How about criminals? The majority voting for their rights seems to have worked out reasonably well.
That’s a completely different situation. But if you can delineate exactly WHY homosexuals should be punished by restriction of their rights as convicted criminals are, I’m willing to at least read it.
I’m not claiming it as a similar situation - just an example that I think answers cosmosdan’s question. I don’t believe that many of the same reasons apply between restriction of rights between homosexuals and convicted criminals, which i’d guess I don’t need to go on about to you.
That said, this kind of gets at what I feel is an important point. I do feel that, in general, what the majority says should go - democratic rule, and all that. However, there are certain things I am not comfortable having in the hands of the masses, and it’s a similar sentiment that in part led to your Constitution and Bill of Rights; that there are some rights which are so necessary, so worthy of protection, that they require greater than normal effort to change. I personally don’t feel that marriage, straight or gay, is important enough to fall into that particular area. But in general, it makes sense to me that the “importance” of the right should be equal whether it’s between straight or gay couples.
From TURNER v. SAFLEY, 482 U.S. 78 (1987),
Prisoners currently have more rights (WRT marriage) than homosexuals do. 
CMC fnord!
I gotta disagree with you, there. Consider, by way of analogy, Guess who’s Coming to Dinner? In that film, Spencer Tracy plays a man who’s always been proud of his liberal principles, who has always held that racism is a social evil, and that there is no qualitative difference between blacks and whites. However, he still doesn’t want his daughter to marry one. Tracy has no problem with Sidney Poitier as a person, but objects to his actions - namely, his romance with Tracy’s daughter. And that objection is racially based. It is a bigoted objection. I would argue that the concept behind “love the sinner, hate the sin” is similar. A person holding this belief has no problem with gay people, but objects to their actions - namely, their romances with people of the same gender. It is, again, a bigoted objection.
It’s not correct that there is no barrier. There is. Yes it can be breached, but so can yours, as you grant. I’m not versed well enough in the law to understand just how strong my barrier could be. That sad, I’m willing to assume that your barrier is a stronger one. As I said, that would be a plus for your way. I’m still left with the objections I have to SSM, and the degree to which my barrier may/is weaker doesn’t address that. BUt you do make a good point.
That’s not correct. I reviewed that thread before I went on my bike ride, and there was no consensus. Feel free to reread the thread as I did.
And that’s fine. I just think you do your fellow citizens no favour if you try to vote these objections into law. I mean, seriously, what does it accomplish?
Because it allows gays couples to avoid all the rights and privileges that married couples enjoy without diluting the meaning of the word “marriage”. I know you don’t think it dilutes it or don’t care, but I think it is quite important.
Not relevant to the thread. Criminals are not a minority in the sense we’re speaking of.
What might be relevant is how minorities have been treated by the law for the same crime.
I’m assuming you mean “enjoy”. What is the nature of this dilution? What are its effects? How is a hetero marriage sealed in 2005 different from one sealed in, say, 2012, after gay marriage is hypothetically legal and commonplace?
“Avoid?” I do not think that word means what you think it means. [ETA: I see others have beaten me to it already]
As to the alleged “dilution” and its importance to you, you’ve still not provided a concrete example of the harm such “dilution” does to you or to any other heterosexual person or couple.
Some people think that the relationship between an adopted child and its adoptive parents is qualitatively different from the relationship between a child and its biological parents. Shall we come up with new words for the adoption relationship so that the we don’t dilute the meanings of “son/daughter/father/mother/sister/brother/etc.”?
Yes they wanted to be equal. They wanted the same rights and privileges. Which my plan gives. But it sounds like you think gay people, or a term that connotes gay couples, are inferior. If not, what objection do you have to another term. Like I said, the civil rights movement was about rights, not labels. MLK could have argued for the abolishment of back-white labels and proposed something along the lines of we’ve all varying shades of brown, but that wasn’t what he/they did.
I’m unclear what point you’re making here. I don’t think riding in the back of the bus is fine, unless that is one’s preference.
Maybe. It is within their rights to be unreasonable; to insist that they get the legal rights and privileges while jabbing a thumb into the eye of their neighbors and fellow citizens. In the long run, I really think this is a counterproductive route to go. It will deepen the rift that is already there.
No it is not. One was denying a group rights. The other is denying a group a label. A label that, by definition, they do not qualify for.
One denies rights to an individual, which is direct contradiction to the founding natural law principle that all men are created equal. The other assess the gay union and finds it, as a union, is not identical to a heterosexual union. One can procreate, one cannot.
No, that’s not true. Read what I just wrote directly above. A mixed couple consists of one man and one woman. They can do everything a white or black couple can do.
I agree wholeheartedly that there are a bunch of people who should not marry, and more important, shouldn’t have kids. But they meet the basic criteria. Maybe the infertile or elderly fall short, but we’ve had these groups as long as we’ve had marriage and there has been no confusion. I’m much more concerned with the Britney Spears nonsense.
What? Isn’t it a synonym for “enjoy”? :smack: Enjoy. Enjoy. My apologies.
I’m pretty sure I have, back a ways.
I don’t know what you my by “I won’t”. I have supplied reasons. If my bike ride left you on pins and needles, I can understand that, but the reasons were supplied earlier. I’m also unclear about “what is different about your bus analogy?” Different than what?
As individuals, no. As a union, yes. One union is not identical to another, as I explained a few posts back.
I’d be happy to search this out, since I must have missed it. What were some of the words you used?
I think yet another perfectly clear, simple, easy to follow explanation will be a waste of time for both os us.
It remains unclear that the difference between a heterosexual union and a homosexual union is enough to over-ride existing legislation (including the 14th Amendment) that strive for equal treatment under the law.
A woman citizen is legally entitled to the same rights and protections as a man citizen, despite the fact that she has a vagina and he has a penis, correct? I fail to see why a pair of citizens gets a right denied to another pair of citizens simply because (and I can’t see any other reason, can you?) the first pair has a penis and a vagina while the second has two penises or two vaginas.
I’d still very much like to read your explanation of “dilution”.
You admit the majority decides who has what rights but what you won’t admit is historically the majority has consistently been wrong when they attempt to justify not giving the minority equal rights.
And just who do you want to decide these issue if not the majority. The minority? Which minority? Are you find with some minority making all the decisions for our society? How about we get the all the people who follow Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh and have them deiced some things for all of us. You good with that?
:rolleyes: Maybe I should have stuck with us being done.