posted
Dag: sL's post preserves a quotation that pooka has apparently deleted the original of (I recall reading it, however).
edit: wait, now I see her post again . . . I'm pretty certain it wasn't there when I just checked. Odd.
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posted
Ah, I see what you mean, I had only skimmed Baron Samedi's post and didn't notice the entire byplay. Yes, pooka's apparently just referring to the language she prefers for pronouns in Samedi's post.
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quote:Originally posted by Baron Samedi: Are you asking that he vote for the amendment? If so, consider that we live in a constitutional republic, not a democracy. We're supposed to be able to protect the rights of every citizen, including those in the minority. It's perfectly reasonable for a legislator to vote against a constitutional amendment, rather than accepting it just so it can be put to a popular vote, if he or she feels that this amendment could be used by the majority to repress the minority.
quote:Originally posted by pooka: I'm asking him and her to vote for.
<post by Bokonon skipped>
quote:Originally posted by pooka: The ongoing inequality of women is the main reason I feel this amendment is necesary. Hide behind your style manual if you like.
Note the style manual reference - isn't that referring to the change to "him and her"?
Edit: I'd sure like direct clarification from the source, though.
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Dag, your law degree is showing. It's clear from the context of the first few posts that she was referring to the constitutional amendment, not to the "amending" of her words.
And to "point to a place", you can search for threads from December 2003 and March 2004 where she also discusses feeling "a little threatened" by gay marriage sidelining women, as she believes that the number of gay men far outweighs gay women.
People aren't just pulling this from nowhere.
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I'm the only one who's discussed the context of the relevant posts. By all means, explain why my reasoning is flawed, but don't expect me to change my mind merely because you say it's clear.
As to the other threads, If they exists, I expect someone could point to them.
quote:Dag, your law degree is showing.
What, you think my actually applying reason to the facts at hand is somehow a byproduct of my law degree? There are plenty of people who do that here who don't have one.
Which degree of yours is it that shows when you make straw-man or ad hominem attacks?
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My ad hominem attack about your lawyerly nature referred to your dogged insistence that a native English speaker (I presume) used the term "amendment" in a discussion about a "constitutional amendment" to refer not to the issue at hand, but to the "amending" of a pronoun to a sentence.
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Its not clear, Zeugma. It could just be a reference to the pronoun suggestion, using the sorts of language that she's been speaking with recently. I know I tend to use odd word choices if I've been reading an unusual style of writing, for instance.
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quote:My ad hominem attack about your lawyerly nature referred to your dogged insistence that a native English speaker (I presume) used the term "amendment" in a discussion about a "constitutional amendment" to refer not to the issue at hand, but to the "amending" of a pronoun to a sentence.
Whenever using a word not normally used, it's fairly common to use it (especially in informal communication) instead of a more appropriate word. You're overlooking the fact that she's more likely to use the word when she's been using it recently and overestimating the likelihood that the word was consciously chosen.
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If a State wants to pass a law banning gay marriage I think that is probably OK. Keeping in mind that I am FOR gay marriage/civil union. That is the choice of the individual state.
However, there is a very specific reason why most states don't just do that, and that is because doing so would likely be overturned by the State and/or Federal Supreme Court as being blatantly discriminitory. So, the Religious Right is trying to do an end run around the law by having their personal wishes enshrined in the State and/or Federal Constitution where it become extremely difficult to challenge.
Next, you don't go mucking around with any Constitution to enshrine current popular opinion into it. The Constitution is a document of universal and indisputable truths, and not the place for short term (relative to history) personal agendas.
Further, the Constitution is about insuring rights not about limiting them. To define marriage in the Constitution is ridiculous, it is especially ridiculous when it is a thinly disguised effort to prevent or eliminate the rights of a specific segment of society.
Again, the Constitution is about universal and indisputable truths. The very fact that there are so many diverse opinions on the matter, the fact that some states allow civil union while others do not, and in fact some world countries allow them, means that this subject is FAR FROM Universal Truth.
This is a clear effort of a few to force their opinion on the majority, and to do so in a way that circumvents the normal legal process. Now you may say that it is not the will of the few, but the will of the majority, but that make little difference. Believe it or not, our country is not really ruled by the will of the majority, because if it were, any hairbrained idea that can be framed to capture the popular opinion could be made into law.
Yes, we let people vote, and to some extent, we accept the will of the majority but only to the extent that the will of the majority does not conflict with or impinge on the universal and irrevocable truths upon which our nation (or state) is founded.
You can not allow the current popular will of the people to suspend the Bill of Rights in the name of security. You can not allow the will of the people to suspend the Constitution and envoke a facist government. The will of the people and the will of the government have very specific and intentional boundaries and controls on them to make sure that the will of the people/government never corrupts the foundation of our generally free society.
Next, this is not a religious issue; it is a civil and legal issue. It is about whether or not two couples in nearly identical circumstances should be afforded nearly identical rights. There is no logical or reasonable reason why they should not. There is not reason why one couple should have inheritance rights while the other is denied those rights. There is no reason why one couple should be able to make medical decisions for each other while another couple should not. There is no reason why one couple should have automatic guardianship of their children, while another nearly identical couple should be denied that right. There is no reason why one couple should have full insurance benefits while another nearly identical couple should be denied those benefits.
This must be decided as a matter of law. It must be viewed from a cold dispassionate postion that is devoid of person views and prejudices. It should be resolved as purely a matter of civil and general law, and from a pure civil rights perspective.
Again, any attempt to alter the Constitution as a matter of popular opinion or the thinly veiled wishes of a vocal majority with a specif agenda, is the road to ruin for any Democratic Republic.
Further 'popular vote' is never a majority, it is merely a majority of the people who were willing to take the time to go to the ballot box, and assuming they understood what they were voting for or against, to initiate that action. Now, if you can actually get 51% of the total eligible voting population to agree that vote might carry some weigh. But again, we must be ruled by underlying universal truths and rights, and not by the whims of a majority of the people. We can not allow popular opinion to pollute, corrupt, and corrode the foundation upon which we have built a free and just society.
One final point, which I have already made, the push for a Constitutional Ammendment is being made by people who know they can not win in the realm of Law, because any law past that restricts the right of a specific generally law abiding segement of the population is bound to be declared un-constitutional, therefore the Religious Right can only attack the Constitution itself.
It is very easy for great orators to rally a sufficient number of people to their cause to get a majority vote on a ballot, but they will never get a majority of the population to agree that resticting rights should be incorporated into the Constitution.
posted
I am in not in favor of Constitutional Amendments being used to define things like "marriage". However, a more broad amendment could reasonably be necessary to reign in the courts if they start interpretting equality as a blank check for altering social institutions.
For instance, I think it would be much more equal if men could be mothers if they want to, at least in the eyes of the law. However, I don't think equality demands that we redefine "mother" in order to make this so.
To some extent I agree with you. In a way, I like to explain the 'blank check' concept as the difference between Rational and Rationalize; two very very different things. When you rationalize you can taylor your logic to arrive at any conclusion; logical or illogical. However, Rational thought is tempered with true reason and fairness.
So, it is important that the 'powers that be' do not fall into the trap of irrationally rationalzing anything and everything. There are still reasonable limits and boudaries.
I do take small acception to a 'broad ammendment' that prevents the alterning of 'social institutions'. Remember that at one time Slavery was a accepted Social Institution, but we would never now, in our modern day and age, consider it acceptable. 'Social Institution' DO NEED TO CHANGE when we come to see that they are corrupt and morally unfair as well as blatantly discriminitory.
There may be some Social Institutions that you do not want to be changed, but there very well may be and surely are Social Institutions that very much DO NEED TO BE CHANGED. The great problem facing society is determining which are which, and making that determination in a fair, just, and dispationate way.
posted
The government must never be in the business of legalizing morality. Morality is a personal conviction, no a social one. A crime is only a crime if there is a VICTIM... Otherwise, we're all #$!(&'d.
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quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: Can someone point to the place where pooka said homosexual marriage threatened women's equality?
And before simply quoting the he or she amendment post, please explain why you think "amendment" referred to the amendment being proposed in Congress, not the change of "he" to "him or her."
I quoted pooka, above. It's in line with a view she's espoused for some time now, that allowing homosexuals to marry as heterosexuals do will threaten women -- as I recall, her logic was that if men could marry men, they wouldn't marry women anymore.
It's been some time since I've heard her say it, so I might well have misunderstood her -- but in the context, I'm fairly sure she's repeating her old opinion. It didn't stand up to examination the last time around, and I'd be interested in hearing if she's found new justification for her belief -- assuming she still holds it at all, of course.
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quote:Originally posted by Robin Kaczmarczyk: The government must never be in the business of legalizing morality. Morality is a personal conviction, no a social one. A crime is only a crime if there is a VICTIM... Otherwise, we're all #$!(&'d.
Whew, looks like we narrowly missed that one. Let's all act quickly to keep morality illegal.
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posted
When I read Pooka's post, I interpreted it as a way to link her frustration toward my (technically proper) choice of pronouns with the reason she started the thread. It appeared to me that she was saying that the reason it bugged her that I used the indefinite pronoun instead of a combination of the masculine and feminine ones was because it somehow degraded females, and her extraordinary sensitivity to the plight of the modern American woman is why she took action on both the Defense of Marriage Amendment and on my use of that pronoun.
Of course, I could be wrong, but based on her word choice coupled with an apparent history of feeling that gay marriage degrades women, it seems to make sense.
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quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: Can someone point to the place where pooka said homosexual marriage threatened women's equality?
Sure. It's here. It's kind of sad seeing someone use "being against prejudice" as an excuse for supporting prejudice.
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posted
Ok heterosexual guys, how many of you are gonna jump at the chance to marry another guy first chance you get!
(serious now) Pooka, straight guys aren't gonna go gay. No matter how much hairy man sex they can get, that's not what straight guys are into. You might think the idea is two guys is so hot that, hey, why wouldn't they? but straight guys don't think it's hot. And having it be socially acceptable will not MAKE them think it's hot. Their brain isn't wired that way.
quote:Morality is a personal conviction, no a social one.
I don't think that any society without moral convictions can survive.
The people who persecuted Mormons were defending their moral convictions as well. Somehow I don't see you as being quite so eager to defend that stance.
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quote:The people who persecuted Mormons were defending their moral convictions as well.
I don't think so.
Why not?
EDIT: Mormons were primarily (to my knowledge) persecuted for following a false prophet and for polygamy. How is that not persecution based on moral convictions?
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posted
I still don't understand the arguments against gay marriage. I guess immorality is one that is used, but I really don't understand how two people who love each other and want to dedicate their lives to each other is at all immoral.
Unless you use the argument that children should result from a union, but that is purely a religious point of view. The Constitution provides for the separation of church and state, so religious ideals should not be a foundation of Constitutional law. Are we saying that people who are sterile because of health reasons should not get married too?
Next argument: it is unnatural. So what? Are we saying that everything unnatural should be banned? How is it "natural" that we are able to go into space? I mean, if we were meant to go into space, we would've been born with wings.
Frankly, I think this law is very unfair. Homosexuals are a very real part of our society, and from what I've seen they are like everyone else. They try to get through life the best way they can, just like heterosexuals. They contribute to society, sometimes more so than heterosexuals. It is my view that society should accept homosexuals as they are, and I can't believe that this country is going to lengths of actually preventing two consenting adults that want to spend their lives together from doing so. And honestly, I kinda hate those people who are that close-minded to how other people want to live their lives. This country has passed laws preventing two people of different races from marrying, which (I hope) people now realize is ridiculous. I think that one day, people will realize that the consideration of this type of law is equally as ridiculous. But the fact that this law is being considered means that we have learned nothing from history about being open to other lifestyles and just not accepting people for who they are. Diversity is a good thing because it lends different ideals and points of view, so why stifle it. Meanwhile, we are preventing two people who want to live together from formal recognition by the state that they are together.
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posted
I would vote for a constitutional amendment defining marriage if, and only if, it allowed same sex couples to marry and have the same rights as heterosexual couples.
I would like to see that happen so that we don't end up with a patchwork of state laws making it legal to discriminate against some couples (or deny them the same legal status as heterosexual couples) in one state, but illegal to do so in another state.
Anyway, I don't see that happening any time soon.
This particular amendment is not something I'd like to see passed.
If it does leave Congress, I will actively campaign against it.
If it passes in my state, I'll be seriously disappointed.
If it passes in the country, I'll be disgusted.
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quote:I can't believe that this country is going to lengths of actually preventing two consenting adults that want to spend their lives together from doing so.
I don't see anybody trying to do that.
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posted
I do. I see a country founded on the ideals of diversity having people who consider two people of the same gender wrong, even subjecting those people to verbal ridicule and physical attack.
How are homosexuals supposed to feel, knowing that their country, that their fellow citizens, disregard them so? That their love means nothing to the state, which in fact is composed of their own peers? I'd rather have two homosexuals who are committed to each other have the right to marry and entitled to all privileges associated than people who see it as nothing and marry multiple times.
By passing this amendment, there is a message sent that there is something wrong with being homosexual, that the way they live their life is wrong. My point of view is that we should let people lead their lives the way they choose, especially if they are trying to lead peaceful, joy-filled lives. I don't care if people are gay if that makes them happy, especially since they're not harming other people or society. If anything, they are contributing to society by demostrating their appreciation and love for other people.
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posted
Porter, the opposition to same-sex marriage is primarily predicated on a fear that it will make homosexual monogamy socially acceptable.
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I find it interesting that the pro-gay-marriage people are making long posts with well-thought-out points, and the antis, if I can use that words, are making one-liners objecting to particular sentences, and without giving their reasoning or responding to objections at that.
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posted
KOM -- you'll notice that the people making long posts are people who are in general more likely to make long posts, and those making short posts are those who tend to make sort posts in other threads.
quote:Porter, the opposition to same-sex marriage is primarily predicated on a fear that it will make homosexual monogamy socially acceptable.
I agree. I may have been mistaken in reading "preventing two consenting adults" more as "making it impossible for two consenting adults" than "persuading people not to".
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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quote:Originally posted by Tresopax: I am in not in favor of Constitutional Amendments being used to define things like "marriage". However, a more broad amendment could reasonably be necessary to reign in the courts if they start interpretting equality as a blank check for altering social institutions.
For instance, I think it would be much more equal if men could be mothers if they want to, at least in the eyes of the law. However, I don't think equality demands that we redefine "mother" in order to make this so.
Racial segregation was once a social institution that many people should not be changed.
"Unless you use the argument that children should result from a union, but that is purely a religious point of view. The Constitution provides for the separation of church and state, so religious ideals should not be a foundation of Constitutional law."
BlueWizard:
I realise I am picking a very very very very fine point here, and I also think I understand what you intended to say, but I must point out what I consider, well, not an error, but a poor choice of words.
Religious Ideals can be part of a foundation of constitutional law, but ideals are very very different that Religious Doctrine, Religious Opinions, and Religion itself. We can draw on universal ideals that are religiously based, and in fact the founding father probably did just that. However, we can not let Religious Doctrine, and popular Religious Opinion errode away the very foundation of our Constitutional Republic. There are founding documents, the Declaration of Independance, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights that have served us very well, in fact, served us better than any other form of government, and while religious IDEALS can be part of what guides us, popular religious opinion or extreme interpretations of religious doctrine can not be allowed to compromise that core foundation of our government.
I do understand that I am essentially saying what you said in the broader sense. Actualy, I am really only pick at your use of the term 'ideals'.
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: I find it interesting that the pro-gay-marriage people are making long posts with well-thought-out points, and the antis, if I can use that words, are making one-liners objecting to particular sentences, and without giving their reasoning or responding to objections at that.
I find it interesting that it's primarily only people on the pro-gay-marriage side who are assembling straw-men and assigning motives to others.
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posted
It may be only me, but even if it was socially acceptable I wouldn't sleep with a woman or spend my life with a woman. I don't think women understood women best, either. So far the person who understands me best is my Hubby who happens to be male. It's not an uncommon idea though - I may be wrong but I remember reading about it in a book from Joe Haldeman, in a far future were everyone is gay or lesbian and a poor guy who belongs to our time but was in the future because of the relativity involved in space travels was straight and considered as very, very weird.
[ June 01, 2006, 09:52 AM: Message edited by: Anna ]
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posted
I think it is a slippery slope when we start granting rights on people's behaviors or comparing the same behaviors to race and beliefs.
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posted
Agreed. So we should stop granting rights based on heterosexuality and let people marry whoever they want.
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quote:I thought someone told me it was wrong to assign motives to the opposition.
When responding to Porter's "I don't see anybody trying to do that," in reference to this statement -- "I can't believe that this country is going to lengths of actually preventing two consenting adults that want to spend their lives together from doing so." -- it becomes rather relevant to establish that this is exactly what one of the most commonly-advanced arguments against same-sex marriage actually is.
There are of course OTHER motivations, ranging from a narrow desire for semantic purity to a desire to completely eliminate marriage altogether. But the second most commonly cited reason for banning same-sex marriage (i.e. "defending marriage") is that permitting gay people to live together in social acceptance will lead to social immorality.
The MOST common reply is that "redefining" marriage to include gay relationships will somehow cheapen marriage, meaning that heterosexual couples will take marriage less seriously for some reason.
Here's my paraphrase (i.e. humorous distortion) of the five most common reasons given. I fully expect anyone opposed to same-sex marriage to recognize their own argument here and be offended by my oversimplification of it.
1) Heterosexuals won't take marriage seriously if they have to share it with gay people. 2) Letting gay people enjoy monogamous relationships might make us stop hating them. 3) If we let gay people marry, we'll have to let rocks marry donkeys. And while individual rock-donkey couples might make decent parents, we certainly can't put them on equal footing for things like adoption rights when there are thousands of heterosexual couples out there right now waiting for a cute blonde baby to show up on the adoption list, and if the rock-donkey couples take all the cute babies, the heterosexual couples are going to have to start paying Asian agencies even more than they already are to avoid adopting ugly middle-schoolers. 4) My church doesn't marry gay people. My church doesn't marry Catholics, either. So I'm also opposed to Catholic marriage. 5) Marriage is defined as being "a man and a woman." Somewhere. In some dictionary. And I can't afford a new dictionary, so I hate it when words change.
Note that I'm not attempting to explain why we SHOULD hate gay people (or, if you must, the "sin" of gay behavior, not the sinner); that's just a premise on which argument #2 is founded. But there's arguments for that, too, both secular and religious:
1) God says so, and we don't want to piss off God. 2) If we stop hating gay people, we'll all turn gay. And then we'll go extinct. 3) Gender roles are essential to our society, which we define as a society in which gender roles are essential.
--------
MY solution? Get rid of marriage entirely as a legal institution, replaced by civil unions for all. If people want to get married in a church, let 'em -- and let the churches apply whatever standards they want to that completely ceremonial, um, ceremony. But then make them sign a little paper that makes their "marriage" also a "civil union."
But, unfortunately, if you look at the REAL problems (as stated above *grin*), you realize why this isn't much of a "compromise" -- even if it fully solves the problem as usually phrased by SSM opponents.
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quote:Originally posted by Dr. Evil: I think it is a slippery slope when we start granting rights on people's behaviors or comparing the same behaviors to race and beliefs.
I think it's dangerously naive, (or maybe just plain disingenuous ), to reduce sexuality to simple "behavior".
Also, I'm interested in knowing in what way "belief" in your sentence is less a "behavior" than sexuality is.
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quote:MY solution? Get rid of marriage entirely as a legal institution, replaced by civil unions for all. If people want to get married in a church, let 'em -- and let the churches apply whatever standards they want to that completely ceremonial, um, ceremony. But then make them sign a little paper that makes their "marriage" also a "civil union."
You could also do as we do, have a civil ceremony for everyone and after that a religious for those who want, but which would have no legal value. After all this would also eliminate the five minutes marriage Vegas-style because you'd have to fill a file and wait a few weeks before you get married. Time to think over things is always good. (Just realized that what I wrote may lead people to think gay marriage is authorized here - it's not, but there's a special contract very much wedding-like that same sex people can sign together. Not exactly the same rights and obligtions, especially since you have to have this contract signed since months-years before you have some rights, but it's still better than nothing.)
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posted
To further expound on my problem with Dr. Evil's post above:
"Sexuality" is much more than mere "behavior". Sure my behavior can be an outward indicator of my sexuality, but is it the whole of it? I don't think so. If I yearn to be with a man sexually but never act on it am I not homosexual nonetheless? I think it's a mistake of reduction on the part of many anti-gay rights people to try to limit the issue to gay sex acts. If they can define us solely because we "do that" they can lump it in with all the other things people do which are immoral and/or illegal.
Contrary to this view, sexuality is a very complex mix of behavior, attraction, biology, psychology, upbringing, and personal identity. I think there's ample evidence that religious belief is also a complex mix of those things. Far from being a slippery slope, one's sexual orientation has (IMO) overwhelmingly more in common with religious belief than it does with mere behavior, and no one here questions whether religious belief is worthy of explicit protection.
For that matter, both of those have most of those same things in common with "Race". Though I'm not at all sure "race" means anything legally other than "color of skin", most common usage of the term certainly means a mix of all the things stated above. If you don't think "behavior" plays a large part in "race", ask yourself how it's possible for a black man to be an "Uncle Tom", or for a white kid to "act black"?
The biggest irony in Dr. Evil's slippery slope fear is that homosexual behavior, at least in terms of sex acts, is already a protected behavior, just like heterosexual behavior. It's all the other stuff that goes into sexual orientation and equal rights that we're still fighting for.
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posted
Seriously, Tom, I don't have a problem with you painting what you feel the other side to be, or with the idea of governments getting out of the marriage business, and let marriage of any stripe be a religious/individual issue.
I just wanted to be petty and point out your hypocrisy in telling me I shouldn't create a simplified potrayl of "the other side" on abortion, but then have you turn around and do the same thing to "the other side" on SSM.
I'm just trying to get you to concede that painting a picture of the other side, even if you've never been on it, is not in and of itself wrong.
Like I said, petty. But I'd be interested in hearing your self-justification.
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posted
I don't think you can compare sexual orientation and religion, because you can choose your religion but not your sexual orientation (IMHO).
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posted
(Do you know what's really fun? When I saw the title of this thread I was sure it would be about the fact that the 6th of June this year will be the 06/06/06 and some people think the devil will come on Earth or whatever. )
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quote:Originally posted by Anna: I don't think you can compare sexual orientation and religion, because you can choose your religion but not your sexual orientation (IMHO).
First, differences in one area do not make two things incomparable in other areas.
However, I understand your point, and agree that they are not exactly the same in that specific way, but I'm not at all sure that religion, for most people, is simply a choice. I bet there are many religious people here who do not feel that they choose to believe something is true. I bet the most considered among them believe something because it is true (to them). I bet to many religious people, "choosing" to stop believing as they do would be very much like my "choosing" to no longer be gay.
But I'm open to correction if someone like Dag or Belle wants to chime in. [edit: not to limit it to them.]
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