You may want to sleep on that again. Or have some coffee. There are no two buses. I can’t believe we’re back to this nonsense. ONE bus. ONE set of legal rights and privileges. ONE. The groups that qualify to tap into these rights and privileges are two fold: 1) those joined through marriage and 2) those joined through civil union.
My position is really not that complicated.
That’s really the part I don’t understand and can’t make sense of any explanation.
IMO given the divorce rate, the rate of people living together rather than being married, the rate of unwed parents the meaning of marriage has been diluted by society long before SSM came to the fore as an issue.
A loving commitment by two people who may or may not raise a family is found in their heart and no place else. Surely not in a set of laws. I can’t see how it means anything about my marriage whether my neighbors are monogamous and committed or open and swinging. If two people of the same gender decide they want to try the difficult task of making a lifetime commitment to each other more power to them. It’s the quality of love ion their heart that counts and it doesn’t affect the quality of love in mine at all.
It’s more complicated than it has to be, at least until such time as you explain the need to have two groups when one will do.
And as I have noted above, having two groups can lead to different treatment EVEN IF THE RIGHTS EACH GROUP GETS AT HOME IS THE SAME.
In cases (such as the examples I offer of civil unions and gay marriage), the loss of rights can be avoided by having one, rather than two groups–given that, what justification do you (Magellan) have to still have two groups?
Since you’ve just conceded that we’ve always allowed marriages that “fall short” of your basic criteria, could you explain the objection to allowing one more group that falls short to marry?
I know I’ve asked this before*, so here goes again: Do you think that the Supreme Court in deciding Loving v. Virginia should have ruled that interracial couples would be entitled to the rights and privileges of marriage but that the resulting unions should be called something other than marriage to avoid “jabbing a thumb in the eye” of those neighbors and fellow citizens who object to the practice?
I think I asked it of you, but it’s hard to keep the players straight* without a scorecard
**Pun not intended
And Montgomery has ONE transportation system and ONE set of routes. The groups that qualify to use these routes are two fold: 1) those riding buses and 2) those riding civil transportation units.
I don’t find anything at all complicated about your position. The only things complicated are the mental contortions required to pretend that going “straights can get married” and “gays can get civil unions” isn’t – at its best – the epitome of “separate but equal.”
This was discussed in another thread but who would decide what to call the SS Civil Union?
Would Mr & Mrs be used? Would one partner take the last name of the other partner?
Someone said in that thread that no…John Smith remains John Smith. No taking of his partners last name. In fact it should be as innocuous as possible. In the workplace you couldn’t tell at all if someone was “civil unioned”.
Bullshit, I say. If they won’t be allowed simple, accurate “marriage”, then SS couples should create some VERY clever descriptive prefixes. Ones that define the relationship and it’s differences. The “marriage protectionists” opened up this can of worms…so I say gays should go for it.
They’re being forced to differenciate…they should go all the way! Define who they are and their differences!
Why not? Certainly, there are differences, but why is the argument totally irrelevant?
Well, a palpable reason exists to treat criminals differently, and they get this treatment after (one hopes) due process of law. There’s no due process, nor is there any particular reason, for the state to treat homosexuals differently.
Or if there is, I’ve yet to hear it.
He only wanted one label. Equal. Really equal. Not just some compromise that is close to equal. That’s why the separate but equal farce didn’t work.
You’re trying to turn it around, asking me why I object to another term while justifying your insisting on one. That’s not gonna fly. As I said, your idea won’t work because most who oppose SSM will not support it. They’ll see giving gays all the same legal privileges under a different label as a short step to SSM which is what it amounts to. A transitional phase while people recognize how empty their objections really are. I’d see it as a step forward if people would support it but it still falls short of equality. The inference that SSM is not as real or as good as hetero marriage is the only point. You won’t admit it but the fact that you see SSM as somehow diluting the term marriage indicates the truth.
What if they prefer the term married over civil union? Get it?
Are we talking about two different groups here? I was talking those who oppose SSM and that would likely reject your plan as well. You seem to talking about supporters of SSM and if that’s the case all I can say is OMFG. Deepen the rift? Look at the history of our gay community and the prejudice they’ve faced and tell me about deepening the rift. That why I suggested you read Letter From Birmingham Jail.
Although your proposal may take us to the edge of equality it perpetuates the “something less” “something wrong” mindset that is the root of prejudice.
The fact that the qualification is decided by the majority against the minority without real moral or fact based justification is what makes it prejudice.
Which has been clearly shown to be a a bullshit justification early on in the thread since hetero couples that cannot procreate are able to marry.
The point being that the majority came up with bullshit justifications to declare interracial marriage illegal such as this gem from the landmark case of Loving v. Virginia
Now , decades later, most people see it as the bullshit it was and is. Despite your protests your justifications are the same because they that what they are, baseless justifications. Once gays have gained the rights they deserve and people see that society doesn’t crumble into moral decay the objections to SSM will be seen just as empty as the ones against interracial marriage are.
I think you got your quotes mixed up but I’ll respond to this.
Comon. The history of this country shows without reasonable doubt that equal rights has to be fought for or the majority will not give it up. Please don’t attempt to justify prejudice with majority rules. We strive to overcome our shortcomings not slap a fresh coat of paint on them and call them something else.
Who gets to decide? We do, by standing up for the principles of equality and equal rights for our fellow citizens when the majority is wrong. It’s been a repeating pattern in our nations history. I asked a question of you and others a few posts back. If you think the majority should decide then answer it.
That’s fine by me, since I thought you were done several posts ago. Still, I’d like to see you answer my question in post 519 if you can.
Asked and answered RT, Thank you Bryan
Your whole argument follows from a basic misunderstanding. You keep trying to force the argument into “my side gets to decide because there are more of us than your side” without convincing SSM proponents to accept your pronouncement. Well, *** there’s your problem!!!***
The majority always tries to decide issues, and decide them in its own favor. Self interest is a core human motivation, after all. If this were some sort of pure democracy, the majority would thereby be able to do whatever it wishes with the minority (any minority).
Fortunately the Founders saw the danger of such a system, and instead created a Constitutional democracy. That Constitution contains protections of the minority from the actions of the majority. Neither the state itself nor any group within (majority or otherwise) can impose restrictions upon another group without demonstrating an overwhelmingly compelling societal benefit from such restriction.
Despite all the hand waving in this thread, there has been no demonstration that same sex marriages, including use of the word marriage, would cause any measurable harm to any person. Without such a demonstration (and the *ecchhh *factor doesn’t count; neither does appeal to any particular religious doctrine) the ban on same sex marriage is a violation of equal protection rights.
You must not have read the thread. I’ve not tried to force that argument as you say at all. I did comment when a poster brought up the issue with the implication that the majority is always wrong in these cases and that we should ignore their desires.
Feel free to read the entire thread, specifically, all my posts, before you think you know what I “keep trying to force the argument into”.
No, they should not have ruled the way you suggest. There is no difference between a black man and a black woman and a what man and a white woman other than skin color. And skin color is not a criteria for what constitutes a marriage. I pretty sure there were any documents or laws that stated something to the effect, “marriage is between one white man and one white woman”. I don’t think the bible may any such reference either. (I’d like to point out that I bring this up not for the religious argument, which has no bearing on nonbelievers, but as a book that has largely crafted culture from a historical perspective.) Marriage needs: one man, one woman. The color of thier skin is immaterial.
Now, some people might not have liked it, but there was no logic other than bigotry, as far as I can see. Are you aware of other arguments?
Why?
THIS would be separate but equal. You have two distinct things—buses and civil transportation units—that two different groups will be accessing exclusively, with the hopes of making them equal. The major problem with “separate with equal” is the acknowledgement that the different thing each group has access to will not/cannot be equal, as much as one might try. My opposition does not have two different things people will be accessing. It has one. One set of legal protections, rights, and privileges that each of the two groups can access equally and in full.
It won’t help you any more if you emphasize: ONE transportation system and ONE set of routes in ONE city in ONE state in ONE country on ONE planet in ONE solar system in ONE galaxy in ONE corner of the universe. The only thing that needs to be ONE is the thing being accessed, and in my plan we have ONE set of laws.
I agree that it is not complicated. But, evidently, you’ve not been able to comprehend it, as evidenced by your first paragraph in this post. And your second .
Well, there’s the quasi-religious “God made the races separate for a reason” argument that was actually espoused by the state in Loving. I don’t know why you want to offend these God-fearing people by legitimizing the sin of miscegenation by calling it a “marriage.”
Besides, so far the only arguments offered against same-sex marriage have consisted of bigotry, extreme language prescriptivism, and the utterly false claim “marriage is intended for procreation and gays can’t have kids.” Yet you seem to find those arguments sufficient. So why do you endorse kowtowing to avoid offending the homophobes, but are against kowtowing to avoid offending the racists?
ONE set of laws for all marriages would be superior. Any two people of marriageable age can marry. Why isn’t that superior to the current state of affairs?