First gay couples wed in US state (page 9)

William Penwell

GW response;

No we can't have that now, yeh hi. I Will just have to rewrite the constitution so all you low life, gay sinners will all go to hell.

Will

Hmmm... let's put the gay marriage issue into perspective with other pressing issues that can actually affect the quality of your life. In order of most probable to affect you to least:

Traffic
Weather
Gas prices
Coffee prices
Local zoning/property tax issues
Earthquake/Hurrican/Tornado/Flood
Job outsourcing
Separation of Church and State issues
Iraq War
SARS
Terrorism
Mad Cow
Global Warming
Meteor Strike causing mass global extinction
Gay Marriage

rem

Perry

Gradual transition from gay marriage to state-sanctioned polyamory, and the eventual abolition of marriage itself as a legal category, is now the most influential paradigm within academic family law. As Chambers put it, "All desirable changes in family law need not be made at once."

But it's University of Utah law professor Martha Ertman who stands on the cutting edge of family law. Building on Fineman's proposals for the abolition of legal marriage, Ertman has offered a legal template for a sweeping relationship contract system modeled on corporate law. (See the Harvard Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Law Review, Winter 2001.) Ertman wants state-sanctioned polyamory, legally organized on the model of limited liability companies.

And in ten years when this gets implemented, the mental giants on this board will respond with a zombie-like automoton tone in their voice as they raise their voices in unison saying hypnotically, "Marriage is bad and causes too many problems". LLC's is the way to go.

Geez.

scotsman

I agree, your society is unravelling but if the cat is out the bag and you're skidding down the slippery slope, what can you do but stand and watch.

What I can never understand about Traditionalist Christians complaining about the collapse of society is why they don't celebrate it as a mark of the end times. The more unChristian things get, the more marginilised you feel, surely the closer to Christ you become.

joelbear

I think yeru should marry a goat.

I myself am only interesting in being able to make a legal contract with the 1, that's one, ONE person that I love and will spend the rest of my life with so that the house we own together, the money we save together, the ability that we should have to make the hardest life and death decisions for each other will be protected.

The two of us are a family. We function as a family in every way that a man and a woman do. We share resources and decision making responsibilities.

I am grateful that most people understand the pure human need that two people have to commit to one another in love.

Valis

Hi joel! Always nice to see you.

Sincerely,

District Overbeer

William Penwell

I do not profess to be a Christian but shouldn't we leave the judging up to God?

Will

Abaddon

ThiChi

Of course there are groups that I am not tolerant of Thichi. I just thought it very funny that you complain you are not being shown tolerance when you show no such tolerance yourself. When did I whine about not being shown tolerance?

And of course, you group groups of harmful individuals (NAMBLA) with groups of non-harmful individuals when discussing tolerance, showing that you have no real comprehension of one of the core differentiating issues, which is that of informed consent.

I am very tolerant of people or groups who do no real harm to others or who do not oppose or show lack of tolerance to people who do no real harm.

Thus, as gay marriage is non-harmful to others in any substansive or measurable fashion, I am tolerant of it, and opposed, indeed intolerant of those that oppose it. No contradiction there; I don't tolerate neo-nazis as they use lies and distortions to spread a philosophy that encourages division and suspiscion, an attitude that breeds hate. This isn't a contradiction either.

As regards the posted article... you could run a winter sports centre with the amount of slippery slopes you've got going there.

IF those in favour of plural and group marriage DO use the legalsiation of gay marriage to argue for the legalisation of plural or group marriage... so what?

If it's consensual, no problem. If it's dodgy patriarchs with young girls, use targetted legislation. Any tax burdens with regard to children would be there in those sorts of realtionship when they were not recognised by law. Stopping such marriages changes NOTHING.

I assume you agree with Bush that Muslim terrorists are enemies of freedom?

Which part of condemning religious fundamentalists who attack peoples' freedoms and doing the same thing yourself strikes you as not being contradictory?

Perry

I see no major problem in (for example) having an AOC of 16 (as is average in the USA) beeing raised to 18 by a court if parents of social workers complain, and of anyone over 21 breaching this higher AOC suffering a higher penalty than those under 21.

You might see restricting marriage to heterosexual couples as a fairer method of protecting young teenagers in polygamous cult scenarios, but it doesn't actually protect those you have highlighted as in need of protection. It just denies gay people a perfectly reasonable right. I'm sorry Perry, but I think the stuff about non-consensual polygamous cultists is a smoke screen, a convenient thing to use in your opposition to gay marriage that actually doesn't impact on the issue in the real world.

I regret to inform you what whatever tradition might have been, marriage is now a right of everyone over a certain age with very few restrictions - you probably have to be reasonably sane and not a close relative, and I'm sure the reasonably sane bit is not that bigger bar to being married. Right as in 'not prevented from having' as opposed to right as in 'everyone should be'.

Your mass of supporting material contains arguments along the lines of;

Gay marriage is a bad idea as heterosexual marriage is in trouble.

Let gay people be the judge of that. White people may have tried to argue that sitting on the front of the bus had its problems. It didn't mean black people shound't sit with them, did it?

Gay marriage is a bad idea because unmarried gay people would be subject to greater discrimination.

In any civilised country discrimination on grounds of race, religion, sexuality etc. is illegal. It is illogical, even if the argument were valid, to not allow something initself unharmful on the grounds that something already illegal might be encouraged by it.

Gay people get divorced more so shouldn't be allowed to marry

This argument seems to imply that marriage should only be allowed to those who can make a relaible commitment. Surely we need to apply this to heterosexuals first?

Gay marriage means the law is unable to affirm that children need mothers and fathers, not just "parents,"

This argument carries so many assumptions and ignores so much. For a start it assumes that children are the end result of any marriage. This is not true in heterosexual marriages let alone homosexual marriages. It ignores the lack of societal care given to single-parent familes. It assumes that some skills are sex based rather than knowledge based - bit like saying men can't be midwives.

And last but not least the "what will the neighbors think" comes into play. Already the islamic world views the western world and especially the US as morally bankrupt and that our culture is in serious decline. Could all these changes to the societal bedrock institution of marriage be viewed as absloute proof of our degenerancy especially with other non-traditional marriages on the horizon? Will this give them further encourgement and justification to wage "jihad" as we export our deconstruction of centries old notions of family and marriage?

This is like saying if South Africa had been a political danger or whatever, we should have recinded the equal rights legislation of the 60's so the Safas didn't think bad of the USA for treating black people equally. What a dumb argument.

Does helping gays, bi-sexuals and polygamists to feel better about themselves by providing a greater emotional support system through the legalization of non-traditional marriages justify ignoring possible unintended consequences regarding children, additional tax burdens, and moral ammunition for our enemies.

Marriage IS a "piece of paper from the city hall keeping us tied and true", to borrow Joni Mitchell's lyrics. Giving official recognition to gay marriage is allowing them the same piece of paper. All other things given as reasons for not allowing it can already happen without it. In the Netherlands, where we know what we are talking about (see article below) none of the problems those with anti-gay marriage agendas based upon religious scruple, sexual phobia or dubious logic seek to portray as consequences of gay marriage have come to pass.

Your polygamous pedophile cultists will have their evil way if gay marriage is legal or illegal, unless you care enough to target specific legislation to protect those at risk.

Children with one parent will still one have parent if gay marriage is legalised, and those suffering from inadequate parenting will still suffer from inadequate parenting if gay marriage is legalised - regardless of the sexuality or gender of their parents.

Tax burdens from polygamous cultists spawning l;ike crazy will be there whether gay marriage is legal or not. Two tax payers on the otherhand, should be able to have the same rights as any other two tax payers, regardless of the sexual make-up of the couple.

And since when did the morality of those who are wrong serve as a benchmark?

2 Timothy 3: 13b - ...evil men and impostors will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.
Wake up folks! Without doubt we are watching the unraveling of our society before our very eyes.

Nice, rational, non-religious argument. Oh, no, it was divisive, religiously-based, and unbased.

Keep those arguments up, and gay marriage will be an increasingly available freedom.

dubla

Nice argument, and I agree you can certainly draw that from my use of "typical". Although I can see what you mean, I didn't see that reading it until you highlighted 'typical' shows. Thanks for pointing my sloppy phrasing out.

I hope you can see I was not saying Christians in general are mean, but that it was typical that in a thread about gay marriage, the anti view was supplied by Christians. THAT is typical, and I invite you to examine any thread on the subject on this board to verify my opinion.

Yeru

Your arguments over polygamy and tax burdens are arguing about probelms (tax burdens) from situations (families with lots of children and one or less wage earners) that already exist. Preventing gay marriage would not change this situation. Please try, when making a sliding slope argument, to make the adverse conseqeunce something that isn't already happening, as otherwise the argument 'if you allow x to happen then b will happen' looks rather silly as b is already happening.

joel

It's the fundy merry-go round again... wheeee! Let's see who we can blame for feeling bad about stuff! Yup, it must be gays who are responsible for the decline of Western civilisation.

Will

I do not profess to be a god, but shouldn't we leave the judging up to Christians?

(in threads about non-biblical marriage )

scotsman

not completely off topic...

Mormon polygamy has always struck me as quintessentially American. It's one of the many things that appeals to me about the USA. On reflection Mormons are truly American ambassadors. Wherever I go in Europe I see these clean-cut, young, patriotic guys with their shirts, ties and badges and chat to them about some of the bizarre aspects of their faith.

While I'm not against legalising polygamy, maybe it shouldn't be legalised so that they can still seem appealingly avant-garde to me.

LittleToe

IMHO, setting aside the sexuality issue entirely, I'd be for raising the minimum limit of all marriages to somewhere between 21 and 30.
Gotta get past the bloom of youth, doncha know!

If you're going to get into a legally binding contract with another human being, might as well have a clue as to what it's about!

Humans - can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em!!!

Edited to add:
Btw. Scotsman, you crack me up (in a good way)

First gay couples wed in US state

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