The costs of gay marriage

[Zombie]

One argument that I hear is that it is about defending the sanctity of marriage. I think that is a very noble goal and one that should be given more support. However I do not think preventing gay marriage does that. I think it weakens it. I think you do better to protect marraige thru other means. Perhaps a marriage course before marriage, a waiting period to be divorced perhaps. Doing away with the drive thru wedding service...

Protecting marriage is great. There are just better ways to do it.

Rep worthy post. Those who wish to protect marriage would be better served protecting the tradition of marriage rather than the nebulous idea of traditional marriage. Opening the right to marriage to those whose lifestyle differs from the norm strengthens and
upholds the importance of it in our culture rather than the opposite in my view. I'm sure there are many out there, especially in the younger generations, who have a hard time viewing marriage as an important institution when it is withheld from such a large group of society for something as inconsequential as which sex they are attracted to.

 

[babe]

Biologically, in terms of DNA, humans and chimps are 95% similar.(*) But that remaining 5% is pretty darn significant, wouldn't you say?

But anyway, I'm bowing out of this discussion. I will simply note to conclude that in your response you didn't point out any bigotry, odiousness, or hurtfulness on my train of logic.

(*) Or so it's been reported. I don't know the accuracy of the number, but that's not vital to my point.

An interesting point of departure. Please don't go.

men and women are genetically different. XX vs XY chromosome pairs. *** and XXY and YXX occur, and are called trisomies, and are known to be correlated to specific differences from the regular XX and XY.

men and women are developmentally different, largely as a result of effects of hormones on specific tissues, including the brain.

One of the largest concerns we should have as a society is the effects of chemicals we create as they become our environment. Plastics of some types are "plasticized" with phytoestrogenic compounds like bisPhenol A, and these compounds are being detected in soil and water and have been observed in some areas being associated with feminizing certain species. The real danger is we are losing our real men, and what all they are worth to families and society. Here we've got a whole lot of men who are just off the track hormonally and can't, or perhaps don't respond normally to natural stimulii that promote the actions to, function as men. I don't think that's a plus, personally. I don't think it's "equal to" being a functional man, so to speak. Definitely not what I want for my life.

Biologically, actions that are not somehow helpful to reproduction, are not sexual actions. Well, in the least they are not the effectively "right" actions.

I know some women who, I suspect, would like to marry their cat, and who in fact do put animals in their wills. Some men, in Wyoming according to some accounts, have true love for sheep. I don't think their wishes are any less valid than anyone else's, and I don't care to involve myself in their private lives, but I'll be damned if I have to get all timid about my "bigotry" for thinking they're not as acceptable or beneficial to society as a man and woman who are living for one another and for their children, working to be beneficial members of society. There is no reason not to honor them as good examples, and no reason to try to make anything else a "marriage".

Precisely because it is a distinction that has a purpose. It's not even a "purpose" invented by man, it's just something coming from our natures, from nature itself. All we're doing with structuring laws that deal with it as a special case is recognizing the fact of nature, and adapting our laws to that situation, with some purpose in mind. Like showing kids that moms and dads are important, and helping moms and dads take better care of their kids.

 

[JGolds]

This thread is always a good for a good read... sometimes it gets a little dry, but good job guys keep up the good work.

 

[Darkwing Duck]

An interesting point of departure. Please don't go.

men and women are genetically different. XX vs XY chromosome pairs. *** and XXY and YXX occur, and are called trisomies, and are known to be correlated to specific differences from the regular XX and XY.

men and women are developmentally different, largely as a result of effects of hormones on specific tissues, including the brain.

One of the largest concerns we should have as a society is the effects of chemicals we create as they become our environment. Plastics of some types are "plasticized" with phytoestrogenic compounds like bisPhenol A, and these compounds are being detected in soil and water and have been observed in some areas being associated with feminizing certain species. The real danger is we are losing our real men, and what all they are worth to families and society. Here we've got a whole lot of men who are just off the track hormonally and can't, or perhaps don't respond normally to natural stimulii that promote the actions to, function as men. I don't think that's a plus, personally. I don't think it's "equal to" being a functional man, so to speak. Definitely not what I want for my life.

Biologically, actions that are not somehow helpful to reproduction, are not sexual actions. Well, in the least they are not the effectively "right" actions.

I know some women who, I suspect, would like to marry their cat, and who in fact do put animals in their wills. Some men, in Wyoming according to some accounts, have true love for sheep. I don't think their wishes are any less valid than anyone else's, and I don't care to involve myself in their private lives, but I'll be damned if I have to get all timid about my "bigotry" for thinking they're not as acceptable or beneficial to society as a man and woman who are living for one another and for their children, working to be beneficial members of society. There is no reason not to honor them as good examples, and no reason to try to make anything else a "marriage".

Precisely because it is a distinction that has a purpose. It's not even a "purpose" invented by man, it's just something coming from our natures, from nature itself. All we're doing with structuring laws that deal with it as a special case is recognizing the fact of nature, and adapting our laws to that situation, with some purpose in mind. Like showing kids that moms and dads are important, and helping moms and dads take better care of their kids.

So you're saying that marrying a certain type of human is as absurd as marrying a cat or sheep. And gay people shouldn't take offense to that?

 

[babe]

So you're saying that marrying a certain type of human is as absurd as marrying a cat or sheep. And gay people shouldn't take offense to that?

I'm saying "marriage" sensibly means a coming together of a man and a woman. I wouldn't quibble about anything that conforms to human intimate relations involving a connection that is man plus woman. I didn't say anything about absurd. I said I think some people could feel a relationship with an animal is as important to them as a gay relationship can be between humans. I've got a dog, for example. I know lots of people who consider their dogs as good or better than kids.

If you think you're entitled to take offense you're just off base with reality. People have a right to think whatever they want about you, and you have no right to demand they change to please you. And that is where I blow off and take my opinion to another thread.

https://jazzfanz.com/showthread.php?14990-Longest-Thread-Ever/page164

 

[Gameface]

I've had a wonderful idea. Instead of homosexuals calling their marriages "civil unions" why don't people with "traditional" marriages performed in churches call their marriages "Christian marriage" and that way they can continue to feel special and there will be a clear distinction between gay marriage and even marriages like mine which was performed by a judge and no religious stuff took place during the ceremony. You could even get bumper stickers that say "proud member of a Christian marriage" and maybe have special T-shirts (for those folks who aren't fortunate enough to have special underwear).

 

[babe]

I've had a wonderful idea. Instead of homosexuals calling their marriages "civil unions" why don't people with "traditional" marriages performed in churches call their marriages "Christian marriage" and that way they can continue to feel special and there will be a clear distinction between gay marriage and even marriages like mine which was performed by a judge and no religious stuff took place during the ceremony. You could even get bumper stickers that say "proud member of a Christian marriage" and maybe have special T-shirts (for those folks who aren't fortunate enough to have special underwear).

Interesting that even a good libertarian can go for a statist solution by suggesting something everyone else can do to solve a personal problem. At least, Gameface, you didn't propose to make this "solution" a new law actually enforceable by jackbooted thugs with badges.

People who believe in human rights should see the sense in letting other people think and say what they like, and leave it out of legislatures and courts.

What I do propose is changing some statutes or laws that don't necessarily involve changing the meanings some people attach to words. Let the laws use a term like "household partners" , "legal household members". Let anyone who wants to join legal "household" simply file a legal notice with the country clerk declaring their association. Make every household legal and equal under the revised statutes.

Make employers and other folks doing business with a "household" treat them all the same in all their contracts. That would mean no matter what hypersensitive values and meanings we attach to our relations, we can call them what we like and define them in our own minds and think what we please. And let everyone else have their opinions too. Could still talk about the merits of prejudice or hate, but that's essentially always going to be part of the human condition, but some people can try to be more understanding if they wish, just not at the insistence of legal force.

the legal force would apply in a way that does enforce human rights without giving the government the position of imposing value judgments on our choices.

Again, I think the issue is hijacked as part of a statist/oligarchal agenda of human management which will if pursued under the arguments being made, result in the "lesser" masses, the subjects of the oligarchs, losing more freedom. I call that a sort of "neo-slavery" and it just feels like the plantation managers are insisting too much on exactly how we all are saying "yes sir".

 

[One Brow]

I'm saying "marriage" sensibly means a coming together of a man and a woman.

Why does "sensibly" only apply to the this particular relationship?

No person is divorced from the culture around them. For better or worse, the term "married" is used to give a cultural stamp of approval to a life-long commitment between adults, whether they are religious or not, intend to have children or not, etc. To exclude gay couples from this designation is to, culturally, exclude them from the status of being fully approved. It should not be the role of government to decide which legal couplings are considered culturally approved.

 

[One Brow]

So, which claim do you think did not appear in the same form? Certainly, people claimed that interracial marriages couldn't produce fruitful progeny...

Let's just stop with that one. Do you have evidence for that? I find myself skeptical that it's true.

I have seen references to a Georgia court case from the 1960s, with a quote about producing effeminate men, but none that have identified the actual case. I therefore withdraw this claim, as I don't have reliable evidence.

 

[PearlWatson]

This thread was an amusing, and a broad discussion of the topic. Some of you were pretty persuasive despite yourselves.

Questions that came up while reading:

Why is it okay for the people of Maryland to vote to call homosexual unions marriage but not okay for the people of California to reject calling homosexual unions marriage?
How can it be unconstitutional to vote in order to amend the constitution? (prop 8) Why is it acceptable for 9 government appointed people to overrule what 100's of thousands of citizens find culturally acceptable if that shouldn't be the role of government. (<--goes to One Brow's statement on what the role of government is in all this).

 

[PearlWatson]

I have seen references to a Georgia court case from the 1960s, with a quote about producing effeminate men, but none that have identified the actual case. I therefore withdraw this claim, as I don't have reliable evidence.

The Eugenicists/Darwiniacs claimed interracial progeny was "unfit" for the gene pool, which is why they sought to outlawed those marriages.

 

[One Brow]

This thread was an amusing, and a broad discussion of the topic. Some of you were pretty persuasive despite yourselves.

Questions that came up while reading:

Why is it okay for the people of Maryland to vote to call homosexual unions marriage but not okay for the people of California to reject calling homosexual unions marriage?

For the same reason it would be good for one state to call interracial unions marriage, and bad for another state to reject calling interracial unions marriage. In our culture, we accept that there are individual rights, and that among these is the right to participate in state-recognized institutions such as marriage. The will of the majority is not considered sufficient, in and of itself, to abridge those rights.

How can it be unconstitutional to vote in order to amend the constitution? (prop 8)

A constitution is not allowed to contradict itself.

Why is it acceptable for 9 government appointed people to overrule what 100's of thousands of citizens find culturally acceptable if that shouldn't be the role of government. (<--goes to One Brow's statement on what the role of government is in all this).

Those 9 appointees are the people's method of protecting the rights of the individual against the tyranny of the majority, among other things.

The Eugenicists/Darwiniacs claimed interracial progeny was "unfit" for the gene pool, which is why they sought to outlawed those marriages.

You had three really good questions, and then followed it up with this false garbage. Ugh.