Cooper says:
The concern is that redefining marriage as a genderless institution will sever its abiding connection to its historic traditional procreative purposes, and it will refocus, refocus the purpose of marriage and the definition of marriage away from the raising of children and to the emotional needs and desires of adults, of adult couples….Justice Kagan presses him: What about older heterosexual couples over the age of 55? Their sexual intercourse isn't going to produce children. Letting them marry when they can't procreate ought to present the same problem of centering marriage on adult "needs and desires" instead of on children.
Cooper says:
[S]ociety's interest in responsible procreation isn't just with respect to the procreative capacities of the couple itself. The marital norm, which imposes the obligations of fidelity and monogamy... advances the interests in responsible procreation by making it more likely that neither party, including the fertile party to that...The fertile party? Yes: The man can still reproduce, just not with this woman.
The marital norm... [is] designed... to make it less likely that either party to that — to that marriage will engage in irresponsible procreative conduct outside of that marriage.... That's... the marital norm. Society has an interest in seeing a 55-year-old couple that is -- just as it has an interest of seeing any heterosexual couple that intends to engage in a prolonged period of cohabitation to reserve that until they have made a marital commitment.... So that, should that union produce any offspring, it would be more likely that that child or children will be raised by the mother and father who brought them into the world.Got that? In this view, marriage is about children and not adult desire because it is a device to rein in male desire, to keep men from fathering children they aren't going to raise. It's not that marriage can keep that bad thing from happening. It just makes it less likely, because the marriage norm is fidelity.
Obviously, fornication and adultery go on despite this marriage norm, and it's hard to see why letting gay people marry would mess up the norm. I'm trying to picture this man at the heart of Cooper's vision of society: He's true to his wife, because he's gotten the message that's the norm, but if some gay people can marry, then he's going to start cheating, knocking up some other woman, and it's because of this guy that gay people can be excluded from marriage?
What a nutty set of things we're asked to believe! Who the hell is this stereotypical married man, constrained by what other people are forbidden to do? And why should his ridiculous, tenuous connection to norms carry the day? And how can obsessing over what makes him tick work to keep marriage focused on the raising of children and not on the emotional needs and desires of adults? It seems to be all about the needs and desires of adults — really ridiculous heterosexual male adults.
Who are these people?!
Posts
251 comments:
1 – 200 of 251 Newer› Newest»If people want to fix heterosexual marriage, then they should fix heterosexual marriage.
Stop blaming gays for something they had nothing to with.
Marriage broke a long time ago.
Your post seems infantile, Professor. Government support of heterosexual marriage is aimed, however badly, at helping the nuclear family, which seems to support the community and the government itself.
Does this seem inobvious to you?
Ann, you make an interesting policy argument. Just the sort of thing a legislature might consider, but that's not the point, is it?
And, how do you oppose polygamy, if you do? And why should you. What difference, at this point, does it make?
Here's one answer: A sterile opposite sex couple could adopt a child (or even nurture a child without the benefit of government sanction) and that would be a good thing for the rest of us because a married man and woman, a husband and a wife, a married mother and father are inherently (historically, instinctively, naturally?) more valuable as parents and role models for children, especially boys, than any alternatives.
Those people are the adults who have managed to keep the ship afloat.
I guess you're asking, though clumsily, why SSM hurts heterosexual marriage. Does that also seem inobvious? Let's say you play the violin well, and some guy plays it badly, and the music school you go to says he's just as good as you, because, well, them's the rules.
Our society won't survive without heterosexual marriage. Go take a look at the average inner city if you disagree.
Our society will survive quite well without same sex "marriage". We've done so for hundreds of years.
Therefore heterosexual marriage is more valuable, and therefore deserves benefits that same sex "marriage" does not.
Gresham's Law: "Bad money drives out good." Or, to put it another way: treating unequal things as equal always ends up harming the more valuable thing.
How? Don't necessarily know. So what?
You want same sex "marriages" to be treated like heterosexual marriages? Fine. Prove that society benefits as much from them as from real marriages. Until then, you've pushing a fraud by saying they should be treated the same.
I'm just explaining the petitioner's argument. I give you the quotes and my paraphrases are accurate. If you don't like it, don't complain about me. Complain about Cooper and fix the arguments. Articulate them better. Do something. But calling me "infantile" or whatever is basically turning away from reality. Look at what Cooper said and deal with it.
The religious nuts don't help the argument.
If you want the heterosexual angle, the erotic gaze exposes the beloved without the beloved able to become an object.
This lack of becoming-known is the future, in the form fecundity and a child.
Which is how it's not able to become known.
Marriage has that hidden in it.
Right. You didn't espouse any viewpoint. It's all arguments to you. Please.
Steyn:
And no court with any understanding of accountable government or constitutional propriety would go along with it. It may well be that the tide has turned, and the American people are cool with gay marriage. In that case, their elected representatives should enact it into law (as the House of Commons at Westminster recently did). But the spectacle of a nation agog waiting for a puff of smoke from Justice Kennedy to see which way he’s going to blow is ridiculous. Why not ask Punxsutawney Phil?
You keep ignoring Justice Scalia's point - regardless of how awkward it is to define something that is so basic as to not require explanation - the most basic institution of civilization - the issue is still whether the Constitution requires it, which is an absurd assertion. If one thing on this issue is without dispute it is that the 14th Amendment was NOT intended to apply to homosexuals. End of analysis.
Marriage broke a long time ago.
True. Probably around the time marriage stopped being viewed as an inviolable sacrament (or nearly so) and started being viewed a contract to be agreed to or voided as either of the two parties saw fit. Add to that the idea that children of single parents end up being exactly the same as children of two parent households* and the stage was set for the last 50 or so years of the destruction of marriage.
* Warning! This is a statistical argument!
Who are these people?!
About 90% of your current commenters, I'm afraid.
Why would you run and hide from this neutral paragraph?
What a nutty set of things we're asked to believe! Who the hell is this stereotypical married man, constrained by what other people are forbidden to do? And why should his ridiculous, tenuous connection to norms carry the day? And how can obsessing over what make him tick work to keep marriage focused on the raising of children and not on the emotional needs and desires of adults? It seems to be all about the needs and desires of adults — really ridiculous heterosexual male adults.
If one thing on this issue is without dispute it is that the 14th Amendment was NOT intended to apply to homosexuals. End of analysis.
The Constitution doesn't mention marriage at all. End of analysis?
Judging by my Facebook friends, young people are overwhelmingly for SSM.
Procreation is not the issue. Marriage is the relationship in which sexual relations are permitted and more than that, expected.
This should be obvious from annulment laws.
But if marriage is not strictly a relationship in which sex is not merely permitted but is expected, then marriage has no meaning at all other than a random sanction of a chosen relationship, and here the burden shifts to the proponents of gay marriage to tell us how they show a government interest in limiting marriage at all.
it will be everything so it will become nothing. And hasn't that been the point all along! To destroy the one cradle of true civic and personal morality - a father and mother teaching a child.
( We're nearing the point where the sophistry of man failed to persuade God and volcanoes start to become strangely active. )
Ann have you considered that there really is a Satan that was cast down to earth and seeks the misery of all men and women. And families that don't or can't teach virtue and morality, and can't emotionally shelter and nurture children will lead directly to that misery.
Satan knows it. Why don't you seem to, Ann?
Satan knows it. Why don't you seem to, Ann?
LOL. Ok, you people have turned from morons to complete wackos.
The fertile party? Think Tony Randall.
I'm surprised that Obama's people didn't use the "Satan knows it" argument when advocating their ruinous health care law.
"Gresham's Law: "Bad money drives out good." Or, to put it another way: treating unequal things as equal always ends up harming the more valuable thing."
But since everyone can only marry one person, and you probably don't even want a gay person to marry a nongay person, where is the problem? Marriage takes people OUT of circulation. Shouldn't that improve value in your analogy?
Isn't there more value in having individuals paired with other individuals, living stable, productive lives rather than drifting around stirring up trouble?
Cooper's argument is about the fear of the heterosexual male drifting around causing trouble.
That's kind of stereotyping and sexist, but if that's the problem to be solved by marriage, how do gay people marrying mess up the solution?
Quite another question is why should that be the problem to be solved by marriage?
From a feminist perspective, I object to the concept that women are society's tools for taming men.
There is way too much social engineering here. It isn't good. It isn't freedom. It isn't pretty. It isn't smart.
Back off, government. Smarten up, people.
There is way too much social engineering here. It isn't good. It isn't freedom. It isn't pretty. It isn't smart.
Back off, government. Smarten up, people.
See, this is why I continue to brave the current high tide of moron commenters and remain a devoted fan of your blog, Althouse.
Justice Kagan presses him: What about older heterosexual couples over the age of 55? Their sexual intercourse isn't going to produce children. Letting them marry when they can't procreate ought to present the same problem of centering marriage on adult "needs and desires" instead of on children.
Just because marriage is defined to promote a family structure that will support the children it sites doesn't mean that every marriage MUST have kids.
Older couples can adopt, science can allow for older couples to have kids (just look at Anthony Quinn).
But that is irrelevant.
There is an age requirement to get married because we differentiate adults from children. But if you are an adult and meet all the other criteria why would we deny the right?
thats not even a point that should be addressed as a serious question.
Do we place a restriction on people voting if they are 80 and likely senile if they meet all other requirements. There is no grandfather clause in our laws that say you only have rights or access to congracts, but only till you become a certain age.
Even the idea of retirement doesn't mean that you HAVE to retire at the set age of retirement.
What a stupid line of questioning. Even stupider that it is offered as some valid argument as if it somehow disproves the rule.
Polygamy CAN produce offspring. Incest CAN. Produce offspring. But despite this we still discriminate against these types of relationship too. Why?
If you want to focus marriage on adults needs and desires on what basis would you deny polygamy if there are people looking to form polygamous unions?
This enitire argument is completely specious.
What we are talking about is a bisexual man who has a same-sex marital partner, but then gets a woman who is not his spouse pregnant.
Under the traditional norm of procreative responsibility, he should marry the woman so they can raise the child together. But he's already got a spouse, so that complicates fulfillment of the traditional norm.
Or it could be a bisexual woman who gets pregnant by a man who is not the woman she married and pledged fidelity too. The man is inconvenient, but for all we know he may be the parent who will care most for the child.
Hollywood even made the award-winning movie The Kids are Alright about the second scenario with Annette Bening, Julianne Moore, and Mark Ruffalo as the no longer anonymous sperm donor for "their" two children.
So, it must not be a completely irrational concern, even though I agree it does seem a bit thin.
Satan knows it. Why don't you seem to, Ann?
LOL. Ok, you people have turned from morons to complete wackos.
3/26/13, 6:32 PM
Mormons know Satan when they see him, Palladian.:) oh you said morons, sorry.....
Professor, Cooper should have said, "Marriage, in California, is defined by California law. The federal government has no legal authority in this matter because no provision of the Constitution grants it that authority and express powers are the only ones the federal government has. Nothing has been done to take that power from the states and give it to the federal government. The District Court lacked subject matter jurisdiction. Please reverse with an Order to Dismiss." And then sit down.
Sophists, like yourself, are empowered when one allows them define the terms and then argue from those terms. This was Justice Alito's point. Your argument is just a law professor's cheap trick, which works on law students. Not so much on adults.
"Smarten up, people."
Pot, meet kettle.
Nothing like some snarky ad hominem when you are down and out. I suspect all of us here expect more from you than that. At least I did.
Wow, Basil actually make a legal argument.
Mormons know Satan when they see him, Palladian.:) oh you said morons, sorry.....
There's a difference! And I say this as a member of a distinguished Mormon patrilineal descent.
makes.
(Using Blogger's awesome 2nd post edit feature)
If one thing on this issue is without dispute it is that the 14th Amendment was NOT intended to apply to homosexuals. End of analysis.
Palladian say "The Constitution doesn't mention marriage at all. End of analysis?"
Absolutely - the State legislature (or the people via referendum) can do what it wants to do unless the federal constitution prohibits it, it is a federal issue or the state constitution prohibits it.
Constitutional Law is not really hard. it's just made opaque to allow for the promotion of left wing political ideology.
I'm for opening it all up.
Let's do this. Polygamy, Pygmygamy, Origamy, Incest, Bestiality.
Let's rip this up Caligula-style and never look back!
Isn't there more value in having individuals paired with other individuals, living stable, productive lives rather than drifting around stirring up trouble?
Are you saying gays are running around stirring up trouble because they can't marry?
To me that sounds as vapid as the argument as the argument that because gays can marry, it is going to sully other relationships.
You've even got a poster here who is saying he goes out to prove he still has it, even though he is married to his gay lover. And apparently, he sees nothing wrong with it.
Gay and heterosexual commitments are NOT the same thing. One will forever lack biological offspring.
And frankly, I'm tired of the argument that because some married couples can't procreate, therefore it impacts on the entire institution the value of heterosexual marriage for procreation purposes. I personally find those who marry with the intent to never have kids, and follow up on that intent, to be abusing the tax laws.
But, there aren't very many of those.
Sorry:
To me that sounds as vapid as the argument as the argument that because gays can marry, it is going to sully other relationships does to you.
Just because marriage is defined to promote a family structure that will support the children it sites doesn't mean that every marriage MUST have kids.
Not to mention the economic consequences of marrying do not stop when the kids are grown. They continue, due to all that time spent raising kids, and not promoting yourself.
Are you saying gays are running around stirring up trouble because they can't marry?
I've been deliberately fucking married men and trying to break up their heterosexual marriages as a form of protest!
Right, guys, because the only argument that can inform a political argument is a political argument.
And how long do you intend to be stuck in that circular death spiral?
till the whole society comes down on your heads?
I note that nobody tried to address how they'd logically set limits on marriage.
And Obama did invoke Satan in his "selling" of Obamacare and he does it in every battle. He may nit say the name Satan but he surely calls his political opponents the personification of Satan.
besides, the Satan to which I refer is correspondingly provable to be least as real as global warming.
I'm not arguing that marriage is in fact a right, but if we are discussing rights, what rights do you lose when you hit a certain age? Do you only have the right to bear arms till you're 56?
So eliana, to answer your question, why can heterosexuals marry even if they're too old to have kids? Because the requirement is that a man can marry a woman. So long as you meet that criterion you are good to go.
Simple enough?
Eliana's question would be akin to saying that we order marriage around people loving each other (the way Inga says we should even though she still would ban all the other loving relationships that don't meet her narrow view), yet what about those marriages people enter into where they don't actually love one another, but are doing so out of convenience.
Would the fact that not every couple marries for love negate the premise that we should base marriage around the idea of people loving each other? The idea is absurd.
As would the idea be that society would set up a love detector bureau where they would test each and every couple who might want to get married to make sure they really love each other before getting a marriage license.
So too, the idea that individual couples might be infertile or too old to sire kids has no bearing on society promoting the relationship that would promote a traditional family and allowing people to marry even if they might not actually be able to do so,.
besides, the Satan to which I refer is correspondingly provable to be least as real as global warming.
What a terrible thing to say about Satan.
"And frankly, I'm tired of the argument that because some married couples can't procreate, therefore it impacts on the entire institution the value of heterosexual marriage for procreation purposes. I personally find those who marry with the intent to never have kids, and follow up on that intent, to be abusing the tax laws."
Dante seems to want you and Meade prosecuted for tax fraud, Ann.
Dante seems to want you and Meade prosecuted for tax fraud, Ann.
If you've procreated, you've already paid your dues, in my view. I thought I made that clear later. So yes, an omission on my part.
My original sentiment stands.
How does First Amendment "Freedom of Association" language fit into the Fed's powers to trump state law like Prop 8?
So the sweet little widow down the street from me, who never was blessed with children cannot marry her old gentleman friend who also never had children!?
So the sweet little widow down the street from me, cannot marry her old gentleman friend who also never had children!?
Only if they promise to try anal. At least once.
I've been deliberately fucking married men and trying to break up their heterosexual marriages as a form of protest!
Very funny! I know a gay guy who tried that on me, not for spite reasons, I assume (yes, I was already married). And he bragged about how he had buggered or allowed himself to be buggered by some married friend of his, but he said "It didn't work."
So, do you make yourself assessable to married guys? I'm assuming the spite part of it was for humor's sake!
Bob Ellison writes:
Your post seems infantile, Professor. Government support of heterosexual marriage is aimed, however badly, at helping the nuclear family, which seems to support the community and the government itself.
Does this seem inobvious to you?
But how does allowing a sub-set of the 3% gay population, maybe 30 or 40% of gays who will actually marry, interfere with "helping the nuclear family, which seems to support the community and the government itself."
I mean really. The only thing that changes is that maybe .7% of the population in the US will be able to marry if same sex marriage would become the law of the land. That is a far far less amount of people that the number who stray outside of their marriage and produce children out of wedlock. If you're really serious about wanting to protect marriage and the nuclear family, why not throw those who do this marital destructive thing in jail for ten to twenty?
So the sweet little widow down the street from me, who never was blessed with children cannot marry her old gentleman friend who also never had children!?
What's the point?
There is way too much social engineering here. It isn't good. It isn't freedom. It isn't pretty. It isn't smart.
Back off, government. Smarten up, people.
social engineering is redefining marriage to mean something it hasn't. Pot meet kettle.
"Mormons know Satan when they see him."
one of the main functions of a religion is to enable people to distinguish god and god-like from Satan and satan-like.
the evil Mormons seek to point out is human suffering - all suffering.
it is possible to grant with good intentions some "right" that, under unintended consequences causes a great deal of suffering not envisioned or contemplated.
what other reason is there for prophets than to see things that others don't or won't see.
"So the sweet little widow down the street from me, cannot marry her old gentleman friend who also never had children!?"
------------------
"Only if they promise to try anal. At least once."
I'll leave it to you to let them know the conditions, EMD. Perhaps it would be prudent to have paramedics on hand, they're in their 80's.
I'm glad the subject of tax law has come up. The government is presently denying me the Child and Dependent Care Credit, on the flimsy pretext that I don't happen to be caring for any children or dependents. So, yeah, my case doesn't have much to do with the purposes for which the credit was created in the first place-- but shouldn't the government still have to extend it to me anyway, unless they can give the Supreme Court a whiz-bang policy argument that will convince them that it would do some harm?
This is clearly evidence why government needs to get out of the marriage business. Marriage has been a societal institution between a man and a woman for thousands of years. Even in Roman, Greek, or Spartan times, marriage was reserved for the relationship between a man and a woman to procreate and raise a family. All this while homosexuality, pederasty, prostitutes, and concubines were accepted, but these were separate from marriage.
If we go the direction as suggested by the questioning by the justice, then one must ask, why limit the number of adults that may enter into such an arrangement? Why 2?
Ann, please take your shoes off, sit down in a comfortable chair, grab a drink and sin no more today.
Principles or normative standards, whether biological imperatives or personal desires, do not guarantee, but promote a preferred outcome. Marriage is not about restraining a male, but is a formal commitment between a man and a woman, which is principally, but not exclusively, oriented around their developing Posterity.
There are other forms and kinds of unions, which serve other purposes, including guardianship. There are unions which are based on sexual and platonic relationships. There are unions which are corporate and purposed with facilitating economic production. There are valid reasons to distinguish between these different unions.
A couplet is a union based on a sexual relationship, which may or may not also be a guardianship. It does not distinguish itself from other unions formed with that purpose and seeking formal recognition of a personal relationship, whether sexual or platonic.
The issue is two-fold. First, the equal protection of rights. Second, the classification of a behavior for rejection, tolerance, or normalization. The first issue is primarily about individual rights and freedom of association. The second issue begins with objective, reproducible standards. Behaviors are classified as normal when they serve a useful purpose for society and humanity. Both homosexual behavior, as well as promiscuous heterosexual behavior, have no redeeming value to society or humanity. They are tolerated within reason. Only procreative heterosexual behavior possesses an intrinsic value to society and humanity, which we recognize as necessary to comply with a biological imperative, and ensure there is a Posterity for which we will secure the Blessing of Liberty, among other desirable Rights, both unalienable and granted.
The intent is to promote an outcome, not necessarily guarantee it, which is often well outside of our capability. Normative standards meet two criteria: they serve the interests of society and humanity. The tolerance standard is typically limited to behaviors which do not cause the premature ( and capricious) abortion or incursion into another human life, which includes most behaviors such as material, physical, and ego gratification, which is not achieved through redistributive or retributive change, or fraud, and which do not sponsor a progressive corruption of individuals, institutions, and society.
Isn't his argument (persuasiveness aside) really framed towards adopting a rational basis level of scrutiny? If we end up using minimal scrutiny, then shouldn't he win on the argument? The fit might not be perfect, but there is some rational reason for the law.
Inga wrote:
So the sweet little widow down the street from me, who never was blessed with children cannot marry her old gentleman friend who also never had children!?
I already answered this above - but, they can marry because they are adults who meet the criterion for marriage and we don't have separate rules for senior citizens only for children. And, just because marriage is promoted to allow for a union that will best support the biological children it produces (and so he states don't have to), it oesnt mean hat every marriage will produce kids.
Just because you have the right to vote it doesn't mean you have to vote. And even if you don't vote, you don't lose that right, even if you are 90 and have Alzheimer's disease.
Get it?
"what other reason is there for prophets than to see things that others don't or won't see."
3/26/13, 7:01 PM
To find golden disks? To tell American Indians they are the lost tribes of Israel? I'm just reaching here. Sorry.
We're falling into the trap of arguing this topic. This is just what the left wants. They feel that any topic they bring up needs to be argued at this level.
Have we forgotten to power to ignore these people? Turn off the TV. Don't watch their movies. Don't read their websites. Don't buy their newspapers or magazines. Deny them revenue.
The fit might not be perfect, but there is some rational reason for the law.
That's the old-fogey version of rational-basis scrutiny. Under the new convincing-to-me-basis scrutiny, the fit will be gone over with a micrometer.
From a feminist perspective, I object to the concept that women are society's tools for taming men.
Well, it looks like you are going to find out what happens over the next 15 - 20 years in China, to see whether that concept is less egregious than not having women tame men.
Blogger bpm4532 said...
This is clearly evidence why government needs to get out of the marriage business.
Funny how nobody expressed that POV before the advent of same sex marriage became a likely outcome.
Older heterosexual couples over might still have a kid or 2 in school and/or raising the grandkid possibly at the same time, Justice Kagan.
Professor you can only marry 1 person at this time. Give it a few years.
Sure inga. All of those if the result is a better understanding of how a just and merciful society is built and maintained.
"But since everyone can only marry one person, and you probably don't even want a gay person to marry a nongay person, where is the problem? Marriage takes people OUT of circulation. Shouldn't that improve value in your analogy?
Isn't there more value in having individuals paired with other individuals, living stable, productive lives rather than drifting around stirring up trouble.
Cooper's argument is about the fear of the heterosexual male drifting around causing trouble.
monogamy is only one aspect of marriage that society is trying to promote, and while it is applicable to gays its the least valuable reason to promote gay marriage. Because you can be monogamous absent marriage.
As Joni Mitchell the liberal feminist sang back in the day " we don't need a piece of paper from the city hall, keeping us tried and true." And you don't. There are many couples who remain together for their lifetimes and never get married. How did committed gays, such as there are, get by prior to the Ida that they must be married. Being faithful doesn't require a marriage.
More importantly though, in the interest of society, who cares if gays are promiscuous? What is the consequence of gay promiscuity? Certainly not pregnancy. So then, it doesn't matter to society.
But if a heterosexual man is fathering children all over the place and not marrying any of the women, the consequences are enormous on society.
But doesn't that same argument apply to letting men marry other men so they won't be tempted into impregnating women instead? After all, not all men who identified as "gay" are 100% exclusively homosexual.
"But since everyone can only marry one person, and you probably don't even want a gay person to marry a nongay person, where is the problem?"
Why not? I'm also curious why marriage would be limited to one person. If the value of marriage has nothing to do with children and less to do with social stability, how then is it to be defined and what is the rationale for whatever limits you might put on it? In the end, what's even love got to do with it?
But doesn't that same argument apply to letting men marry other men so they won't be tempted into impregnating women instead? After all, not all men who identified as "gay" are 100% exclusively homosexual.
if they impregnate a woman and they are not 100% gay the have an avenue to raise that kid with their spouse (the person they fathered the kid with). Even if they are gay 100% they can still marry the mother of their child and raise he kid it doesn't guarantee promiscuity though does it?
That's the only real consideration that society cares about. Who raises the kids. And primarily its along biological lines. The people responsible are the ones who's genetic material is involved. The assumption being that people are being responsible and actually raising their kids.
If there was a gay couple, and one of the parents was the biological parent, and they got divorced, the law would recognize the biological mother first and foremost (this would be true for heterosexual couples too by the way).
But if gays are out fornicating and not producing kids, then who cares?
I'm looking for a fertile party. Oh yeah....
This is clearly evidence why government needs to get out of the marriage business.
Funny how nobody expressed that POV before the advent of same sex marriage became a likely outcome.
I've been advocating this position for years, right here on this blog. Surely you've noticed...
So, do you make yourself assessable to married guys? I'm assuming the spite part of it was for humor's sake!
I've been with a few guys who I later learned were married to women, or had girlfriends. There's quite a lot of that about.
And yes, my "fucking married men" comment was intended as humorous and silly. I only do it for lust, not spite or politics.
Presumably, the social impulse to give advantages to marriage had some benefit in mind for society other than love. If law professors cannot discern what that benefit was or is, then we are pretty far adrift.
And if there is no discernable benefit to society, then no marriage of any kind ought to be subsidized.
Wonder if we will ever have Professor Althouse's view on polygamy in the context of the SSM arguments?
sonicfrog said...
I mean really. The only thing that changes is that maybe .7% of the population in the US will be able to marry if same sex marriage would become the law of the land.
In reality the change is to further enshrine the principle that there are no constraints on our government's actions.
The upside is that AndyR isn't here whining about the situation. I pity the poor guy that winds up with that drama queen.
Go. Get married. You all deserve each other.
Now get off my lawn.
This is clearly evidence why government needs to get out of the marriage business.
Not really. It's not in societies interest to promote relationships so that people can love one another, but it is in societies interest in promoting the family that produces children, has both sexes in it and is supposed to raise the children it sires. Not having the state raise people's kids is in the staes interest. Promoting the relationship that most people will have who then go on to have kids of their own is in the states interest.
If people want to live unconventional lives, its up to them, and society shouldn't (necessarily) restrict them from living their lives. But that doesn't mean that society must make all conventions equal to assuage the unconventional.
etbass said...
Wonder if we will ever have Professor Althouse's view on polygamy in the context of the SSM arguments?
We know Top Men can articulate them.
It is the stupidest argument against SSM yet.
There are some decently good ones, CJ Roberts was articulating some. So was Scalia and Alito. You can tell by the caterwauling from the leftists.
I'm for marriage liberty, but don't much care for the assholeishness of the gay activists. Alot of gay marriage activists are completely OK with severely restricting and even eliminating the 2nd amendment right to arms, or they support politicians that do.
So, I could really not give 2 turds for their crying about their rights, when they won't acknowlege mine.
I hope the USSC tosses DOMA and allows Prop 8 to stand. Just to confound the gay leftists. :)
Of course gays should marry. They should have to suffer like the rest of us. It's only fair.
"Who are these people?!"
That doesn't refer to the people who oppose same-sex marriage. It refers to the presumed man that remains faithful to his wife because marriage excludes gay people.
If you oppose ssm, I'm asking you if you believe in this guy and his status in the argument made by Cooper.
Skimming this thread has lowered my IQ. This is the dumbest and yet most successful distraction foisted on the American public in a long time. Europe is test piloting overt savings theft and our fed is inflating our economy into oblivion and the monkeys can't stop squabbling over this.
Anyone who thinks the government should be involved in this is stupid(the right) or nefarious(the left.)
Wonder if we will ever have Professor Althouse's view on polygamy in the context of the SSM arguments?
I wonder too, mostly because it may help keep my hope alive that I can one day marry both her and Meade!
More importantly though, in the interest of society, who cares if gays are promiscuous? What is the consequence of gay promiscuity? Certainly not pregnancy. So then, it doesn't matter to society.
What an ignorant statement.
The AIDS epidemic matters to society. That is a consequence of promiscuity, regardless of orientation.
The gay community is responsible for a horror show, all so they could continue a lifestyle of lots of anonymous and group sex. Gay liberty radicals actively opposed ordinary public health measures to stop an epidemic, by turning their promiscuity that was spreading a deadly disease into a bullshit "liberty" issue.
The reason the hetero community didn't see the explosion of AIDS is because they had taboos about sex that the gay male community wanted to repudiate and ignore.
They blame Ronald Reagan because they cannot face their own responsibility for the epidemic they caused.
I'm not gay, but I want to earn like a boss.
Althouse: "From a feminist perspective, I object to the concept that women are society's tools for taming men."
My god! Object all you want, but not from a "feminist" perspective! That's what most brands of feminism are generally about in one sense or another. Taming. Reining in. Repressing. Pick your verb and try not to be delusional in your zeal to promote SSM.
Those of you who think "gay marriage" is a contradiction in terms should note that our spammer used the phrase "great Chrysler".
The gay community is responsible for a horror show, all so they could continue a lifestyle of lots of anonymous and group sex.
No, a virus is responsible for the horror show, you piece of shit.
And it was primarily the work of gay men and women, and AIDS activists, that helped slow down the "horror show" that was killing so many gay men.
See, this is what I meant by moron commenters.
Wonder if we will ever have Professor Althouse's view on polygamy in the context of the SSM arguments?
She answered this (badly) in another thread with the following:
If the only purpose of a law is to stamp a badge of inferiority on some people, it lacks a legitimate interest. All laws must have a legitimate interest.
The laws against incest and polygamy and so forth can be supported by other articulable interests.
in short, when the legitimate interest for promoting traditional marriage is expressed she says that its only stamping a brand of inferiority on people. But in regards to incest and polygamy such bans can be justified based on other articulable interests. What those interests are she doesn't say, and who is deciding that those interests are justifiable she doesn't mention (I wonder if its the same people saying that ordering marriage along the lines that is has been ordered is a legitimate interest).
Why are those other articulated interests not similarly without justification? She doesn't mention.
Not that agree with Sgt Ted, but a virus didn't lure my stepson into gay bathhouses in San Fransisco when he was still a teen. But he's sure got the virus now.
Just to show it ain't all black and white.
Not that agree with Sgt Ted, but a virus didn't lure my stepson into gay bathhouses in San Fransisco when he was still a teen. But he's sure got the virus now.
No, a virus didn't lure him. Neither did nefarious homosexuals and their morality-warping pits of iniquity. What lured him was the natural sex drive of a young man. Perhaps you remember what it was like to have such a drive, all those years ago :)
I'm all for polygamy. My great-great-great grandfather had 11 wives during his life.
Just to show it ain't all black and white.
Sometimes it's pink, with tassels.
Sgt Ted wrote:
ignorant statement.
The AIDS epidemic matters to society. That is a consequence of promiscuity, regardless of orientation.
The gay community is responsible for a horror show, all so they could continue a lifestyle of lots of anonymous and group sex. Gay liberty radicals actively opposed ordinary public health measures to stop an epidemic, by turning their promiscuity that was spreading a deadly disease into a bullshit "liberty" issue.
The reason the hetero community didn't see the explosion of AIDS is because they had taboos about sex that the gay male community wanted to repudiate and ignore.
but aids hit Africa and infected a lot of heterosexual who engaged in risky behavior. Though aids hit the gay population its one disease among many. It also hit drug addicts and hemophiliacs.
I agree that aids hit gays predominantly and that it was largely due to promiscuous behavior, but that wasn't the argument.
Society doesn't care about gay promiscuity in the context of marriage. But certainly society cares about promiscuity as a health concern. But not just for gays and not just regarding aids.
Marriage will not necessarily address this behavior. First, because even if gays et married it doesn't mean they will be less promiscuous. And secondly it didn't take gays getting married to stop the aids epidemic. Once they were hit it changed behavior. Many became more careful after seeing the devastation. As we understood he epidemic more people were able to work around it. People are more promiscuous than ever. We are just now dealing with different diseases.
"
But since everyone can only marry one person, and"
Why ? Your argument applies to all forms of relationship. I wonder how long before relations with underage minors is challenged as harming some pervert's rights.
I don't really care about gay marriage but it so obvious a ploy to demand that everyone regard homosexuality as perfectly normal and equivalent to heterosexual relationships.
This won't end with gay marriage.
Sgt Ted: "The AIDS epidemic matters to society. That is a consequence of promiscuity, regardless of orientation.
The gay community is responsible for a horror show, all so they could continue a lifestyle of lots of anonymous and group sex."
Exactly! But, of course, gay marriage will change all that (NOT!). And the pro-SSM movement asks that the government be required constitutionally to normalize perceptions of a lifestyle that the CDC has documented as detrimental to public health.
The PC implications are such that the lawyers opposing SSM will probably not even raise the issue.
"What lured him was the natural sex drive of a young man."
Perhaps. I doubt anyone can be sure of that, but it's right handy to assert that nobody is ever at fault, they were all just being driven by irresistible impulses. It's even easier if the boy isn't a relative, I suppose.
Yep, I do remember the impulses of youth. And I'll stop now, before I say something insulting.
Palladian wrote:
I'm all for polygamy. My great-great-great grandfather had 11 wives during his life.
I can see some benefits. Much larger household income, much better distribution of house hold chores and plenty of sex for me. If I wanted a five way with four beauties I'd have to find a REALLY adventurous gf who knew four other super freaks. OR, hire prostitutes. OR just go in the bedroom for fiveway Fridays.
Also, I think it would help with healthcare costs since we can buy insurance in bulk and get a group discount.
Plus, we love each other.
So clearly, having laid out the pros its up to althouse to explain why she would deprive me, a tax paying adult who loves his spouses the ability to redefine marriage to include my marriage.
Oh, did I mention that there is also a history of a minority being OPPRESSED BY SOCIETY,S bigotry that althouse is not standing behind who have suffered and suffered. Can she not think of the kids?
He's true to his wife, because he's gotten the message that's the norm, but if some gay people can marry, then he's going to start cheating, knocking up some other woman, and it's because of this guy that gay people can be excluded from marriage?
I think the point is over the public meaning of marriage. To the extent that marriage is "heterosexual," procreation is part of the public meaning of "marriage" even if there are individual exceptions. If marriage expands to encompass homosexual couples, the public meaning of marriage is completely unmoored from procreation -- now it's just about love. And people love their mistresses too. Remember Mark Sanford gushing about his mistress?
Not saying I necessarily agree with this -- I think it's foolish to look to the state for some kind of affirmation of the "meaning" of any particular social institution. If the social institution is dependent on legal affirmation for its survival, it's not actually real anymore. It's just a legal contrivance at that point. I don't think marriage is quite that far gone yet.
In effect, using the sterile male/female marriage argument seems facile. Do couples normally go into marriage knowing they are sterile? Maybe some do, but the vast vast majority do not, but once some of them realize that they cannot have children, then what? Should society expect them to dissolve their marriage because of it to ausage the homosexuals?
I'm just explaining the petitioner's argument. I give you the quotes and my paraphrases are accurate. If you don't like it, don't complain about me. Complain about Cooper and fix the arguments.
In law school, you learn to win arguments. The method by which you win is of little consequence. Logic only matters to the point it advances the argument. Fallacies are welcome if they advance the argument. The only goal is winning the argument.
I'm saying this about all law schools, not just Wisconsin. I've never known anyone who went to law school at Wisconsin, but do know plenty of people that went to other law schools. They all argue according to the rules above, win however possible within what the rules allow. Logic and reality need not apply. The funny/sad part is that lawyers and law professors sometimes forget that their arguments are sometimes little more than polished horse dung and get offended when such is pointed out.
Althouse wrote: Obviously, fornication and adultery go on despite this marriage norm, and it's hard to see why letting gay people marry would mess up the norm. I'm trying to picture this man at the heart of Cooper's vision of society: He's true to his wife, because he's gotten the message that's the norm, but if some gay people can marry, then he's going to start cheating, knocking up some other woman, and it's because of this guy that gay people can be excluded from marriage?
I see you framing this like a tort law fact pattern with your hypothetical man being the "reasonable man" (the fictitious "person of ordinary skill in patent law terms with which I'm more familiar). You're asking what reasonable damage would this man suffer? I'll give you one hypothetical: inequality.
People like Sullivan who insist that gay marriage is equal to straight marriage are in effect saying algebraically that M + F = M + M (or M + F = F + F. This seems willfully naive and doesn't account for any differences between M and F, but how would he know, never having raised children of both genders.
Another inequality (actually an insult to straight men) is the willful overlooking of examples such as Dan Savage who wish to change societal norms of monogamy. If such standards of monogamy were to become accepted among married gay males (as in the example of your beloved Titus) who's to say it wouldn't become more standard and acceptable among married gay males in general? Divorce--which has unfortunately become all too common in straight marriages--may be contagious and spread to SSM. If you accept that then why couldn't "monogamish" marriage spread to straight males? The reason it wouldn't is because women would not stand for it. Yet married gay males may accept it and it could become the norm. If we go back to the equation M + F = M + M we actually have an inequality.
It's funny but all the problems people seem to have with same-sex marriage actually seems to be problems with men. Read most of the anti-gay and/or anti-civil-gay-marriage comments here and you'll see that many of the complaints are related to typical male behaviors.
Maybe we need to ban men!
Fat Scalia, who dyes his hair (so gay), needs to exit stage right.
Yes he is hugely witty and enormously funny and the most intelligent man in the entire world.
But......
There needs to be a limit on how long these things suck on the government teet.
15 years max for these creatures. The Supreme Court is like a union or tenured professors-seniority is God.
And they are so fucking old.
A member of the Supreme Court should be appointed between the age of 45-55 and gone at the age of 55-65.
And if it still feel the need to work they can give speeches, work at Fox, replace Fat Drugbag when he is in the Domican Republican stocking up on his boner pills
And Thomas and Ginsberg need to follow suit. Followed by the other jew from Cambridge shortly thereafter.
@Palladian: I don't pretend to speak for women and only know the foibles of men.
There is no "Civil Right" to marry. I don't care if you are gay, straight or a blue-assed baboon. Marriage until a few hundred years ago was the provice of the church, be it in the western world or elsewhere, with a few exceptions that don't really matter. Government permission has been in the past all about maintaining social order: go back far enough and it was about class. A little closer to home and it was about race, and now it pretty much is about legal advantage (read: taxes) Some states have offered civil unions- the same tax advantages under another nom-de-rule, so to speak, but that doesn't seem to make the activists happy. Why is that do you suppose? Could it be the inevitable evil of the 'Sneetches Effect' rearing it's ugly head? Or maybe Oikophobia seasoned with a little bile, and the venal desire to punish anyone who is getting something that you think you are denied? Human emotions, in all their shitty glory. That's Occamm's solution.
Back in the 1980's when I lived in northern VA, The Blade, the gay print standard at the time, proclaimed "AIDS is our banner!"
Reflecting on that and on the current state of affairs, a new banner is supplanting the old. Brilliant PR and an effective spiritual stronghold now established.
Palladian: "And it was primarily the work of gay men and women, and AIDS activists, that helped slow down the "horror show" that was killing so many gay men.
See, this is what I meant by moron commenters."
Bullshit, Palladian. The horror show abides and is documented by the CDC every year. The overwhelming majority of new HIV/AIDs cases each year involve MSM - men having sex with men.
That doesn't mean ALL gay men are responsible, but gay men are sure as hell responsible.
@titus
Its spelled TEAT you bonehead.
And would it ever be possible to get a Supreme Court justice (liberal or conservative) who is not an East Coast Ivy League shit?
@ Hombre
LOL man, for a moment i thought you meant the Main Stream Media!
Though I am sure they played their part...
Titus said...
Fat Scalia, who dyes his hair (so gay), needs to exit stage right.
It seemed obvious to me that Ted Olson has enhanced hair color as well.
That doesn't mean ALL gay men are responsible, but gay men are sure as hell responsible.
What about HPV? Or breast cancer? Who's responsible for those?
So it follows then that, if gay marriage is not a civil right, then what's all the fuss about? a label? Lets see:
Man+Woman+sanction of the state= Marriage
Man(Woman)+Man(Woman)+ Sanction as above=Civil Union.
What's the problem here? If i break may arm i have a broken arm: If i break my let i've got a broken leg: I can't say my arm's broke when its my leg, and vice versa? Calling something a name that it ain't doesn't make it so. All it does is confuse the audience, and make you look like a fool.
From a feminist perspective, I object to the concept that women are society's tools for taming men.
There is way too much social engineering here. It isn't good. It isn't freedom. It isn't pretty. It isn't smart.
Remind me how well that's working out in our inner cities.
Re: Methadras:
In effect, using the sterile male/female marriage argument seems facile. Do couples normally go into marriage knowing they are sterile? Maybe some do, but the vast vast majority do not, but once some of them realize that they cannot have children, then what? Should society expect them to dissolve their marriage because of it to assuage the homosexuals?
I think the more important point re: sterility is that it's none of the government's business whether you're sterile, or whether you in fact want to have children. Gender, on the other hand, is a public fact. If it weren't, there wouldn't be any issue here.
Not that I'm advocating the following (I'm not): but we could institute fertility tests.
The other thing is that while the argument regarding "most optimal results" for raising children is a compelling one, it's not the only.
There, is for example, the argument that traditional marriage (however tattered, beaten, and degraded largely by the actions and choices committed by heterosexuals) also provided both societal benefits in terms of caring for the generation **up** from the current one (on account of at least theoretical flexibility in meeting elder- generational obligations) AND--even more so--societal benefits in terms of the obligations of the marital partners **to care for each other** in elder-times illness. Which of course assumes a fidelity and one-to-one obligation once pledged via marriage.
I think that at the crux of a lot of objection to redefining the traditional notion of marriage involves all sorts and sets of stuff, including the raising of children, the caring for elder-generation family members, the first-obligations of spouses one-to-another, even the providing for members of the extended birth-family who don't have anyone to care for them. All of that order of things is totally tilted-over and overthrown if, fundamentally, the vows of marriage **no matter who undertakes them** don't involve a firm commitment to longevity--which, in most cases (though not all, of course--because, of course, there are always exceptions) ALSO involves fidelity, and even monogamy [which, at heart, is really just a commitment to the building of a specific family added to pre-existing ones].
And I say all of that as someone who has already stated where I am on the issue of gay marriage, and marriage, with respect to how it's being argued from various points, and thus how and why I came to the conclusion to which I came.
What restrictions may the government place on marriage consistent with the 14th amendment?
Age?
Gender?
Number?
Intellectual capacity?
Ability to reproduce?
None of the above?
Calling something a name that it ain't doesn't make it so.
Why do you look to the State to define "marriage" at all?
None of the above?
Yes. The only correct answer is that the government should have no answer to the question "what constitutes a marriage?". Neutral civil contracts should be the extent of the State's meddling in this affair.
Palladian said:
Why do you look to the State to define "marriage" at all?
Actually, I don't. In fact I would be perfectly happy with Marriage being a religious institution, and the state keeping their hairy nose completely out of it. Naturally it would follow then that such things as the income tax with its rank upon rank of favors and punishments for people depending on marital status (among other things) would be destroyed. Unfortunately those for whom power is their drug of choice, and the pecksniffian busybodys who insist on smelling every ass in the world for its own sake, social control via tax and regulation are the ultimate opiate.
Palladian asks:What about HPV? Or breast cancer? Who's responsible for those?
The Illuminati, obviously.
Hey, that makes about as much sense as most of the comments Palladian is shooting down.
I know gay men who were trying to put s stop to it and close the bath houses in SF that were marginalized for their efforts by the radicals claiming that their promisciuty was a revolutionary act. That other gay activists were trying to put a stop to it doesn't change that fact.
Gay activists were against the normal medical reporting procesures of dealing with a epidemic saying that they would be stigmatized. They got the rules changed just for them. This is well docnumented. This happened. You cannot deny it.
There are other sources that confirm this as well. Look it up. It isn't an antigay conspiracy.
Quit denying the truth just because it hits home, Palladian. The virus is neutral. The promiscuous gay subculture caused its rampant spread.
If heteros had acted the same way sexually in great numbers, it would have happened there too. But it didn't, did it?
I like you Palladian and I support many of the things you do in regards to gay liberty, but this blinds spot to the gay culture helping spread this disease should ne examined.
A theoretical:
If we were to dispense with altogether the notion of fundamental obligation between individuals related to each other (and in this case "related" includes voluntary choices of partnership as well as blood ones) and just went with pure, individual choice, then what?
What then?
***
Moreover, what do we then do with the vagaries, not to mention variations, of individual "unchoosings"?
What then?
Typical morons arguing the exception rather than the rule. The RULE, i.e the law of nature--- on which our law is based (See A1S8C10-- Congress shall punish violations of the law of nations (law of nature)--- see also the "the law of nature and nature's god-- Declaration of Independence) is that men and women procreate and produce children. That procreation is the basis of the advancement and survival of our society--- without it, it withers and dies. That is the only reason that government sponsors heterosexual marriage. For same sex couples to marry is completely against the law of nature, and there is no reason for government to sponsor it, as it serves no role in the advancement or survival of the US. DUH. Such nonsense and silliness to distract us from the Usurper and his NWO banker masters destroying the US.
And furthermore... Since I am on a rant tonight, Why do we continually see in this country a tiny minority dead-set on upending everything they can get their hands into? And more astonishingly, winning? All i hear is, "OHH OOH! I'm so put-upon! I'm so wounded that I dont get whatever the hell i want as soon as i want it! it's my CIVIL RIGHT!"
Ok big boy, where's mine? I think its grossly unfair that i'm not a billionaire! Where's mine??? Give my billion its my civil right and i want it NOW!
What? you say that if everyone gets a billion dollars it will destroy the currency, destroy the object of my desire? TO HELL with you! I want what I want when I want it, AND I WANT IT NOW!
Seems like screening for fertility would present an excessive entanglement.
"Seems like screening for fertility would present an excessive entanglement."
3/26/13, 9:55
Especially for old folks.
Sounds like a rational basis to me. the problem in this entire debate has been that those who support traditional marriage as defined for thousands of years have to defend its basis. This is ass backwards! The burden is on the advocates of state recognition of gay relationships as a marriage to prove why those relationships ought to be recognized as such.
How does society benefit from that and is that greater than the harms caused by fundamentally altering civilization's most basic social unit? Those questions haven't been answered. Hell, they haven't even been asked.
Freeman Hunt said...
Seems like screening for fertility would present an excessive entanglement.
I do believe until VERY recently many states required a pre-marital blood test? Remember RH factor in blood could cause problems in pregnancy, and in some cases the bride and groom would be 'counselled' to reconsider marriage. Its only an entanglement if your not the state. if you are its a 'compelling interest' Viv la difference!
Y'know, I acknowledge that I'm noodling over the notion of a post personal-obligation world in the cultural and societal sense and if/when (when/if?) it all becomes about legal contracts about individuals, which contract of course can and will contain all sorts of escape hatches, except for those that contain none at all. Again, then what?
Also, will it become necessary to require that contracts between individuals include certain clauses having to do with the care of children, each other and other, extended issues having to do with the groupings of people?
As I just said, just noodling over.
...and as I have said, now, repeatedly:
then what?
Will we end up replicating something, just in a much more complicated, difficult, expensive, regulated, etc. etc. & so forth way? Will we? I honestly don't know. Which is why I'm find myself noodling over the "then-what thing", for an example.
If the purpose of marriage is for having kids the following points are consistent with this idea:
1) Same sex couples should not be allowed to adopt kids. Yet, this is legal in several states and the SSM opponents have done nothing to stop this.
2) Straight people who don't want kids should not be pushed into marriage. Indeed, it makes sense to discourage such people from getting married. Yet, the SSM opponents seem obsessed with pushing straights into marriage even if when such people are very open about their desire and intent NOT to have kids.
3) The opponents of SSM need to show how the legalization of SSM will have a causative effect on how straights treat marriage. To date, they have yet to show a plausible mechanism for such an effect. Causality must be demonstrated for this argument to be valid.
4) Given 1) through 3), the only legitimate argument the SSM opponents have to offer is that SSM will result in a "slippery slope" that will eventually lead to polygamy. This is the argument Bill O'reilly often employs in his program. Yet, most social conservatives seem to be deficient in using this argument.
"Althousenfreude":
I am familiar with the like of 'Schadenfreude' -- those great German words that describe a feeling that articulates what we would perhaps rather leave more inarticulate (as opposed to: deja vu -- the French leaving nebulous, well, nebulous)
So what is the word when someone's arguments have made headway with you even though you are loathe to acknowledge it?
Gay marriage seems to have been a topic here for the last few days (when there is no Gatsby I have to peek my head out of the hole).
I have Kübler-Ross'ed my way through the misgivings I have on this subject (and misgivings I still may have -- that is 'acceptance' I figure): I think I have followed the Slippery Slope somehow upward (as in against the expected progression, not as a holier-than-thou value judgment).
It is Going To Happen: I am OK with That.
This is where I will employ the term "Althousenfreude": I would like to say Ann's arguments had no effect on me, but I cannot state this, realistically, as True. I have to acknowledge what I wish I could ignore or ellide.
I do not agree with all of her arguments; the catch is, it only takes one to wedge the door (or two -- I will keep these to myself - let her wonder).
I guess this is where I have landed: anyone truly buying into the concept of Commitment I will honor. If I am now naive to believe in the Good Intentions of the majority of Gay Marriages to come then so be it: Let Free Market Marriage reign.
kurt9 said...
If the purpose of... blah blah blah. You got it backwards. why do the proponents of the status quo of marriage have to say or defend a damn thing? how about you guys explaining why this is such a good idea, and convincing everyone else? Should not the burden of proof be on the side that wants to change things? Again, marriage is not a civil right. get that through your head and make an argument from some basis of reality.
Why has this discussion thread ended in an argument largely involving HIV/AIDs?
I'm tempted to say it's on account of all sides wanting to yell, "Squirrel." But I'm betting it's more complicated than that, and that therefore I am wrong, including in terms of my own temptation.
Lots of solar power companies received subsidies without ever selling any solar cells.
Palladian: "What about HPV? Or breast cancer? Who's responsible for those?"
Sorry, I'm missing the analogy between STDs and breast cancer.
Try this: Mosquitoes carry Dengue Fever and Malaria. We go to an area where they are prevalent. We deliberately forego mosquito nets, repellant and inoculations. We are infected. Who is responsible, the mosquito?
Should not the burden of proof be on the side that wants to change things?
Yes of course. But if the bigotry tactic works--labeling your opponents as bigots and declaring eventuality--this will change all the political rules as I've known them. That--I have to say FTR (as if anyone cares) is my truck with this whole thing: the tactics, the perpetual petulance, and, a tenured law professor as much as saying that after just this one time conservatives will need to make a principled stand against judicial activism (but not yet--shades of Augustine).
Repellent, that is.
J. Breyer's question is an attempt to divert the argument from the real issue.
It is not a concern that extending marriage to same sex couples would
would "taint" marriage. It is the re-definition of marriage itself that raises a "concern about the long-term consequences to marriage and the vital societal interests it has always sought to promote."
The burden is on the proponents of same sex marriage to prove that the rationale they use to justify the re-definition of marriage will not lead to polygamous or multi-member bisexual marriages. But so far, they have remained silent.
OK, then. The real issues have to do with a) HIV/Aids and b) bigotry, including reverse bigotry. Yeah, OK.
Y'all asked for where this is going, and therefore I will leave you to it.
Except that I want to say this.
The burden is on the proponents of same sex marriage to prove that the rationale they use to justify the re-definition of marriage will not lead to polygamous or multi-member bisexual marriages. But so far, they have remained silent.
The biggest burden on anyone or any group disliking the obligations attached to the traditional definition of marriage here in the U.S. right now is not any such thing. The biggest burden is stating plain how the many, assorted obligations attached to traditional marriage will be met otherwise. That's the conundrum no one wants to discuss. (And don't respond to this comment if you haven't read my others in this thread.)
Stop making this so complex. Gay marriage is wrong. End of story.
National debt is at $16.744 Trillion.
Now, back to "teh gheys!"
"[U]nder the Constitution, the regulation and control of marital and family relationships are reserved to the States."
- U.S. Supreme Court,
Sherrer v. Sherrer (1948 )
Seems pretty clear to me.
You'd think law professors and lawyers might know this.
As I understand it the purpose of our government is not and has never been to provide legal protection to every act that people want to do for their own purposes.
Marriage, understood in the traditional way is profoundly unselfish. (There are self-fulfillment aspects to it, that also make it worthwhile but they aren't the first purpose of marriage). Marriage has been legally protected because raising children unselfishly is a commitment for life. Marriage is intended to provide the structure for this commitment.
Same-sex marriage cannot be legally justified on the grounds that it provides self-fulfillment to its partners.
Why should this be decided at the federal level and especially why should it be decided by the supreme court? It is ludicrous for the supreme court to be arguing about the pluses and minuses of gay marriage, a completely unconstitutional and undemocratic approach to gov.
Personally I understand why some gays would want to marry (I'm on my 3rd marriage and it looks like this one is actually until death do us part), it is a normal human impulse and probably good for society.
What I don't want is for the feds (especially the supreme court) defining marriage rights, that should happen in state legislatures. Ideally government would stay completely out of the marriage business (leaving religion alone) and restrict itself to civil unions.
Benefits to procreators need not be tied to marriage.
What's wrong with marrying your cousin?
I dont know, you tell me.
Maybe there's a case to be made for legally redefining marriage as a contract available only to couples who have children. That way homosexual couples who adopt could (in fact must) be married, while heterosexual couples who are childless would not be. That would put the focus back on the children where the state can demonstrate a compelling interest, thereby opening the way to laws which favor married couples with legal benefits, tax credits, and the like (as well a penalties and sanctions) designed to strengthen and foster marriage as an institution for the nurture and acculturaltion of chidlren.
Old childless marriages could be grandfathered in; new ones would be redefined as domestic partnerships.
Marriage, understood in the traditional way is profoundly unselfish.
I disagree. Marriage into families of two individual people agreeing to sign onto creating an offshoot both therein and thereof are being **both** selfish and unselfish. Just philosophically speaking, at least.
However and in whatever way or ways individuals embarking in a joint partnership, so to speak, play out their relationship is a whole different thing. The more fundamental argument going on now is whether the notion of family obligation--especially family obligation that extends beyond two individuals to, yes, children, but also to each other and to generations older--has any enduring or transcending meaning and, if so, what that obligation entails and if it's of value enough to codify .
Maybe there's a case to be made for legally redefining marriage as a contract available only to couples who have children. That way homosexual couples who adopt could (in fact must) be married, while heterosexual couples who are childless would not be. That would put the focus back on the children where the state can demonstrate a compelling interest, thereby opening the way to laws which favor married couples with legal benefits, tax credits, and the like (as well a penalties and sanctions) designed to strengthen and foster marriage as an institution for the nurture and acculturaltion of chidlren.
Old childless marriages could be grandfathered in; new ones would be redefined as domestic partnerships. Having children out of wedlock would become a criminal offense and would be treated just like other criminal offenses are treated today: the guilty could be fined, jailed, and their offspring taken away unless and until the biological parents assume their legal responsibilities or can find someone to take their place (either through adoption or remarriage of one of the parents).
Palladian said...
It's funny but all the problems people seem to have with same-sex marriage actually seems to be problems with men. Read most of the anti-gay and/or anti-civil-gay-marriage comments here and you'll see that many of the complaints are related to typical male behaviors.
Maybe we need to ban men!
You would be the first to go I'm afraid. Men inherently have a problem with it because men, are more intimately aware of it's inherent unnaturalness. The fact that it is 'allowed' to exist under such auspices is a testament to the humanity of men. Because in sadder times to have known other men who would have been homosexuals would invite death. If you don't believe me, take a trip to Iran, proclaim who you are and then get back to us on how it goes.
Men have a problem with this because they understand that it goes against the observed natural order of the world. They don't deny that homosexuals are created via the coupling of heterosexuals, they just don't like that it happened or happens and given the thin veneer of a civil society of laws that are carried out by men, you should be finding yourself in safe company and that you should be thanking whatever god(s) you pray to that it stays that way.
I'll expand my argument.
SSM doesn't matter. Really, it doesn't. Three percent of the population is gay, maybe, and only a fraction of them will get married.
So what? How does this matter? It doesn't, so why not allow it?
Well, it threatens traditional heterosexual marriage. Marriage is good, and the decline of marriage is bad.
Fine, I totally agree. But... marriage has already fallen apart. Allowing SSM isn't going to change that, and the only things that would are not being proposed as state constitutional amendments.
If all the people who keep voting against SSM would also vote to end no fault divorce and penalize parents for leaving their children, then I'd take the argument more seriously.
Since that isn't happening, I suspect that the motivating force behind most of those votes is either prejudice against homosexuals, or scapegoating them for the failures of heterosexuals.
Again, if we want to fix marriage then fix marriage. Gays have nothing to do with the problems of divorce and fatherless children. Fix the actual problem rather than using it as an argument of convenience.
Steve Koch:
What I don't want is for the feds (especially the supreme court) defining marriage rights,
You just said you're on your third marriage. Now, I don't personally give a shit about that (I don't think--you didn't mention kids & etc.). I do have a question as to whether the federal government recognized all three, most particularly in terms of whether you filed federal tax forms during each and all of the three (which, by definition, means you were serially assuming recognition by the federal government and thereby were serially claiming the benefits of serial marriage therein).
WTF!
Also, LOL.
Well done.
bpm4532 said...
We're falling into the trap of arguing this topic. This is just what the left wants. They feel that any topic they bring up needs to be argued at this level.
Have we forgotten to power to ignore these people? Turn off the TV. Don't watch their movies. Don't read their websites. Don't buy their newspapers or magazines. Deny them revenue.
And while we ignore them, they go on ahead and forge the society we don't want to live in until we wake up and take notice and see it for what has been wrought and we are left wanting. No, fight them at every turn, give them no quarter, make their lives miserable to the point that they won't wish to go on because they can no longer stomach the fight and the costs. Do we have that kind of back bone as I society? I sometimes wonder.
The other argument, that I consider very serious, is that allowing SSM will lead to polygamy.
Yup, it probably will. And polygamy is nuts. Absolutely crazy, with horrendous social consequences. Every extra wife a man takes means that some other man will never marry. That leads to wonderful social pathologies.
Having a court OK SSM using some theory of a previously unknown constitutional right will open the door to all sorts of insanity.
This is why a judicial solution is a bad idea, while a legislative one can allow one and not the other.
Palladian said...
It's funny but all the problems people seem to have with same-sex marriage actually seems to be problem with men.
That is **not actually** the problem I'm having, Palladian.
They don't deny that homosexuals are created via the coupling of heterosexuals, they just don't like that it happened or happens and given the thin veneer of a civil society of laws that are carried out by men, you should be finding yourself in safe company and that you should be thanking whatever god(s) you pray to that it stays that way.
LOL. Come at me, bro. As a beastly anarcho-libertarian-conservative, I'm well-prepared to defend myself. Since I realized I was a faggot, growing up in rural Pennsylvania, I've learned to both be honest about what I am and how to protect myself with my formidable intellect and my formidable physical, defensive skills. In other words, if you, or anyone, wishes to attempt to take away my natural rights as an American, human being, or cock-sucking queer, you'll have quite a fight on your hands, and you'll have to kill me to prevail. No one, but Nature and Nature's God, grants me rights, and no son-of-a-bitch is going to take them away from me.
Luke Lea qrote
Maybe there's a case to be made for legally redefining marriage as a contract available only to couples who have children. That way homosexual couples who adopt could (in fact must) be married, while heterosexual couples who are childless would not be.
What if the kid dies. do they lose their marriage?
That is **not actually** the problem I'm having, Palladian.
Of course not, because you're definitely not a moron.
I'm glad you contributed to this nutty comment thread. I have great respect for and interest in your opinions.
Balfegor said...
Re: Methadras:
In effect, using the sterile male/female marriage argument seems facile. Do couples normally go into marriage knowing they are sterile? Maybe some do, but the vast vast majority do not, but once some of them realize that they cannot have children, then what? Should society expect them to dissolve their marriage because of it to assuage the homosexuals?
I think the more important point re: sterility is that it's none of the government's business whether you're sterile, or whether you in fact want to have children. Gender, on the other hand, is a public fact. If it weren't, there wouldn't be any issue here.
That's a good point. That also dovetails with the current argument made by the militant homosexual lobby, that homosexual acceptance is not unlike racial acceptance, that homosexuality should be treated as a civil right just like the civil rights movement of the 60's. They are and have been trying to equate sexual preference with racial identity, which is pure farce, but there you have it. Anything to win the game.
"marriage has already fallen apart. Allowing SSM isn't going to change that, and the only things that would are not being proposed as state constitutional amendments."
That's like murdering your parents and then protesting that you deserve leniency because you're an orphan.
Maybe there's a case to be made for legally redefining marriage as a contract available only to couples who have children.
Great evidence that all I have commented in this thread is just spitting in the wind.
It does illustrate, beautifully, why my general default makes sense re: where it's all gonna end up, regardless.
Ciao.
Palladian said...
They don't deny that homosexuals are created via the coupling of heterosexuals, they just don't like that it happened or happens and given the thin veneer of a civil society of laws that are carried out by men, you should be finding yourself in safe company and that you should be thanking whatever god(s) you pray to that it stays that way.
LOL. Come at me, bro. As a beastly anarcho-libertarian-conservative, I'm well-prepared to defend myself. Since I realized I was a faggot, growing up in rural Pennsylvania, I've learned to both be honest about what I am and how to protect myself with my formidable intellect and my formidable physical, defensive skills. In other words, if you, or anyone, wishes to attempt to take away my natural rights as an American, human being, or cock-sucking queer, you'll have quite a fight on your hands, and you'll have to kill me to prevail. No one, but Nature and Nature's God, grants me rights, and no son-of-a-bitch is going to take them away from me.
Hey, I wouldn't wish any harm or ill will to you. I'm just stating a fact, and one which you've clearly reiterated in the point you just made. That you know of the thin veneer and frailty of the life you live and those that you have to share that life with known and unknown is a perfect example of the perilous life you've undertaken to be who you are. I wouldn't take that away from you, nor would I wish it upon you. I'm just making a larger statement against who you think has the bigger issue with it, men. I tried to explain why. Maybe it was ill conceived, but I gave it my best shot. However, at the same time, you've just articulated that you have the same god given rights that no man can take away unless you let them or die trying and that has been my point and argument all along. Every man and woman citizen in this country as individuals have the same rights as every other citizen, not as a collective, but as individuals.
wyo sis-
No, it isn't.
I always become skeptical when someone identifies a problem but their solution has nothing to do with solving it.
As an example, this is why I don't buy global warming. None of the solutions seem to actually lower carbon dioxide levels significantly enough to solve the dire emergency environmentalists are constantly warning us about. If it's really that bad, then some solar and wind plants aren't going to do squat. Our energy needs are simply too great. A serious plan would include finding a way to build hundreds of nuke plants, for instance.
Same problem with SSM. If marriage is in trouble, why go after gays when they have nothing to do with it? If marriage needs to be fixed, then fix it. If divorce and illegitimacy are out of hand, then propose solutions to them. This has nothing whatever to do with gays.
It seems to me that the fight over SSM is drawing a line in the sand and saying, "this far and no farther!"
A bit late for that, and it misses the point. Traditional mores are almost dead, and they need to be replaced with something workable that will perpetuate society as something beyond a cloud of individuals. Simple prejudice isn't enough.
I'll identify the problem. Degrading marriage results in degrading society. Allowing SSM degrades marriage. Cultural norming of adultery degrades marriage. Redefining marriage degrades marriage.
Here's the answer...instead of further degrading marriage we should put all this outrage and name calling energy to good use by working to get government out of marriage, out of supporting the results of immoral behavior, and out of our children's futures. Families are the scientific and social base units. Families should be supported in every possible way by not usurping their natural functioning .
Hey, I wouldn't wish any harm or ill will to you. I'm just stating a fact, and one which you've clearly reiterated in the point you just made.
I know, I'm just saying, as they say. I like you, and appreciate your comments, Methadras. I think your comment about the "thin veneer of a civil society of laws" is applicable not only to my particular "sub-group", but to all of us. We, as Americans, occupy an extraordinarily tenuous, delicate and exceptional place in history; we're all very lucky, and all of us need to protect our unique position at the expense of our lives, if need be.
I'm with you, brother, and to paraphrase something that Voltaire never said, I'll defend your right to say it, to the death.
n response to the post of Ann, what I am getting from the respondent, Charles Cooper, is that if marriage is about pro-creation then marriage for SS is irrelevant, either way-- whether the homosexuals are exclusively committed to each other or whether one or both of them are promiscous because obviously they can't procreate. I note that homosexuals are inherently promiscuous because their only constraints are their conscience and maybe fear of AIDS and other communicable diseases.
Palladian said...
Hey, I wouldn't wish any harm or ill will to you. I'm just stating a fact, and one which you've clearly reiterated in the point you just made.
I know, I'm just saying, as they say. I like you, and appreciate your comments, Methadras. I think your comment about the "thin veneer of a civil society of laws" is applicable not only to my particular "sub-group", but to all of us. We, as Americans, occupy an extraordinarily tenuous, delicate and exceptional place in history; we're all very lucky, and all of us need to protect our unique position at the expense of our lives, if need be.
I'm with you, brother, and to paraphrase something that Voltaire never said, I'll defend your right to say it, to the death.
Cheers to a happy and long life. :D
Wyo sis-
OK, but how, exactly? What measures need to be taken? What laws are needed to ban what behaviors?
I'm very, very neurotically pro-marriage. It's the building block of society. You can't have a functioning society after a certain number of people are raised outside of marriage. It all falls apart. Since people generally aren't persuaded by moral or religious arguments, I'll make an economic one.
The middle class that everyone likes so much exists essentially because of marriage. People who marry and work really can't help being middle class, and if they stay together they tend to leave an estate for their children, which perpetuates the family economically. There are plenty of people who can be middle class on their own, but the much ballyhoo'd decline of the middle class seems to track the decline of marriage pretty closely.
But... punishing people who want to get married when they don't have to doesn't seem to be a good idea. If marriage is a good thing, then including people who would not normally become part of society seems like a good idea. I don't think that this cheapens marriage at all. I think allowing people to cheat and get divorced for no good reason does far more damage.
Gay people aren't going away, ever, so we can either all be part of the same society with the same rules, or have different rules for no good reason other than some residual sense that maybe things have gone too far. They have, but this isn't the fight that will fix it.
What is interesting to me is the argument that marriage is about limitation rather than liberation is increasingly impossible for many people on the cultural/social left to understand. To me, the idea that marriage is at least partially about restraining male irresponsibility is something that is undeniable. But to Prof. Althouse such an idea is absurd. I think that this difference of perspective is one of the many things that separates supporters of traditional marriage from those who support redefining marriage to include same-sex couples. While most of the supporters of traditional marriage at least understand the marriage-as-liberation argument, those who support same-sex marriage seem incapable of truly understanding the marriage-as-limitation argument.
I would also argue that that inability to understand the worldview of traditional marriage supporters means that a defeat on same-sex marriage would be particularly bad for their rights (particularly religious rights) once the New Order is established. The traditional view will just be seen as silliness at best and pure bigotry at worst by the social & cultural left.
Cheers to a happy and long life. :D
And to you!
This silly "culture wars" shit is just divide-and-conquer nonsense, as far as I'm concerned. We, all of us, have more in common as liberty-loving Americans than we do disagreements.
Mark-
Yeah, it is about limitation. Marriage is commitment and loyalty and a contract.
As far as anyone, gay or strait, takes this seriously I think it's a good thing.
I'm skeptical that most people on either side really care that much about marriage per se. Most of the gay supporters of marriage seem to care more about respect and acceptance of homosexuality than a binding commitment to their spouse and society as a whole, and most strait opponents of SSM are just fine with the freedom to divorce and to have sex out of wedlock.
In short, it's a big argument about something other than marriage. It's really about accepting gay people as full citizens, and marriage is a proxy for that.
I watched Hannity today. I think SCOTUS will pass on this one and leave the gay marriage in limbo.
Justice Sotomayor asked about the restriction on the number of parties that can marry. What about the polygamist and the polyarmorist.
Justice Roberts noted that the concept of SSM was very recent, as new as the internet and the cell phones as compared to heterosexual marriage which had thousands of years of history behind it.
Justice Scalia remarked that the SCOTUS had reached a point where the river has to be crossed.
Justice Kennedy or Roberts ???? (not sure who said it) said that the court was being put in a situation where 9 unelected people will have to decide on an issue that will effect the society now and beyond.
The New York Court Of Appeals answered this question, when it reaffirmed marriage as one man and as one woman years ago.
"if we redefine marriage then it will lead to marriage with animals, bigamys etc."
"Oh STFU that is argumentum ad adsurdum"
============================
"If gays are allowed to marry how does it impact heter-marriage"
"OOOOH!. Keep talking that's argumetum ad orgasm"
Palladian said...
What about HPV? Or breast cancer? Who's responsible for those
I think you should go on comparing STD's to cancer.
They are totally like the same thing.
They say there was an Emperor of one of the pre-Han Dynasties, I forget which, anyhow he got into a power struggle with the head of a mighty clique of country nobles. Then one day in the Assembly Hall, the head of the anti-Emperor-faction brought in a beautiful hind, led on a leash. He led her around and repeated again and again:
"Look at this fine hart; is he not a wonderful animal?" - "yes yes," answered the noblemen in the Hall. "This is a wondrous hart."
That was when the Emperor knew he had lost the mandate of Heaven.
Palladian said...
No, a virus is responsible for the horror show, you piece of shit.
Yes!!!
And the virus just randomly attacks you!
It falls on your head!
Why do you offer such stupid comments on this topic over & over?
Palladian said...
Yes. The only correct answer is that the government should have no answer to the question "what constitutes a marriage?". Neutral civil contracts should be the extent of the State's meddling in this affair
Good for you.
But since that isn't happening, you offer no argument or solutions.
You can't engage in an argument defending SSM.
So you're go all libertarian pipe dream.
That's fun.
Nathan Alexander said...
"[U]nder the Constitution, the regulation and control of marital and family relationships are reserved to the States."
- U.S. Supreme Court,
Sherrer v. Sherrer (1948 )
Seems pretty clear to me.
You'd think law professors and lawyers might know this."
Please, the "law prof" does not even know what a natural born Citizen is, or that the Usurper means the end of the "Constitution", and the "United States". There is no law, only what evil men say it is, because the executor of the laws is an illegal entity.
Nothing like a discussion of gay marriage to bring out the halfwits and bigots and their "fresh-outta-my ass" arguments opposing the right of gays to marry. I only read through the first 25 or 30 comments before I became impatient.
Does the commentary get any better further on?
Does this seem inobvious to you?
It isn't inobvious to her. Personal requirements and interests blind her to the big picture. She wants her gay son to have approval of everyone else, even if it requires absurd redefinition of language.
"You can't engage in an argument defending SSM."
It's not SSM that needs defending; it's the position that gays should be prohibited from marrying. (Think of a criminal trial: the defendant has no obligation to prove his innocence; it is the state's obligation to prove his guilt. In this case, the defendant is SSM.)
Word, dat.
This quote comes from the Howard Law Review's "Portrait of a Marriage." 2006, while now several years old, I think about this law review article constantly.
"In a recent decision from New York’s appellate division, the court stated that: It is an undisputed fact that the vast majority of procreation still occurs as a result of sexual intercourse between a male and a female. In light of such a fact, “[t]he State could reasonably decide that by encouraging opposite-sex couples to marry, thereby assuming legal and financial obligations, the children born from such relationships will have better opportunities to be nurtured and raised by two parents within long-term, committed relationships, which society has traditionally viewed as advantageous for children.”65 The risk of a redefinition of marriage is that this social understanding and the goods it promotes are in danger of being lost in the new adult centered version of marriage."
Robert, use clear language. No one is preventing gays from marrying. Gay people can have all the weddings they want and agents are not going to burst on the scene and arrest them as if they were selling raw milk or something. What is under discussion is government recognition of these marriages. There are a lot of aspects to consider about whether this policy change should be effected. Given that gays can happily live together and carry on a relationship and set up legal protections for each other unmolested, I don't understand your impatience with those who want to think carefully through the ramifications of bringing gay marriage to the same legal level as straight marriage.
What a nutty set of things we're asked to believe!
Yup. And now Althouse wants us to believe even nuttier things.
The Black family is gone. We need only to look at it, and the things that caused its destruction, to see what the consequnces of ridiculing marriage and its fundamental purpose - the family - are.
Althouse heaps scorn upon the traditional effects of marriage's mores, as she must to bolster her personal philosophy. But those mores did reduce errant behavior by most, and resulted in benefits to society that now a almost gone in the Black urban subculture. Fatherless boys and girls enter into perpetual poverty and likely perpetual violence, because tjhe family is gone, is derided as negative and enslaving.
That's where the rest of us are headed because of nutty things the elite, like Althouse, insist we believe.
It's curious that the most promiscuous, adultering population on earth, that provided nature with the ideal breeding ground for the AIDS virus, wants now to be able to marry. It is as if the stabilizing aspect of marriage - the mores that Althouse ridicules -is sought by gay/lesbian intelligentsia as a way, perhaps, to tamp down the self-destructive sexual partying of homosexuals.
The irony, of course, is that it won't work, since disestablishing a social foundation will only aggravate matters. Knowing that everything is fluid makes unreflective, emotional behavior more justifiable, not less desirable.
The first homsosexual (lesbian) couple to marry in Massachuisetts is alreadt divorced. It just didn't work out. Other things beckoned, I suppose.
@ Rober Cook:
This is not a criminal trial. What this is, and what gets my dander up, is an attempt to use the courts to impose the will of a tiny minority on the people of the country. Prop 8 passed with a large margin, but the minority refused to abide by the decision and is trying to get the court to side with them similar (in their minds) to how it ruled in Roe V Wade. SSM has failed to pass every time it is brought to a vote. A few states passed laws through their legitimately elected legislatures, good for them. That's their business. Forcing the rest of the country to accept what they clearly rejected is opression. So, if you maintain that gays are currently oppressed, which then is the greater evil? Opressing 3% of the population? or 97%?
What most of the arguments, in both the post and comments, make clear is that this is not a constitutional question, or one that nine (really one) Justice should be deciding. It's all policy and has nothing to do with discrimination (everything gov't regulates or touches involves "discrimination" in some way. This is a classic policy issue that should be decided, if at all by gov't, then by States via their legislatures, or by referendum, with people actually voting (where, so far, it always loses [I think], but might not in the future).
Tank,
SSM passed in some states also by legislature in others. If SSM will be common, let's do it that way.
Arizona doesn't have to accept a cousin marriage from Massachusetts, where cousin marriage is legal.
"Maybe we need to ban men!"
-- Well, it can't hurt.
It is boiling down to questions about specific laws, what should be banned, who gets what benefits, government interference in our lives in other words.
It's pretty clear what this is about. SSM is just the current spear point.
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