# Since I can't be honest in GD . . . **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 27, 2009, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768 "2009-05-27T02:40:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 20
**Author:** ![Sarahfeena](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sarahfeena/32/519_2.png) [@Sarahfeena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sarahfeena)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/381 "2009-05-28T19:13:16Z")
> [@Sarahfeena](#): > > I’m not necessarily in favor of separating out the “civil union” part from the “marriage” part, myself. But if I were, I think that I wouldn’t so much call the “marriage” part the milieu of religion per se, but more that it would just refer to the vows part, and the civil union stuff would refer to the paperwork part. The “civil union” would be accomplished by going down to the the license, and that would be all it would take to be _legally_ joined. Then you could stand wherever you want and have the vows (or not), have a religious ceremony (or not), it wouldn’t matter. The vows would simply not have anything to do with the legal part of it. Anyone who wants to could call themselves married, or they could buck convention and NOT call themselves married if that floats their boat, as well. But the state wouldn’t, they’d only consider the two a legal couple. > > In fact, this would open up the possibility of another idea of mine, which is to allow the “civil union” part to non-romantic couples, as well, and then they would legally get benefits for one other party such as a sibling or friend. Why should people be punished because they never found someone they’d like to marry? I’m still working through that one in my head, though. I’ve almost talked myself into this scenario. Another advantage would be this: the wedding officiator wouldn’t have to be licensed by the state, and for that matter you wouldn’t necessarily need one at all, you could just say the vows yourself. Judges wouldn’t do it anymore, but you also wouldn’t have to have a friend answer a “become a licensed minister” ad in the back of Rolling Stone in order to do it yourself. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/382 "2009-05-28T19:36:18Z")
> [@Olentzero](#): > > Well now, that’s actually pretty cool! How’s the email debate with your friend going, by the way? I had meant to come back in here and suggest using segregated movie theaters and buses rather than bathrooms, but I’m sure by now it’s too late for that. Sorry…I copied the wrong response from my friend before. This one is worse. Re: the Restrooms analogy: > [@](#): > > This is NOT the same as the Black Civil Rights movement at all, because Prop 8 didn’t take any rights from gays at all. That’s a bad analogy. What the media doesn’t tell you is that gays can still wed via civil unions and domestic partnership. But you will not listen because you feel some false indignation and want to think of yourself as “helper to those in-need”. > GAYS CAN WED. > THEY HAVE ALL THE RIGHTS OF HETEROS. > Or did you mean restrooms, because that’s where gay men hang out to find other gay men? ---
**Author:** ![buttonjockey308](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bcef8e/32.png) [@buttonjockey308](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buttonjockey308)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/383 "2009-05-28T19:50:45Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > That does not mean that the analogy is inapt, or should not be made. Yes it is and no it should not. Equating the plight of black Americans from post-emancipation to current and modern day homosexuals who cannot marry offends me (whitey) to my very soul. It is not apt, it is not correct, it is barely similar and it is patently, absolutely and 100% red-white-and-blue-star-spangled crap. ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/384 "2009-05-28T19:57:13Z")
Nobody’s doing that, you doofus. People are equating _miscegenation_ with SSM. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/385 "2009-05-28T20:11:58Z")
gods, but these Same Sex Marriage threads make me laugh out loud. I mean, here I am, in fucking South Africa, and we have SSM. South Africa! We’ve only had fucking real democracy for _15_ years, people, and our gays can marry. And a bunch of bigots are holding 90% of the Land of the Free back. Some of them post on the 'Dope, too. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/386 "2009-05-28T20:19:07Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > Nobody’s doing that, you doofus. People are equating _miscegenation_ with SSM. I don’t think you quite got the thrust of the remark. though I’m open to correction. I think the esteemed poster is pointing out that equating the struggle for equal marriage rights with the struggle for black civil rights is inappropriate. For examples, repeated remarks herein that if one is reluctant to accept equal marriage, for any reason whatever, that this is precisely the same as racial bigotry. It isn’t, for obvious reasons. This is not to imply that opposition to equal marriage is somehow rendered acceptable, only that there is an order of magnitude involved. ---
**Author:** ![42fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/4/b487fb/32.png) [@42fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/42fish)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/387 "2009-05-28T20:21:02Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > Nobody’s doing that, you doofus. People are equating _miscegenation_ with SSM. There’s also been some equating of white-only vs. colored-only water fountains with marriage vs. civil unions. Although I’m not sure why comparing one separate-but-equal situation with another would be considered terribly offensive to someone\*. \*Except magellan01 who keeps insisting that “straights can marry, gays have to settle for civil unions” is the ideal of equality with no separate part whatsoever. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/388 "2009-05-28T20:27:07Z")
The first and foremost objection to the “separate but equal” dodge is that it was never intended to be truthfully implemented, it was merely intended as a cover story. Of course, truly equal facilities and access would have been a practical impossibility, but it was never meant sincerely in any case. One might well speculate, in a alter-history fantasy, what might have been if it had been sincerely meant and applied, but it wasn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/389 "2009-05-28T20:28:32Z")
> [@42fish](#): > > \*Except magellan01 who keeps insisting that “straights can marry, gays have to settle for civil unions” is the ideal of equality with no separate part whatsoever. But there’s only ONE LAW!!! ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/390 "2009-05-28T20:58:09Z")
> [@buttonjockey308](#): > > Equating the plight of black Americans from post-emancipation to current and modern day homosexuals who cannot marry offends me (whitey) to my very soul. GOOD. ---
**Author:** ![buttonjockey308](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bcef8e/32.png) [@buttonjockey308](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buttonjockey308)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/391 "2009-05-28T21:00:36Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > I don’t think you quite got the thrust of the remark. though I’m open to correction. I think the esteemed poster is pointing out that equating the struggle for equal marriage rights with the struggle for black civil rights is inappropriate. For examples, repeated remarks herein that if one is reluctant to accept equal marriage, for any reason whatever, that this is precisely the same as racial bigotry. It isn’t, for obvious reasons. > > This is not to imply that opposition to equal marriage is somehow rendered acceptable, only that there is an order of magnitude involved. Correctly elucidated, kind sir. There is no direct, unbroken line between black civil rights and gay marriage as a civil right as some would suggest here and I believe attempting to draw that line is not only a bad analogy but openly disrespectful precisely because of the magnitude of the issue. Opposition to equal marriage (good line) is a bigoted standpoint, no matter how one arrives at said standpoint. This does not make, at least in my opinion, the entire person a bigot. If we are to believe that people can be rehabilitated after a life of crime and wrong decisions, then we must believe that of everyone, I think. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/392 "2009-05-28T21:16:18Z")
> [@buttonjockey308](#): > > Correctly elucidated, kind sir… Wait a minute, that’s what an “elucidator” is? I thought it referred to an, ah, physcal characteristic, like, “Ron Jeremy is an elucidator.” Well, shit! ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/393 "2009-05-28T21:26:23Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > I don’t think you quite got the thrust of the remark. though I’m open to correction. I think the esteemed poster is pointing out that equating the struggle for equal marriage rights with the struggle for black civil rights is inappropriate. For examples, repeated remarks herein that if one is reluctant to accept equal marriage, for any reason whatever, that this is precisely the same as racial bigotry. It isn’t, for obvious reasons. > > This is not to imply that opposition to equal marriage is somehow rendered acceptable, only that there is an order of magnitude involved. I’ve noticed that people around here are not good with proportion. Binary modes are more to their liking. ---
**Author:** ![ivan\_astikov](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/58f4c7/32.png) [@ivan\_astikov](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivan_astikov)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/394 "2009-05-28T21:27:23Z")
As those famous musical philosophers, The Prodigy, once said - _“Fuck 'em, and their law!”_. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/395 "2009-05-28T21:30:33Z")
> [@ivan\_astikov](#): > > As those famous musical philosophers, The Prodigy, once said - _“Fuck 'em, and their law!”_. Ahh yes but what about, “Catch my pitch up…” ---
**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:** [May 28, 2009, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/396 "2009-05-28T22:12:39Z")
> [@buttonjockey308](#): > > Yes it is and no it should not. > > Equating the plight of black Americans from post-emancipation to current and modern day homosexuals who cannot marry offends me (whitey) to my very soul. > > It is not apt, it is not correct, it is barely similar and it is patently, absolutely and 100% red-white-and-blue-star-spangled crap. That’s as may be, but I was referring solely to the idea that, simply because black people do not like the analogy, the analogy is incorrect. The analogy can stand or fall on its own, regardless of how black people feel about it. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/397 "2009-05-28T22:39:09Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > And what is your problem here exactly? Atheism was central to communism. If that bothers you take it up with Joseph Stalin and Karl Marx. Oh, please. Atheism was just a rather minor feature of it, harped on by people like you who want to demonize atheism and have no real ammunition to do so. Which is why it’s always communism, communism, communism that gets brought up. As if communism and atheism were the same. > [@mazinger\_z](#): > > Well, do you agree that marriage has been traditionally defined as a union between a man and a woman? If so, then you must agree that SSM does not equal marriage. (I guess if one were to be hyper-technical, SSM really isn’t marriage as it has those extra words attached to it, but I digress…) No; generally it has been defined as a man taking ownership of a woman, or multiple women. Not a union of equals. So by the “traditional standard”, marriage hasn’t existed for some time. Absurd ? Yes, but that’s the kind of absurdity you get when you try the “it’s not marriage unless it never changes” argument. > [@mazinger\_z](#): > > Look at the difficulty to changing the meaning of the word marriage to include SS couples. SSM advocates are trying to get it legally acknowledged, not change the meaning. If I saw “Steve and Jim want to get married”, no one mistakes my meaning. > [@mazinger\_z](#): > > Besides, people are already claiming separate but equal is dead in the water anyway. Though, I don’t know why. If the law is identical regarding both types of union, then there should be no problem. It’s not like people are going to be using two types of government services (e.g. one for “married couples only,” one for “civil unions only.”) But they will and do; marriage and civil unions don’t have the same body of law, or the same legal recognition. Separate but equal never works, because they are never equal, because NOT being equal is why the separation is created in the first place. > [@mazinger\_z](#): > > Calling all state-sanctioned unions as civil unions defeats that claim. But, as pointed out lends strength to the “gays are trying to destroy marriage” crowd. > [@buttonjockey308](#): > > Yes and? Not to be insensitive, but how long has this truly been an issue? I mean when you compare gay marriage to the entire civil rights struggle, it is a young effort. This has not been going on for 100 years, hell, even 50 years. The fact is that there has been much progress and there is much progress still to come, but you will galvanize people against you with whom you fail to compromise. This is THEIR country too and while you’re waiting for them to ‘die off’ they are building more of their own. The squeakiest wheels in the cause for gay marriage can’t see far enough past their own desires to marry to see that they are continuing to make enemies that will gather in sufficient numbers to overturn thegains made today. This country voted for Bush. Twice. If you don’t think the republicans will be ready to stuff this right down your throats in 2012, you’re wrong. First, as I understand it the demographics favor SSM; the people who oppose it are dying off and not being replaced. Second, if they CAN do that, they will regardless of anything I say. Third, they already ARE enemies; they aren’t being “made into enemies”. And why does how long its been going on matter ? Does that magically make it less valid ? > [@buttonjockey308](#): > > As an aside, t bothers me that gays equate themselves with blacks with regard to the ‘struggle’. It is mildly, remotely similar to one part of one part of the civil rights movement, it does a disservice though to compare directly the desire for gay marriage to the entirety of the civil rights movement. It’s handy rhetoric but it’s a lie. Gays aren’t bought or sold, gays can vote, drive, hold jobs, go to schools, restaurants or laundromats and date whoever they choose. Blacks couldn’t do that until this nation came to its’ senses. The struggle is not the same. Yes, yes, and it “just wasn’t the same” for the Jews or women either. I hear that argument all the time, and no; just because your group was oppressed doesn’t mean you get to deny that other groups have been oppressed. The analogy works because it fits; because it’s applicable. Like it or not. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/398 "2009-05-28T22:49:23Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > If I say “Steve and Jim want to get married”, no one mistakes my meaning. Yeah, I’m glad those crazy guys finally found a couple of dames to marry them and… what… to each other? Ew. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/399 "2009-05-28T23:00:34Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Oh, please. Atheism was just a rather minor feature of it, harped on by people like you who want to demonize atheism and have no real ammunition to do so. Which is why it’s always communism, communism, communism that gets brought up. As if communism and atheism were the same. Why do you feel the need to lie about common knowledge? Atheism was a huge part, Karl Marx coined the phrase, “Religion is the opiate of the masses.”, and considered religious belief to be a control mechanism by which the elite held power and had no place in a rational workers state. It was such an important part of it that they shut down Christian religious worship in the Soviet Union and killed a bunch of Jews. It wasn’t a minor aspect at all. But it’s a good thing this is the pit so I don’t have to debate what is an obvious lie. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2009, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768/400 "2009-05-28T23:06:30Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > Why do you feel the need to lie about common knowledge? > > Atheism was a huge part, Karl Marx coined the phrase, “Religion is the opiate of the masses.”, and considered religious belief to be a control mechanism by which the elite held power and had no place in a rational workers state. It was such an important part of it that they shut down Christian religious worship in the Soviet Union and killed a bunch of Jews. > > It wasn’t a minor aspect at all. But it’s a good thing this is the pit so I don’t have to debate what is an obvious lie. The key tenet of communism is not surfing. Communists don’t surf. Not surfing is a core belief of communists. You’re an idiot. And a coward unwilling to defend his beliefs on top of that (at least if the GD thread is any evidence). By the way, Hitler was a Christian. 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768.md?page=19) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/since-i-cant-be-honest-in-gd/497768.md?page=21)