EPTAny thoughts?
Gay Marriage has come to Portland
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Commander{+}
United States2878 Posts
Any thoughts? | ||
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z7-TranCe
Canada3158 Posts
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BroOd
Austin10831 Posts
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Beyonder
Netherlands15103 Posts
2. Marriage is for procreation. The proponents of that argument are really hard pressed to explain why, if that's the case, that infertile couples are allowed to marry. I, for one, would love to be there when the proponent of such an argument is to explain to his post-menopausal mother or impotent father that since they cannot procreate, they must now surrender their wedding rings! That would be fun to watch! Again, such an argument fails to persuade based on the marriages society does allow routinely, without even a second thought. 3. Same-sex couples aren't the optimum environment in which to raise children. That's an interesting one, in light of who society does allow to get married and bring children into their marriage. Check it out: murderers, convicted felons of all sorts, even known child molesters are all allowed to freely marry and procreate, and do so every day, with hardly a second thought by these same critics. So if children are truly the priority here, why is this allowed? The fact is that many gay couples raise children, adopted and occasionally their own from failed attempts at heterosexual marriages. Lots and lots of scientific studies have shown that the outcomes of the children raised in the homes of gay and lesbian couples are just as good as those of straight couples. The differences have been shown again and again to be insignificant. Psychologists tell us that what makes the difference is the love of the parents, not their gender. The studies are very clear about that. And gay people are as capable of loving children as fully as anyone else. 4. Gay relationships are immoral. Says who? The Bible? Somehow, I always thought that freedom of religion implied the right to freedom from religion as well. The Bible has absolutely no standing in American law, and because it doesn't, no one has the right to impose rules anyone else simply because of something they percieve to be mandated by the Bible. Not all world religions have a problem with homosexuality; many sects of Buddhism, for example, celebrate gay relationships freely and would like to have the authority to make them legal marriages. In that sense, their religious freedom is being infringed. If one believes in religious freedom, the recognition that opposition to gay marriage is based on religious arguments is reason enough to discount this argument. 5. Marriages are for ensuring the continuation of the species. The proponents of such an argument are going to have a really hard time persuading me that the human species is in any real danger of dying out through lack of procreation. If ten percent of all the human race were to suddenly refrain from procreation, I think it is safe to say that the world would probably be better off. One of the world's most serious problems is overpopulation and the increasing anarchy that is resulting from it. Seems to me that gays would be doing the world a favor by not bringing more hungry mouths into an already overburdened world. So why encourage them? 6. Same-sex marriage would threaten the institution of marriage. That one's contradictory right on the face of it. Threaten marriage? By allowing people to marry? That doesn't sound very logical to me. If you allow gay people to marry each other, you no longer encourage them to marry people to whom they feel little attraction, with whom they most often cannot relate sexually, and thereby reduce the number of supposed heterosexual marriages that end up in the divorce courts. If it is the institution of heterosexual marriage that worries you, then consider that no one would require you or anyone else to participate in a gay marriage. So you would have freedom of choice, of choosing what kind of marriage to participate in -- something more than what you have now. And speaking of divorce -- to argue that the institution of marriage is worth preserving at the cost of requiring involuntary participants to remain in it is a better argument for tightening divorce laws than proscribing gay marriage. 7. Marriage is traditionally a heterosexual institution. This is morally the weakest argument. Slavery was also a traditional institution, based on traditions that went back to the very beginnings of human history. But by the 19th century, humankind had realized the evils of that institution, and has since largely abolished it. Why not recognize the truth -- that there is no moral ground on which to support the tradition of marriage as a strictly heterosexual institution, and remove the restriction? 8. Same-sex marriage is an untried social experiment. The American critics of same-sex marriage betray their provincialism with this argument. The fact is that a form of gay marriage has been legal in Denmark since 1989 (full marriage rights except for adoption rights and church weddings, and a proposal now exists in the Danish parliament to allow both of those rights as well), and most of the rest of Scandinavia from not long after. Full marriage rights have existed in many Dutch cities for several years, and it was recently made legal nationwide, including the word "marriage" to describe it. In other words, we have a long-running "experiment" to examine for its results -- which have uniformly been positive. Opposition to the Danish law was led by the clergy (much the same as in the States). A survey conducted at the time revealed that 72 percent of Danish clergy were opposed to the law. It was passed anyway, and the change in the attitude of the clergy there has been dramatic -- a survey conducted in 1995 indicated that 89 percent of the Danish clergy now admit that the law is a good one and has had many beneficial effects, including a reduction in suicide, a reduction in the spread of sexually transmitted diseases and in promiscuity and infidelity among gays. Far from leading to the "destruction of Western civilization" as some critics (including the Mormon and Catholic churches among others) have warned, the result of the "experiment" has actually been civilizing and strengthening, not just to the institution of marriage, but to society as a whole. So perhaps we should accept the fact that someone else has already done the "experiment" and accept the results as positive. The fact that many churches are not willing to accept this evidence says more about the churches than it does about gay marriage. 9. Same-sex marriage would start us down a "slippery slope" towards legalized incest, bestial marriage, polygamy and all kinds of other horrible consequences. A classic example of the reductio ad absurdum fallacy, it is calculated to create fear in the mind of anyone hearing the argument. It is, of course, absolutely without any merit based on experience. If the argument were true, wouldn't that have already happened in countries where forms of legalized gay marriage already exist? Wouldn't they have 'slid' towards legalized incest and bestial marriage? The reality is that a form of gay marriage has been legal in Scandinavian countries for over many years, and no such legalization has happened, nor has there been a clamor for it. It's a classic scare tactic - making the end scenario so scary and so horrible that the first step should never be taken. Such are the tactics of the fear and hatemongers. If concern over the "slippery slope" were the real motive behind this argument, the advocate of this line of reasoning would be equally vocal about the fact that today, even as you read this, convicted murderers, child molesters, known pedophiles, drug pushers, pimps, black market gun dealers, etc., are quite free to marry, and are doing so. Where's the outrage? Of course there isn't any, and that lack of outrage betrays their real motives. This is an anti-gay issue and not a pro marriage issue. 10. Granting gays the right to marry is a "special" right. Since ninety percent of the population already have the right to marry the informed, consenting adult of their choice, and would even consider that right a fundamental, constitutionally protected right, since when does extending it to the remaining ten percent constitute a "special" right to that remaining ten percent? As Justice Kennedy observed in his opinion overturning Colorado's infamous Amendment 2 (Roemer vs. Evans), many gay and lesbian Americans are, under current law, denied civil rights protections that others either don't need or assume that everyone else along with themselves, already have. The problem with all that special rights talk is that it proceeds from that very assumption, that because of all the civil rights laws in this country that everyone is already equal, so therefore any rights gay people are being granted must therefore be special. That is most assuredly not the case, especially regarding marriage and all the legal protections that go along with it. 11. Sodomy is illegal. Ah, the ol' sodomy law argument! Why is sodomy still illegal in many states? Because conservative religionists (at whose behest those laws were enacted) have blocked attempts to repeal them in every state where sodomy laws are still on the books. Indeed, those laws are very rarely enforced (though it does happen), yet there is very stiff opposition to their repeal. Why? Because they're a great tool for a homophobe to use as a basis of legalized discrimination. "Why should I rent an apartment to an unconvicted felon?" "I can't have an admitted criminal on my staff." "You're an unconvicted felon. I want you out of my restarurant and off my property." "I don't want you around my children. You're a criminal!" These are very real, actual arguments used in states where sodomy laws remain on the books. So even though the moral crusades of the religionists using the power of the police have largely ended, the sodomy laws that made them possible remain, and likely will for as long as conservative religionists have their way. Indeed, some state legislatures have even tried to reenact sodomy statutes! Heterosexuals would never allow such intrusion into their private sex lives, of course, but the homophobes among them see nothing wrong in using the power of the state to enforce their prejudices. State court systems, however, have begun to see the violation of the Fourth Amendment in such laws, and nearly as many state sodomy laws have been overturned as unconstitutional as have been repealed by state legislatures. | ||
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Jim
Sweden1965 Posts
On March 05 2004 01:15 Commander[SB] wrote: Multinomah county in OR is now the 4th (Or around 4th) county in the country to now allow gay marriage. Any thoughts? Let people do whatever they want to as long as they are not hurting anybody else. Its not my business. | ||
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DV8
United States1623 Posts
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Commander{+}
United States2878 Posts
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Beyonder
Netherlands15103 Posts
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BroOd
Austin10831 Posts
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z7-TranCe
Canada3158 Posts
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Commander{+}
United States2878 Posts
On March 05 2004 01:43 Beyonder wrote: The point that it is proven to be very important for a child to have both a father and a mother. Of course, and in an ideal world every kid would have a very loving mother and father. But in our not-so-ideal-world with kids already in orphanages, how does a gay couple adopting them hurt anyone in any way? They still love there kid just as much. And thats really what the world needs the most right now. A little bit of love. | ||
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baal
10541 Posts
I mean they can marry and do whatever they want, but having a child means to put a boy with no possible opinino into a huge stress into school. I cant really imagine how they manage to survive school having 2 queers taking care of him... just imagine the mental abuse. Remember that post of that guy who was beated in hongkong?, well now imagine a kid with gay parents OMG! endless torture just because 2 god damn queers wanted to take care of someone... well buy a god damn cat. | ||
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Beyonder
Netherlands15103 Posts
On March 05 2004 01:46 TranCe wrote: im sure kids have been raised by single parents before and turned out fine,so i doubt thats true.. Whats turning out fine? Not being on drugs, not having a drinking problem? And we are talking about statistics (percentages), knowledge of our kind - humans. Home is a secure environments for kids, a place where they can not be touched by the 'evil world'. Only having one parent, or growing up in an unsafe environment has a surprisingly big effect on a child. If you for example fight with your partner in front of your child, it has major negative effect. When it comes to having two partners from the same sex there's also the thing that you are very very likely to get teased during several early stages of your life. This again has a really negative effect on a child. Ofcourse that leads to the next point, should we hold all this in our mind and prevent it, or just let it go so gay marriage will slowly get a social acceptance? In the past people got teased for glasses, now it's all normal. Will the same thing happen with gay marriages? How will it be in, let's say, 30 years? | ||
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Commander{+}
United States2878 Posts
My brothers friend doesn't have to live through much 'mental abuse'. Edit: to baal | ||
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z7-TranCe
Canada3158 Posts
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Commander{+}
United States2878 Posts
On March 05 2004 01:48 Beyonder wrote: Whats turning out fine? Not being on drugs, not having a drinking problem? And we are talking about statistics (percentages), knowledge of our kind - humans. Only having one parent, or growing up in an unsafe environment has a surprisingly big effect on a child. If you for example fight with your partner in front of your child, it has major negative effect. When it comes to having two partners from the same sex there's also the thing that you are very very likely to get teased during several early stages of your life. This again has a really negative effect on a child. Ofcourse that leads to the next point, should we hold all this in our mind and prevent it, or just let it go so gay marriage will slowly get a social acceptance? In the past people got teased for glasses, now it's all normal. Will the same thing happen with gay marriages? How will it be in, let's say, 30 years? How will the world solve any of its problems if it lets cycles continue? War will never end while countering violence with violence. The only way to stop cycles is to do just that, STOP CYCLES. | ||
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Beyonder
Netherlands15103 Posts
On March 05 2004 01:50 Commander[SB] wrote: Maybe they need to go to a better school. I go to a school where one of my brothers best friends dad is now technically a woman, dresses in female clothes, and comes to our school on a regular basis. My brothers friend doesn't have to live through much 'mental abuse'. Edit: to baal The level of acceptance on these kind of matters differs based on region, and population. In some places live the kind of people that easilly accept this, and their kids will take over this behaviour. In some places there are a lot of these people, in some not. I'm sure that at the point where I got teased for having glasses, it was already a normal thing somewhere else. It however isn't rational to send your kids to school 100 miles away now is it? | ||
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baal
10541 Posts
On March 05 2004 01:51 TranCe wrote: i like to think i turned out fine.i can't speak for every other single parent/child though. interesting. but im not saying its a rule, im saying its a big possibility, if they pick sometimes on random targets imagine having such a "tail"... I only know that i'd really wouldnt want to be a child raised by homosexuals. | ||
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baal
10541 Posts
On March 05 2004 01:54 Beyonder wrote: The level of acceptance on these kind of matters differs based on region, and population. indeed. | ||
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Beyonder
Netherlands15103 Posts
On March 05 2004 01:53 Commander[SB] wrote: How will the world solve any of its problems if it lets cycles continue? War will never end while countering violence with violence. The only way to stop cycles is to do just that, STOP CYCLES. Ofcourse, but the first wave will have it extremely hard. I said that it was a point of discussion, I didn't say that we should do or not do it. And as long as we have these really retarded systems in our so called super advanced western countries, we'll have retards at the top making decisions, and propoganda to make us believe our leaders are doing the right thing. | ||
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