I may choose to retract my earlier statement, you know, the one about people having reasoned objections to gay marriage; unless one turns up pretty soon, I’ll concede that such folk are a figment of my fevered imagination or that the scenario I detailed was nothing more than a publicly acceptable facade, presented by people who, on the inside, are actually thinking nothing much deeper than 'Ick! Homos!"
Quint Essence, I am not normal. I have a card in my wallet which says I’m a member of Mensa. Membership in that group means that I am different from 98% of the population. There are other ways in which I’m not normal, but that’s the most quantifiable one. I am also mentally ill. I suffer from clinical depression and, while I am in good shape, it is something I will deal with for the rest of my life. I am also a straight, unmarried woman. When I was growing up, because I was too smart for my own good, too stupid to conceal it, and too weird to fit in, I was told I was unfit to marry and that for me to smile at a fellow was an insult. In my perfect world, cruelty would be unnatural, but I’ve seen far too much to believe that. I still believe cruel people should not marry because they will not show others basic, human respect.
The arguments you use against homosexuals marrying or wanting to fall in love could be and were used against me. They’re one reason my battles with clinical depression have been so bad they nearly killed me. Should I not marry because I am “not normal” and “mentally ill”? Should I not be glad because a gentleman of my acquaintance, a fellow Mensan who is also, by definition, “not normal” smiled at me and asked me out? Especially at this time of year, we are conditioned to believe romantic love is the epitome of happiness, and this goes double for young women. We are also given the message that sex ain’t half bad either! 
Because I am straight, I need feel know shame that a back rub from a fellow I like can make me purr with pleasure or a smile from a gentleman I like in a different way can warm my heart. That doesn’t apply to my gay friends.
Cruelty such as you showed in your posts is all too natural, I’m afraid. I’m also entirely too familiar with the effects of that cruelty. One hundred years ago, it was an accepted fact that women were less intelligent than men and allowing them to go to college would cause their wombs to shrivel and make them less womanly. Marriage meant a woman went from being property of her father to being property of her husband. Now, there’s a chance that some people out there will thing that it’s unfortunate that things have changed. As for me, I’m glad I own my own property, and I hardly think my education makes me less womanly.
As a certifiable prude until my mid-20’s, I can see how sex would make one feel “oogy” – any form of it had that effect on me! I also realize that allowing same-sex marriages does disconcert people and make them consider things they’d rather not. The thing is, to paraphrase something someone said when they were asked about giving women the right to vote, I don’t see how homosexuals can possibly make a worse hash of marriage than the heterosexuals have!
CJ
And I thought this thread wouldn’t take off last night after I wrote it. Well Mrs. Phlosphr saw to it I didn’t get infront of the computer last night so this will be my first post since writing the op.
First off for all those definition mongers out there: Bolding is mine: Merriam Webster said:
[quote]
Main Entry: mar·riage
Pronunciation: 'mer-ij, 'ma-rij
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English mariage, from Anglo-French, from marier to marry
1 a (1) : the state of being united to a person of the opposite sex as husband or wife in a consensual and contractual relationship recognized by law (2) :** the state of being united to a person of the same sex in a relationship like that of a traditional marriage <same-sex marriage> ** b : the mutual relation of married persons : WEDLOCK c : the institution whereby individuals are joined in a marriage
2 : an act of marrying or the rite by which the married status is effected; especially : the wedding ceremony and attendant festivities or formalities
3 : an intimate or close union <the marriage of painting and poetry – J. T. Shawcross>
[quote]
So those who think “same-sex” is not in the official definition of ‘Marriage’ are wrong. Plain and simple.
Over the years the DSM-IV has categorically eliminated homosexuality as a mental disorder and instead uses sexual disorder not otherwise specified: …persistant and marked distress about sexual orientation. cite
On all fronts opposition groups are losing the battle. I hope one day my own children will be in a less ignorant society.
Thanks. I’m actually in St. Louis, but I don’t often read the RFT. I’ll check it out.
The reason I asked is that I’m writing an op/ed for my college paper about Missouri’s current efforts to bring a constitutional amendment to vote this fall defining marriage as being between a man and a woman. One of the legislators really enjoys saying that allowing gay marriage means that in a few years, people will be marrying ponies, and I’d like to be able to say that, at the moment, loving a pony isn’t illegal here.
I (sadly) live in Missouri, and work for Jefferson County, a large rural-suburban county south of St. Louis. A couple of years ago, our county sheriffs raided an adult video store called Award Video (now under new management as Maximus Video). They arrested approximately 9 men and one woman who were engaged in some form of orgy. IIRC they had to release the woman. They prosecuted the men, but the only law they could find broken was the sodomy law. The men were ultimately aquitted, and the anti-sodomy law ruled unconstitutional. I think what you said about homosexuality being illegal was true at one point, but has recently become false.
Sorry I don’t have a site for this, but I’m sure the RFT did an article about it, and the Post-Dispatch surely did, too. Do a search for Award Video, and you’ll probably find further info.
First of all, no one has the right to get married. Heterosexuals nor homosexuals. There is no right giving it to heteros and not homos.
Also, except for the extreme fringe group of people, no one wants to deny a group of people something based on a precondition, but then, see above.
The word marriage existed long before the Church used it to describe the matrimonial union between a male and a female. And, the Church (take your pick) has a definite solid use for the word marriage with no leeway at all. And, just because Webster says that the word marriage applies to same gender unions, that doesn’t make it so. I doubt that Webster consulted the Church before printing that edition. Also, I doubt that that definition appears in earlier editions.
The whole argument, again, comes down to Church vs. State. The Church existed long before the State, and invented the rules involving marriage. The State simply was following suit to use marriage as a social contract for governing property, taxes, and offspring.
This same type of contract can be established with simple Power of Attorney documents. Sure it’s a hassle, but the same ends are achieved.
As the Church says, a marriage is simply between a male and a female. I’m not the least bit religious, but even I can respect this. A rule is a rule. And as long as the Church has invented marriage, it can chose what the rules are.
Homosexuals cannot be married by the Church, but they might be able to be “married” by the State, someday - which is not a true marriage. It’s a Union. It’s a Social Contract. It is the word marriage that homosexuals are getting hung up on, and that is just plain silly.
The ironic part is that homosexuals are begging to be given an opportunity to be included into a sacrament, by a Church that hates them.
This is false. While you can establish some of the incidents of marriage by the clever combination of contracts, powers of attorney, wills, and advance medical directives, some of them are completely beyond the power of individuals acting without state support. Only a married couple benefits from the right of survivorship, from spousal privilege, and from the right of conjugal access, to name just a few of the legal incidents of marriage bestowed by the state. You can’t write a contract that holds a third party liable for loss of consortium in the event that third party kills your partner (without the advance consent of that third party). Advance medical directives are routinely ignored; even a clear directive naming your same-sex partner as your medical care decision authority will be disregarded if your parent–or your kids, or your sister–wants something else done. Wills leaving the bulk of an estate to a same-sex partner are often protested, and such transfers, even when successful, are not exempted from the estate tax as transfers to one’s surviving spouse are. A same-sex partner can be forced to testify against his or her spouse. Opposite-sex partners, on the other hand, can sue someone who kills their spouse, will generally be allowed to direct the medical care of their partner, their wills are much less likely to be successfully contested and are much less likely to incur tax burdens at death. None of these rights and privileges can be acquired without state recognition because they all involve the relationship between the couple (or the members of it) and the state. There are hundreds of other rights and privileges (and not a few duties) that are bundled up in the legal institution of marriage – all of which are denied to same-sex couples.
This is part of what gays are seeking when they want state recognition of their unions: the legal incidents of marriage. Claiming that “you can get the same thing without the state’s involvement” is, plainly, false.
As has been pointed out to you, this is untrue. If you read my earlier (epic) post, you’ll see that my boyfriend and I were unable to buy a house, because we aren’t allowed to file our federal taxes jointly. No Power of Attorney contract in the world is going to give us that right.
Except that there are actually two different institutions of marriage in this country; state and church. You can have a church wedding, but no license from the state. You can have a license from the state without ever stepping into a church. They’re entirely separate entities that share the term ‘marriage’.
The rules for marriage change. For instance, it was recently illegal for an interracial couple to be married. A change which was opposed in the name of religion. If we followed your ‘the church invented marriage, they make the rules’ doctrine, we’d still be jailing people for loving people of differing races. Tradition must give way to justice, for a government to treat all its citizens as equals.
If you were to show me a Civil Union statute that gave me every single right that married couples have, and guaranteed that no legislation could be passed limiting Civil Unions in ways in which marriage wasn’t affected, then I’d be all for it. But if a separate Civil Union is established for gay people without those protections, then we run the risk of being gradually disenfranchised in the future by legislation that applies to us, but not to heterosexual couples taking part in the contract by the name of ‘marriage’.
If you object to gay people wanting to call their unions ‘marriages’, well, aren’t you just getting hung up on a word? Isn’t that just plain silly?
I don’t care about religion. I don’t want to be married in a church. My boyfriend doesn’t either. I don’t see marriage as being a sacrament, I see it as being a loving, devoted commitment to spend my whole life making my boyfriend’s life better, to making him happy. Religion has nothing to do with it.
The ironic part is that a church that claims to operate out of love and devotion to humanity hates us because we love each other.
Now this is just my opinion take it as you will. If the government recognized gay marriages, it would change their status as taxpayers and insurance and benefit providers would have to pay. Insurance companies stand to lose??? I could give a rat’s ass!!!
There are religions, even Christian denominations that allow gay marriage or have no set policy, allowing each individual dioceses to set the policy (Episcopal Church is one such last I heard).
Also, you think people didn’t get married before Christianity? I’m not sure, but I think people had been getting married well before Christianity showed up. Anyone have some kind of historical cite about when marriage originated?
I’m really tired of hearing this focus group tested “definition” crap.
Yes, for thousands of years, when people said “marriage” you thought of a man and woman. So what? Definitions are based on common usage, and are arbitrary. To put it plain THERE IS NO LEGITIMATE ARGUMENT based on what a word is or isn’t defined as. Anyone can call something anything they want, and no one has to care. This argument is pure smokescreen to avoid having to discuss the substantive issues at hand.
Here is what the real issue is, translated: for 10,000 years, only men and women were given certain legal protections and benefits as well as community recognition of their sexual, financial, and child-raising partnerships.
THAT is the issue. Defend THAT, not some ridiculous nonsense about a “definition.” Why should homosexuals be denied those legal benefits and protections for THEIR sexual, financial, and child-raising partnerships, no matter what we call this conglomeration of benefits and protections and social recognition? Why should homosexuals be denied THOSE THINGS. Because that is what is being denied. Not merely a “definition.”
Aw, Keeee-rist! Like you queers haven’t made us straight guys’ lives miserable enough with your fitness and good taste. We have enough trouble already convincing women that all that is needed for a wedding reception is pizza, a keg, and a polka band.
Marriage is complicated. There are legal and civil society parts to it. It’s perfectly possible for the legal end to be there and the civil society not to bless the relationship at all. One has to ask whether giving someone the legal benefits of marriage forces civil society to accept them as marriage. I would argue that it does not. Churches are still free to not accept gay couples. So is anyone. Civil society is something that should work itself out without government direction. The government should be concerned only with justice in its treatment of citizens, and their treatments of each other: not in their regard for each other.
Well, y’know, I wasn’t married in a church.
I tried. Thing is… we wanted the ceremony to be performed by a friend of ours, an ordained minister.
And when we went to the church my wife wanted to get married in, we were told that this was not acceptable. That particular church did not agree that women could be ministers. Our minister chum was a woman. Therefore, they could not, in good conscience, allow us to use their church, unless we allowed an APPROVED minister to perform the ceremony.
I told the guy to stick it, and we got hitched at the country club. By the minister of our choice.
Not all ministers, priests and holy men are assheads, of course. It’s just that when they turn out to be, it sticks out… because of all folks who ought to stand firmest against injustice and stupidity, it’s them, don’cha think?
Hypocrisy and holiness don’t mix well. At least, not from where I’m standing.
As to abominations… well… I can think of LOTS of abominations that are routinely condoned by all kinds of churches. Brussels sprouts, reality TV, George W. Bush, and the last several Eddie Murphy movies, just to name a few. Do I get to go crusading against THEM?
Hmmph. No one ever listens to ME when I wanna go crucify somebody… 
Yeah, what’s with them getting all uppity?! BACK TO THE COTTON FIELDS WITH YOU GAY HEATHANS!
Points for originality here. Flaming–Hell–BWAHAHAH!! WHAT A CREATIVE RIOT! :rolleyes:
I’m not saying that all gays have this horrible, idiotic persona, but a huge chunk of their population does.
[/quote]
My roomate (a lesbian) always squinches her nose at me when my boyfriend and I are smooching one another… then she says,
“I don’t mind straight people, so long as they act gay.”
Which, ya know, sounds as ridiculous as it does when straight folks say it, doesn’t it?
Uh. I think that if I saw ANY elephants going at it, I might think it’s kind of gross, regardless of their orientation. How would you feel about two straight elephants going at it? Eesh.
I’m not sure what “freagin” is, but I think that most sex looks pretty ridiculous. YMMV
That’s right, sweetie. The whole world lives their lives simply to give you the heebie jeebies and spread cooties. :smack:
Which is okay, because well over half of the straight population has, at one time, probably been bi-curious. Isn’t making up random facts fun?!
The ancient Egyptians had marriage. (And divorce. And lawsuits involving who got what in the divorce. And because they wrote everything down, we have documentary evidence.)
They considered marriage a social contract. No priestly intervention at all was involved (and given that the Egyptians were called the most persistently religious folks in the ancient world, I think that’s saying something). Personally, I think some religions nicked marriage from ordinary people a long time ago and it’s about time ordinary people took it back.
There are civilizations older than the Egyptians, but not many, and I don’t know anything about them.
You directly claim that the church did not invent marriage. Thus, the church has no say in how the term us used.
Depends on the church. Some churches do perform gay marriage ceremonies.
What? Just, what? How the hell can you state in the same post that “The word marriage existed long before the Church used it to describe the matrimonial union between a male and a female” and “the Church has invented marriage”? Did a second personality kick in after the first three paragraphs?
The Hindu concept of marriage is older than that of any of the other major religions. Does that mean the Hindus get to decide whether gays can marry? Of course they don’t.
Marriage isn’t a “Social Contract”, either, with or without the capitals. Social contracts exist between the people and the state. Marriage is a legal contract, something that declares that two people now share ownership of properties once specific to each. Oh, and that they love each other and want to spend the rest of their lives together.
I defend the right of individual faiths to refuse to perform ceremonies between two people of the same sex. That isn’t what gays are asking for, though; all they want is the same right to exist as a unit of two individuals rather than one.
How does gay marriage affect me? My employer might have to cover a couple of extra spouses and then would be less profitable, and I might get fired. That’s the only conceivable complaint, beyond the ridiculous “because it will send America closer to the moral sewer and the Lored will smite us” stuff. You guys already decided that the Lord did smite us, remember? That whole September 11th thing should be the last smiting for a while, given that it was some 2,000 years since the last smite.
That “straight men/women will marry for tax benefits” stuff doesn’t fly either. No straight man, no matter how comfortable, could suggest marriage to another straight man for any purpose. My roommate would probably freak out and find someone to sublease his room if I suggested it to him… I
n any case, divorces for real couples are expensive enough. You seriously expect people to risk that for mild tax benefits?
Damn you, Joe Random , and your simulpost!
Let me take this opportunity to congratulate those of you who are married, straight OR gay. I do have a question for the same-sex brides and grooms, though- who throws the bouquet, and who picks the best man? Do you each get one?
LOL… We didn’t have bouquets… And we each picked one person to be a witness… My husband picked his father, and I picked a close friend…
The fun part was filling out the forms in Ontario… They hadn’t been changed yet, so my (then) partner/ (now) husband was my bride on the form…
Survivor