Everyone shares the right not to be beaten, which has unfortunately been violated with impunity for both of those groups at one time or another.
Me too!
–VT
I couldn’t help but notice you never posted any cites.
If Guin had posted a thread that said: “Help. I’m sure that [brickbacon** is wrong here, but he keeps using fancy words an’ confusing me, and stuff,” that would be a different story – and a different reaction here. I agree with you that the failure of Guin to rebut the argument is not evidence of the argument’s soundness.
That was pretty much the one that got me.
Perhaps I was hasty. Perhaps I’m rather emotional and not as skilled as presenting my argument. All right, I freely concede that. I’ve never claimed to be a master debator. 
:eek:
HOWEVER, I will NOT concede that his argument, while perhaps presented better than mine, was not ignorant and offensive. I personally am getting the impression-and brickbacon is free to correct me-that somehow if anyone other than blacks claim to have their civil rights violated, that they are somehow insulting the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s. And tell me, is THAT not ignorant and bigoted? “Brand name?” Bitch, please. (Yes, I know it’s a metaphor. It’s still a stupid one.)
But, as someone else pointed out, the risk of being kicked out of one’s home, having to hide one’s own identity, called abominations before God, being forced into mental institutions, freaks of nature, diseased, etc. And while there are laws that protect discrimination based on one’s race, there aren’t on one’s sexual orientation. Yes, someone who is gay can hide in the closet, and one who is black cannot. But isn’t THAT part of being discriminated against as well?
The exact experiences of discrimination perhaps are different-but discrimination is discrimination. And it’s wrong.
Sorry, I completely forgot about that. :smack: I’m off to do so right now.
Upon further reflection, jumping on Guin for not making a cogent argument is like yelling at my one-month-old for pooping in her diaper instead of using the toilet. I retract my earlier post and am done with this thread.
Here’s a better idea: how about you tell us how it is bigoted? Because I’m just not seeing it. He thinks that the term, “Civil Rights Movement,” should only apply to blacks. I don’t agree with that, I think it’s a stupid argument, but I don’t see where that equates to an argument that gays deserve fewer rights under the law, or should be treated differently in society.
I take issue with the use of the word “vaguely.”
I just scanned the other thread and I’m not entirely sure I’d label Brickbacon a bigot, but he is certainly misinformed and ignorant. For example:
I find it incredible that someone who claims to have such close gay friends can be this unenlightened about the issues facing the gay community.
And of course the plight of Blacks is not exactly analogous to the plight of gays. But I’d say the experience of black people who could “pass” is probably similar to that of gay people who are in the closet.
What I found bigoted was his argument that marriage isn’t a right. If THAT’S not being a bigot, what is it?
As for the rest, perhaps “bigoted”, isn’t the right term, exactly, but I wasn’t sure how else to put it. Help me out here-I’m serious.
Sure it’s wrong. But gay people simply do not have it as bad today as black people did in the first half of the 20th century (much less before the 20th century).
That doesn’t mean I don’t support gay rights, or that I don’t think DADT should be repealed tomorrow and gay marriage should be legal everywhere the next day. It just means you shouldn’t use the civil rights era as a parallel when constructing your arguments.
Ignorant, misinformed, oblivious, obtuse?
Is he arguing that it’s only not a right for gays, or that it’s not a right for anyone? My impression was that it’s the latter. I don’t agree with him there, but that doesn’t make him a bigot.
If you want to complain about a poster, but you can’t think of the right term for what’s pissing you off about him, “bigot” is not the default answer, okay? Take some time, think about what you’re trying to say, and if you still can’t come up with a better solution, maybe what you have to say isn’t worth posting.
That wasn’t my issue with him, Miller. And I think you know that. I think Enola Gay stated it better. Ignorant, definitely, and certainly closed-minded might be better.
Doesn’t that imply that, if the discrimination against blacks hadn’t been as severe, there wouldn’t have been any justification in demanding that the discrimination end? The parallels between the two movements does not lie in the degree of discrimination, but in the principles espoused by those opposed to it.
It actually is debatable whether marriage is a “right” – at least as it pertains to state recognition and privileges. Congress could probbly vote to stop recognzing all marriages tomorrow and there wouldn’t be anything unconstitutional about.
The issue, as it pertains to same-sex marriage, is about equal protection. It’s not about whether marriage per se is a right, but about to what degree states and the federal government can discriminate in granting recognition and privileges.
Yeah, I know that wasn’t your issue with him. That’s sorta the point of that post: you were pissed off at what he was saying, you couldn’t articulate why, so you went with “bigot” because you couldn’t think of a better term.
Don’t fucking do that.
Not that I’m faunching at the bit to leap to Guinastasia’s aid here, but I can see how she would come to view gay marriage as a right because that is how it has been described by many of the issue’s more vocal advocates, many of whom claim that gay marriage opponents want to deprive gays of their rights, take away their rights, etc.
I’ve never viewed marriage as a right but more as a privilege, sort of like a driver’s licence. Different states have different laws regarding it; you have to apply for a licence and conform to certain regulations to do it; etc.
Plus (and while I’m not necessarily opposed to or in favor of gay marriage), it’s been a source of some minor annoyance to hear that anti-gay-marriage proponents want to take away the rights of gays to marry when they’ve never had those rights to begin with.
It can be argue that the right being taken away is their 14th Amendment right to equal protection. To use your drivers license analogy, there is no per se right to drive a car, but if the state is going to grant licenses to drive, it can’t just grant them to men and not women or black people and not white people.
The argument is about whether the government has a right to recognize heterosexual marriages, but not homosexual marriages. Obviously, the state can impose some reasonable restrictions (such as age, for both driving and for marriage), but generally the government has to show a rational basis for that restriction. The debate over whether homosexuality should be a protected class like race or gender is still ongoing, but the “rights” in question are about equal protection, not marriage per se.
Having said that, there’s a lot of the public that doesn’t understand the distinction and a lot pro-GBLT people who do (mistakenly) think that marriage is a per se civil right.
Of course, in California, we also did have a case where a legal right was granted temporarily and then literally taken away.
Well, we hold these truths to be self-evident, don’t we? Pursuit of happiness, and all that there. Kinda what we’re all about, isn’t it?