, but if you're going to state them publicly, then you need to be prepared for response. Up to and including supported refutation.
I back up my claims with references, and I'd appreciate it if you did the same.
Glenfiddich Special Reserve. 12 year or preferably 18 year old. What's that like? One of the smokey, peaty, sea-wrack and iodine kind?
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I'm not sure exactly why you need a reference to this. You seem to be quite aware of what we are talking about, but I aim to please.
"The second substantive section of the bill amends the U.S. Code to make explicit what has been understood under federal law for over 200 years; that a marriage is the legal union of a man and a woman as husband and wife, and a spouse is a husband or wife of the opposite sex."
http://www.lectlaw.com/files/leg23.htm
Quote:It’s very oaky and peaty. I never really understood the iodine thing. So I don’t know about that. It has sort of a fruity smell.
Originally posted by rue:
Glenfiddich Special Reserve. 12 year or preferably 18 year old. What's that like? One of the smokey, peaty, sea-wrack and iodine kind?
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
http://www.hrc.org/Template.cfm?Section=Your_Community&Template=/Conte
ntManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=19449
I didn't want to post to picture to preserve bandwidth, but as this site will show, states only recently adopted the federal DOMA (defense of marriage act, 1996) as state laws. Only three states had pre- 1996 laws defining marriage as between a man and a woman. There is not a long history of law which forbids same-sex marriage.
The reference in its entirety rests on a decision of the US Supreme Court which addressed polygamy, not sex.
The quote you selected more than anything else demonstrates the restriction of marriage was NOT codified by either formal legislation (law) or common law (which is written, but derives from practice rather than legislation). It may be that 'everyone understood' it was so, but it was not explicitly addressed.
I'm curious what would happen if an established church with the 'power vested in them by the state' decided same-sex marriage was ok with god. If they started marrying same-sex couples, would it pit the separation of church and state against restrictive marriage laws?
The US Census Bureau reports that only 25% of all households are traditional families - two opposite-sex married parents, with children at home.
Historically, in Western cultures, marriage rules were made for nobility, and later the wealthy, for property reasons. The rest of everyone, the vast majority, were under the 'common law' which was informal and poorly defined. The poor also came together for economic reasons, but it was for survival - it drove the formation of 'extended' families which often included unrelated people. To a large extent, economics is driving the formation of non-traditional families today. People who care for each other and have a sense of responsibility to each other wouldn't be banding together if, individually, they had resources to make it on their own. Love, care and responsibility would be expressed in non-economic ways.
No matter how it is decorated and filigreed, the attempt to narrowly define marriage is based on mean, spiteful prejudice. That, and finding a minority small enough that it can be stomped-on with impunity. Letting gays marry in a tolerant church of their choice doesn't hurt anybody in particular, or society in general.
Iodine - I can't describe it. You have to have smelled it to recognize it. But peat, oak and fruit - that sounds pretty good. Ben Nevis, without being sweet, is buttery with a hint of bitter toast. It spreads through your mouth like warm butter. Very smooth.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
So somehow, according to you, this radical idea that a marriage is between a man and woman is something that was invented in 1996 in order to stick it to gay people? In order to believe this you have to ignore the fact that common law marriage, as you apparently have, is between a man and woman, and that this has been the definition of marriage throughout most of Western history. And common law marriage IS defined as being between a man and a woman. One of the criteria for a common law marriage is that the couple must hold themselves out to be "husband and wife." Tell me how two men hold themselves out to be "husband and wife?"
Common law is built on English traditional morality. So I suppose that for 1700 years the religious ideals dominating Western morality as prescribed in Christian Dogma was perfectly at peace with the concept of same-sex marriages. Is that what I'm supposed to believe? Is that the story your trying to sell? That somehow, until 1996, marriage, as practiced in the Western World, was always inclusive of both sexes. The idea of marriage as being between a man and women was never put forth until 1996. This is tripe. Current marriage law simply states what has been understood about marriage for at least 1700 years, and accepted in Common law for probably a thousand years; you don't have to like it, but that's the reality we live in.
I'll have to try Ben Nevis. I'm heading over to some friends tonight, so maybe I'll stop in somewhere and pick some up, if they have it. Liquor stores around here are notoriously bare of anything worth drinking.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Whoa there big fella!
Common law was not actually based on 'morality'. If you don't believe that, check out the common law on abortion (further up the thread). And you seem to think that I claimed same-sex marriages were accepted. What I said was that it was not addressed either way, neither forbidden nor approved.
Quote:
... what has been understood about marriage for at least 1700 years, and accepted in Common law for probably a thousand years
You seem to think that western marriage is an eternal phenomenon, and homosexuality is a new-fangled one. I don't suppose you can imagine some backward village a few hundred years ago, pretty representative of how most people lived, where the priests came by only rarely. Where religion was some combination of church ritual and old-time 'pagan' beliefs and social rules. Where men and women cohabited without the benefit of clergy. Where women threw men out, and men left for other women. Where women took up with men just to have a way to feed the kids. In other words, a society where marriage was self-defined.
PS If you can find some Ben Nevis on the shelf, let me know. I've been ordering through importers. I'll give your brand a try. Cheers.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
In 1885 gay sex was ruled illegal and homosexuals were jailed. Do you really believe that in a society were gays are jailed that marriage is likely to field a same-sex definition? I really don't know why this is so difficult to grasp, because I don't think that, given what I've read, I'm going to be convinced that homosexual marriage was necessarily an accepted practice by the state anytime in the last thousand years of English law, and certainly not in the last 200 years.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
The gay marriage ethics debate is lacking a legal analysis here:
In the U.S., a marriage is a contract between 3 parties: the two partners and the state. The partners have rights and obligations spelled out under state laws. The state is a party because it defines the rights and obligations of that contract ahead of time. Under civil law, that makes it a party to the contract.
One presumption favored by pro-gay-marriage people is that the state should stay out of the bedrooms, and love lives, of those involved. However, the state's marriage-related laws are there for (mostly) the protection of those involved and the state at large. For instance: Marriages must be performed by licensed practitioners to protect against frivolous and legally complicated 'accidental' marriages. Blood tests must be performed to protect both parties (and yet-unconceived children) from highly dangerous pregnancies. Age limits apply (and they are notably not those of 'adulthood' - many states have a 14-years-old minimum marriage age, not 18). Rights of inheritance and taxation are clearly defined according to black letter law - this is a right, this is not, this is an obligation, this is not.
These laws protect both the state and the parties. They are good and worthwhile laws, mostly.
I favor amending state laws to define marriages as being of a certain 'class'. Class T (traditional hetero) would be required to conform to certain standards. Class 'G' (gay men), like Class 'L' (lesbian), would not be required to submit to a blood test ensuring chromosomal compatibility for child-rearing. Class 'M' (multiple, polygamous) marriages would have quite a few additional strictures placed on them, specifically, that all parties in the marriage must agree to the marriage or it is null/void, that all parties have been advised of the current marital status of all other parties, that that a marriage contract can only be amended with the informed consent of all involved, and if one of the parties is incompetent, the rights of that incompetent party must be protected.
There is quite a bit of interesting law to be made if polygamy is acceptable. I am quite happy in my standard hetero one. Mine is in no way threatened by others. However, I want to make sure of something as a citizen. We've decided our society is obligated to protect the least among it. Thus, we must carefully create legal strictures that people can best find happiness in.
In short, civil laws apply with some caveats. Other laws must be updated if the standard definition changes. It's not hard, we just have to think about how to protect our citizens in the best way possible.
Oh, and by the way - I'm Unicorn's husband, and quite proud of it... (grin).
(And Seagram's 7 is best, served with cool but not cold 7 up, and a small amount of Peach Schnapps)
--Kevin
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Before I start, I just want to make a side note on polygamy... What's wrong with polygamy, from a purely religious standpoint, assuming for a moment that we're only talking about love-based, family-raising arrangements where there is mutual respect in abundance? (Leaving aside, for a moment, the muddier waters associated with money, taxes, fraud, and the government's piece of the pie...)
Incidentally, the Holy Bible itself allows polygamy for anybody who can take care of such a large responsibility as all of those wives and children can be. Judaic tradition (I can't remember if this one's in the Bible itself, or if it's just the Oral Tradition) also insists upon a practice we Americans would consider to be incest: namely, when a man dies without any children, his brother must marry the dead man's wife (his sister-in-law) and impregnate her with a child 'for the dead brother' so that his soul can rest in peace. So if you're looking to the Judeo-Christian tradition for supporting how bad polygamy is, don't look back too far.
Okay. My actual point: Obviously black letter law about sex and two thousand years of what was going on in England (surely the most pertinent of all bodies of law to this debate, British law) are more important in this thread than the intention or spirit of the laws of our country as laid out by the founders all those years ago.
Did the founders write about white land-owning men instead of all people? Of course. Probably they couldn't imagine a society where all people were fully equal. Should we then assume that we must discriminate between black and white people because the founders didn't include them? Between men and women? Just because the original application of basic principles of equality and freedom wasn't extended to its full and logical end, that all _people_ were created equal, doesn't mean we the people should assume they deliberately left out most of the melting pot.
Prohibiting same sex marriage is illegal discrimination based on sex (saying you can't get married because your partner isn't the right sex). It's an invasion of privacy since the government has no right to regulate what goes on between consenting adults, either religiously, or behind closed doors when no illegal substance abuse is occurring. If the U.S. government can tell two men going to my UU Church that our church can't marry them, that's state interference with a private religious ceremony. That blows separation of church and state out of the water. AND it's the state saying it will recognize some religions above others, (all Catholic marriages recognized, only some UU marriages recognized) which is completely illegal according to the First Amendment.
Denying two people who are in love the right to marry when they are both single (so no contradictory contractual obligations exist), both of legal age, and are both competent to make decisions for themselves is just plain wrong.
It's especially wrong if the reason for that denial is that it makes some people uncomfortable. If you don't like a movie, don't go into the theater where it's playing. If you don't like caviar, don't eat it. If you're a man and you don't like men marrying men, then don't marry one.
I'm really getting fed up with all of the brain-dead, illogical arguments being made against allowing gay couples to marry. You can't logically support an argument against it, because they're people too, dammit! They fight and die for our country, just like straight people! They work hard to earn a living, just like hets. They contribute a great deal to society, just as you or I do. They deserve to be able to marry their emotional and spiritual life-partners just like I married mine. (And please don't tell me they should just pick somebody more appropriate, because I'd like to see YOU choose who YOU fall in love with!) They deserve to raise their families as recognized legal entities. There is no logical reson to deny them legitimacy, and the DOMA people make asses of themselves pretending there is.
Marriage doesn'
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Yeah. And guaranteed to keep divorce lawyers employed for the next thousand years.
Originally posted by justanyone:
I favor amending state laws to define marriages as being of a certain 'class'. Class T (traditional hetero) would be required to conform to certain standards. Class 'G' (gay men), like Class 'L' (lesbian), would not be required to submit to a blood test ensuring chromosomal compatibility for child-rearing. Class 'M' (multiple, polygamous) marriages would have quite a few additional strictures placed on them, specifically, that all parties in the marriage must agree to the marriage or it is null/void, that all parties have been advised of the current marital status of all other parties, that that a marriage contract can only be amended with the informed consent of all involved, and if one of the parties is incompetent, the rights of that incompetent party must be protected.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
In 1885 gay sex was ruled illegal and homosexuals were jailed.
That does not quite address marriage, but I'll work with it.
In Ireland? That was the only reference I could find. But that certainly puts a hole in your argument that gay marriage has been illegal in Christian-English law for 1700 years. If I do the numbers correctly, it works out to only 110 years.
Your original claim did get me to thinking, though. When did Christianity come to the British Isles? King Arthur is presumed to have existed around 550 AD, and Christianity was not the dominant religion of the common class at the time. What was the status of British religion around 300 AD? I could look it up, but haven't, it's just a side note. I was wondering if you happen to know offhand.
This thread is getting tastier with every post. Smacks lips. Looks forward to this evening.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:I’m not sure what you’re talking about, rue. But my confusion aside, I never said it was necessarily illegal, although in many places and times it was. What I said was that, historically, marriage has been defined as being between a man and a woman, and that is true. Common Law clearly states that marriage is between a man and woman. You’re attempts to pull some quasi-Christian isolated ancient village out of history and claim this disproves what has clearly been the predominate definition of marriage is disingenuous. You can imagine yourself 'shooting holes' in my theory all you want, but it's just lunacy to pretend that same-sex marriage was a norm anytime in recent history. I don't understand your obstinacy in this, to be honest. Is it really that hard to believe that marriage has historically been defined as being between a man and woman in the Western world, particularly a Western Christian world?
Originally posted by rue:
In 1885 gay sex was ruled illegal and homosexuals were jailed.
That does not quite address marriage, but I'll work with it.
In Ireland? That was the only reference I could find. But that certainly puts a hole in your argument that gay marriage has been illegal in Christian-English law for 1700 years. If I do the numbers correctly, it works out to only 110 years.
Quote:The time period for King Arthur ranges between 460 AD and 560 AD.
Originally posted by rue:
Your original claim did get me to thinking, though. When did Christianity come to the British Isles? King Arthur is presumed to have existed around 550 AD, and Christianity was not the dominant religion of the common class at the time. What was the status of British religion around 300 AD? I could look it up, but haven't, it's just a side note. I was wondering if you happen to know offhand.
This thread is getting tastier with every post. Smacks lips. Looks forward to this evening.
And in 300 AD Christianity was a major if not dominate influence among the common class in Britain. All the southern Romano-British Cities (Britain below the Hadrian wall) probably had very large Christian populations in 300 AD. Christianity was the religion of the common class; that's where its strength existed. The reason for this fast spread of Christianity in Britain was that the Roman legions stationed in Britain were largely from the Eastern Empire, which was largely Christian. To say nothing of the oppressive nature of the Roman and other pagan state-religions, which tended to foster a support for non-Roman, particularly unsanctioned, religions. But Christianity would not gain a permanent stable foothold in Britain until probably the late 6th to early 7th century.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Holy crap, I get busy for a few days and look what happens. I guess it was to be expected.
Quote:
Originally posted by Radhil:
A sect practiced it recently in Canada and the US, actually. Some group clinging to Mormon orthodoxy. Not sure if they've been broken up yet.
Point of fact, this isn't Mormon Orthodoxy.
A few years ago I took an intro religion class and at the end we got to pick (as a class) 4 representitives for certain religions to come in and give a short talk. One of them was Mormon.
The first words out of his mouth was (paraphrase), "We do not practice poligamy nor do we agree with it. We praticed it until there was laws made against it; we obey the law. Anyone that does so is not a Mormon nor would be even have a hope of being recognized by our church."
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Point of fact, this isn't Mormon Orthodoxy.
Bad wording. I had presumed that meant the "old ways", when a simple dictionary check proves me wrong. It seems to represent a strict old-school sect when applied to other religious groups.
Mormons did (past tense) practice polygamy, hence my use of the word clinging. I didn't mean to imply current Mormons. The group I referenced was using old Mormon teachings, combined with the usual nutjob fascination with abuse, and mainly it seemed because got them several easily controlled wives.
Air cleared.
Radhil Trebors
Persona Under Construction
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
...so I'll simply say that in fact with the recent politicization of the gay marriage arguments, there have already been attempts by polygamists to seek state sanctioning of their polygamy. So this slippery slope exists and is currently in practice working its way through the courts as we speak.
Pardon me, but I was talking about the rediculusness of saying that allowing homosexuals to marry would incurr other things. Just because some people are trying doesn't mean that the slippery slope exists.
But, since gay marriage isn't legal, how can this be related? How can legalized gay marriage produce polygamy when it isn't legal? Hmmm...
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
But today, we condemn a man for refusing a court order to remove the Ten Commandments from a court house, but not a Mayor who commits 5000 counts of a felony by signing marriage licenses he has no right to sign.
It's call SEPERATION OF CHURCH AND STATE!!!!
The second is called a political statement. I whole heartedly agree with what was done and condem those that forced the stopage of it. If you want the mayor put to justice for what he did, then start a campain for it.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
The media can't seem to recognize that the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church was not an example of mass pedophilia, but rather gay perverts abusing the priesthood to impose themselves on impressionable young men, in the same way that straight perverts have been known to impose themselves on impressionable young women.
Reference please.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
The gay community cannot seem to express themselves without stripping down to a pink thong and dry humping each other on a float in full view of children or openingly having sex in the parking lot of Disney World.
What?!?!?!?
What you don't seem to understand is that you can't take the actions of a few and apply it to the many.
Also, what about the straight people who have sex in parking lots? What about straight people who grope eachother in public?
It seems to me that when people find the straight version happening the will at most shake there head and be disappointed. But, if there are gays doing the same thing, then all holy hell breaks loose! Hipocratical Bigotry!
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
...when in reality there is a lot about the gay community that needs to be criticized and aired out before we pull it into the mainstream of American families. Society simply does not seem to have the framework or the maturity to deal with this issue right now.
You are right, but not in the way you think. These stereotypes must be abolished for the FUBAR that they really are.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
As far as the civil rights comparison goes, there isn’t one.
< sarcasm >
Yah, you're right. Same-sex marriage isn't part of civil rights.
< /sarcasm >
I'd say that what you are saying is a joke if it wasn't so sad
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Actually it’s called Tyranny. That’s what you call it when the government, under the control of a single person, usurps the will of the people and imposes his own will in its place.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
The second is called a political statement. I whole heartedly agree with what was done and condem those that forced the stopage of it. If you want the mayor put to justice for what he did, then start a campain for it.
Quote:I agree.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
Yah, you're right. Same-sex marriage isn't part of civil rights.
Quote:The truth can have that affect on people.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
I'd say that what you are saying is a joke if it wasn't so sad
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Finn
Quote:
Marriage has a definition in our society. It has had that definition for a very long time.
The federal definition of marriage was common law until 1996.
The legal definition of marriage follows logically the historical and cultural definition going back to pre-historical times.
The second substantive section of the bill amends the U.S. Code to make explicit what has been understood under federal law for over 200 years
common law marriage ... is between a man and woman, and that this has been the definition of marriage throughout most of Western history
Common law is built on English traditional morality. So I suppose that for 1700 years the religious ideals dominating Western morality as prescribed in Christian Dogma ...
In 1885 gay sex was ruled illegal and homosexuals were jailed
historically, marriage has been defined as being between a man and a woman
You vacillate between saying heterosexual marriage was historical, defined, understood (but inexplicit), and legalistic. You own postings indicate a lot of confusion.
I take my cues from the statement: "The second substantive section of the bill amends the U.S. Code to make explicit what has been understood under federal law for over 200 years ..." In other words, people made assumptions, but it was not addressed explicitly, either by definition, by common law, or by legislation. Thus, the *ss-clenched response to promote, create and defend a new law which did not previously exist, for the sole purpose of explicit discrimination where none previously existed.
I never said that same-sex marriage was approved. I have consistently said the laws have been SILENT on the issue. I don't appreciate being misreprsented time and time again.
Perhaps you should read Unicorn's post, if you haven't done so already. It is not confused, it is rational, complete and eloquent.
On another topic, I went back to just one old thread and pulled a quote from you:
Quote:Apparently you think you support freedom. I'm curious what this supposed freedom consists of in your mind, if it does not include personal liberty.
(we) support freedom, capitalism, democracy, whatever you want to call it
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:No one's misrepresenting you. You are ignoring the reality that English common law has traditionally defined marriage as being between a man and a woman. And current statutory law is simply a statement of what has been understood in Common law and dominate Christian religious tradition for at least 200 years and probably much longer. You're trying to dance around this fact with irrelevant assumptions of what might have been in some as of yet unidentified quasi-Christian ancient village in order to rewrite history to suit your desire to paint Jim Crow on anti-gay-marriage. It's the same old thing: if you don't agree with something then scream racism.
Originally posted by rue:
I don't appreciate being misreprsented time and time again.
Quote:This is a perfect example. You've pulled some obscure statement out of context, and then claim it to be mine in order to draw some conclusion that I don't support personal liberty. The statement may very well be mine. It certainly looks like something I would say, but what relevance does this have to the topic and how do you find in this that I don't support personal freedom?
Originally posted by rue:
On another topic, I went back to just one old thread and pulled a quote from you:Quote:Apparently you think you support freedom. I'm curious what this supposed freedom consists of in your mind, if it does not include personal liberty.
(we) support freedom, capitalism, democracy, whatever you want to call it
I did read Unicorns posts. I don't necessarily disagree with what she said, although I also don't necessarily agree with the notion that prohibiting same-sex marriage is necessarily bigotry or illegal (in fact it is quite legal.) I am, as I've already stated, in favor of allowing same-sex marriage, but that doesn't mean that I'm ready to agree with the emotional rhetoric being thrown around by the anti-anti-gay-marriage camp. Just because I'm in favor of gay marriage doesn't mean I'm going to try to rewrite history to redefine the definition of marriage, nor am I willing to contend that there is no difference between same-sex and opposite-sex marriages and therefore should be treated with the same laws or insist that criticism of the gay community is paramount to bigotry. There is an extreme level of immaturity in the pro-gay-marriage camp, that I just can't align myself with.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
So, because a minority of gay people immaturely choose indiscretion by 'wearing pink thongs in public' and so on, you refuse to align yourself with the completely rational call for equality and justice for all citizens of the U.S.?
That's like saying that because you think afros are too shaggy, you can't align yourself with the civil rights movement.
I don't get it.
There is no such thing as a weed.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:There are two different acts of immaturity here. These pink thong wearing gay men certainly demonstrate a horrendous degree of immaturity by exposing themselves in such a manner that children are likely to see. But heterosexuals are just as likely to do that same thing. There are perverts are both sides. The difference is that if a heterosexual pervert does something that is offensive to me or my family, I can do something about it. I can criticize it. I can insist that there is something wrong with exposing my children to this and most intelligent people in this country will respect my feelings. But if a gay man does something similar and I criticize it, I’m as likely to be called a bigot or a homophobe. There’s no consideration given to the idea that I’m not a bigot or a homophobe. That I have no ill will towards gay people and even have some friends who are gay (who happen to agree with me on many things), or that I, in fact, support gay rights. Just that I criticized a gay man or the gay community is enough to get me labeled a bigot by a segment of the Left in this country. That’s the greater immaturity. It’s not rational, or just or equitable. It’s an immaturity of thought.
Originally posted by Unicorn:
So, because a minority of gay people immaturely choose indiscretion by 'wearing pink thongs in public' and so on, you refuse to align yourself with the completely rational call for equality and justice for all citizens of the U.S.?
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
As far as the polygamy question goes, those who are interested should really pick up Jon Krakauer's "Under The Banner Of Heaven," which is an interesting (as well as disturbing) read about fundamentalist Mormonism, (or, as Mormons prefer to be called, The Church of Latter-Day Saints) and how they are thriving in the American West.
Polygamy does still exist in the U.S. and Canada, albeit illegal. It has everything to do with the original tenets of the Mormon faith, and those who practice polygamy believe in the classical, fundamentalist interpretation of the faith, as begun by Joseph Smith.
It's an enlightening read about a religious segment of the U.S. population that many don't even know about, and how the practice of polygamy is destroying families.
After reading Krakauer's book, you may surprised to learn that almost all of the fundamentalist Mormons (and their huge families) live off the government, using welfare payouts; girls are forced to marry much, much older men and are expected to bear even more children; and that these poor kids and women have barely any education at all.
I'm not a Mormon, so I don't claim to know all about the LDS Church, but reading this book will definitely give you a better idea of fundamentalist religious beliefs that exist in our own country.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"My office! Burgled! Plundered! Purloined! Ha ha ha...loins."
-- Phil Sebben, Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I think we should all just have a beer and get on with our lives (wherever that goes).
Vilavon AKA Claude
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
The rights of the many gay people who don't flash small children to marry their equally inoffensive partners should not be trampled just because there is a minority of gay people who do run around clad scantily in gay pride parades. (Frankly, what are you doing watching a gay pride parade with your children at all if that sort of thing embarrasses or offends you?)
To hold all people in a minority responsible for the few bad apples is unfair and illogical. If there are people doing dangerous things in a society (never mind how I feel about public nudity-- that's another thread entirely) then everyone in the society is equally responsible for finding a legal way to put a stop to it without punishing innocent parties in the process. According to the law of this land, protecting the innocent has always taken precedence over punishing the guilty.
If people can't marry their partners because they're gay, that's discrimination. Plain and simple. I'm sorry if it offends you, but I'm calling a spade a spade. Just because you have gay friends who acknowledge how very far away we are from equality doesn't mean they wish to abdicate the right to have their long-term, monogomous relationaships sanctioned and supported by the state to which they pay taxes.
As for the whole perversion question which keeps getting tossed casually arounnd in this conversation, the number of heterosexual perverts in this country is far greater than the number of homosexual perverts, where the word pervert is used to describe molesters, sex offenders, and people who would harm others in a sexually intimate way. Yet somehow, heterosexuals are allowed to marry without anyone questionning their right to do so. EVEN PREVIOUSLY CONVICTED SEX OFFENDERS are allowed to get married to whomever they want if their partners are consentual and of the opposite gender. I've never heard anyone mention this as a concern.
Child molestation is completely separate from homosexuality, just as it is completely separate from heterosexuality. Generally, molesters are people who have suffered such abuse at the hands of others that the only way they can feel good about themselves, feel powerful, is to hurt somebody else. I'll get back to you with some statistics on that separation of loving versus non-loving sexuality.
There is no such thing as a weed.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I bet the guy who started this thread is now shaking his head - in amusement or irony - at the "unimportant" arguements that have now hijacked the thread.
Ah well.
Radhil Trebors
Persona Under Construction
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Actually it’s called Tyranny. That’s what you call it when the government, under the control of a single person, usurps the will of the people and imposes his own will in its place.
I really think that you should check a dictionary about this word.
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=Tyranny
"
A government in which a single ruler is vested with absolute power.
"
Note the "absolute." If the local government in this case had absolute power then this would still be happening. It isn't, so therefore there is no absolute power and thus isn't a tyranny.
But, don't you have a precedence legal system down there? If so, wouldn't this be an attempt to set one?
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:Quote:
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
Yah, you're right. Same-sex marriage isn't part of civil rights.
I agree.
You're one of those people that like quoting out of context aren't you.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:Quote:
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
I'd say that what you are saying is a joke if it wasn't so sad
The truth can have that affect on people.
Um, what?
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
@Radhil:
How has the thread been hijacked? This is about gay-rights which is in the threads title.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Interesting thread - so many things to comment on, but I'll start with polygamy.
RhymePhile:
Quote:
Polygamy does still exist in the U.S. and Canada, albeit illegal. It has everything to do with the original tenets of the Mormon faith, and those who practice polygamy believe in the classical, fundamentalist interpretation of the faith, as begun by Joseph Smith.
As a current and former, although non-practicing (I'm an observant agnostic), Mormon (I'm not concerned with the looong, "proper" name), I feel qualified to interject.
I don't know about "classical" but it is "fundamental." Joseph Smith initiated polygamy because (this is the party line given to women, I'm sure the actual reasoning was quite different) many more women were being converted to the Church than men, and since only temple marriage guaranteed accession to the highest "heaven" (Eternal Kingdom in Mormon parlance), polygamy was introduced to ensure as many souls made it as possible. *sarcasm alert* It had nothing to do with a bunch of dirty old men wanting to boink the fresh-faced immigrants joining the community. /sarcasm
Quote:
It's an enlightening read about a religious segment of the U.S. population that many don't even know about, and how the practice of polygamy is destroying families.
Many don't know about it because they don't live in Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Northern Mexico, or British Columbia.
Quote:
After reading Krakauer's book, you may surprised to learn that almost all of the fundamentalist Mormons (and their huge families) live off the government, using welfare payouts; girls are forced to marry much, much older men and are expected to bear even more children; and that these poor kids and women have barely any education at all.
I wouldn't be surprised, but then again, I've known about this most of my life. In addition to living off the gummint, these "patriarchs" don't pay much in the way of taxes, and yet a lot of the wealthier ones have "family" businesses to keep them in the style to which they've become accustomed. If not their younger wives and children, because if the gummint's paying for them, why should the patriarchs bother?
Just my cynicism coming out, nothing to worry over.
On the other hand, this is just one sect of a religion that now (publicly) rejects the article of polygamy. While mainstream Mormonism does not practice polylgamy, in the here-and-now, it does practice afterlife polygamy. A man can marry more than one woman in the temple, if he is divorced or widowed, thus having more than one wife in the hereafter. Women cannot, just as they cannot hold the priesthood. Until very recently, women could not even get a temple divorce, it must be obtained by her husband - the temple divorce cuts all ties, both now and after death.
Incidentally, I found out my mother and father had been divorced in the temple only after my mother remarried in the temple. But that's probably just a personal issue and I should shut up about it now. ;-D
As for the thread topics: Stem cell research - yes. Gay rights - gay people are human beings, and deserve anything and everything every other human being is owed. Abortion - don't care for it, but it's none of my business what another human being does with her body. Jane Jackson's boob - hasn't she gone bananas like her brother, yet?
I don't see what all the kerfuffle is about gay marriage, or even polygamous marriage. Somebody else's personal relationship is no concern of mine. My relationship with my husband is no concern of anybody else, and I don't see how two (or more) people getting married affects our marriage in any way. I mean, seriously. If my friend Richard married the love of his life (which he will be doing shortly), it will make me happy for him, and surprise lessen my commitment to my husband not one iota. If five people decide to marry each other because that's the way they feel about it, same consequence.
It's not my business until I'm invited to the ceremony, and even then, I would atte
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Okay.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
I really think that you should check a dictionary about this word.
Tyrant:
an absolute ruler unrestrained by law or constitution b : a usurper of sovereignty
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=tyrant
In other words, a Mayor who ignores democratically enacted law by the will of the people in favor of his own ideology might be called a tyrant. Unless he’s usurping the will of the people in a way you agree with, then I guess it’s okay, right?
Quote:True. But why can’t I criticize perverts for being perverts without being accused of being anti-gay? The way I see it, and the way I think millions of American see it, is that the pro-gay marriage camp is telling me that I must accept the perverts with the gay marriage or else I’m a bigot. I must accept the tyrant Mayors with the gay marriage. I must accept the insulting and dismissive attitude towards my sacred traditions. I must accept all of these things with the gay marriage or else I’m a bigot. That’s not good enough. If that’s the choice you intend to give Middle America, then Middle America will choose NOT gay marriage. Not because they are necessarily opposed to it or something like it, but because they are opposed to the perverts and the tyrant Mayors and the dismissing of their traditions. I’m in favor of gay marriage, but if I feel that in order to bring the gay community into the mainstream of American families I must acquiesce the perverts, then it’s not going to happen.
Originally posted by Unicorn:
The rights of the many gay people who don't flash small children to marry their equally inoffensive partners should not be trampled just because there is a minority of gay people who do run around clad scantily in gay pride parades.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I don't have a problem if you're offended by nudity in public. You're free to have your feelings about it and free to talk about it. As far as I'm concerned, public nudity is a completely separate issue from gay marriage. Frankly, I find it offensive that so many people seem to think these issues are linked.
But there are a lot of people who aren't as offended by frat guys --who show up in speedos to have a kegger in stadium seats in mid November, not even when they paint their bare chests in school colors and get drunk on TV-- as you say you are by men wearing thongs in Boystown parades. I don't see a difference there, and it mystifies me that some people do.
The pro-gay-marriage movement is about human rights. The people on this side of the argument who are really serious about it aren't asking for the 9:00 News to be shot in the nude. They're not asking to pose nude in storefronts up and down Michigan Avenue. They're not asking to mandate public nudity in all midtown parks between the hours of six and nine every second Thursday. They're not interested in affecting at all what other people do when they get married. We don't disdain other people's customs and beliefs. All we're asking is that our equally valid rights and beliefs be respected, which right now, they aren't.
Why do the people on the anti-marriage side of this issue always seem to think they have to give up something, anything, that's rightfully theirs? If your church holds that marriage is defined as a union between a man and a woman, fine. Nobody's forcing your church to change its stance. But at a national level, there should be no laws governing what consenting adults can and can't do with their own bodies and lives, provided no laws that affect other people's safety or physical well-being are broken. I ask the room: can somebody please tell me what the 'anti-'s are giving up if nice gay couples can marry? Please?
Finn--
Not knowingly having accused you of anything (if I'm wrong, show me the quote, and I mean the complete sentence), I can't speak for the people who call you anything. I reiterate that in my view, to be anti-gay marriage is to take an unsupportable (and I say again, Unconstitutional) stance against the civil rights of a minority of United States citizens, including gays, lesbians, and all members of churches wishing to be free of state interference in bestowing the sacrements of marriage.
In my view such a stance is bigoted. I have deliberately criticized the position rather than the people holding that position outright because I have no personal knowledge of any of those people. This is not a personal attack on a person or persons. This is my strong criticism of what I feel to be an unsupportable and unconscionable position.
I've had my husband helping me out looking around on the internet for information. (I'm such a slave driver...) I wish I could remember where I read the statistical information I remember. Anyway, here is a site which had a wealth of statistics and citations. (The four to six religious sites I looked at regarding the 'evils' of being gay all had the same single article blaming the scandal in the Catholic Church on gays, although they offer very little in the way of studies, statistics, or scientifically arrived-at data to bolster their claims; there were no numbers used in that article.)
http://www.jeramyt.org/gay/gayhealth.html
In particular, direct your attention down the page a ways to:
3) Homosexuals are no more promiscuous or predatory than heterosexuals
And read from there. Lots of statistical data from reputable sources. Most mainstream psychologists and psychiatrists agree that statistically speaking, homosexuals are no more likely to commit sex offenses or acts of pedophilia than are straight people.
There is no such thing as a weed.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
OK, sum-up reply to everything I see - too lazy to make separate posts here.
Finn: True. But why can’t I criticize perverts for being perverts without being accused of being anti-gay? The way I see it, and the way I think millions of American see it, is that the pro-gay marriage camp is telling me that I must accept the perverts with the gay marriage or else I’m a bigot. I must accept the tyrant Mayors with the gay marriage. I must accept the insulting and dismissive attitude towards my sacred traditions.
Maybe you're listening to some loud-mouthed lunatic fringe lefty a bit much. I'm of the opinion that all lunatics should be ignored, myself. You are talking with what appears to be a crowd of reasonable people here, on this board. If you're being called bigot here (I've seen some statements of yours to suggest it's possible), it's also being pointed out why, and I doubt it's simply because of a problem with thongs. If it's from some lunatic somewhere else, it's worthy of being ignored.
On the tyrant thing: Yes, rule of the majority by a minority (or singular) is tyranny. On the flip side, rule of the minority by a majority is mob rule. You cannot justify something as right simply because it falls into either category. Both are something to be avoided, in my opinion. To avoid either, it takes reason, and balance - traits in precious and rare supply these days, at least in the public spotlight.
Sigmanunki: How has the thread been hijacked? This is about gay-rights which is in the threads title.
Re-read the title. It's asking how these things are so important against so many other things. Thus, I say hijack. This thread was surely NOT intended to be a new debate on these topics. I merely find it amusing that it has.
Reequeen: Take religion out of all these issues, please. Myth and legend should not bear upon our laws, only morality and ethics.
Great post, by and large. Just one small flaw. Myth, legend, religion, all inform our morality and ethics. They are some of the founding blocks. It is impossible to separate morals from some legend that demonstrates it. Someone can come up with ethical and moral thoughts on their own, surely, but a religion often provides a grounding in practicality and reality (I say this with full sense of irony) that free-form ethics lack. The problem is not involvement of religion - the problem is the priority of religion. When beliefs come before reason, when a faith is more important than the results of that faith, is where it all goes FUBAR.
A stolen line that puts it more bluntly: Does the sacred brook no improvement?
Unicorn: Thank you for saying everything I probably would have tried to say and screwed up.
Rhymepile: I am not suprised. At all. Leeches are leeches, whether dealing with wives or money.
Radhil Trebors
Persona Under Construction
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Okay.
Tyrant:
an absolute ruler unrestrained by law or constitution b : a usurper of sovereignty
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=tyrant
In other words, a Mayor who ignores democratically enacted law by the will of the people in favor of his own ideology might be called a tyrant. Unless he’s usurping the will of the people in a way you agree with, then I guess it’s okay, right?
Perhaps you should look up the world absolute. Again if the mayor had absolute power, this would still be going on, period.
The mayor was restrained by law.
But, then again, the bay area has a huge gay population and the turn out was massive to get married. So, then it was the will of at least a large chunk of the local population to have this done.
Thus an argument could be made that this was the will of the people.
And I'd really like to hear a comment from you on my comment about your presedence type legal system.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
True. But why can’t I criticize perverts for being perverts without being accused of being anti-gay?
You can, no-one is saying otherwise. What we are saying is that you can't make gross generalizations based on a select minority of any populace.
If the gay community told me that I'm a womanizing
because they based what I am on the sterotypical jock at university, I'd be calling them a bigot just the same.You seem to be confusing what a pervert is, or aren't you aware of any hetero perverts?
You also complain about being called anti-gay when what this statement also says is that you think gays are perverts?
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
The way I see it, and the way I think millions of American see it, is that the pro-gay marriage camp is telling me that I must accept the perverts with the gay marriage or else I’m a bigot. I must accept the tyrant Mayors with the gay marriage. I must accept the insulting and dismissive attitude towards my sacred traditions.
Where the hell are you getting this? No-one is telling you that you have to accept such things.
And what the hell is with the sacred traditions?
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Not because they are necessarily opposed to it or something like it, but because they are opposed to the perverts and the tyrant Mayors and the dismissing of their traditions. I’m in favor of gay marriage, but if I feel that in order to bring the gay community into the mainstream of American families I must acquiesce the perverts, then it’s not going to happen.
I really think that you are against it.
You start off saying that you're for it and then say that you can't speak of perverts without being called anti-gay? What the hell?!?!?
I'm really starting to think that your legal stance against gay marriage is some sort of justification for you yourself being anti-gay.
You spout off about the "perverts" and then compain about being called a bigot? If I were gay and you were talking about us, the word "pervert" kept coming up and you spoke of us as you are doing now... I be calling you a bigot and justifibly so.
You can keep talking about how same-sex marriage is illegal, the act of one mayor, the acts of a minority of minorities, blah, blah, blah until the cows come home. You still aren't addressing the issue and are being quite prejudice in the process.
You have to start talking about what we are, which is what should be and the reasons why. We have posted a number of links which are found above and backed it up with logic.
You've posted prejudice, bigotry and opinion. All your arguments are, is a house of cards. You can't build a case based on exceptions to a rule.
I find it absolutly stunning that people like you actually still exist. I guess it's just proof of how far we still have to go and a race
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Radhil:
Sigmanunki: How has the thread been hijacked? This is about gay-rights which is in the threads title.
Re-read the title. It's asking how these things are so important against so many other things. Thus, I say hijack. This thread was surely NOT intended to be a new debate on these topics. I merely find it amusing that it has.
"Stem-Cells, Gay rights, Abortion, Janet Jackson's boob..what's the problem ??"
We seem to be discussing that now.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Radhil:
Great post, by and large. Just one small flaw. Myth, legend, religion, all inform our morality and ethics. They are some of the founding blocks. It is impossible to separate morals from some legend that demonstrates it.
Sure it is. Name one religion from the west and one from the east and they teach certain values differently. If the value wasn't seperable from the legend then it couldn't be taught another way and that way would be across the world. It isn't, thus qed.
Quote:
Originally posted by Radhil:
...
but a religion often provides a grounding in practicality and reality (I say this with full sense of irony) that free-form ethics lack.
Speaking specifically to this conversation.
Which religion? There are a number of radically differently ones in North America as with the world and it's just getting more and more diverse because of the relative ease of immigration.
So, which one do we follow to guide the laws?
It's one of the reasons why I like secular government so much.
Quote:
Originally posted by Radhil:
The problem is not involvement of religion - the problem is the priority of religion. When beliefs come before reason, when a faith is more important than the results of that faith, is where it all goes FUBAR.
I think that problem is both... and more. The priority of religion is as you say, way too high. But religion should have no bearing no what is commanded to the public in general.
Should christians be allowed to force there way on those that don't wish it? Should any religion?
I really think that this gay-rights things boils down to that. The people in power are trying to oppress a people. This never works out for the best.
(not directed at Radhil specifically, just a comment
)Look at Rome. They tried to supress the christians and look what happened. So, if this happened to them, then I could happen to GW and friends.
But then again, I wouldn't suggest that a christian in north america would know about such things. That would require reading outside of the scope of the bible, which is after all, evil.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Radhil:
Quote:
Great post, by and large. Just one small flaw. Myth, legend, religion, all inform our morality and ethics. They are some of the founding blocks. It is impossible to separate morals from some legend that demonstrates it.
I beg to differ, although I thank you for your analysis. Philosophy - not religious philosophy, the other kind - has of old searched for moral and ethical foundations people can live with, and use to live with other people, without resorting to the "Great Beard in the Sky Said So" argument. It is most definitely possible to separate the morals from the legend, since legends sprang up to explain the morals. Although that could be a long chicken'n'egg argument....
(edited because I'm up at 2am with Insomnia)
"There is no grace under pressure for a cat on fire." Cosi
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:I don’t think you’ve said anything that would constitute a personal attack against me; and you’ve certainly not said anything to me that I found offensive. Compared to many discussions that I’ve been involved in, this one has been very civil and interesting.
Originally posted by Unicorn:
Finn--
Not knowingly having accused you of anything (if I'm wrong, show me the quote, and I mean the complete sentence), I can't speak for the people who call you anything. I reiterate that in my view, to be anti-gay marriage is to take an unsupportable (and I say again, Unconstitutional) stance against the civil rights of a minority of United States citizens, including gays, lesbians, and all members of churches wishing to be free of state interference in bestowing the sacrements of marriage.
But I’m using my own experiences more as a metaphor then anything else. I’m trying to point out how immature the pro-gay marriage argument has become. I realize that you feel that you are arguing in favor of civil rights and freedom, and you may be, but the issue is more complex then polarizing it as gay marriage is right and traditionalists are bigots. I believe that until the pro-gay marriage camp can learn to appreciate that one can oppose gay marriage without being a bigot, they will have a very hard time getting gay marriage to stick.
Quote:Without a doubt the lunatic fringe of the Left is where this kind of thing gets most attention, and I’m not necessarily referring to anything or anyone here. The problem is that the pro-gay marriage camp has become a mop up organization seeking to “cover-up” the problems with the gay community instead of pointing them out and denouncing them. I realize that many people who favor gay marriage believe that they must protect the image of the gay community in order to protect American sympathy for the gay community, but this is a mistake, because Americans need to see more maturity coming from the gay community. Americans need to know that the gay community can police itself, set boundaries and understand the reasons why grown men dry-humping themselves in public is not the kind of behavior that washes with the American family. You all seem to be arguing (some more bluntly then others) that traditionalists are the problem, and that the core of American traditionalism needs to change in order to suit gay marriage. What the pro-gay marriage camp seems to refuse to see is that there needs to be change in the gay community and in the way that community presents itself as well, and in fact, first. People seem to insist that the gay community has no problems and that the apparent corruption and indecency displayed by the gay community is just a few fringe elements. Maybe, maybe not. I don’t know. What I do know is that gay marriage will never be reality so long as traditionalists form the core of the American populus and gay rights activists intend to put forth a divisive and aggressive policy. So you have two options, wait and hope that the American core changes to something less traditional, which is at best a long wai
Originally posted by Radhil:
Maybe you're listening to some loud-mouthed lunatic fringe lefty a bit much. I'm of the opinion that all lunatics should be ignored, myself. You are talking with what appears to be a crowd of reasonable people here, on this board. If you're being called bigot here (I've seen some statements of yours to suggest it's possible), it's also being pointed out why, and I doubt it's simply because of a problem with thongs. If it's from some lunatic somewhere else, it's worthy of being ignored.
On the tyrant thing: Yes, rule of the majority by a minority (or singular) is tyranny. On the flip side, rule of the minority by a majority is mob rule. You cannot justify something as right simply because it falls into either category. Both are something to be avoided, in my opinion. To avoid either, it takes reason, and balance - traits in precious and rare supply these days, at least in the public spotlight.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Oh, for crying out loud. Trying to say, as Finn Mac Cumhal has, that:
Quote:
but the issue is more complex then polarizing it as gay marriage is right and traditionalists are bigots.
is like saying that peanut butter and banana sandwiches have subtle layers. Please. The people who want to get married just want that. There is no agenda, unless you call wanting the same thing everybody else has an agenda. The religious wingnuts of this country are the ones who have polarized the issue, so worried are they that Christianity will suddenly *poof* disappear if gay people are allowed to marry those they love.
Quote:
The problem is that the pro-gay marriage camp has become a mop up organization seeking to “cover-up” the problems with the gay community instead of pointing them out and denouncing them.
So, denying them a theoretically stabilizing institution like marriage makes it all just go away, does it? Makes the gays behave according to some sort of pre-approved seemliness? Makes everyone sit up and take notice how extremely well-behaved and discreet most Christian bananaboats are, yes?
(snipping rest of post because, well, yuck)
If everyone else is being polite to you, Finn, I will take a deep breath, gird my loins, and be rude. Because I don't have the patience to be nice - you're touting a bigoted line, you've fooled yourself into thinking you're broad-minded, and you're proselytizing. Which, to me, is about the rudest thing anyone can do.
Here's the deal: Christian Rightwing Wingnuts, of every variety and flavour, those Biblical literalists, those moon-faced morons who gave up their higher brain functions to believe everything will be oh. kay. for them if they just believe in what they're told to believe in, these same religious angels of vengeance think that marriage will somehow dissolve as a sacrament if people of the same sex have it too. To this end, they argue that somehow gay culture is, well, strident or promiscuous, or whatever their tiny little minds imagines it to be. As if there was such a thing as "gay culture," all people being individuals. Should we follow that reasoning, however, wouldn't it make more sense for those scared folks to advocate marriage, for everybody, since it cuts down on the promiscuity. At least in theory. I mean, if gays were all married to each other, they wouldn't be bothering the Straight White Male Protestants, now, would they? What with their fun lifestyles and carefree ways.
I'd love to know what "problems" the gay community has. I mean, besides the normal problems people have with each other in every situation.
People are people, people. We're all different, and we're all the same. Dividing us into pre-approved groups only serves to make you look stupid.
Unless you're a religious nutjob, in which case, enjoy your faith in the privacy of your own home, as long as it doesn't disturb anybody or frighten the horses.
/over-the-top
"There is no grace under pressure for a cat on fire." Cosi
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I do go on...
I have to get my baby girl, so this will actually be very short.
Finn--
I can agree with you that of course the gay community has problems (I don't personally know anybody who claims otherwise) if you can agree with me that these problems are not unique to the gay community. Everybody has problems.
Heck, hets have: Mardi Gras, Las Vegas, strip clubs, football games, soccor matches, basketball games, golf, Florida, gambling boats and other establishments, and reality TV in which to riot and flaunt quick nudity here and there, dressing flambuoyantly, disturbing the peace, overturning cars, and flashing people indiscriminately in some cases, usually freely yelling profanities and other explitives all the while. (I may be wrong about the majority of these types of events, but I know what I've seen on TV. I assume that's where most of the people opposed to gay marriage are getting their information too.)
I don't think anyone should be held legally responsible for the flambuoyant actions of others, but I agree with you that a nuanced position is vital in any discussion if you're going to come up with a solution that really works.
There is no such thing as a weed.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
@Finn mac Cumhal:
All you've done is come up with straw-man arguments and complain that no-one is listening to you.
If you would read the posts in response to yours you'll see that we have, very logically, gone through your arguments and argued against them, showing the straw-man-ness of them. And quite effectively if I might say so.
Why you still cling to what has been proved otherwise here I have no idea.
Perhaps you should actually read the lit. from the gays instead of (from what I can gather here) listening to the right-wing religious nuts telling you what they think the gays want and the implications as well.
I'm really actually boggled by the "reality" you live in.
How can you say that gays are perverted people because of x, y, z when x, y, z are the fringe of there culture. Not to mention that hetero culture has x, y, z (or at least the analog of it) as well.
Have you actually listened to yourself? Because by your arguments, heteros shouldn't be getting married because they are deviants as well.
You should really take the time to find out what gay culture really is and what they really do, because your idea of what it and what they are, is very very off.
You should also find out what the real implications to same-sex marriage are as what you think is, again, very very off.
And I'll mention it once more here because it really needs to be said... again.
If you are being called a bigot here, with all the quite intelligent resonable people that post to this forum... well, you might want to think about that.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Okay, one last post:
Quote:I don’t know. Do you think I can agree with that? I’ll leave that up to you, but let me remind you of a recent post from me to you:
Originally posted by Unicorn:
I can agree with you that of course the gay community has problems (I don't personally know anybody who claims otherwise) if you can agree with me that these problems are not unique to the gay community. Everybody has problems.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
These pink thong wearing gay men certainly demonstrate a horrendous degree of immaturity by exposing themselves in such a manner that children are likely to see. But heterosexuals are just as likely to do that same thing. There are perverts are both sides. The difference is that if a heterosexual pervert does something that is offensive to me or my family, I can do something about it. I can criticize it. I can insist that there is something wrong with exposing my children to this and most intelligent people in this country will respect my feelings. But if a gay man does something similar and I criticize it, I’m as likely to be called a bigot or a homophobe. There’s no consideration given to the idea that I’m not a bigot or a homophobe. That I have no ill will towards gay people and even have some friends who are gay (who happen to agree with me on many things), or that I, in fact, support gay rights. Just that I criticized a gay man or the gay community is enough to get me labeled a bigot by a segment of the Left in this country. That’s the greater immaturity. It’s not rational, or just or equitable. It’s an immaturity of thought.
To further illustrate my point:
Examine SIGMANUNKI’s posts who has consistently called me a bigot with no support for such a claim other then his contention of his own self-proclaimed reasonableness.
Examine REEQUEEN’s post who introduced his/herself to this discussion by calling me a bigot, whose support for my presumed bigotry apparently lies in her contention that Christians are “Rightwing Wingnuts” and “moon-faced morons.”
Now granted SIGMANUNKI and REEQUEEN may represent a fanatical wing of this discussion, but aside from their use of adhomenem and insults, their arguments are not dissimilar from the typical pro-gay marriage argument. The pro-gay marriage strategy is to zealously and prejudicially attack traditionalism, asserting that an anti-gay marriage position is paramount to bigotry. Indeed, one can be in favor of gay marriage (as I am), but to criticize the gay rights movement is enough to get one labeled a bigot. The desire is not to discuss the issues, but to silence dissent and criticism, through false accusations and intimidation. And when you understand this, you understand why the gay rights activists put on parades in which they ALLOW weirdoes in pink thongs to represent the gay community. These promiscuous individuals did not happen to be in the parade by mistake. They were allowed to be in the parade by parade organizers. Following the strategy as is used by SIGMANUNKI and REQUEEN, which is to say: Traditionalists are bigots therefore we will insult them. Do you believe this is a strategy that is likely to prevail, or an immature attitude which needs revising? Indeed, it did NOT prevail and in fact, now there are eleven new States with laws restricting marriage to the traditional definition.
A quote from Tammy Bruce who is, by the way, a lesbian.
“In classic Thought Police fashion and like children throwing a tantrum, the name-calling flies—those who oppose gay marriage are “homophobes,” “haters” and, the label du jour, “bigots.” Once again, the Left, unable to answer critics with respect, resort to name-calling only to further the divide they need to validate their inevitable victimhood.”
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=12339
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
English common law has traditionally defined marriage as being between a man and a woman.
Show me a historical quote in English common law that defines marriage as between a man and a woman.
Then show me a historical quote in US law (preferably legislated Federal law, or State legislated law, or Federal or State state common law) that DEFINES marriage as between a man and a woman. Definitions have meaning in law, so a presumption that that's what they WOULD have said is not adequate. To make your claim, you need to find a bona fide definition that actually says what you claim.
And I think you 'misunderestimate' history. Do you not think homosexuals actually existed in the past? For hundreds of years common laws covered all sorts of things - including when abortion is the perogative of a woman. Why is there no specific, ancient common law against homosexual relationships? Was it because they didn't happen? (Unlikely) More likely, the neighbors simply - looked the other way. Did not check too deeply into the nature of the relationship between same sex people living together BECAUSE it would not produce children, or paternity and inheritance questions. I find the silence of common law to a common situation simply astounding, and extremely revealing.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
According to FindLaw, a database of legal definitions and jurisprudence.
Quote:
. . . a common law marriage can occur only when:
1. a heterosexual couple lives together in a state that recognizes common law marriages
2. for a significant period of time (not defined in any state)
3. holding themselves out as a married couple -- typically this means using the same last name, referring to the other as "my husband" or "my wife" and filing a joint tax return, and
4. intending to be married. [Emphasis mine]
http://public.findlaw.com/family/nolo/faq/709FAEE4-ABEA-4E17-BA3483638
8313A3C.html
Since Common Law forms the bases of our statutory law, it is enough that Common Law defines marriage as being between a man and woman to support the precedence behind statutory and constitutional marriage definitions.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
That is the CURRENT state of the law, not a historical one. As you may remember, the DOMA was adopted by many states in 1996 or later, which altered their common-law marriage rules.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:I doubt the Common law definition has changed in at least a hundred years. In fact, I doubt it’s changed significantly in a thousand years. In regards to gender, anyway.
Originally posted by rue:
That is the CURRENT state of the law, not a historical one. As you may remember, the DOMA was adopted by many states in 1996 or later, which altered their common-law marriage rules.
Quote:Well, if by marriage you mean a state sanctioning of a sexual relationship between two individuals of the same sex, the answer to your question is that, in general, it probably didn’t happen. If you mean two members of the opposite sex living together and having sex, that was, at certain times and places, quite common. And in fact, usually quite accepted by the people, so there would have been no need to “look the other way,” as you contend. The state however, rarely sanctioned such relationship even in places, such as the ancient Greco-Roman world, where homosexual acts were, under certain conditions, quite common and accepted. The closes thing I know of, to a state sanctioning of a homosexual relationships, was in Ancient Greece, and I’m not completely sure that I remember the details. But while homosexual acts were, under certain conditions, not only accepted but often praised, that doesn’t mean that homosexuals were necessarily so tolerated. In fact, being gay in the ancient world was often a death sentence.
Originally posted by rue:
And I think you 'misunderestimate' history. Do you not think homosexuals actually existed in the past? For hundreds of years common laws covered all sorts of things - including when abortion is the perogative of a woman. Why is there no specific, ancient common law against homosexual relationships? Was it because they didn't happen? (Unlikely) More likely, the neighbors simply - looked the other way. Did not check too deeply into the nature of the relationship between same sex people living together BECAUSE it would not produce children, or paternity and inheritance questions. I find the silence of common law to a common situation simply astounding, and extremely revealing.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Finn mac Cumhal:
Quote:
Okay, one last post:
Promises, promises...
Quote:
Examine REEQUEEN’s post who introduced his/herself to this discussion by calling me a bigot, whose support for my presumed bigotry apparently lies in her contention that Christians are “Rightwing Wingnuts” and “moon-faced morons.”
Yes? So? If you align yourself with the propaganda espoused by those I label nutbars and religious wackaloons, then it isn't my fault that you're offended.
I stated right up front that I wasn't going to be polite.
By the way, I am female, hetero, the mother of three sons - all straight - and live in Utah. Is that enough biographical detail for you? Or do you also need to know that I'm agnostic, far left liberal, and pretty damn quick off the posting box?
To correct your mistaken impression, I did not leap into the fray with both size 9 1/2 feet by calling you a bigot. I posted a rather nicely written piece about Mormon polygamy, as I recall. Perhaps you didn't read it, because you're too focused on your own crusade? Don't matter.....
Quote:
Now granted SIGMANUNKI and REEQUEEN may represent a fanatical wing of this discussion, but aside from their use of adhomenem and insults, their arguments are not dissimilar from the typical pro-gay marriage argument.
Nah, my insults were fully deserved, and didn't come out of nowhere. If you hadn't expected heated debate, you would never have brought up your rather twisted logic. As for being "fanatical," well, fantatical is as fanatical does. I don't see me with a sign, hanging about churches, spreading the gospel of agnosticism or "gay" rights (as opposed to rights that everybody are owed, which is a point I think some have already mentioned). Nor do I pretend to be unbiased or unopinionated.
My opinions matter to me, as they should to everybody. I have the ability to say what I mean, and I intend to continue doing so. If that bothers you, it's really too bad.
Quote:
The pro-gay marriage strategy is to zealously and prejudicially attack traditionalism
Right. Because retaining everything traditional is so much better than introducing social skills and practices that would be more beneficial for everybody. If everyone obeyed tradition, we wouldn't even have this country, because people would've been too discreet to rock the British boat.
Please. There's nothing wrong with tradition, in it's place. However, worshipping tradition as the basis of everything (perceived) good, is blind and advertises ignorance. If we still practiced many traditions, I would not be able to sit here and metaphorically rave at you, Finn. I would be knitting or something. Perhaps bringing in the coal so my husband could relax after a hard day's work at the papermill. Or whatever.
I would certainly be dead, because "traditional" medicine would've killed me when I had appendicitis at 15. Progress is what forced doctors to actually get education, and progress - while not always to the good - ensures that our society is not stagnant and insular.
Quote:
Indeed, one can be in favor of gay marriage (as I am), but to criticize the gay rights movement is enough to get one labeled a bigot.
Hmm...you say you support gay marriage, but then you say:
Quote:
the gay rights activists put on parades in which they ALLOW weirdoes in pink thongs to represent the gay community. These promiscuous individuals did not happen to be in the parade by mistake. They were allowed to be in the parade by parade organizers.
So the fu
ck what? Why do you care that some guy in a pink thong is in a parade? Did you go to the parade? Did you see the parade on tv? Or did you just hear about it? And even if you were accidentally exposed to the allegedly pink thong, why do you care so much that you were? I see things all the time that offend me, but I've learned that I don't have to look. It's easy - don't effing look. I mean, jayzus. The sad thing is, this seems to be the only thing that bothers y
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Explain what? You have one state, at most two. The Traditional Marriage Camp has 38. And ultimately, the only solution that you can see is the anti-democratic option of a Supreme Court ruling to impose a minority will on the country, supposing that it comes and supposing that the ruling is in your favor? There are a lot of ifs there, a part form the questionable ethics of relying on judges to impose law in democratic system where law is supposed to be written by elected officials of legislative body. But I admire your spunk. Most people would call that loosing.
Originally posted by ReeQueen:
Hmmm....then explain the state that does allow gay marriage. And then explain, in a few months or years time, why the Supreme Court did what it had to do, by voiding those laws for being unConstitutional. It could be a long time coming, but it will come. It's something called "change," you may have heard of it.
As for the immature attitude, hey baby, it's what keeps me young.
Let me offer you an alternative:
Let’s assume that this Supreme Court ruling actually comes (I could be wrong, but I don’t think the Supreme Court would take it), and let’s assume that the ruling is in your favor. Now assuming that the pro-gay marriage camp has not made any more friends in the traditional marriage camp, and by your demeanor that would seem to be reasonable assumption, all that the traditional marriage camp has to do is hold a Convention and amend the US Constitution to negate your Supreme Court ruling (otherwise known as your one and last chance at gay marriage) thereby solving the gay marriage argument in favor of the traditionalists, presumably, forever. (Including taking away your only two states.)
They really wouldn’t even have to go to that much trouble though, because Congress could just pass a law striping the courts of any authority to act on the definition of marriage. My personal favorite, because it assures that the states can continue to legislate their own definitions of marriage, thereby preserving at least your two states (You can thank me anytime.)
Ideally the best solution for all involved, would be for both the Left and the Right in this case to come together and BOTH learn a lesson on tolerance and acceptance, but if that’s not good enough, then the Right in this case, has the power to end this for you, and there’s your change.
Like I said, the pro-gay marriage people are just not thinking this stuff through.
This really has to be my last serious post on this matter, because I've got too much work to do. And I can't spend my time thinking about this.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Finn--
I understand your distress. Example: Half of my background is Jewish, both German and Russian Jewish, and I have always identified with my Jewish and heathen roots rather than anything approaching other organized religions. (Unitarian Universalism is the exception because if you know anything about them, they are a decidedly DISorganized religion.) In college I doubled majored in English and religion with an emphasis on Judaism, my interest strongly based in the text of the Hebrew Bible and in figuring out what was in there and what we only thought was in that (I believe) largely misunderstood book of books. (Not that I believe for a moment that I even get it.)
When I visited Germany for a weekend while I was overseas a few years back, my companion for the two-day trip was a Jewish girl who said, as our train blustered through the picturesque German countryside on the way to Dresden, "Don't you feel the cold, the darkness descending over you like a plague? Can't you feel the hate? Don't you feel the horrible weight of the shadow of death, now that we're in Germany? It's like when we crossed the border, all the color drained away. Don't you feel it?" (I know, I know, we were in a writers' workshop together.)
Now outside, the weather was maybe 65 degrees F. and sunny, with a bright blue, clear sky that had a few bleach-white, fluffy clouds drifting languidly through it. We were passing beautiful rock formations, pristine rivers against a backdrop of rugged grey mountains and emerald-deep forests. We were passing glorious fields of bright orange, poppy-looking flowers, or pastures in which small herds of horses or cattle or goats ran free and uninhibited. You could tell there was a gentle breeze by looking at the trees we passed. In short, Germany, one of the lands of my ancestry, was wonderful, shiny even.
So I said, "No, I really don't feel that. I can't blame this place today for its history. The holocaust was a terrible thing, but it is an event in the past, and my Jewish roots are from here."
My companion stopped listening at 'no I don't feel that' and started shrieking at me that I was a terrible anti-semite for not feeling the jaws of Germany closing around my neck in a mystical death-grip. (Later that evening, this companion would tell some young German men we made friends with that I had told her all Germans were evil and responsible for the holocaust, which fortunately they mostly seemed to ignore, though I wanted to strangle her when she said it!) She wouldn't ever let me get a word in after that conversation on the train, though, and it was deeply frustrating and upsetting to me.
At my heart's core, I try very hard to refrain from judging people. Oh, I'll adamantly rip into an argument I feel can't hold water, and I can be quite ferocious, but I really try to understand people, where they are coming from, so this girl just totally flabbergasted me. She couldn't listen to a thing I said, and she didn't understand me at all, or try to. In her defense, her grandmother had survived one of the camps, so I can understand that it was difficult for her to feel the sun on her back in Germany. I just wish she could have accepted where I was coming from, too.
To answer your answer to my question (sheesh!), you did indeed assert that everyone has problems. But you still insist on linking disparate issues together, when they have nothing to do with each other.
And I disagree with you about someone doing harm to your family. You can raise outcry whenever that happens, no matter who does the harm. Sure there may be a few people claiming you're only accusing someone because he's gay, but there are always a few people claiming to be a minority-under-siege in some way; the truth will out.
But may I ask you a question? What harm does the guy in the thong do exactly, if you aren't in Boystown to see it? (If a guy in Boystown wears a thong and no offended people are there to see it, is it still offensive?) And why does it matter so much to some people whether the guy in
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Sorry for the double. Here, simply put, it's like this:
Regarding the will of the minority and so on,
Most times, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.
But there are times when the needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many.
It happened when thousands of white people didn't want hundreds of black people to desegregate and vote. It should happen again now, because nobody is hurt of gays can marry, but quite a few people are hurt if gays can't marry.
I'll repeat the most important part of that: Nobody is hurt if gays can marry.
Thank you, Spock.
There is no such thing as a weed.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Finn:
Actually, the only thing I "loosed" was my irritation. Nice try, though, sweetie....
Clearly you are afraid of anything other than complete mob rule. If you're in the majority, that must make you right. I think you forget that your majority is only a majority by a very slim margin. Still doesn't make it right.
Of course, it must be a relief to finally be in the majority after all those years of frustration. I mean, between the years of Reagan/Bush/Reagan/Bush/Bush/Dork and Bush/Cheney/Bush/Cheney.
Turn about is fair play, and we liberals did get spanked. I think your main concern here is that we enjoy it. True enough, masochism has it's good points, but the wheel keeps turning. That's your fear. For all the retrogressive, pseudo-Christian, and anti-humane laws passed now, there will be an accounting. That must really frighten you.
Good.
"There is no grace under pressure for a cat on fire." Cosi
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Actually, if your example is any indication, I don’t think you do. Basically, you’re just calling me a bigot; you’re just using more words. Isn’t that really what you’re saying? Did I miss your point?
Originally posted by Unicorn:
Finn--
I understand your distress. .
A better analogy would be to say that I’m telling you that I think there is something wrong with the way the Nazis are doing things and that they will hurt Germany, which most intelligent people would say is accurate. And in response you’re telling me that I’m saying all Germans are Nazis, when it is quite clearly obvious that I am only criticizing the Nazis.
Likewise, (for what has to be the tenth time now) I’m telling you that I think the gay rights movement is making a mistake in the way they are handling things and it will (and has) hurt the gay community. In response you’ve completely ignored direct comments by me, because they didn’t support the typical accusations of bigotry, and then went ahead and accused me of blaming all the gay community for the actions of a few. It’s quite obvious that is not what I’m doing.
Quote:It has nothing to do with what I want or fear. It has to do with reality. The gay rights movement cannot challenge Traditional America directly on the issue of marriage. If it comes down to a political battle of wills, you will lose.
Originally posted by ReeQueen:
Clearly you are afraid of anything other than complete mob rule. If you're in the majority, that must make you right. I think you forget that your majority is only a majority by a very slim margin. Still doesn't make it right.
My position remains the same. I personally support gay marriage, but I do no think that society has the maturity to deal with the issue of gay marriage, right now. And just about all your comments serve to support my position. There needs to be a movement away from this offensive, ad hominem-style politics. And the gay rights activists need to make the first move.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
To further illustrate my point:
Examine SIGMANUNKI’s posts who has consistently called me a bigot with no support for such a claim other then his contention of his own self-proclaimed reasonableness.
Actually, if you go back and read my posts you will find that I logically discard your opinion and call you a bigot for very logical reasons.
Yourself on the otherhand have not contested any of the points that I have brought up. You just keep stating the same very wrong opinions about the gay community.
YOU ARE BASING YOUR "KNOWLEDGE" AND OPINIONS ABOUT GAYS ON THE EXCEPTION TO THE RULE AND NOT THE RULE ITSELF.
The rule being that gays are people and have the same problems in the same proportions that the rest of us have.
I've even used your own reasoning against you proving that by your reasoning, heteros shouldn't be getting married as well. Funny you didn't comment on that.
I challenge you, again, to prove me otherwise.
You can keep saying that I've not provided support for my arguments, but as anyone can see, it is there. You just choose to ignore them.
Also, I have not called those "traditionalists" bigots. I call those that are anti-gay-marriage because all they see in the gay community is the pink thong, etc (that you keep going back to) bigots. So, if the shoe fits...
I call them bigots just like I'd call someone who says that all blacks are stupid and worthless because some inner city school's black population gets more than poor grades and a lot also go to jail a bigot as well.
Just like I'd call anyone that calls German nothing but a bunch of Nazis a bigot.
etc
As you can see, I'm not calling you a bigot because you are against gay marriage. If you were only against gay marriage that'd be a different discussion. It is the reasons why you are against it that I call you a bigot and that is what you fail to see.
Currently, you are, at least, behaving like a bigot. Now if you would just get a clue of what the gay community is really about, then we could have a conversation. The majority of the gay community isn't the pink thong, etc that you state it is. They are normal, law abidding people that just want the same rights as everyone else. The only difference is there sexual orientation.
Basically, what we know, is that bigotry comes from fear and misunderstanding. It is this misunderstanding that you must fix before you can have any meaningful discussion on this topic.
Also, you keep coming back a non-point that we aren't addressing the point that the gay community has problems with it. This is fay-fay duh pee-yen. We have addressed it by basically saying, yes but the "straight" community has the same problems in the same proportions. Thus the non-point. Re-read the above posts if you don't believe me.
And how you get from being flamboyant to promiscuous I do not know. Just because someone is flamboyant doesn't mean that they are promiscuous. It just means that they are probably a tease, but doesn't mean anything more.
And perhaps you should supply some defense for your opinions. Just because you don't like how other people argue doesn't mean that they don't have a point. It just means you don't like the delivery method or are interpreting things wrong. Don't confuse those things.
Now, you say that gays (who are currently primarily "older" though this is changing as more and more "youths" are "coming out") are promiscuous. Well let's assume that this is true for a significant portion of the gay community.
Well, what about the fact that for straight singles in there 30s+, they are quite promiscuous in general as well. You are aware of the 3rd date rule right (if it even takes to the 3rd date)?
What about for a lot of teens now, oral sex is like shaking hands, or you don't even need to know the persons name to do it?
Correct me if I'm
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Because it's not my argument. It's something you invented.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
This makes your arguments moot (and I've stated this before) as it implies that "straights" shouldn't marry as well. Why do you refuse to address this flaw in your argument?
You can't logically accuse me of bigotry if you use my argument, so you invent something and then pretend that I said it. But I never made any of the claims you accuse me of having made. You invented them all. You're entire posts is essentially a fabrication.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
A better analogy would be to say that I’m telling you that I think there is something wrong with the way the Nazis are doing things and that they will hurt Germany, which most intelligent people would say is accurate. And in response you’re telling me that I’m saying all Germans are Nazis, when it is quite clearly obvious that I am only criticizing the Nazis.
Um, what's your timeframe, because this statment is either kind of right or wholly wrong depending on when and where you are talking about. This analogy is rather bad in general because of this.
In the beginning of the the Nazi movement they were a small political party and thus couldn't be confused with Germans in general.
During the hieght of there power, there may have been confusion for the sheer amount of power that they had. But it was clear to many that many Germans were helping the allies.
And if you look to the intellecutal newspapers in the time period when the Nazis where rising to power and in influence, they definitly were saying how horrible the Nazis were. A lot even left the country before (and after) the war broke out and lived in England.
When my German wife gets home I can ask her about how many Germans in general supported the war if anyone is interested.
Now, the Nazis are just an annoyance which everyone just lets yell and shout to prove there ignorance. They are a threat only to there direct surroundings; kind of like a gang in North America. So, no confusion is there.
What at least myself (and some others) are saying is that you are a bigot because you only consider but a fraction of the gay community when you form your opinions. You must consider the whole community and compare it to our own community to see if any real differences exist. It is clear that none really do.
Gay man in pink thong - Fat man in spedo on beach
Promiscuous gay man - Promiscuous straight people
Obnoxious anti-gay marriage activist - Obnoxious pro-gay marriage activist
etc
ALL of what you've said about the gay community have a equivalent in the straight community in the same proportions. I find it interesting that you don't comment on these things.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:It’s not that I don’t comment on these things, but rather that you conveniently choose to ignore where I have said. You pick and choose my comments out of context to suit your pre-conceived accusation of bigotry. You fabricate a bigoted argument and claim I said it, when in reality I said no such thing. This is called a strawman.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
ALL of what you've said about the gay community have a equivalent in the straight community in the same proportions. I find it interesting that you don't comment on these things.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Because it's not my argument. It's something you invented.
You can't logically accuse me of bigotry if you use my argument, so you invent something and then pretend that I said it. But I never made any of the claims you accuse me of having made. You invented them all. You're entire posts is essentially a fabrication.
So, you never said that gays are promiscuous? Wait a minute, you did.
So, you never said (you know certain words have meanings and imply certain things, right?) that all gay men are the same type on the parade floats? Wait a minute, you did.
I could go on, but if you're not even going to read what you wrote, there's no point.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Some gays are.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
So, you never said that gays are promiscuous? Wait a minute, you did.
Quote:Actually I did not. You invented this.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
So, you never said (you know certain words have meanings and imply certain things, right?) that all gay men are the same type on the parade floats? Wait a minute, you did.
Quote:This is the pot calling the kettle black.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
I could go on, but if you're not even going to read what you wrote, there's no point.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:Quote:
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
ALL of what you've said about the gay community have a equivalent in the straight community in the same proportions. I find it interesting that you don't comment on these things.
It’s not that I don’t comment on these things, but rather that you conveniently choose to ignore where I have said. You pick and choose my comments out of context to suit your pre-conceived accusation of bigotry. You fabricate a bigoted argument and claim I said it, when in reality I said no such thing. This is called a strawman.
All I've read from you is something like, "The gay community is promiscuous and wears pink thongs on parade floats and I find that offensive!"
I've brought up (and others) that the straight community has the same problems in the same proportions.
Quote yourself addressing this.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:Quote:
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
So, you never said that gays are promiscuous? Wait a minute, you did.
Some gays are.
But you imply that they ALL are. Which is my problem with this and you never address the fact that a lot of straights are as well.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:Quote:
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
So, you never said (you know certain words have meanings and imply certain things, right?) that all gay men are the same type on the parade floats? Wait a minute, you did.
Actually I did not. You invented this.
You did read the word imply right? If you didn't want to say this the you shouldn't have kept going on about only refering to gays that are on the parade floats. You should have said something like, "I know that they aren't representive of the gay community, but..." which is what you exactly didn't do. But then again, that'd take a lot of wind out of the sails of your argument.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:Quote:
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
I could go on, but if you're not even going to read what you wrote, there's no point.
This is the pot calling the kettle black.
What?
On a different note, I'm finding this quick back and forth somewhat amuzing
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Well, since I never made that quote, there is no possible way you could have read that from me. So this statement of yours is basically a lie.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
All I've read from you is something like, "The gay community is promiscuous and wears pink thongs on parade floats and I find that offensive!"
Quote:Previously posted by me. (And unlike your fabricated quote, this is a real quote by me in this thread, which presumably you read, but clearly ignored):
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
I've brought up (and others) that the straight community has the same problems in the same proportions.
Quote yourself addressing this.
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
These pink thong wearing gay men certainly demonstrate a horrendous degree of immaturity by exposing themselves in such a manner that children are likely to see. But heterosexuals are just as likely to do that same thing. There are perverts are both sides.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Ah. So finally we get to the crux of it. You assumed that is what I meant. A convenient assumption, I think.
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
You did read the word imply right? If you didn't want to say this the you shouldn't have kept going on about only refering to gays that are on the parade floats. You should have said something like, "I know that they aren't representive of the gay community, but..." which is what you exactly didn't do. But then again, that'd take a lot of wind out of the sails of your argument.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:Quote:
Originally posted by SigmaNunki:
All I've read from you is something like, "The gay community is promiscuous and wears pink thongs on parade floats and I find that offensive!"
Well, since I never made that quote, there is no possible way you could have read that from me. So this statement of yours is basically a lie.
Um, you clearly didn't read the "something like" in the sentence.
Basically, what this boils down to is that you think that I've (and others) have misinterpreted you. But, it's your job to type a clear as possible post that you can. It's our job to read your posts as best we can and see if we can't get what you meant.
Clearly, at times there are going to be misunderstandings and at that point they must be cleared up... by you. This is exactly what I don't see you doing.
All I see you doing is saying stuff like, "That's not what I said, this is just a lie!" Where is the, "I didn't mean that. What I actually meant was..."?
You just post a reponse attacking the person who attacked you saying that they have no right to call you a bigot, etc, not even acknowledging the possibility that the other person may have a point. That the problem could have been in the way you are communicating your ideas or you may actually be that way (though I imagine none of us wants to think of ourselves in that way).
I've been, in not so many words, called a bigot before on a select few occasions as well. My response was to stop the person and find out why they thought what they did and then fix the problem. This has always ended up in an "I'm sorry" type situation.
So, what are you doing to rectify the situation here besides just telling us that you aren't?
Here's my argument:
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=bigot
bigot:
"
One who is strongly partial to one's own group, religion, race, or politics and is intolerant of those who differ.
"
What I've read of your posts is that you are intolerant of those that differ (gays, on floats at least). That you are strongly partial to your own notion of marriage (man and woman only) and unaccepting of another way.
You say that you're for it, but then make an argument against it. Should we not be fighting for what's right and not saying that it shouldn't be done because of how a few are going about trying to make it happen? Is this not reasonable?
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=prejudice
prejudice:
"
An adverse judgment or opinion formed beforehand or without knowledge or examination of the facts.
"
What I've read of your posts you are holding an unreasonable notion of gays basing your knowledge about them on only a select few that are on the fringe of gay culture. As I've said before, to base an opinion about a people on only the extreme and/or the delinquents is irresponsible. It also does less than justice to the reasonable majority of the gay population.
The above is at least a short explination of my opinion of you based on what you've said here. So, if you would care to re-state your position with greater clarity so that we may have a chance of understanding what you actually originally meant, please do so.
But even throwing aside the bigotry issue, how do you justify not allowing gays to marry given that it is unConstitutional to do so? Or is it now, america the free, unless you're gay? Do you not see the future implications by not allowing gays to marry? How many other things might come up in the future that are Constitutional, but because the majority find it icky or are uncomfortable with it and thus want it banned, it will be banned? What happened to all that freedom that I keep hearing you guys talking about?
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
We've already determined that your assumptions about what I've said are essentially fabrications. This is simply further fabrication.
And you're fabrications and accusations of bigotry continue to prove my point.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:Quote:Actually, if your example is any indication, I don’t think you do. Basically, you’re just calling me a bigot; you’re just using more words. Isn’t that really what you’re saying? Did I miss your point?
Originally posted by Unicorn:
Finn--
I understand your distress. .
Yes, you totally missed my point. I'm no anti-semite. I'm half Jewish, for crying out loud! But I've been unfairly called an anti-semite by a very emotional person (the girl in my story above) who couldn't be reasoned with and who woiuld not listen to a word I said after she made that decision about me. Therefore I understand your distress at being called a bigot when you take pains not to be one. That's all I was trying to illustrate with my (apparently too long and complicated) story.
Now quit accusing me if name-calling! I'm working very hard to keep this conversation civil and reasonable, because it's the only way to get anything done and still feel good about the result.
I apologize for the emoticon (or the embarrassing, flubbed use of such); they're not really my style, but I was testing out usage.
There is no such thing as a weed.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:Well, then I did miss your point, and I owe you an apology. I’m sorry for jumping to conclusions. I perhaps should have reread your posts before responding so hastily, but starting work this week has placed serious constraints on my time. I hope you’ll accept my apology.
Originally posted by Unicorn:
Yes, you totally missed my point. I'm no anti-semite. I'm half Jewish, for crying out loud! But I've been unfairly called an anti-semite by a very emotional person (the girl in my story above) who couldn't be reasoned with and who woiuld not listen to a word I said after she made that decision about me. Therefore I understand your distress at being called a bigot when you take pains not to be one. That's all I was trying to illustrate with my (apparently too long and complicated) story.
Now quit accusing me if name-calling! I'm working very hard to keep this conversation civil and reasonable, because it's the only way to get anything done and still feel good about the result.
And after re-reading your post, I realize what you actually said was not what I originally construed it to mean, and if you’ll permit me, I’ll address the question that you asked.
There is no difference between the flamboyant behavior of heterosexuals and homosexuals. Traditionalists don’t like sexual promiscuity among heterosexuals anymore then they like it under homosexuals, particularly the ones who have teen-age daughters. But traditionalists, by and large, also don't know that much about homosexuals, and in the absence of other images, these sexuality explicit ones take on much more emphasis then perhaps they should. There’s already a huge uphill climb for gay marriage, and it’s only going to get worse if gay rights activists intend to put forth this image of the gay community has promiscuous. Now you can say all day that one gay person doesn’t represent the whole, and I agree with you, but when that one (or one like him) gay person, seems to find his way into the gay pride parades every single year, it does not make Traditionalists feel any better about accepting gay marriage. If the gay community puts forth an image of homosexuals as being responsible adults, then I think traditionalists will come to accept gay marriage.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
We've already determined that your assumptions about what I've said are essentially fabrications. This is simply further fabrication.
And you're fabrications and accusations of bigotry continue to prove my point.
Actually no you haven't, you've just stated that without proof. Which incidentally, I've asked for.
Also, I put forth an argument without using any personal attack or any such thing. I put forth an argument based on what americans keep telling the rest of the world and what I know of that country of yours.
I've also stated that there has clearly (from what you've said) been a misunderstanding. I've asked you to re-state your arguments (hopefully without using pink thong gay guy) and I'll reply accordingly.
I find it interesting that you've not commented on this. It kind of tells me that you havn't been reading my previous posts and are you just assuming the content.
I'll quote myself you need not use the page up key
Quote:
But even throwing aside the bigotry issue, how do you justify not allowing gays to marry given that it is unConstitutional to do so? Or is it now, america the free, unless you're gay? Do you not see the future implications by not allowing gays to marry? How many other things might come up in the future that are Constitutional, but because the majority find it icky or are uncomfortable with it and thus want it banned, it will be banned? What happened to all that freedom that I keep hearing you guys talking about?
I think that at this point I must mentioned that there are other things in a gay pride parade besides what you keep refering to. There are typically hundreds of normally dressed individuals walking in the parade as well.
I think that it must also be mentioned, that it is an unreasonable demand to say that it is only the gay community that must put forth a better image of themselves to prove that they are more than what some people perceve them as.
Reason dictates that it is the others in society that must do the same. Because the "traditionalists" are coming off just as crazy as you say the gay rights people are.
And even given what I've experienced talking to these people, even if one sticks to statistics, civil liberties, etc in the discussion, they won't listen.
So, how would it help if the gay community did this? When I've done it, they just tell me that I'm lieing, etc. That if they don't want it to happen in there country, they'll vote and that'll be it, human rights be damned.
So, why can't it be both? That is the logical, reasonable solution. You know, to require both the behave in a civilised fashion.
Basically, I agree with you that the gay pride parades must be made more... tame. But I disagree with you that it is only the gay community that must do something for forward this.
It is the resonsibility of all "traditionalists" to truely understand the issue before coming to a conclusion. This is what the (most at least) "traditionalists" have not done.
It is the resonsibility of the gays to not yell and scream about this. Perhaps they did in the beginning (or maybe just in your country because this certainly didn't happen in mine), but I see no evidence that this is still going on. If it is, please provide proof to the contrary.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
SigmaNunki:
Quote:
Also, I put forth an argument without using any personal attack or any such thing.
I think what's-his-name was mostly unhappy with my rudeness (and I did have a disclaimer/warning at the top of my post that I was going to be rude, so I don't think anybody should've been surprised), and he just threw in your name because, well, you disagreed with him.
Quote:
I find it interesting that you've not commented on this. It kind of tells me that you havn't been reading my previous posts and are you just assuming the content.
This happens a lot - I do it all the time, because I simply haven't got the patience for people who write what they think are literate rebuttals, when what those posts really are, are screeds. I've written more than a few, so I should know.
SigmaNunki, you clearly have more patience than I do, and I happen to admire that. I just can't emulate it because there's a not-a-thing-you-can-tell-me dynamic at work here. Since I already know I am not going to convince anyone (meaning Finn) that he's wrong, no matter how many times he's told he's wrong, and no matter what factual, reasoned, and logical reasons he's given that prove he's wrong, I went with the rant option.
It's much less stressful that way, I find posting a screed or three often relieves tension. I understand that some people may not "get" this, and that's okay. We're not all built like obsessive/compulsive keyboard monkeys.
Quote:
I think that it must also be mentioned, that it is an unreasonable demand to say that it is only the gay community that must put forth a better image of themselves to prove that they are more than what some people perceve them as.
This is the rub, isn't it? To admit that heterosexual Christians may not act in a generally socially acceptable way is to admit that someone else may be right.
"There is no grace under pressure for a cat on fire." Cosi
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by ReeQueen:
[snip]
and he just threw in your name because, well, you disagreed with him.
Well, although I don't think I was rude (I backed up what I said) I definitly wasn't polite and I was somewhat aggressive. So I understand being thrown in that pile.
Quote:
Originally posted by ReeQueen:
SigmaNunki, you clearly have more patience than I do, and I happen to admire that. I just can't emulate it because there's a not-a-thing-you-can-tell-me dynamic at work here. Since I already know I am not going to convince anyone (meaning Finn) that he's wrong, no matter how many times he's told he's wrong, and no matter what factual, reasoned, and logical reasons he's given that prove he's wrong, I went with the rant option.
I don't know that it's patience, probably more akin to stubbornness
Quote:
Originally posted by ReeQueen:
This is the rub, isn't it? To admit that heterosexual Christians may not act in a generally socially acceptable way is to admit that someone else may be right.
< sarcasm >
What do you mean wrong? They're the majority! How can they be wrong?
< /sarcasm >
Quote:
Originally posted by ReeQueen:
"There is no grace under pressure for a cat on fire." Cosi
LOL, that awesome!
Do you find it as interesting as I do regarding the tumble-weeds blowing by in this thread?
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Tumblin' along with the tumblin' tumbleweeds.
Quote:
Well, although I don't think I was rude (I backed up what I said) I definitly wasn't polite and I was somewhat aggressive. So I understand being thrown in that pile.
Don't you know aggressiveness is often arbitrarily mistaken for rudeness? My gosh! Heh.
Quote:
I don't know that it's patience, probably more akin to stubbornness
Yeah, I know about stubbornness. Love the stubbornness. When I agree with the stubbonrnness.
Is that wrong?
Quote:
< sarcasm >
What do you mean wrong? They're the majority! How can they be wrong?
< /sarcasm >
Omigod. I see what you mean. My bad.
And now that we've completely managed to throw this thread off-track, I think our work is done here. Hah! It's not done till it's over-done!
(The "cat on fire" is quoted from Cosi, a lovely little Australian movie about a bunch of institutionalized nutbars (psychologically-speaking) putting on a production of Cosi fan Tutti. The guy who says it is recalling when he actually set cats on fire. Toni Collette and Barry Otto, who played Scott Hastings' father, Doug in Strictly Ballroom, are in it.) /extraneous detail
"There is no grace under pressure for a cat on fire." Cosi
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
*slaps head on forehead*
Okay, first of all, isn't it wierd I have to write essays about this stuff! I'm actually going to write both sides off the argument - just based on the bible, and church canon- and then write my actual opinion.
Why just from the bible? Because the christian's here so poorly argued their point I felt sorry for them.
Even though I'm not actually a christian.
Christian fundamentalists these are your balanced points:
It says in the bible in the OT (Leviticus 18:20) - man lying with man is and abomination against the law and punishible by death.
Rational Christian replies in italic:
the same passage has no problem with polgamy, and as previously mentioned says you can't wear a garment made of two different types of cloth -they don't like homosexulaity because it mixes roles, not because there's necessarily anything intrinsically wrong with it. Plus abomination may be a mis-translation, more like shameful.
Genesis 19 Sodom and Gomorrah brought down by God for amongst other things trying to rape a man.
this is actually about kindness to strangers - a huge theme in the OT, Lot actually chucks out one of his daughters(or wives can't remember) to be raped instead.
Moore (a monk) said that M/M homossxuality was not permissible not because it was homosexual but because one partner takes on the female 'subservient' role.
With the rise of women talking their place in the workforce that's a bit of a moot point
St Paul condemns homosexuality in Corinths 6:9-10 and Romans 1.
Paul is actually trying to define the difference between christians and gentiles - we're special because we don't do this - honestly he could have picked anything
According to the pope (highest link to God), sex is a procreative and unitive event - gays can't have kids therefore immoral.
given that this is actually a 60s change to the original statment that sex was just about procreation ~ there is a change coming in the church me thinks. Plus some m/f couples can't have children - does that make their marriages immoral? The pope also says in the same document 'We are called to love each other as God loves his creations' It doesn't say it has to be m/f love.
According to natural law, (ie what nearly all christian teaching is based on) it is immoral to use anything in a way that does not fulfil it's natural purpose. genitallia is to procreate can't procreate with homosexual sex.
as before - as well as naturalistic fallicy - just because something ought to be used for a particular thing doesn't meant it won't get used for something else, and does it mean it's wrong to use it for anything else? example - mouths are to eat with, so should we never talk?
Jesus said absolutely nothing about homosexuality - and it *was* around at the time. What does that mean? That he probably didn't give a rats ass about it either way - 'Cos everything he thought was important he bangs on about all the time, things like love and respect and being kind to your neighbours even if they believe different things to you.
less religious-y points:
homosexuality spreads desease (like AIDS)
so does hetoresexual sex - i didn't really want to put in the AIDS point, but I thought someone would eventually, and I'd rather have the rebuffle up before they did
There is a decrease in population
what about priests - catholic ones can't have kids? the infertile? Plus it may actually be good for the world at this point to have a decreasing population. (though we don't to be clear)
Males taking role of women to have children - wrong, goes against the complimentalitry of man/woman two parts making one whole as with Adam/Eve.
these roles are becoming defunct. besides - who says that complimentarity they were describing wasn't actually love? in which case there's no reason why there can't be homosexual relationships, between loving homosexuals as with heterosexuals.
It undermines family life/ changes family structure.
so do a lot
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Weasy:
Quote:
Genesis 19 Sodom and Gomorrah brought down by God for amongst other things trying to rape a man.
this is actually about kindness to strangers - a huge theme in the OT, Lot actually chucks out one of his daughters(or wives can't remember) to be raped instead.
Sorry to be nit-picky, but that's just me and nothing to do with any ongoing argument hereabouts. I thought your post was highly entertaining, Weasy, I just have to get this off my chest: http://www.religioustolerance.org/hom_bibg.htm
As far as I can tell, browsing the sites and what remains of my religious upbringing, what the crowd outside Lot's house wanted was to rape, have sex with, or "know" the angels who were visiting him. It does have to do with hospitality, but also to do with the state of the cities in that area at the time and why they were punished like the naughty little monkeys they were. (For a given accuracy of the history recorded, of course.) So, Lot offered up his daughters to the crowd to prevent the angels from being harmed.
The site linked says that the crowd refused the daughters, which may be part of where a preference for males becomes so offensive in some passages of the bible. I mean, if a human male wants to engage in non-consensual acts of intercourse with an angel (legendarily asexual, although generally male-ish), how perverse must he be?
What irritates me (among so many other things, not going to go into them right now
) is that Biblical literalists take what they want, when they want to be fundamentalist in their treatment of the Biblical canon, but ignore the stuff they'd get the chair for. Mostly. I know I've seen fundies wear polyester and nylon together, and you can't tell me that's right."There is no grace under pressure for a cat on fire." Cosi
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:I don’t remember anyone trying to argue a Christian religious point here. I could be mistaken. I’m also not so sure that your presentation of the Christian religious opinion on gay marriage is terribly genuine and certainly not well argued, since you seem to be trying to debunk it, not present it.
Originally posted by Weasy:
Why just from the bible? Because the christian's here so poorly argued their point I felt sorry for them.
Quote:Yes AIDS can be spread as efficiently through heterosexual sex as it can be through homosexual sex, but in reality we don’t see this. What we see is AIDS being spread largely by and within the gay community. What this suggests is that there is a larger amount of unprotected casual sex in the gay community then in the heterosexual community. Indeed, it suggests that promiscuity among the gay community may actually be a more common phenomenon then it is among the heterosexual community. And this stands to reason, as gay relationships are rarely burdened by unexpected pregnancies
Originally posted by Weasy:
homosexuality spreads desease (like AIDS)
so does hetoresexual sex - i didn't really want to put in the AIDS point, but I thought someone would eventually, and I'd rather have the rebuffle up before they did
Quote:Actually, federal law clearly prohibits polygamy, and so do the laws of most states. In fact, I’m not sure there are any states in which polygamy is legal. Gay rights activists were seeking to impose gay marriage through the courts in one state and then to seek a Supreme Court ruling to support the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the Constitution, thereby bypassing the democratic process. I don’t believe this will work, but if the gay rights activists had managed to succeed, it is certainly reasonable to believe that polygamist would seek the same loophole. Gay marriage may yet become an institution, and if it does then it is likely that polygamists will seek establishment of polygamy. So the slippery slope argument is quite alive and well.
Originally posted by Weasy:
Religious Marriage: (Christian here but obviously this differs)
Now, Finn and others, in the OT there is absolutely nothing wrong with Polygamy. In fact, Jacob forefather of Jesus himself - had two wives. So if you're going to argue that homosexual marriage is a slippery slope to polygamy - too late it's already there. Plus as someone else pointed out, the mormons never bothered to stop practicising it.
By the settlement in Israel polygamy was outlawed.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear....
Finn-Finn-Finny-Finn-Finn-Finn:
Quote:
Yes AIDS can be spread as efficiently through heterosexual sex as it can be through homosexual sex, but in reality we don’t see this. What we see is AIDS being spread largely by and within the gay community. What this suggests is that there is a larger amount of unprotected casual sex in the gay community then in the heterosexual community. Indeed, it suggests that promiscuity among the gay community may actually be a more common phenomenon then it is among the heterosexual community. And this stands to reason, as gay relationships are rarely burdened by unexpected pregnancies
Actually, you're quite wrong about this. AIDS is actually down among gay people (although there has been a minor spike upward since medication has made the disease chronic, rather than fatal, but that is across all of the at-risk groups). Since AIDS was first recognized to be spread by gay men, however erroneously, good information was spread more quickly among those folks; since gay men see themselves (or used to) as more at risk, they took the precautions available quite seriously. (I speak as someone who, while I lived in LA in the late eighties/early nineties, had a circle of friends consisting of ninety-eight percent gay men.) Like information about using condoms, safe sex practices, abstinence issues, and so on.
Buying into a stereotype like the one you, Finn, just presented, ignores the people who were poisoned by a tainted blood supply before all blood was tested for HIV (hepatitis was also a big problem), as well as drug users, and heterosexual people who passed the virus amongst themselves and others. And this is without mentioning the current epidemic of AIDS in the African subcontinent, where it is spread mainly by heterosexual sex.
Promiscuity has little to do with the spread of disease. A good little sexual connoisseur (and I am one, so I know whereof I rant) is aware of risk factors, and always practices safe sex. Naturally, there are exceptions, as there always will be, but blaming a disease on the presumed promiscuity of a certain group of people, or using it as proof of the promiscuity of a certain group of people, is as stupid as it is ignorant. It's a lack of knowledge that prevents someone from practicing safe sex, not the number of partners with whom one boinks.
Quote:
Actually, federal law clearly prohibits polygamy, and so do the laws of most states.
Quote:
In fact, I’m not sure there are any states in which polygamy is legal.
Just because there may be a law against polygamy - and there is no such law in Utah, which really chaps the hides of some in this state (I know they were trying to get a law passed, but I got bored and stopped paying attention, so there could be such a law now, but I doubt it. The Utah legislature is too loaded with really good Mormons who believe polygamy will once again be practiced by the church out-of-the-closet) - doesn't mean it's not practiced, or even that it's prosecuted. In fact, here in Utah, polygamy itself is not prosecuted at all, but welfare fraud, child abuse, molestation, and sometimes even tax evasion are prosecuted. Which is as it should be.
People can marry each other, without the marriage being recognized by the state. Bigamy, in terms of law, is when a person marries more than one spouse under the presumed auspices of legality. Generally this happens when one person neglects to divorce (for whatever reason) the first spouse, then marries another person. Polygamists generally marry their first spouse, and have that marriage civilly recognized, and marry subsequent spouses in religious ceremonies unrecognized by the state.
Quote:
Gay rights activists were seeking to impose gay marriage through the courts in one state and then to seek a Supreme Court ruling to support the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the Constitution, thereby bypassing the democratic process.
So? The "democratic" process in this country isn
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME