What are you getting out of all this, Bricker?

[Lilairen]

@jayjay

You’re conflating traditional polygamy with modern polyamory. Traditional polygamy is only one form of modern polyamory. To act as if that’s what polygamy still is is either disingenuous or uninformed.

To be fair, not all modern polyfolks are interested in group marriage (and a fair number are eeped out by the concept). Some modern polyfolks are interested in group marriage, some in multiple marriage, some only want one marriage, and some not at all.

Also, to the previous comment, there are both polygynous (one man, multiple women) and polyandrous (one woman, multiple men) societies on record; polygyny is more common, but it’s not the sole form of polygamy that has existed. (Polyandry is known when land resources are scarce, as in Tibet; sets of brothers will marry one woman so that the family farm doesn’t get divided among the sons. Women are also known to have multiple male partners, but I don’t know if they have multiple marriage, in parts of the Amazon basin, where there’s a belief that babies benefit from the sperm of multiple fathers.)

[Weird_AL_Einstein]

@MaxTheVool

Oh come ON… that’s an incredibly cheap shot, and really is quite beneath you.

Perhaps. If so, I apologize. I did find the story of that car fascinating, and had a yen to mention it, and this seemed like an opening.

@MaxTheVool

There’s a specific term, “sister wife”, for that relationship. However, my point is, much of your argument seems to stem from the fact that if you meet a man on the street and he says “I’m married”, you want to be able to instantly know that he’s married to a woman and not a man (I still don’t understand why, but that’s neither here nor there).

This is reductionist. It is easy to make my commitment to the principle that words should keep their meanings seem silly and trivial by applying it to this one example. Just as it is easy to make my commitment to freedom of expression seem silly and trivial by applying it to a 2 Live Crew concert. Offhand, I can’t think of a reason why I would need to know, in the example you cited, whether the relationship was with a man or a woman. But I also can’t think of a reason why I need to hear 2 Live Crew rap about how they’re so horny. Yet in both cases, the principle remains.

@MaxTheVool

So if polygamy were legal, if you met a man on the street and he said “I’m married”, you wouldn’t know whether he was married to one women or multiple women. So, supposing polygamy were legal, would you claim that a word other than “married” should be used to describe people in such a relationship?

I would think so, yes. As I said in my last post, the line of the relationship still runs from one man to one woman. Although if the arrangement were such that the “sister-wives” had any formal obligations to each other, making it somewhat more like a “group marriage”, then I don’t know.

@MaxTheVool

So I want to take a moment and rehash things. We have a fundamental disagreement about what a word means, at its most deep and basic sense. And this is not an easy disagreement to resolve, as looking it up in a dictionary won’t really help. I agree that most dictionaries will probably mention something about a man and a woman, but that’s because of the difference between commonly used meaning and Deep, Basic Meaning, as discussed previously. And you claim the Deep Basic meaning is one thing, I claim it’s something else. As both claimed meanings are logically consistent, I’m trying to come up with thought experiments and little tests which will demonstrate what the Deep Meaning really is.

That’s why I keep bringing up aliens, doors, etc. I claim that if we encountered aliens who had no gender whatsoever, but had a concept of love, and two of these aliens had a ceremony in front of family and friends in which they committed themselves to live together, love each other, and raise baby aliens, we would without hesitiation absolutely positively refer to that as a “marriage”.

Ummm…I would at least hesitate, myself.

@MaxTheVool

Thus, I argue, the Deep Meaning of the word “marriage” is the love and commitment and ceremony of it, not anything to do with the gender (or even species) of the participants. Sadly, we have not yet encountered aliens, so my example (while clever, in my opinion), can not be tested.

That’s the real problem with the analogy. Although if we were to suddenly encounter aliens, I imagine we’d have other things to talk about…

@MaxTheVool

Similarly, I claim that if someone says “I’m not ready to get married”, they are not commenting on their sexuality, but on their feelings wrt commitment, love, etc. And if someone says “so, are you and Pat married?”, they are asking about the level of commitment of the relationship, not the gender of the parties involved.

True, although the fact that people can use a word in such a way as to invoke only a subset of its meaning does not in itself tell us anything. Remember what I said a few posts back about how I would have no problem with the state defining the word “walk”, for the purposes of a law, to mean a subset of word the word means in reality, excluding some activities that can be defined as “walking”.

Getting back to the word marriage, consider the phrase: “Pat and I are going to get married and have kids”. The phrase in its entirety conveys a somewhat different meaning than “Pat and I are going to get married” or “Pat and I are going to have kids” (though in this case a marriage might be implied). The phrase “have kids” almost always implies doing it the usual way (I’m tempted to say always, people will say “adopt” when they’re going to adopt, although two lesbians using a sperm donor might use it). Of course it takes a man and a woman to have a child in the usual way, so here we see a case of the word “marriage” being used in a gender-specific sense.

@MaxTheVool

And if someone asked someone “what’s something that’s almost a marriage, but not quite”, the response would probably be “an engagement” or “two people living together”, not “two people of the SAME gender who have had a commitment ceremony, live in a house together, and are raising kids”.

You are subtly stacking the deck here. To my eye, the phrase “almost a marriage, but not quite” implies “almost as good as a marriage, but not quite”. A better phrase might be “like a marriage”, and here I think as the phrase “civil union” comes more into use, more and more people would say it. Some people already would.

@MaxTheVool

So, my challenge to you is this: Can you come up with an argument, a thought experiment, anything, which demonstrates that YOUR opinion about the Deep Meaning of the word “marriage” is the correct one?

I think I had one in my last post. Remember my reference to the Theban Sacred Band? Formally recognized romantic-committed relationships between two men, yet they were not referred to as “marriages”.

@MaxTheVool

Well, the analogy only works if you accept that, while a gay man and a gay women might have all the biological bits and pieces and external fittings to have sex, they couldn’t, in any meaningful sense, be “married”. So A and B are a straight man and a straight women, and C and D are a two gay men. A+B = marriage, C+D = marriage, no other combinations are possible, even if B might look lustfully on the chiselled buns of C, and D might think A was kind of hot.

Similarly, A and B are the two components of a hinged door and socket and C and D are the same for a sliding door, only A+B together make a full door and C+D together make a full door.

What I was pointing out was that your analogy would be much, much closer if you had A+B and C+C, or D+D. Or, to change the letters around, M(s)+W(s) and W(g)+W(g), or M(g)+M(g). You see, in other words…

@MaxTheVool

But we’re getting distracted in the minutiae of this analogy,

Ahh…I suppose we are.

@MaxTheVool

whose point was to respond to a point you made which I definitely think is outright WRONG. Namely, you have stated numerous times, in numerous threads (I’ll track them down if you like), that there’s a fundamental difference between a gay relationship and straight relationship, BECAUSE THE PARTS CAN’T BE INTERCHANGED.

Mmmmm…I don’t recall ever using that particular phrase. What I have said is, cutting and pasting again, that if you accept as an axiom that men and women are different in fundamental ways, then an inescapable corallary is that a relationship between two men is fundamentally different from a relationship between a man and a woman is fundamentally different from a relationship between two women.

I suppose you could rephrase that in the way you said, though I don’t know. Talking about “parts”, it looks like we’re getting back into gender reductionism. Men and women, both, are more than the sum of their “parts”.

@MaxTheVool

Now, there may be fundamental differences between gay and straight relationships, sufficient that they ought to be described by different words. I can’t prove that’s NOT the case. But the mere fact that the parts can’t interchange does NOT make that the case, any more than the fact that sliding and hinged door parts can’t be interchanged means that we should use the word “door” to describe them both.

Hopefully, you understand the point I’m making.

Well…in all honesty, I think you’ve pushed past the limits of this analogy. The function of a door, and a door framework, is pretty much defined by their parts. The function of a man or a woman (gay or straight) is not. In fact, from a philosophical standpoint, I don’t know if it is proper at all to even talk about human beings having a “function”.

@MaxTheVool

OK, let me ask you straight up, as a yes or no question. If we lived in a society where there were mostly straight people, but a few gay people, and the word “marriage” was commonly used to refer to both, with the modifiers “gay marriage” or “straight marriage” thrown on when necessary, would that situation be an internally consistent and stable one?

I can’t see why not.

@MaxTheVool

And, as a follow up, would that language (precisely like English, but with everyone accepting of “marriage” to mean gay or straight) be worse than our current English language, better, or equally good?

The question involves something inherently subjective, unless you want to come up with a way of measuring a language for “goodness”. My subjective evaluation is that this language would be less good than current English by a trivially small amount. Bear in mind, though, that if 2 Live Crew is banned, freedom of expression in this country will have been reduced by an amount that I would also call “trivially small”. Yet, I still oppose banning 2 Live Crew.

@MaxTheVool

We agree that there are some (but not many) contexts in which the government treats men and women differently, such as only drafting men to fight in wars during wartime. What’s a context in which the government should treat straight and gay married couples differently?

I haven’t been arguing that they should be treated differently, except in the very narrow sense that I would be more comfortable than you with a situation in which they were treated with legal equality but different labels, although that is not my preferred situation.

@MaxTheVool

I hate to bring up such an emotionally charged comparison, but how do you feel about “separate but equal”, Brown v. Board of Education, etc.? Do you think that private business owners should be able to discriminate, both in hiring and in who they serve, based on race or gender?

Legally, yes I do, though I would not do business with such a business. This is clearly hijack fodder.

[MaxTheVool]

@Weird_AL_Einstein

This is reductionist. It is easy to make my commitment to the principle that words should keep their meanings seem silly and trivial by applying it to this one example. Just as it is easy to make my commitment to freedom of expression seem silly and trivial by applying it to a 2 Live Crew concert. Offhand, I can’t think of a reason why I would need to know, in the example you cited, whether the relationship was with a man or a woman. But I also can’t think of a reason why I need to hear 2 Live Crew rap about how they’re so horny. Yet in both cases, the principle remains.

I think it’s a bit unreasonable to compare your principle that the government should not meddle in language to the principle of freedom of expression. Freedom of expression is perhaps the single most important right in any free society (along with the right to vote). And, it’s important to note, there are plenty of quite reasonable exceptions to freedom of expression, among them:
-invasion of privacy
-libel and slander
-fighting words
-incitement to riot
-advertisement for illegal services
-breaking of copyright laws
-publication of classified documents
-shouting “fire” in a crowded theater.

So basically, to sum up your entire position, you’re saying that if a proposition came up to vote in your state which would allow gay marriages, and your only two choices were to vote for it or against it, with no proposition coming along to potentially lead to the government-making-no-mention-of-marriage solution that you’d prefer, you’d look at the arguments for and against like this:

FOR - people in gay relationships, who you claim to value as highly as their straight counterparts, have the same rights wrt hospital visitations, inheritance, adoption, taxes, etc., that their straight counterparts have, not to mention the intangible benefit that comes from being told by society as a whole that they are accepted and valued

AGAINST - the government is messing with language, and this is somehow a principle on par with freedom of expression, despite the fact that the government isn’t forcing anyone to use a WORD that they don’t want to use, and despite the fact that people already are allowed to (and, fact, many do) use that word, and despite the fact that you yourself admit that any loss of actual meaning in the language is trivial
So, in other words, (as I see it) you’re saying that equality of personal rights for gay people is less important to you than a principle which I’ve never really heard anyone but you mention, which is not one officially enshrined in the constitution in any way, and which is being only trivially violated at best.

(I’m not trying to make you sound heartless, or anything, but honestly, I just can’t wrap my head around your prioritization here…)

That’s why I keep bringing up aliens, doors, etc. I claim that if we encountered aliens who had no gender whatsoever, but had a concept of love, and two of these aliens had a ceremony in front of family and friends in which they committed themselves to live together, love each other, and raise baby aliens, we would without hesitiation absolutely positively refer to that as a “marriage”.

Ummm…I would at least hesitate, myself.

How would you proceed? By trying to come up with a brand new word to describe that relationship? By referring to them as “committed unions”? What if the aliens learned English quicker than we learned their language, and actively chose to use the word “marriage” to describe their relationships?

(Damn it, I love analogies about alien relationships!!! )

Getting back to the word marriage, consider the phrase: “Pat and I are going to get married and have kids”. The phrase in its entirety conveys a somewhat different meaning than “Pat and I are going to get married” or “Pat and I are going to have kids” (though in this case a marriage might be implied). The phrase “have kids” almost always implies doing it the usual way (I’m tempted to say always, people will say “adopt” when they’re going to adopt, although two lesbians using a sperm donor might use it). Of course it takes a man and a woman to have a child in the usual way, so here we see a case of the word “marriage” being used in a gender-specific sense.

I have a cousin who is a lesbian, and after she and her girlfriend got married, I at one point asked them if they were planning to have kids. (And in fact my cousin is now pregnant and due in a month.) I don’t know that they ever precisely used the phrase “we are planning to get married and have kids”, but they might well have. I guess I don’t see what’s at all gender-specific about your usage, aside from the fact that, in the US today, the overwhelming majority of couples who get married and have kids are still straight.

If you knew a loving couple who was gay, would your reaction of cognitive/linguistic dissonance be any stronger if they said “we’re planning to get married and have children” than if they said “we’re planning to get married”? And, in fact, if anything I think your most recent examples weakens your argument… if the only way you can make the word “marriage” seem gender-specific is by tacking on “and have children”, which is an arguably gender-specific phrase, that implies that “marriage” by itself is NOT gender-specific.

(I say that “having children” is arguably gender-specific, in that in some contexts it can mean “produce children” or “give birth”, while in others it means something more akin to “raise children”.)

That’s why I keep bringing up aliens, doors, etc. I claim that if we encountered aliens who had no gender whatsoever, but had a concept of love, and two of these aliens had a ceremony in front of family and friends in which they committed themselves to live together, love each other, and raise baby aliens, we would without hesitiation absolutely positively refer to that as a “marriage”.

You are subtly stacking the deck here. To my eye, the phrase “almost a marriage, but not quite” implies “almost as good as a marriage, but not quite”. A better phrase might be “like a marriage”, and here I think as the phrase “civil union” comes more into use, more and more people would say it. Some people already would.

I don’t see how my question implied “as good as”… although we’ve again gotten so abstruse as to have become pointless.

So, my challenge to you is this: Can you come up with an argument, a thought experiment, anything, which demonstrates that YOUR opinion about the Deep Meaning of the word “marriage” is the correct one?

I think I had one in my last post. Remember my reference to the Theban Sacred Band? Formally recognized romantic-committed relationships between two men, yet they were not referred to as “marriages”.

I don’t quite see how that addresses the question I asked. I’m talking about the usage of the word “marriage” in the current vernacular. There are communities and religions today in which the word “marriage” is definitely used for gay couples, which doesn’t prove anything one way or the other, unless we can come up with some sociological/linguistic study which proves that meaning is gained/lost in the language as a whole in those communities…

Anyhow, I repeat my challenge: please come up with an example of usage of the word marriage where the word is clearly being used to differentiate, indicate, or request gender as opposed to level-of-commitment.

What I have said is, cutting and pasting again, that if you accept as an axiom that men and women are different in fundamental ways, then an inescapable corallary is that a relationship between two men is fundamentally different from a relationship between a man and a woman is fundamentally different from a relationship between two women.

There are lots of things that are fundamentally different from each other but which are described by the same word. In the community of people, there are enormously different roles and expectations of men and women (and this was FAR more true when the English language was in its nascency than it is today, and it’s still awfully true). Thus, it’s useful to have a word for “man” and for “woman”. And, let’s be honest, when the words “man” and “woman” were codified, men and women were acccorded very different value by society.

By contrast, we (at least theoretically) value straight and gay couples equally, and I don’t see why the roles they play, as couples, are different. Suppose you attended a liberal unitarian church with a large gay population… the church flyer would presumably say “need 10 couples to host dinner parties to welcome new members” as opposed to “need 10 married couples or civil unioned couples to host dinner parties to welcome new members”. The fact that some couples are made up of two men, or two women, or a man and women, doesn’t mean that it’s useful or important for language to be constantly distinguishing between those couples…

And, as a follow up, would that language (precisely like English, but with everyone accepting of “marriage” to mean gay or straight) be worse than our current English language, better, or equally good?

My subjective evaluation is that this language would be less good than current English by a trivially small amount.

This is an interesting topic on its own… right now, there is no collective word that means “bath or shower”. Which occasionally leads to linguistic frustration… “did you take a shower this morning?” “no, but I took a bath”. What I really want to ask is “did you take a bath-or-shower this morning?”, which I can get around by saying “did you bathe this morning”? One might propose that we would be better off having a single word, “washup”, which meant bath or shower, and could be modified with adjectives “standing washup” or “tubbing washup” to generate the specific meanings of “bath” and “shower” when necessary.

My point being, there are times when having two different words to represent two different similar concepts makes language as a whole WORSE, because one constantly has to use “X or Y” type constructions. I think it depends on how often one wants to refer to the union of the two concepts, and how often one wants to refer to the two concepts individually.
In any case, though, while I find that to be a fascinating hijack, I think that the language will end up being what the speakers of the language want it to be, whatever language the government does or does not use, and thus we shouldn’t really worry about the government meddling in language (which won’t end up mattering), and we SHOULD worry about inequality and injustice.

I hate to bring up such an emotionally charged comparison, but how do you feel about “separate but equal”, Brown v. Board of Education, etc.? Do you think that private business owners should be able to discriminate, both in hiring and in who they serve, based on race or gender?

Legally, yes I do, though I would not do business with such a business. This is clearly hijack fodder.

But what about the concept of “separate but equal”? Your position seems to be that the government should make laws that provide an equal playing field, and then should retire happily, assuming that its work is done. (And, of course, the current laws do NOT provide an equal playing field, as gay people do NOT automatically get to make medical decisions for their comitted romantic life partners.)

[Weird_AL_Einstein]

@MaxTheVool

I think it’s a bit unreasonable to compare your principle that the government should not meddle in language to the principle of freedom of expression.

Once again, I simply have to disagree. My principle is even arguably more important. If the state has the power to redefine words, it can redefine the word “expression”. Or for that matter, “freedom”. Read any Orwell?

@MaxTheVool

Freedom of expression is perhaps the single most important right in any free society (along with the right to vote). And, it’s important to note, there are plenty of quite reasonable exceptions to freedom of expression, among them:
-invasion of privacy
-libel and slander
-fighting words
-incitement to riot
-advertisement for illegal services
-breaking of copyright laws
-publication of classified documents
-shouting “fire” in a crowded theater.

True, but I don’t see how any of these are analogous to redefining the word “marriage”.

@MaxTheVool

So basically, to sum up your entire position, you’re saying that if a proposition came up to vote in your state which would allow gay marriages, and your only two choices were to vote for it or against it, with no proposition coming along to potentially lead to the government-making-no-mention-of-marriage solution that you’d prefer,

You know, I think this is a highly artificial situation you are setting up here. Who would even bother to collect the signatures necessary to getting something like that on a state ballot? In the current political climate, it would be so unpopular as to have no real prospects for success. If the political climate were to change, a natural evolution would lead us towards something like that “seperate but equal” thing.

@MaxTheVool

you’d look at the arguments for and against like this:

FOR - people in gay relationships, who you claim to value as highly as their straight counterparts, have the same rights wrt hospital visitations, inheritance, adoption, taxes, etc., that their straight counterparts have, not to mention the intangible benefit that comes from being told by society as a whole that they are accepted and valued

AGAINST - the government is messing with language, and this is somehow a principle on par with freedom of expression, despite the fact that the government isn’t forcing anyone to use a WORD that they don’t want to use, and despite the fact that people already are allowed to (and, fact, many do) use that word, and despite the fact that you yourself admit that any loss of actual meaning in the language is trivial
So, in other words, (as I see it) you’re saying that equality of personal rights for gay people is less important to you than a principle which I’ve never really heard anyone but you mention,

Orwell played with the idea in “1984”.

@MaxTheVool

which is not one officially enshrined in the constitution in any way,

All the more reason that we have to be committed to defending it. We have no constitutional clause to fall back on.

@MaxTheVool

and which is being only trivially violated at best.

Remember what I said in my last post, about banning 2 Live Crew? The state forbidding me to hear Mr. Campbell and company discuss how horny they are would be a trivial violation of the principle of freedom of expression, but I would still be against it.

@MaxTheVool

How would you proceed? By trying to come up with a brand new word to describe that relationship? By referring to them as “committed unions”? What if the aliens learned English quicker than we learned their language, and actively chose to use the word “marriage” to describe their relationships?

(Damn it, I love analogies about alien relationships!!! )

I don’t know how I’d proceed. I’d have to think about it. It might make a decent plot for a sci-fi novel…

@MaxTheVool

I have a cousin who is a lesbian, and after she and her girlfriend got married, I at one point asked them if they were planning to have kids. (And in fact my cousin is now pregnant and due in a month.) I don’t know that they ever precisely used the phrase “we are planning to get married and have kids”, but they might well have. I guess I don’t see what’s at all gender-specific about your usage, aside from the fact that, in the US today, the overwhelming majority of couples who get married and have kids are still straight.

I guess that’s another thing we just disagree on. To my ear, the phrase “we’re planning to have kids” means having them the old-fashioned way.

@MaxTheVool

If you knew a loving couple who was gay, would your reaction of cognitive/linguistic dissonance be any stronger if they said “we’re planning to get married and have children” than if they said “we’re planning to get married”?

Yes it would.

@MaxTheVool

And, in fact, if anything I think your most recent examples weakens your argument… if the only way you can make the word “marriage” seem gender-specific is by tacking on “and have children”, which is an arguably gender-specific phrase, that implies that “marriage” by itself is NOT gender-specific.

Huh? What? How is “have children” gender specific? A man can say, I want to have children. A woman can say it. Where’s the gender specificity?

@MaxTheVool

(I say that “having children” is arguably gender-specific, in that in some contexts it can mean “produce children” or “give birth”, while in others it means something more akin to “raise children”.)

Ummmm…so, now you’re agreeing with me that it isn’t gender specific?

@MaxTheVool

So, my challenge to you is this: Can you come up with an argument, a thought experiment, anything, which demonstrates that YOUR opinion about the Deep Meaning of the word “marriage” is the correct one?

I think I had one in my last post. Remember my reference to the Theban Sacred Band? Formally recognized romantic-committed relationships between two men, yet they were not referred to as “marriages”.

I don’t quite see how that addresses the question I asked. I’m talking about the usage of the word “marriage” in the current vernacular. There are communities and religions today in which the word “marriage” is definitely used for gay couples, which doesn’t prove anything one way or the other, unless we can come up with some sociological/linguistic study which proves that meaning is gained/lost in the language as a whole in those communities…

Anyhow, I repeat my challenge: please come up with an example of usage of the word marriage where the word is clearly being used to differentiate, indicate, or request gender as opposed to level-of-commitment.

In the first place, looking at what you said in the quote, and at what you said just now, it looks to me like you are changing the terms of your challenge just a bit. I think my citing of the Theban Sacred Band was a good response, and even if it wasn’t exactly what you were looking for, I really would be interested in hearing why you think the ancient Greeks didn’t use the word “marriage” for this kind of relationship.

In the second place, to respond directly to what you said just now: I’m not quite sure what this is supposed to prove, but I could say to you right now, I’m tired of the single life, I want to settle down and get married. Assuming you are aware that I’m a guy, I will be conveying to you that A) I want to have a relationship with a certain level of commitment, with B) a woman. If the definition of the word “marriage” were expanded, the phrase would not convey B.

NB: I’m not actually so tired of the single life that I want to get married at the present time, though I may want to in the future.

To a woman.

@MaxTheVool

What I have said is, cutting and pasting again, that if you accept as an axiom that men and women are different in fundamental ways, then an inescapable corallary is that a relationship between two men is fundamentally different from a relationship between a man and a woman is fundamentally different from a relationship between two women.

There are lots of things that are fundamentally different from each other but which are described by the same word.

In the first place, I note with interest that you cite no examples here. In the second place though, it’s not just a question of fundamental differences. An Apple computer and an apple that you eat are fundamentally different, yet we refer to them with the same name. This is ok because they are so different that the chance that you would not be able to tell which one someone was talking about in referring to an “apple” is negligably small. So, “redefining” the word “apple” to include a brand of pc is pretty much not a problem.

By contrast, a same-sex romantic-committed relationship shares many similarities with an opposite sex relationship of the same type, while still being fundamentally different. So, expanding the definition of the word “marriage” to include it would be like expanding the definition of the word “apple” to include pears. Do you see what I’m getting at?

@MaxTheVool

In the community of people, there are enormously different roles and expectations of men and women (and this was FAR more true when the English language was in its nascency than it is today, and it’s still awfully true). Thus, it’s useful to have a word for “man” and for “woman”. And, let’s be honest, when the words “man” and “woman” were codified, men and women were acccorded very different value by society.

True. Yet now that’s changed. Yet, we’ve kept the words. I think I already mentioned the fact that the women’s rights movement did not try to get equal rights for women by redefining the word “man” to include women.

@MaxTheVool

By contrast, we (at least theoretically) value straight and gay couples equally, and I don’t see why the roles they play, as couples, are different. Suppose you attended a liberal unitarian church with a large gay population… the church flyer would presumably say “need 10 couples to host dinner parties to welcome new members” as opposed to “need 10 married couples or civil unioned couples to host dinner parties to welcome new members”. The fact that some couples are made up of two men, or two women, or a man and women, doesn’t mean that it’s useful or important for language to be constantly distinguishing between those couples…

If that same liberal Unitarian church were just looking for 20 people for the same task (and perhaps they ought to be, are they discriminating against single people?) they wouldn’t care if they were men or women, they would just ask for “people”. But that doesn’t mean we should just junk the words “man” and “woman” and just use “person”.

@MaxTheVool

I hate to bring up such an emotionally charged comparison, but how do you feel about “separate but equal”, Brown v. Board of Education, etc.? Do you think that private business owners should be able to discriminate, both in hiring and in who they serve, based on race or gender?

Legally, yes I do, though I would not do business with such a business. This is clearly hijack fodder.

But what about the concept of “separate but equal”? Your position seems to be that the government should make laws that provide an equal playing field, and then should retire happily, assuming that its work is done. (And, of course, the current laws do NOT provide an equal playing field, as gay people do NOT automatically get to make medical decisions for their comitted romantic life partners.)

I’m not at all sure I understand your question. I’ve never said that I’m in favor of the state making laws requiring people to treat other people equally in their private lives.

[MaxTheVool]

Sorry for the long delay in responding. There was a bit of a national hubbub on Tuesday which stole my attention for a while. But I can’t remember what it was… I must be blocking it out

@Weird_AL_Einstein

Once again, I simply have to disagree. My principle is even arguably more important. If the state has the power to redefine words, it can redefine the word “expression”. Or for that matter, “freedom”. Read any Orwell?

(For the record, I’ve read both 1984 and Animal Farm, although not for years.)

I think you’re vastly misrepresenting the situation. Let’s look at it this way: 200 years ago, when US law was being codified, homosexuality was a taboo topic that existed only in hidden fringes of society. There were not (as far as I know), openly gay couples who were an even remotely significant part of the social fabric. So it’s not like whoever first wrote down laws about marriage was consciously thinking “ooh, and we’ll exclude all of those gay couples”. Rather, it wasn’t even an issue. Now, 200 years later, things have changed, society has evolved, and a new, previously undiscussed, phenomenon (out, open, committed gay couples) has arisen. Obviously, these couples are in many ways similar to straight married couples (that is, in ALL ways except for being straight). So, it might make sense to extend the legal word “married” to cover them. It might also make sense not to. But this is not at all analogous to the government redefining the word marriage.

Rather, a better analogy is that laws covering free expression in written communication, copyrights, etc., were written before the internet existed. When the internet was created, someone had to decide whether pre-existing laws about written communication covered email and message boards. Doing so is a perfectly reasonable thing to do, and in no way involves some Orwellian redefinition of “writing” or “communication” or “free speech”. Deciding whether pre-existing language can be expanded to cover new things is a perfectly reasonable, non-Orwellian, thing to do.

True, but I don’t see how any of these are analogous to redefining the word “marriage”.

They aren’t. I’m merely pointing out that even the most precious principles upon which a free society are based have plenty of exceptions.

So basically, to sum up your entire position, you’re saying that if a proposition came up to vote in your state which would allow gay marriages, and your only two choices were to vote for it or against it, with no proposition coming along to potentially lead to the government-making-no-mention-of-marriage solution that you’d prefer,

You know, I think this is a highly artificial situation you are setting up here. Who would even bother to collect the signatures necessary to getting something like that on a state ballot? In the current political climate, it would be so unpopular as to have no real prospects for success. If the political climate were to change, a natural evolution would lead us towards something like that “seperate but equal” thing.

(a) who cares if it’s an artificial situation? I’m still curious what your answer is

(b) if you lived in Ohio, and there was a state constitutional amendment on the ballot which would ban both gay marriages and gay civil unions, would you support it? That’s an entirely NON-artificial situation.

All the more reason that we have to be committed to defending it. We have no constitutional clause to fall back on.

You know, I really don’t quite grasp what, precisely, your principle is, nor how it relates to the current situation. You seem to be horribly disturbed by the idea of the government meddling with language, but honestly, the government CAN’T meddle with language. If civil unions are allowed, and gay people get civil unions, then they are certainly legally allowed to use the word “married” to describe themselves, and after enough time, that word either will or will not become the generally used term. Long term societal and linguistic trends will determine what word is commonly used to describe formalized gay civil unions, and at best the government can nudge that in one direction or another. And I think it should nudge it, but you seem terribly alarmed that this nudging is tantamount to some kind of federally enforced thought censorship.

At various points in the past 150 years, the term that the federal government used to discuss black Americans has changed many times, through some combination of “colored”, “negro”, “black” and “African American”. Has that been infringing anyone’s rights to talk however they like? Was that the first step down some slippery slope to totalitarian grammarianism?

Huh? What? How is “have children” gender specific? A man can say, I want to have children. A woman can say it. Where’s the gender specificity?

Here’s my point: I asked you to come up with an example in which the term “married” implied heterosexuality, and the example you came up with was “we plan to get married and have children”. I’m claiming that because one possible interpretation of “and have children” is “and together biologically parent children”, then one interpretation of “we plan to get married and have children” implies heterosexuality, not because of the “we plan to get married” but because of the “and have children”.

Ummmm…so, now you’re agreeing with me that it isn’t gender specific?

I think again we’re wading in minutiae, but… I think “we plan to have children” can be interpreted several different ways, at least one of which is gender specific.

In the first place, looking at what you said in the quote, and at what you said just now, it looks to me like you are changing the terms of your challenge just a bit.

Possibly Although I prefer to think of it as clarifying.

I think my citing of the Theban Sacred Band was a good response, and even if it wasn’t exactly what you were looking for, I really would be interested in hearing why you think the ancient Greeks didn’t use the word “marriage” for this kind of relationship.

It’s certainly a reasonable response, yes. But, bluntly, I don’t know anywhere near enough about Greek culture to actually give you any kind of meaningful response. Anyhow, I’m not claiming that it’s impossible for there to be another name for gay marriage. If we started using the word “Snarfblat” to mean “gay marriage”, then, many generations from now, it might have developed enough weight and meaning and power that a snarfblat was just as good as a marriage, but different. But that’s not the kind of thing you can just snap your fingers and bring into existence.

Anyhow, regardless of my previous phrasing of it, I still extend the same challenge: I claim that the phrase “I’m not yet ready for marriage” clearly implies that the speaker is not yet ready to settle down and commit, not that the speaker is becoming increasingly heterosexual, but is not yet heterosexual enough to get involved with a woman. I challenge you to come up with a similar example that supports your claim that the word marriage MEANS man-and-woman.

In the second place, to respond directly to what you said just now: I’m not quite sure what this is supposed to prove, but I could say to you right now, I’m tired of the single life, I want to settle down and get married. Assuming you are aware that I’m a guy, I will be conveying to you that A) I want to have a relationship with a certain level of commitment, with B) a woman. If the definition of the word “marriage” were expanded, the phrase would not convey B.

Agreed. Although it would still be overwhelmingly likely. And, I claim, that’s the ONLY thing lost by potentially referring to gay marriages as marriages. And a damn small thing it is.

NB: I’m not actually so tired of the single life that I want to get married at the present time, though I may want to in the future.

To a woman.

Great. NOW you tell me! You tease!

What I have said is, cutting and pasting again, that if you accept as an axiom that men and women are different in fundamental ways, then an inescapable corallary is that a relationship between two men is fundamentally different from a relationship between a man and a woman is fundamentally different from a relationship between two women.

There are lots of things that are fundamentally different from each other but which are described by the same word.

In the first place, I note with interest that you cite no examples here.

OK: Sports cars and compact hatchbacks are very different from each other, but are both referred to as “cars”. Great danes and chihuahuas are both referred to as “dogs”. We have different words for 10 and 30 year old males (boy and man), but not for 30 and 90 year old men. We use the same word (uncle) to refer to my father’s brother, and my father’s sister’s husband. We use the same word (movie) to refer to documentaries, educational films, and hollywood feature films. We use the same word (kiss) to refer to a peck-on-the-cheek greeting and a tongue-swirling piece of foreplay. We use the same word (stomach) to refer to an organ in the body, and a region in the body. We use the word “picture” to refer to both photographs and drawings of various sorts. We use the word “detergent” to mean the stuff that cleans dishes and the stuff that cleans clothes. We use the word “can” to mean the thing that soda comes in, with a hand-openable top, and the thing that baked beans come in, which requires a can opener. We refer to golf balls and bowling balls as “balls”.

I could go on all day here. In all of the above examples, if we had grown up using separate words for those thing, it would seem natural to us. And, yes, in all of those cases, it’s possible to add adjectives to modify them and make clear what precise thing you’re talking about. If you say “man” it might mean a 30-year-old or a 90-year-old. You can say “young man” and “old man” to clarify. Similarly, “marriage” could mean gay or straight, with “gay marriage” or “straight marriage” used when needed.

In the second place though, it’s not just a question of fundamental differences. An Apple computer and an apple that you eat are fundamentally different, yet we refer to them with the same name. This is ok because they are so different that the chance that you would not be able to tell which one someone was talking about in referring to an “apple” is negligably small. So, “redefining” the word “apple” to include a brand of pc is pretty much not a problem.

What if we discovered a new species of fruit, that was similar to an apple, but was blue. If we wanted to, we could call it a “snarfblat”, and everyone would know that a snarfblat was like a blue apple. Or we could call it a “blue apple”. Neither is obviously the correct approach, and there are plenty of examples from linguistic history of both types of things being done.

True. Yet now that’s changed. Yet, we’ve kept the words. I think I already mentioned the fact that the women’s rights movement did not try to get equal rights for women by redefining the word “man” to include women.

But what if the word for woman was “chattel”? As in, 200 years ago, you had men and you had chattel, and everyone took it for granted. It’s not prima facie ridiculous to claim that a change in language should accompany other changes. It’s not always necessary, but it’s not preposterous. Note, for instance, the fate of “Miss” and “Mrs.”. Was that a 2-live-crew-banning-esque blow to freedom of expression?

[Weird_AL_Einstein]

@MaxTheVool

Sorry for the long delay in responding. There was a bit of a national hubbub on Tuesday which stole my attention for a while. But I can’t remember what it was… I must be blocking it out

Quite alright. I’ve been known to get busy and put off replying to threads like this for a long time too…

@MaxTheVool

Once again, I simply have to disagree. My principle is even arguably more important. If the state has the power to redefine words, it can redefine the word “expression”. Or for that matter, “freedom”. Read any Orwell?

(For the record, I’ve read both 1984 and Animal Farm, although not for years.)

I think you’re vastly misrepresenting the situation. Let’s look at it this way: 200 years ago, when US law was being codified, homosexuality was a taboo topic that existed only in hidden fringes of society. There were not (as far as I know), openly gay couples who were an even remotely significant part of the social fabric. So it’s not like whoever first wrote down laws about marriage was consciously thinking “ooh, and we’ll exclude all of those gay couples”. Rather, it wasn’t even an issue. Now, 200 years later, things have changed, society has evolved, and a new, previously undiscussed, phenomenon (out, open, committed gay couples) has arisen. Obviously, these couples are in many ways similar to straight married couples (that is, in ALL ways except for being straight). So, it might make sense to extend the legal word “married” to cover them. It might also make sense not to. But this is not at all analogous to the government redefining the word marriage.

I think I understand your argument. You seem to be saying that the idea of a committed same-sex relationship was simply unthinkable to the people who originally wrote the laws extending state sanction to marriage, that it was entirely outside their experience. I simply disagree with your argument. Homosexuality has been known about throughout recorded history. And homosexual relationships existed in ancient Greece, the wellspring of western civilization. In western history, people who have written laws have tended to be educated, I think they would have had some knowledge of it. Certainly more than they would have had about the internet.

I think you might have a better argument if you said that the people writing the laws assumed a strong link between marriage and procreation, which necessarily excluded same-sex relationships. Though I still don’t think I would be persuaded by it.

@MaxTheVool

Rather, a better analogy is that laws covering free expression in written communication, copyrights, etc., were written before the internet existed. When the internet was created, someone had to decide whether pre-existing laws about written communication covered email and message boards.

Actually, haven’t legislators been busy writing new laws to deal with these things?

@MaxTheVool

(a) who cares if it’s an artificial situation? I’m still curious what your answer is

I think I already said, a few posts ago.

@MaxTheVool

(b) if you lived in Ohio, and there was a state constitutional amendment on the ballot which would ban both gay marriages and gay civil unions, would you support it? That’s an entirely NON-artificial situation.

I don’t think so. I don’t say “definitely” because I was, and remain, very angry about that decision in MA and the prospect of more like it. I said a few posts ago that I would compromise my principles out of sympathy for friends, I might do the same out of anger. NB, I think that’s why a lot of people who voted for those amendments voted the way they did.

@MaxTheVool

You know, I really don’t quite grasp what, precisely, your principle is, nor how it relates to the current situation. You seem to be horribly disturbed by the idea of the government meddling with language, but honestly, the government CAN’T meddle with language. If civil unions are allowed, and gay people get civil unions, then they are certainly legally allowed to use the word “married” to describe themselves,

True, but then, they and everyone else are legally allowed to use the word, or refuse to do so, right now, and that situation will continue regardless of which path the government takes.

@MaxTheVool

and after enough time, that word either will or will not become the generally used term. Long term societal and linguistic trends will determine what word is commonly used to describe formalized gay civil unions,

Very true. As I’ve said before, I am happy to let issue be settled in the marketplace of ideas without state interference, and if “my side” loses, so be it.

@MaxTheVool

and at best the government can nudge that in one direction or another.

Wait a minute now. You just said the state “CAN’T meddle with language”, now you are saying it can “nudge” it. Which is it?

@MaxTheVool

And I think it should nudge it, but you seem terribly alarmed that this nudging is tantamount to some kind of federally enforced thought censorship.

Once again, I refer you to my “2 Live Crew” analogy. There are a number of perfectly good grounds to argue why the state should ban 2 Live Crew. If the state were to do so, would I think that it would be “tantamount to some kind of federally enforced thought censorship”? Of course not, that’s a ridiculous exaggeration. But I would still be against it.

@MaxTheVool

At various points in the past 150 years, the term that the federal government used to discuss black Americans has changed many times, through some combination of “colored”, “negro”, “black” and “African American”. Has that been infringing anyone’s rights to talk however they like?

No, of course not.

@MaxTheVool

Was that the first step down some slippery slope to totalitarian grammarianism?

I don’t see how.

@MaxTheVool

Here’s my point: I asked you to come up with an example in which the term “married” implied heterosexuality, and the example you came up with was “we plan to get married and have children”.

Ok, how about this: “I’m not gay…I’m married.”

@MaxTheVool

I think my citing of the Theban Sacred Band was a good response, and even if it wasn’t exactly what you were looking for, I really would be interested in hearing why you think the ancient Greeks didn’t use the word “marriage” for this kind of relationship.

It’s certainly a reasonable response, yes. But, bluntly, I don’t know anywhere near enough about Greek culture to actually give you any kind of meaningful response.

Hmmmm, perhaps some research would be in order, then. I’ve been meaning to do some myself, on that subject, but like I said, I’ve been busy.

@MaxTheVool

In the second place, to respond directly to what you said just now: I’m not quite sure what this is supposed to prove, but I could say to you right now, I’m tired of the single life, I want to settle down and get married. Assuming you are aware that I’m a guy, I will be conveying to you that A) I want to have a relationship with a certain level of commitment, with B) a woman. If the definition of the word “marriage” were expanded, the phrase would not convey B.

Agreed. Although it would still be overwhelmingly likely. And, I claim, that’s the ONLY thing lost by potentially referring to gay marriages as marriages. And a damn small thing it is.

So you admit something would be lost? Just that it would be “damn small”…well, going back to the same well again, if we banned 2 Live Crew, we wouldn’t be losing much. I can live without “Me So Horny”, their cover of “Doo Wah Diddy” was lame. But still, banning them = Bad Thing.

@MaxTheVool

NB: I’m not actually so tired of the single life that I want to get married at the present time, though I may want to in the future. To a woman.

Great. NOW you tell me! You tease!

[straight face]
Well now, if I had said “a man”, young attractive single women everywhere would be rending their garments in grief, weeping and gnashing their teeth and dramatically throwing themselves off cliffs. “If I can never have Weird_AL_Einstein, life isn’t worth living!”, would be their echoing cry.

So it’s a good thing I’m straight.
[/straight face]

@MaxTheVool

OK: Sports cars and compact hatchbacks are very different from each other, but are both referred to as “cars”. Great danes and chihuahuas are both referred to as “dogs”. We have different words for 10 and 30 year old males (boy and man), but not for 30 and 90 year old men. We use the same word (uncle) to refer to my father’s brother, and my father’s sister’s husband. We use the same word (movie) to refer to documentaries, educational films, and hollywood feature films. We use the same word (kiss) to refer to a peck-on-the-cheek greeting and a tongue-swirling piece of foreplay. We use the same word (stomach) to refer to an organ in the body, and a region in the body. We use the word “picture” to refer to both photographs and drawings of various sorts. We use the word “detergent” to mean the stuff that cleans dishes and the stuff that cleans clothes. We use the word “can” to mean the thing that soda comes in, with a hand-openable top, and the thing that baked beans come in, which requires a can opener. We refer to golf balls and bowling balls as “balls”.

I could go on all day here. In all of the above examples, if we had grown up using separate words for those thing, it would seem natural to us. And, yes, in all of those cases, it’s possible to add adjectives to modify them and make clear what precise thing you’re talking about. If you say “man” it might mean a 30-year-old or a 90-year-old. You can say “young man” and “old man” to clarify. Similarly, “marriage” could mean gay or straight, with “gay marriage” or “straight marriage” used when needed.

Yes, it could. Or we could use different words. We could do a lot of things, of course. I don’t quite see how all your analogies up there make a strong case either way as to what it would be desireable to do.

@MaxTheVool

What if we discovered a new species of fruit, that was similar to an apple, but was blue. If we wanted to, we could call it a “snarfblat”, and everyone would know that a snarfblat was like a blue apple. Or we could call it a “blue apple”. Neither is obviously the correct approach, and there are plenty of examples from linguistic history of both types of things being done.

I don’t know if it’s the “obviously correct” approach, but I think myself that a new name ought to be found.

@MaxTheVool

True. Yet now that’s changed. Yet, we’ve kept the words. I think I already mentioned the fact that the women’s rights movement did not try to get equal rights for women by redefining the word “man” to include women.

But what if the word for woman was “chattel”? As in, 200 years ago, you had men and you had chattel, and everyone took it for granted. It’s not prima facie ridiculous to claim that a change in language should accompany other changes.

Ah, but in your hypothetical, there is no language change. Chattel back then meant “something you own”, and it still would. Women would simply have been removed from the category of “things you can own”. Just as, in real life, black people were removed from that category after the Civil War. The word “slave” still means the same thing, there just aren’t any in this country any more.

@MaxTheVool

It’s not always necessary, but it’s not preposterous. Note, for instance, the fate of “Miss” and “Mrs.”. Was that a 2-live-crew-banning-esque blow to freedom of expression?

Huh? What about “miss” and mrs."?

[MaxTheVool]

Hello again. Sorry once again for the delay. I actually had an entire lengthy and well-written post written several weeks ago, but I was typing it on a computer in a hotel which was configured in a weird fashion, and I lost it. Damn it.

Anyhow, I figured I’d take this moment to summarize the current state of play, as I see it. (By the way, is anyone aside from me and Weird Al actually still reading this thread?)
So, where are we? Well, you seem to be making the following argument:
(1) There exists some vitally important principle, equivalent to freedom of expression, which is that it’s a BAD THING for the government to meddle with or redefine language.

(2) At its deepest level, the word “marriage” MEANS “a man and a woman”, and thus applying it to a gay couple is like calling a circle a “curvy square”.

(3) Therefore, if the government legalizes gay marriage, it will be meddling with language, which is a BAD THING, bad enough to outweigh any positive benefits that may accrue
First of all, is that a basically fair and accurate description of your position?

Assuming it is, I’ll respond.

(1) I can’t really argue with this point, because, honestly, I’m still not exactly sure what you mean. Sure, the government shouldn’t go around passing laws saying “bad is good and good is bad” or “we define the word ‘murder’ to mean ‘having dark skin’, so now all of our pre-existing laws about murder make it illegal to have dark skin”. On the other hand, the government is CONSTANTLY using words in specific ways, changing the way it uses words, changing what words it uses to mean a preexisting concept, deciding whether or not word X can cover situation Y, etc. You seem to want to make a slippery slope argument here, where opening the door even one millimeter is a horrible thing… except the door is already wide open. Or at least, there’s already a doggie door installed, with brisk traffic through it.
(2) Here we clearly disagree. So I’ll try yet another tack: When someone says “that cookie was a delicious marriage of chocolate and peanut butter”, do you respond by thinking “huh, what an odd analogy. I wonder whether the chocolate is male and the peanut butter is female or vice versa”? No, you understand that the word “marriage” is being used because it means a serendipitous and close joining.

On the other hand, when people are talking about plugs and outlets, they sometimes refer to the “male” and “female” plugs, but no one has ever, as far as I know, used the word “marriage” to refer to a male plug and a female socket.

So, when people compare things to marriages, they compare them to the togetherness and the union, not the fact that two genders must be involved.
And to take yet another tack, a quite basic one, if you meet two men on the street, and they’re holding hands, and one of them says “we’re married”, you UNDERSTAND WHAT THAT MEANS. You might not LIKE them using that word, but it’s utterly clear what they are saying. (OK, it’s not utterly clear, but it’s also not utterly clear for a straight couple, who might be legally married in order to get a green card, or might be common law married, or might just be really close and like to exaggerate.) And, very importantly, after you’ve met 1,000 such gay couples, if you meet a straight couple and they say that THEY are married, not one iota of meaning is lost. Why should the word “marriage” apply to gay couples? Because, obviously, it DOES!

(3) Overall, I think there’s also one other glaring flaw in what you’ve been arguing. You have said repeatedly that you would want to vote against legalizing gay marriage because of your no-government-interfering-in-language principle. Now, this might make some sense if you were saying that you were angry about the Massachussetts decision, which was made just by judges. But if there’s a democratic election, then it’s not The Government (with a capital T and a capital G) meddling in anything, it’s testing the will of the people. So, in an election, you certainly have the right to vote however you like, but if you are voting against gay marriage, in a democratic election, in order to stop The Government from doing something, well, that doesn’t make any sense, because it wouldn’t be The Government, it would be the majority will of the populace.

So, in that election, you would presumably have some OTHER motivation for not voting for gay marriage, if in fact you would so vote. What would that motivation be?

Anyhow, I’ll also address a few bits and pieces of your last email. If there are parts you’d like me to respond to directly that I skipped over, please let me know.

@Weird_AL_Einstein

\Wait a minute now. You just said the state “CAN’T meddle with language”, now you are saying it can “nudge” it. Which is it?

Barring some totally-out-of-left-field situation in which the government actually makes it illegal to use a certain word, the government has an effect, but not control, over language. If the department of education changed its name to the department of book-learnin’, that would influence, but not force, people to use “book-learnin’” instead of “education”. Even if gay marriage were legalized, it might end up that everyone kept referring to gay unions as “partnerships” or “mancouples” or some other word entirely. And even if gay marriage were not legalized, it might end up that everyone would refer to committed gay relationsihps as “marriages”.

Yes, it could. Or we could use different words. We could do a lot of things, of course. I don’t quite see how all your analogies up there make a strong case either way as to what it would be desireable to do.

Please go back and read the context of this. I said “There are lots of things that are fundamentally different from each other but which are described by the same word.” and you responded, somewhat snidely, “In the first place, I note with interest that you cite no examples here.” Thus, I provided many examples.

So, do you agree or disagree with me that there are some examples in which similar-but-not-identical things are referred to by different words, and some examples in which similar-but-not-identical things are referred to by the same word? And that there’s no absolute law stating that one of those situations is preferable to the other?

So you admit something would be lost? Just that it would be “damn small”…well, going back to the same well again, if we banned 2 Live Crew, we wouldn’t be losing much. I can live without “Me So Horny”, their cover of “Doo Wah Diddy” was lame. But still, banning them = Bad Thing.
…
Huh? What about “miss” and mrs."?

I’m shmooshing these two together because I think I can respond to them both at once. You’ve repeatedly pointed out that feminists fought for equality without demanding that the word “woman” no longer be used (although, actually, some like to spell it “womyn”). And while this is true, there HAVE been some pretty serious alterations of the English language that have come with equal rights for women.

A good example is the demise of “Mrs.” and “Miss”.

At some point, the government presumably made the decision to switch over, in its official documents and correspondences, from “Mrs./Miss” to “Ms.”. At that point, it was having an influence on the language. And it’s quite clear that something was lost there, namely, the ability to immediately tell whether a woman is married or not.

Do you think it was right for the government to do so? Because it sure seems to me that all of your government-influencing-language based arguments against gay marriage can also be used against Ms.

And yet, here we are, 30-odd years later, and the Jackbooted Language Police are not yet breaking down anyone’s doors. And, in fact, it’s still perfectly legal to use “Mrs.” and “Miss”, if frowned upon.

[Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew]

[quote=MaxTheVool]
I was typing it on a computer in a hotel which was configured in a weird fashion

[quote]

What, was the lobby on the top floor or something?

[Weird_AL_Einstein]

To facilitate my response, I moved around some chunks of your post:

@MaxTheVool

Hello again. Sorry once again for the delay. I actually had an entire lengthy and well-written post written several weeks ago, but I was typing it on a computer in a hotel which was configured in a weird fashion, and I lost it. Damn it.

Anyhow, I figured I’d take this moment to summarize the current state of play, as I see it. (By the way, is anyone aside from me and Weird Al actually still reading this thread?)
So, where are we? Well, you seem to be making the following argument:
(1) There exists some vitally important principle, equivalent to freedom of expression, which is that it’s a BAD THING for the government to meddle with or redefine language.

First of all, is that a basically fair and accurate description of your position?

Assuming it is, I’ll respond.

(1) I can’t really argue with this point, because, honestly, I’m still not exactly sure what you mean. Sure, the government shouldn’t go around passing laws saying “bad is good and good is bad” or “we define the word ‘murder’ to mean ‘having dark skin’, so now all of our pre-existing laws about murder make it illegal to have dark skin”.

So far, so good.

@MaxTheVool

On the other hand, the government is CONSTANTLY using words in specific ways, changing the way it uses words, changing what words it uses to mean a preexisting concept, deciding whether or not word X can cover situation Y, etc.

If this is true, then I’m sure you can come up with some examples. You did come up with one, I haven’t forgotten, I will address that later in the post.

@MaxTheVool

You seem to want to make a slippery slope argument here, where opening the door even one millimeter is a horrible thing… except the door is already wide open. Or at least, there’s already a doggie door installed, with brisk traffic through it.

And the reason I asked for cites is that I do not think you have at all proven this.

@MaxTheVool

(2) At its deepest level, the word “marriage” MEANS “a man and a woman”, and thus applying it to a gay couple is like calling a circle a “curvy square”.

Just a nit-pick, I thought my own analogy of “4 dimensional cube” was better.

@MaxTheVool

(Assuming it is, I’ll respond.)
(2) Here we clearly disagree. So I’ll try yet another tack: When someone says “that cookie was a delicious marriage of chocolate and peanut butter”, do you respond by thinking “huh, what an odd analogy. I wonder whether the chocolate is male and the peanut butter is female or vice versa”? No, you understand that the word “marriage” is being used because it means a serendipitous and close joining.

Yes, because biological organisms are the only things that actually have genders, and gender characteristics, metaphorical instances such as plugs and electrical outlets notwithstanding. The overwhelming majority of inanimate objects do not even have it in the metaphorical sense. Thus almost any metaphor that involves using the word marriage to describe inanimate objects will necessarily not involve the gendered aspects of that word.

So I don’t see what you’ve proven here.

@MaxTheVool

On the other hand, when people are talking about plugs and outlets, they sometimes refer to the “male” and “female” plugs, but no one has ever, as far as I know, used the word “marriage” to refer to a male plug and a female socket.

So, when people compare things to marriages, they compare them to the togetherness and the union, not the fact that two genders must be involved.

Here you seem to be relying on your ability to prove a negative to make your point, which of course you cannot do. As far as you know, and as far as I know, no one has used the word marriage that way, but we do not know for a fact that no one ever has. Of course we would expect the overwhelming majority of metaphors involving the word marriage applied to inanimate objects to not also involve metaphorical genders, because the overwhelming majority of inanimate objects do not have metaphorical genders, in the sense of being commonly used as with plugs and sockets.

So even if you could prove your negative, I suppose you would have a point in your favor, but it would be a very, very small one, far from sufficient to make your case.

@MaxTheVool

And to take yet another tack, a quite basic one, if you meet two men on the street, and they’re holding hands, and one of them says “we’re married”, you UNDERSTAND WHAT THAT MEANS. You might not LIKE them using that word, but it’s utterly clear what they are saying. (OK, it’s not utterly clear, but it’s also not utterly clear for a straight couple, who might be legally married in order to get a green card, or might be common law married, or might just be really close and like to exaggerate.)

True. But then, if I come across the phrase “4 dimensional cube” in a math book, I will know what concept the author is trying to convey (though of course I can’t visualize such a thing), though I might not like them to use that phrase, and think that they ought to say “tesseract”, but the definition of the word “cube” will remain (in part) “a figure three dimensions”. Not four.

@MaxTheVool

(3) Therefore, if the government legalizes gay marriage, it will be meddling with language, which is a BAD THING, bad enough to outweigh any positive benefits that may accrue

(Assuming it is, I’ll respond.)

(3) Overall, I think there’s also one other glaring flaw in what you’ve been arguing. You have said repeatedly that you would want to vote against legalizing gay marriage because of your no-government-interfering-in-language principle. Now, this might make some sense if you were saying that you were angry about the Massachussetts decision, which was made just by judges. But if there’s a democratic election, then it’s not The Government (with a capital T and a capital G) meddling in anything, it’s testing the will of the people. So, in an election, you certainly have the right to vote however you like, but if you are voting against gay marriage, in a democratic election, in order to stop The Government from doing something, well, that doesn’t make any sense, because it wouldn’t be The Government, it would be the majority will of the populace.

So, in that election, you would presumably have some OTHER motivation for not voting for gay marriage, if in fact you would so vote. What would that motivation be?

I’m not at all sure what you are talking about here. In the first place, I have expounded at length about about why I am personally opposed to redefining the word, as opposed to why I am against the government doing it, though perhaps not as much in this particular thread as in others. In the course of debating this issue at this message board it has become clear to me that when I try to argue both of these at the same time it leads to confusion, hence I try to focus on just one. Though perhaps if it is just the two of us here it won’t be as big a problem, so if you want me to go back over it I will.

In the second place…are you referring specifically here to the way I would vote in a referendum on the issue? I’m going to assume so, as we have touched on that before in this thread. Given that…ummmm…I still totally don’t understand what you are talking about. A referendum would not be called simply to have people register their opinions. That’s the business of pollsters. A referendum would involve voting on what we want the government to do. There is a difference between a situation in which a majority of people simply have an opinion, and a situation in which that majority compells the state to act on their opinion.

@MaxTheVool

Anyhow, I’ll also address a few bits and pieces of your last email. If there are parts you’d like me to respond to directly that I skipped over, please let me know.

I assume you mean post, not email. We haven’t actually debated over email.

@MaxTheVool

So, do you agree or disagree with me that there are some examples in which similar-but-not-identical things are referred to by different words, and some examples in which similar-but-not-identical things are referred to by the same word?

Well…I hate to get all Jesuitical here…or Clintonian, you might say, though I won’t quibble about the definition of the word “is”. But I am going to quibble about the words “similar” and “different”. Tracing this exchange backwards, I see that you mentioned, as one of your examples, Great Danes and Chihuahuas. They are both called dogs, despite their differences, primarily in size. But they are similar in the way that counts, when we are talking about whether or not to label something a “dog”. Ask a geneticist.

By way of analogy, there is a vast difference in size between a Borg Cube and a Rubik’s Cube, and there are other differences as well, but they are similar in the way that matters when it comes to deciding whether or not to use the word “cube”. Among other things, neither one of them posesses a fourth physical dimension.

@MaxTheVool

And that there’s no absolute law stating that one of those situations is preferable to the other?

No. But then, there are no absolute laws at all, when it comes to language. It’s all fundamentally arbitrary. As I believe I’ve said before, there is nothing fundamental to that thing outside my window with the leaves on it that associates it with the sequence of letters (and sound) “tree”. This lack of any “fundamental” rule makes it all the more important that we agree among ourselves on some arbitrary ones, so that language can fulfill it’s purpose, which is to facilitate communication.

@MaxTheVool

You’ve repeatedly pointed out that feminists fought for equality without demanding that the word “woman” no longer be used (although, actually, some like to spell it “womyn”). And while this is true, there HAVE been some pretty serious alterations of the English language that have come with equal rights for women.

A good example is the demise of “Mrs.” and “Miss”.

At some point, the government presumably made the decision to switch over, in its official documents and correspondences, from “Mrs./Miss” to “Ms.”. At that point, it was having an influence on the language. And it’s quite clear that something was lost there, namely, the ability to immediately tell whether a woman is married or not.

Do you think it was right for the government to do so? Because it sure seems to me that all of your government-influencing-language based arguments against gay marriage can also be used against Ms.

Ummmm…ok, I’ve read and re-read this several times, and I can’t help but come to the conclusion that what you’ve done here is come up with an example that buttresses my position, at the expense of yours, so well in fact that I wish I’d thought of it myself.

Consider: The situation that obtained some 40 years ago, or whenever it was, was that the title “Mr.” was used with men both married and unmarried, while the title “Miss” applied only to unmarried women, and “Mrs.” only to married women. This was considered sexist. So what did feminists do to rectify this situation? Did they try to get the definition of the word “Mrs.” expanded to include single women? No. Or anyway if they did, they were unsuccessful. But what they did do was come up with a new word, the definition of which included both married and unmarried women. I say again, they came up with a new word. Exactly the sort of thing I’ve been arguing for. And the government used this new word. Which is perfectly fine of course.

@MaxTheVool

And yet, here we are, 30-odd years later, and the Jackbooted Language Police are not yet breaking down anyone’s doors. And, in fact, it’s still perfectly legal to use “Mrs.” and “Miss”, if frowned upon.

Just another nitpick, I’ve never been frowned upon for using either of those words. Though that’s not a valid statistical sample of course.

[ZombiesAteMyBrain]

I’ve only read half of this thread, so I’m not sure if I’ll be on topic.

The Declaration Of Independence says, “WE hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…” - so, isn’t an amendment which curtails the right of gay people to get married, by definition, unconstitutional?

I also found this article - http://www.bidstrup.com/marriage.htm - put forward interesting arguments on this topic.

[Bricker]

@ZombiesAteMyBrain

I’ve only read half of this thread, so I’m not sure if I’ll be on topic.

The Declaration Of Independence says, “WE hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…” - so, isn’t an amendment which curtails the right of gay people to get married, by definition, unconstitutional?

I also found this article - Gay Marriage: The Arguments and the Motives - put forward interesting arguments on this topic.

Those poor zombies got nothing.

1. The Declaration of Indepence is not a source of any legal authority at all. Nothing in the Declaration of Indepence affects the Constitution.

2. Even if there were an article in the actual Constitution that explictly said, “Marriage shall be available to couples of the same sex,” that would not cause an amendment changing that to be unconstitutional. That’s why they are called “amendments” - they AMEND the Constitution. When the 18th Amendment was passed, a state law permitting alcohol sales would have been unconstitutional. After the 21st Amendment was passed, such a law was constitutional again.

[ZombiesAteMyBrain]

@Bricker

Those poor zombies got nothing.

1. The Declaration of Indepence is not a source of any legal authority at all. Nothing in the Declaration of Indepence affects the Constitution.

2. Even if there were an article in the actual Constitution that explictly said, “Marriage shall be available to couples of the same sex,” that would not cause an amendment changing that to be unconstitutional. That’s why they are called “amendments” - they AMEND the Constitution. When the 18th Amendment was passed, a state law permitting alcohol sales would have been unconstitutional. After the 21st Amendment was passed, such a law was constitutional again.

You mean that the Constitution has a hidden subtext - all men are created equal - except if they’re gay? Equal rights surely includes the right of consenting adults to pursue happiness with the partner of their choosing.

I thought the Declaration of Independence contained the great founding principles of the USA. I’ve seen this claim often enough.

While gay marriage does not violate the rights of others, the rejection of it violates the fundamental rights of homosexuals. Most people derive a significant amount of happiness from love. The idea of finding someone to love and share one’s life with is older than any other institution on earth. It is not the government’s place – nor any church’s – to tell an individual that their love is wrong, immoral or illegal.

Homosexuals ought to be afforded the same rights as everyone else. The United States is founded on the principles of equality and justice. If we wish to work for equality, we must ensure that all people’s rights are protected, regardless of color, creed, gender or sexual orientation. Likewise, we cannot claim to achieve justice without allotting the same primary rights to all people.

So, I leave you with a question: Do you truly believe in the principles America was founded upon?

http://www.spokesmanreview.com/newstrack-news-story.asp?date=040504&ID=s1505944

[Barqalounger]

@ZombiesAteMyBrain

You mean that the Constitution has a hidden subtext - all men are created equal - except if they’re gay? Equal rights surely includes the right of consenting adults to pursue happiness with the partner of their choosing.

I thought the Declaration of Independence contained the great founding principles of the USA. I’ve seen this claim often enough.

Whatever it contains, the Declaration of Independence is not a legal authority. Somehow we managed to have slavery and then Jim Crow laws without a court ever throwing them out for violating the “all men are created equal” provision.

The DoI may contain our founding principles, and you might cite them for a moral argument, but those principles aren’t law.

[Reeder]

I have nothing to add…just a comment.

This page rivals War and Peace in size.

[Bricker]

@ZombiesAteMyBrain

You mean that the Constitution has a hidden subtext - all men are created equal - except if they’re gay? Equal rights surely includes the right of consenting adults to pursue happiness with the partner of their choosing.

And yet in the over two hundred years of the Constitution’s existence, not one federal court has reached that conclusion.

I thought the Declaration of Independence contained the great founding principles of the USA. I’ve seen this claim often enough.

It may contain some or all such principles, but is not a source of law.

[imthjckaz]

@Reeder

I have nothing to add…just a comment.

This page rivals War and Peace in size.

You’re right.

Must be all the quoting.

[ElvisL1ves]

@Bricker

And yet in the over two hundred years of the Constitution’s existence, not one federal court has reached that conclusion.

Nor has one reached the opposite conclusion. You are inferring legal support for your position from no facts whatsoever, and should know better than to try that crap here.

The Declaration has no legal standing, yes - but it has moral standing, and moral standing should and often does guide legal rulings, yes? Are there any principles not derived from case law that mean anything to you?

[Harborwolf]

I don’t really have anything to add either. I was just wondering why I hadn’t seen bricker around for a while.

Staying with a pitting for 10 pages. :eek: Gotta hand it to Bricker, he/she/it’s stubborn.

[Bricker]

@ElvisL1ves

Nor has one reached the opposite conclusion. You are inferring legal support for your position from no facts whatsoever, and should know better than to try that crap here.

You know nothing about the law.

This is a fascinating lack of knowledge, considering how often certain legal principles have been explained to you, but your mind seemingly resists absorbing them with steadfast resolve.

When you advance a novel proposition, it is relevant to observe that there is no existing case law in support of that proposition. In other words, you cannot look at a lack of decisional authoirity in your favor, shrug, and say, “Ah, well, that simply means we don’t know.”

Even more compelling than “nothing,” there is dicta that supports my position (my position, for those unwilling to follow this thread’s full length, is that same-sex marriage should be legalized by the states, but there is no federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage).

The Declaration has no legal standing, yes - but it has moral standing, and moral standing should and often does guide legal rulings, yes? Are there any principles not derived from case law that mean anything to you?

Certainly there are principles not derived from case law that mean a great deal to me, and among them are the principles articulated in the Declaration. But the Declaration ennunciated principles that are given effect in our dual-sovererign system. Some of the Declaration’s principles are given effect by federal law, and some by state law.

To the extent that the principles in the Declaration compel a conclusion that same-sex marriage should be recognized, the onus is on state governments to do so, since marriage is a state, not a federal, issue.

• Rick