# Blacks overwhelmingly against gay marriage - Why such hypocrisy? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 2, 2009, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658 "2009-07-02T02:28:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 12
**Author:** ![Anduril](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c0e974/32.png) [@Anduril](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anduril)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/221 "2009-07-08T21:51:06Z")
They are. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/222 "2009-07-08T22:00:07Z")
> [@not\_alice](#): > > Maybe maybe not. It is a pretty remarkable claim, and if you want to use it support of any argument, I think it is fair on this board for people to ask you for a cite or to explain yourself, as it is not a trivial claim you make as though you are saying the sky is blue on sunny days. Consider yourself so asked. I’m pretty sure you still don’t understand what my claim even is, which is the only reason I can come up with for why you’d think it’s particularly remarkable. Or, for that matter, something that’s citable. > [@](#): > > You don’t have to answer, but consider the credibility of the entire point you were making apparently rests on whether that leg of the table you built is really there or not. No, actually, it doesn’t rest on that at all. I have, in fact, explicitly stated multiple times that it’s a bad argument. (You might have picked up on that if you’d actually read any of my posts before responding to them.) My sole point is that it’s not a _hypocritical_ argument. > [@](#): > > Nope, I saw it, but while it may not have been your point, it was part of your choice to explain your point using that sub-point, and I don’t find it (the sub-point) to persuasive, although I would like to hear how you came to it if in fact it is more reasoned out then I suspected. I didn’t ask if you saw it, I asked if you’d read it. Apparently, I have my answer. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/223 "2009-07-08T22:24:11Z")
> [@not\_alice](#): > > Yeah, married couples everywhere, in CA and across the US, if they are known for anything, it is for standing up and saying “We don’t value the rights we have, why don’t we get rid of them!” :rolleyes: I don’t entirely understand your sarcasm. I pointed out that the differences between gay domestic partnerships, as they currently exist in California, and gay marriage, as it existed in California the day before Proposition 8 was passed, weren’t that great. That’s distinct from what I think should happen, which is that gay marriage should be allowed by every state in the country and recognized by the federal government. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/224 "2009-07-08T23:00:42Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I’m pretty sure you still don’t understand what my claim even is, which is the only reason I can come up with for why you’d think it’s particularly remarkable. Or, for that matter, something that’s citable. > > No, actually, it doesn’t rest on that at all. I have, in fact, explicitly stated multiple times that it’s a bad argument. (You might have picked up on that if you’d actually read any of my posts before responding to them.) My sole point is that it’s not a _hypocritical_ argument. > > I didn’t ask if you saw it, I asked if you’d read it. > > Apparently, I have my answer. I read it. Did you? Because apparetnly you can’t understand aspects of your own argument, or explain them when asked to, denying that it is even relevant. That is OK, I have my answer, that you made it up out of whole cloth even though it is not relevant. Moving along now… ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/225 "2009-07-08T23:01:51Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > I don’t entirely understand your sarcasm. I pointed out that the differences between gay domestic partnerships, as they currently exist in California, and gay marriage, as it existed in California the day before Proposition 8 was passed, weren’t that great. That’s distinct from what I think should happen, which is that gay marriage should be allowed by every state in the country and recognized by the federal government. OK, but you said it was not that much, the difference. That is the judgment that drew the sarcasm. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/226 "2009-07-08T23:20:05Z")
> [@not\_alice](#): > > Because apparetnly you can’t understand aspects of your own argument, or explain them when asked to, denying that it is even relevant. Well, now, let’s be fair. There’s explaining my argument, and then there’s explaining my argument _to you_. I’m not ashamed to admit that one of those things is beyond my skills. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2009, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/227 "2009-07-08T23:25:03Z")
> [@not\_alice](#): > > OK, but you said it was not that much, the difference. That is the judgment that drew the sarcasm. But the difference isn’t that much. Gays in California have much more protection for their relationships than gays in the rest of the country. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/228 "2009-07-09T00:04:22Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Well, now, let’s be fair. There’s explaining my argument, and then there’s explaining my argument _to you_. I’m not ashamed to admit that one of those things is beyond my skills. **Miller,** I just read this page, and my heart goes out to you. I think your excellent communication skills have met their match. I’m cracking up over here. **not\_alice’s** inability/refusal to comprehend your position is both awesome and comical. I suggest surrender, as a road to sanity. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/229 "2009-07-09T00:31:04Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Well, now, let’s be fair. There’s explaining my argument, and then there’s explaining my argument _to you_. I’m not ashamed to admit that one of those things is beyond my skills. Give it your best effort for the crowd as a whole 🙂 We are all about fighting ignorance here, after all, that is the main rule of the game on this board. Working to extend or maintain ignorance about your position seems , well, unseemly 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/230 "2009-07-09T00:32:25Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > But the difference isn’t that much. Gays in California have much more protection for their relationships than gays in the rest of the country. Then why are married couples not clamoring to give any of it up? Why is separate but (somewhat) equal appropriate at all? ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/231 "2009-07-09T00:34:00Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > **Miller,** I just read this page, and my heart goes out to you. I think your excellent communication skills have met their match. I’m cracking up over here. **not\_alice’s** inability/refusal to comprehend your position is both awesome and comical. > > I suggest surrender, as a road to sanity. OK, why don’t you point me back to the post where s/he answered my question about the common law basis for the claim s/he made? In all fairness, I may have missed it, I apologize in advance of seeing it if that is true, and once I see it up there somewhere I will apologize again for missing it. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/232 "2009-07-09T00:46:49Z")
> [@not\_alice](#): > > OK, why don’t you point me back to the post where s/he answered my question about the common law basis for the claim s/he made? > > In all fairness, I may have missed it, I apologize in advance of seeing it if that is true, and once I see it up there somewhere I will apologize again for missing it. You may want to go back quite a ways and simply try to read—slowly—and comprehend what **Miller’s** position on things _is_. I guarantee you, you’re jumping the gun. Switch from debate mode to reading for comprehension mode. Really. I’d attempt to explain it for you, but I don’t see how I can be clearer than **Miller** has been. That is all. As I must take the advice I offered **Miller**. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/233 "2009-07-09T01:01:15Z")
> [@not\_alice](#): > > Then why are married couples not clamoring to give any of it up? Why is separate but (somewhat) equal appropriate at all? I never said it was. But at least you guys get domestic partnerships blessed by the state. We face a constitutional ban to even that. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/234 "2009-07-09T01:07:29Z")
> [@not\_alice](#): > > OK, why don’t you point me back to the post where s/he answered my question about the common law basis for the claim s/he made? “He.” And I never answered your questions about the common law basis of my claims, because the common law has absolutely nothing to do with any claims I’ve made in this thread. All I’ve done in this thread is argued over whether a particular position is or is not hypocritical. And so far as I’m aware, “hypocrisy” is not defined in the common law. Now, I did compare restricting rights of criminals to restricting rights of homosexuals. What you’ve utterly failed to grasp is what the point of the comparison was. It was not to demonstrate that it is logically, morally, or legally proper to restrict the rights of homosexuals. The sole and entire point of the comparison was to demonstrate that a dedication to the concept of equal rights can still exclude groups that you feel, for one reason or another, are not deserving of equal rights. I at no point stated or implied that the _reasons_ for restricting the rights of convicts were in any way similar to the reasons for restricting the rights of homosexuals. Nor did I ever say that the rights of homosexuals _should_ be restricted. In fact, I repeatedly went to some pains to point out that restricting the rights of homosexuals is wrong, and something I’m deeply opposed to. Again, if you’d actually try reading other people’s posts, instead of scanning them for buzzwords and responding to them without regard for the context in which they were used, you would understand that. Well, probably. Maybe. There’d be an outside chance, at the very least. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/235 "2009-07-09T01:24:44Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > I never said it was. But at least you guys get domestic partnerships blessed by the state. We face a constitutional ban to even that. Ah, OK, a half glass looks good when yours is empty. May I ask where you are? I assure you that here in CA, we are working on the big picture with equal fervor too. We are not leaving you out of our plans. Arguably we were caught off guard by out of state forces last time, but that sword cuts both ways. We aren’t stopping in Sacramento, and frankly it is better if we never have to get there in the first place. DC makes it so much faster, but it probably won’t happen that way in the immediate future. It might, but I wouldn’t get your hopes up. In the long run that is absolutely the final outcome, no doubt about it. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/236 "2009-07-09T03:37:09Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > “He.” And I never answered your questions about the common law basis of my claims, because the common law has absolutely nothing to do with any claims I’ve made in this thread. All I’ve done in this thread is argued over whether a particular position is or is not hypocritical. And so far as I’m aware, “hypocrisy” is not defined in the common law. Yeah, because that is so on topic to the thread, that’s why I am not participating in that discussion over the meaning of hypocrisy. I don’t really care what the outcome is. Although the bit about cognitive dissonance I will be looking into more closely, esp. now that my gf, who is a psychologist is home from work. Perhaps unlike you, my interest in this thread is because I am active in the campaign to fix the injustice of Prop 8. I deal with the cultural issues regarding persuading people to vote for civil rights increasingly every day now. I have a parallel thread I started on a very similar topic right now. You can see for yourself that my interest is in the so-called “rational” justifications for people to vote against their best interests regarding SSM, and the cultural underpinnings of them. If you want to use a thread ostensibly on that topic to discuss the meaning of hypocrisy, be my guest. I am sure I have hijacked threads similarly in the past and probably will in the future too. So I will just ignore that part of your comments for now, and focus on your actual reasoning. And in that reasoning, you said something that echoes a lot of what I hear in on-topic discussions: that there is a “traditional marriage” that is at risk somehow. People say it, they mean it, but they can never explain it despite claiming they are talking about civil not religious marriage. Where is this tradtion in law I ask, show me, our legal system dates back almost 1000 years, certainly long enough to evolve and maintain tradition. When asked directly, there is never an answer forthcoming. This is telling to me. Sometimes they come at it by analogy as you did. They say the laws surroudning “traditional marriage rights” are like the laws surrounding something else. IN your case you said something like the rights surrounding incarceration of convicted criminals. In those cases, it is easy to see the basis in English common law for the comparative claim, as it is in your case. So it ought to be easy to compare that to the marriage case. But that doesn’t make the marriage tradition appear out of thin air either. So when you used an analogy like that in the support of your larger case about what is or isn’t hypocrisy, I couldn’t care less about the larger argument. But since you made it in a thread ostensibly about SSM and cultural values, I thought maybe incorrectly you hadn’t forgotten what you were ostensibly discussing, and that you had actually thought about what your analogy really conveyed, both for your hypocrisy argument, and the larger context that spawned the hypocrisy sub-thread itself. But maybe I was wrong about that. Maybe you hadn’t given it any thought at all, and despite the collegial nature of the board where it is well known that any comment is likely to be challenged and support expected to be delivered or else judgment risked, you just attacked me for not paying attention, as though that somehow made your point more salient or your ability to describe what it was you were trying to say less necessary. Well, phooey to that I say. I read what you said, I got what you said, and I asked you a fair on topic question. If you want to shout me down for asking for a clarification, that reflects on you, not me. But, again, if I missed your explanation, or if you want to provide it now, I am all ears because I care more about how I and the people I work with are going to use that information to change 1000 votes a day on average, not because I give a rat’s ass about what you think is hypocritical or not. But it is up to you - I am giving you a chance to answer what many have been asked and have at least tried before they failed before. If you don’t want to even try, that is fine, but it is also fair to say that it is starting to look like there is no good answer to the question, and that is valuable data in and of itself. of so, it wouldn’t reflect badly on you if you realize that and learn to not to use such flawed logic in the future. I’d consider that a great outcome if people are influenced to stop making that style of argument regarding SSM because it means they will be one step closer to voting the way I want them to next time. So go ahead and don’t answer or squawk loudly that I even deigned ask, I don’t care, I only ask that quietly you consider if that is really the best most persuasive argument you have the next time it occurs to you to use it in any context. I can live with that right now. And BTW, before you repeat foolishly again that you didn’t compare the reasons we incarcerate criminals and can limit their liberties with the reasons we can consider limiting the liberties of gays and conclude that they are not internally inconsistent (your term), I suggest you re-read your own post at 141, esp. the first paragraph. That you say you don’t agree with it makes it even more curious to me that you would describe the logic as internally consistent, yet claim you don’t agree and fail to offer a reason why when asked about it. But it doesn’t mean you didn’t say it, and it does mean I did read it and understand it, perhaps you didn’t write it as well as you wished you did, but it is right there for you to read, same as I did. I politely suggest you read it as a reader instead of as the author, and then decide how to proceed, if shouting me down some more is still such a good plan of persuasion. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/237 "2009-07-09T05:13:52Z")
> [@not\_alice](#): > > [SNIPPED]…But it doesn’t mean you didn’t say it, and it does mean I did read it and understand it, perhaps you didn’t write it as well as you wished you did, but it is right there for you to read, same as I did. I politely suggest you read it as a reader instead of as the author, and then decide how to proceed, if shouting me down some more is still such a good plan of persuasion. …here is post 141 in full: > [@](#): > > As much as I agree with your interpretation of the DoI, I can’t get on board with the idea that anyone who doesn’t apply it to gay rights is automatically a hypocrite. “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” are pretty broad goals, and there are a lot of groups whom we prevent from following one of those goals because we believe it’s to the social good. The easiest example is convicts: we’re depriving them of their inalienable right to liberty, because we’ve decided that it’s harmful to society to allow criminals to run around scot-free. It’s not at all hypocritical to support the DoI and to support the incarceration of criminals. Similarly, I think someone can believe in the principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence, and also believe that giving unfettered equality to gays will be harmful to the public good. Needless to say, these people are, by and large, idiots. But that doesn’t necessarily make them hypocrites. I don’t agree with their reasoning. In many cases, I find their reasoning detestable. But it’s not necessarily internally inconsistent, or contradictory with their other beliefs. > > Similarly, there’s really nothing at all hypocritical about a black person being opposed to gay rights. The principle behind the Civil Rights movement of the 50s and 60s was racial equality. Opposing sexual equality does not contradict the principles of racial equality, because sexuality and race are very different things, and while I think there are lots of valuable parallels to draw between the struggle for racial equality and the struggle for sexual equality, my reasoning is not some inarguable logical axiom. One is not required to violate their own internal logic to disagree with my reasoning on the similarities between the two issues. Here is what you quoted: > [@](#): > > The easiest example is convicts: we’re depriving them of their inalienable right to liberty, because we’ve decided that it’s harmful to society to allow criminals to run around scot-free. It’s not at all hypocritical to support the DoI and to support the incarceration of criminals. In summary: - **Miller** agrees with **Rubystreaks** interpretation of the DOI - “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” are broad goals - Not applying this to Gay Rights does not automatically make you a hypocrite - Convicts have had their liberty curtailed: supporting locking them up does not make you a hypocrite - People who don’t support SSM are idiots, but not hypocrites - Being black and opposed to SSM does not make you a hypocrite. To this arguement: you reply: > [@](#): > > But you uinderstand why that is, right? because it is a principle deeply embedded in English Common law dating back to the Magna Carta. > > When I hear people talk about “traditional marriage” and :“how marriage has always been that way” I actually expect that there will in fact be some dicussion of law that can be traced back to English Common law and the principles of the Magna Carta. > > That would in fact be a rational argument, or at least the basis for a sound discussion, as you correctly claim it is for the matter of liberty and convicts. It is a matter of our “social contract” with each other if you will, with 100 years of documented legal history at the foundation. > > Instead, whenever “traditional mariage” is raised, it is not a legal argument at all, but a religious one, in fact a subset of that, it refers to the collective beliefs of some religions, certainly not all present or past. > > I for one would love to see an English Common law argument against SSM, regardless of if it claims that there is a parallel to the idea of imprisoning criminals or something. I think that comparison would be absurd myself, but IANAL. Maybe there is such a beast in a law journal somewhere, or even summarized on some anti-SSM web site. Has anyone ever seen an argument where there was an attempt to define “traditional marriage” and forbid SSM on the basis of English Common law that is the basis of our legal system? > > I would like to see it, but I bet it doesn’t exist, and not because no one has had the time or ability to write such an article, but rather because there is no point to be made there. > > And so it is with the quoted claim - if you are going to suggest that **there is a basis for anti-SSM in the same roots of our legal system that allow imprisonment of convicted criminals,** then I ask you to produce a cite that makes the case fully or else to back off of such folly. This is why you are being accused of not being able to read. **Miller’s arguement:** it is not hypocritical to be black and against SSM. **Your interpertation of Miller’s arguement:** there is a basis for anti-SSM in the same roots of our legal system that allow imprisonment of convicted criminals. You have taken **Miller** ’s quotes completely out of context: then proceeded to argue against the snippet you quoted. And as of your last post, you still haven’t proven that you have actually read and understood his arguements. The **fundemental** premise of the OP is that Blacks are overwhelmingly against SSM: and that this is hypocritical. I disagree with this premise: as do many others including **Miller**. **Miller** has been entirely on topic throughout the whole debate. Our position is that the OP is wrong: and is entirely within the parameters of being absolutely on-topic. Your posts, however, are much closer to being off topic and hijacking this thread IMHO. It is laughable to even consider that **Miller’s** posts have been in opposition to SSM. Seriously: **magellan01** and **Miller** argree in a thread about SSM! I honestly don’t know how **Miller** could be any clearer. You obviously have strong opinions in regards to SSM. I would suggest you are letting this colour your perception of the posts you are reading and of the posters who are writing them: because you are attributing arguements to them that they have not made. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/238 "2009-07-09T06:55:47Z")
> [@Banquet\_Bear](#): > > …here is post 141 in full: > > To this arguement: you reply: I suggest you simply quote relevant parts or link to posts, not quote them in full. It makes your own argument difficult to follow as that is not the generally used format here and does your own credibility no good. That said, since you mentinoed (but failed to link or quote in full) the OP, I will go off and re-read it now… ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/239 "2009-07-09T07:08:13Z")
OK, I just looked at the OP again, while Miller (and others) were drawn into a debate about the meaning of hypocrisy and if it is the right word for some situation or other, the OP’s question was in fact about seeking to identify the cultural basis of the statistical voting and polling pattern he mentioned. I am sure the OP has a dictionary to look up “hypocrisy” if he needs it 🙂 While I know the hijack went on forever, and may still be continuing, I refuse to join in, that doesn’t mean that a few snippets of the context of the hijack, meaning something germane to the OP might not slip in. Maybe if that is problematic, Miller can double check the purity of his posts in advance, but for now, I give him every benefit of the doubt of being interested in the actual topic of the OP, even if he only intends to use it as a framework for debating the definition of a word in the subject line of the OP. And lo and behold, perhaps inadvertently, he did that, and I tried to bring it back in the broader context. If Miller really doesn’t want to answer the question, that is fine, it is open for all really. Note that even in my own thread, I am asking people to address what other people have posited as supportive arguments for Prop 8, without holding the reporter to the argument. That is the same here. If you don’t want to answer, don’t answer. If you were offended, sorry. If you didn’t understand, then sorry for not being clear enough, but not sorry for your choosing to attack instead of ask for clarification. Fact is, you stumbled on an argument that is very closely related to that which I was discussing independent of your hijack, and which I then asked about in the context I was interested in. Sorry again if I don’t live in your head, but really, don’t answer if you don’t want to, or don’t know the answer, I don’t care. Now can you please return to your regularly scheduled hijack about hypocrisy so that I can go to bed tonight hoping that someone else might not find the well so poisoned by your nonsense directed towards me that they will attempt an answer to my question about the legal basis for the claims of “traditional marriage”? As for **Miller** , I don’t think I am familiar with his track record here, I don’t recall the SN (and for all I know he not mine, no biggie, but I will make a mental note of his touchiness when asked about the details of analogies he provides and try to use kid gloves if there is a next time. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2009, 8:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658/240 "2009-07-09T08:35:02Z")
> [@not\_alice](#): > > I suggest you simply quote relevant parts or link to posts, not quote them in full. It makes your own argument difficult to follow as that is not the generally used format here and does your own credibility no good. > > That said, since you mentinoed (but failed to link or quote in full) the OP, I will go off and re-read it now… …good lord! There is a very good reason I quoted the posts in full: because the whole post was relevant. You quoted two sentences out of context and then proceeded to argue against those sentences. You are trying to debate an argument noone is making. You accuse me of jumping in on a conversation when it was you who jumped in and hijacked the thread. A very simple question for you: Reading the whole of Millers post: can you sum up in one sentence what his argument was? I’ve been on these boards for nearly six years now and this is the first time anyone has ever questioned my credibility: so thanks for the laugh! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658.md?page=11) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blacks-overwhelmingly-against-gay-marriage-why-such-hypocrisy/501658.md?page=13)