Listening to the arguments on gay marriage

Respecting the rights of the majority

from JoeUser Forums

The United States is premised on the separation of church and state. But over time, what that separation means has changed.  The founding fathers wanted to ensure that people were free to practice whatever religion they wanted. Moreover, they wanted to ensure that the government did not establish any official religion. You will regularly hear the ACLU refer to the "establishment clause" of the US constitution as the basis for their various lawsuits against states.

It's a sticky situation because for such a long while, the percentage of Americans who were Christians were so high that religious concepts made their way into government policy. This wasn't intentional in most cases. If you're a true believer many things that are religious in nature just seem natural, common sense, normal. One such thing is marriage.

In hindsight, it was probably a bad idea for the government to recognize marriage as anything beyond a civil union. But it's easy to understand why this happened. Marriage is such a normal part of human life that how could the government not recognize it?  As an agnostic, it's never bothered me either way. I am comfortable with my beliefs and do not feel threatened by people's religions. In fact, I embrace their beliefs because it helps create a deep tapestry of culture that enriches us all.

I also believe in two social principles: 1) That the traditions of the super-majority should be respected and protected. 2) The rights of the minority should be protected.

I think government should get out of the marriage business entirely. I support the right of any two people to "get married" regardless of sex.  However, the super majority don't think the government should recognize these unions. And by our constitution, that's pretty much that. Marriage isn't a "right". The 10th amendment makes pretty clear that anything not explicitly outlined in the constitution is left to "the people" (in the form of their democratically elected representatives).

That said, gays should have access to civil unions that have the same legal punch as marriage. It may seem like semantics but to millions of Americans, it's not. There is a principle involved here. The same people who argued that the Super Bowl nonsense with Janet Jackson was "no big deal" are likely to not see why people object to gay marriage. The majority of Americans believe in these traditions and they have been with us for literally thousands of years. All around us, however, small minorities seem bent on using the government to infringe on those traditions.  Marriage is a cultural phenomenon, not a religious one. And as long as the majority of Americans practicing it believe it should be between a man and a women exclusively that is what it should be. It's their tradition. Contrary to what some may believe, majorities have rights too.

The government should work to ensure that civil unions have the same legal meaning as marriages. Two consenting adults, regardless of sex, should have the right to form a legal union.  For that matter, I believe that any number of consenting adults should be able to form civil unions (whether you're into "Polyamory" or whatever). But marriage should not be open for redefinition by a small minority of people. And they should not be trying to use the tools of government to hijack it for their own uses.

 

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Reply #1 from JoeUser Forums Top
"1) That the traditions of the super-majority should be respected and protected. 2) The rights of the minority should be protected."

Brad, just what is the distinction then? What does respected get the super-majority (as opposed to merely the majority?) that the minority does not get?

What if the majority's traditions are immoral? Is this not moral relativism? Do we respect immorality for the benefit of the majority at the expense of minority?
Reply #2 from JoeUser Forums Top
By your line or reasoning, can I assume that if the super-majority supported marriage, then you would whole-heartedly support the passage of laws ensure that right where trampled upon?

Interestingly enough, the "separate but equal" theory played a large part in the Mass judges ruling.

The dissimilitude between the terms 'civil marriage' and 'civil union' is not innocuous; it is a considered choice of language that reflects a demonstrable assigning of same-sex, largely homosexual, couples to second-class status.

They have legal precedent here with the civil rights laws and I actually think this was a deliberate attempt to head off that argument. Will it work?
Galactic Civilizations IV
Reply #3 from JoeUser Forums Top
Gay marriage will eventually come to be simply because lawyers stand to make money from the divorces.
Reply #4 from JoeUser Forums Top
Hey, you people, wake up and smell the caffiene! Majority rule is just that. The MAJORITY RULE. Too often ANY minority group steps up and says "Hey, by law my beliefs are protected, so you..over there..STOP DOING WHAT YOU'RE DOING..it isn't MY Belief, so feck off and stop or we're going to court!"..
Whatever happened to "If I can't beat em, I can stay the hell out of the way"..But oh no, 9 people who want a gay parade surely has the right to trample the 9000 people who don't want it. Bah, whether it be religious, political, social, or racial.. To make exceptions for ONE person that inconviences MANY people..How isn't THAT IMMORAL?
Reply #5 from JoeUser Forums Top
Many of the polls I've seen don't show a super-majority to be oppossed to gay marriages. Also, the numbers are changing pretty significantly year by year as a generation grows up realizing the emotional baggage that their parents have is just that...baggage. Its not useful to discriminate against gays and not only that, its illegal.

I'm sorry Brad, but you toe the line here on clear discrimination. Your making the same case that racists used against the blacks in the 20th century. Well, "The vast majority doesn't want it so...piss off." Umm, wrong. It clearly states in the constitution that ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUALLY. The courts have interpreted that to mean that everyone should have the same rights (though obviously this doesn't apply to teenagers but thats a side problem).

Here your stating that yes, gays and straights should have the same rights and frankly I agree. However, the SECOND you make the case for giving it a different name you discriminate and show that there will never be "equal rights" and "equal protections" until its called...just plain marriage. The second you create a different name, you create a different class. You create an obvious divide. In the end, the public will speak if Congress decides to declare marriage to be just that of "between a man and a woman." I don't think it will ever pass and the courts would strike it down. Again, it clearly violates what this country is built on.

Or atleast, I would hope that common sense (and legality) shows that. Every day I hold less hope for the "common" part though.
Reply #6 from JoeUser Forums Top
I have a question. When you go to the Justice of the Peace, does he/she officiate a marrige or a state accepted civil union. If it is a marriage, does he mention "now in the sight of God" or words to that effect?
Do we have any state official that does a religious marriage or do they just sign off on a marriage license? What legally is the difference between a non-religious marriage and a civil union? Does one grant better benefits? Could'nt we just make sure that the non-religious marriage and civil union were equal?
Would a constitutional amendment (yeah, right) defining marriage affect a civil union?

Jalbert


Reply #7 from JoeUser Forums Top
Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound! Coming to a theatre near you! A SUPER-MAJORITY!!!

Oct 03 CNN:

quote

The greatest differences among the two groups appear to be on social issues, especially gay marriage and ethnic diversity.

While a majority of younger Americans -- 53 percent -- support same-sex marriages that are recognized with equal rights under the law, 32 percent of the older group backed such a concept.

/quote

Younger Americans were considered <30yrs.

It frightens me mommy
Reply #8 from JoeUser Forums Top
This is the main flaw of a 'constitutional' system. Kind of like Biblical theology, it can be reinterpreted to say just about anything you want. In this case, Homosexuality is interpreted as some kind of ethos, or ethnic group, when in actuality it is just a sexual practice. Granted, no one should be live in fear because of they are homosexuals, but to reinterpret a 200 year old document as if "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" was somehow foreseen by the founding fathers is silly.

Can you imagine one guy having to mail alimony to some other guy? The potential for fraud and benefits abuse is insane, as well. You can't change your status as an African American, but people tend to change their mind about their sexual orientation. How does that effect the legal micromanagement of discrimination? Any twisted mess that a normal marriage can become will suddenly be possible with homosexuals as well, greatly increasing the number of twisted messes... "Honey, I'm sorry, but I am abandoning you and the kids. I have to face the fact that I am straight, and there's nothing I can do about it." Jeez...

I don't believe for an instant that the founding fathers ever intended the Constitution to protect homosexuality as a practice, nor do I believe they would have even considered homosexuals a 'group' worthy of legal definition. It is a practice, not a "lifestyle" that defines someone... or at least it shouldn't be.

Times change, sure, but there has to be a limit to how far you can twist someone else's words to say what you want them to.
Reply #9 from JoeUser Forums Top
Hmm.... I find this article odd, but then I did find the fuss about Janet Jacksons breast very strange as well. However, I'm European and have probably a more liberal approach to nakedness.

Perhaps I do not understand the difference between marriage and a civil union if religion is not considered. It's in the semantics? As societies develop, old traditions are put to rest. After one or two generations have died off, I am quite convinced that the majority will have switched sides.
Reply #10 from JoeUser Forums Top
I have been a witness at many JOP type marriages in CO. They are performed by judges for a fee. They are secular but they use a standard "Marriage license" issued to a couple whether they are married in a church or otherwise.

Exactly what a "civil union" would be I do not know, maybe just the same license with the "Marriage" replaced with civil union.

Oh and Lunaticus...

We have a representative form of government in he U.S., as was made so very clear in the last presidential election. Even referenda are really majority minus the apathetic rule.

Also your hyperbole is clouding your vision, no one is suggesting that a minority of one should overcome a super-majority of the rest. This is just silly.
Reply #11 from JoeUser Forums Top
Brazen public display bothers me. However a Gay parade is a sincere openness to get results, just as the civil rights and Nam movements in the sixties and seventies. I would not equate gay marriage as in your face with Janet's boob in my face.
Reply #12 from JoeUser Forums Top
"In hindsight, it was probably a bad idea for the government to recognize marriage as anything beyond a civil union. "
Herein lies the key to solving the problem.
I think we should eliminate the archaic 'Family Court'. All claims filed there are capable of civil remedy by other Courts. The kid tried for crime there is either guilty of crime or not, forget all the subtle differences. He sits in a cell like an adult if he is punished. We can still expunge the record at 18. Adoptions are largely done by agency and the Court signs off on them. The divorcees are only after each others money, and the kid is used as a way to get money by alimony, support rulings. This could be handled by a civil claim for money as any other contract. It would also make the kid a person for purposes of the divorce and they'd get a say in who they live with, or share equal time with both if not. All could be done in a civil court.
Brad is correct to see it as a 'civil union'. Let the church assume jurisdiction over the divorce if they want to, and let the jurisdiction be bound by the 'marriage contract' with parties agreeing to its jurisdiction at time of signing. If they opt for governmental contract as a civil union, then they can file a civil claim for property like anyone else. That means no appeal to the civil courts by church contractees for an adverse finding, as we have separation of church and state. To get an idea of how many people marry because God is an issue to them, watch how many would file for marriage in a church as opposed to a civil court.
Understand that by this, we also eliminate the marriage tax-credit and alter the income filings. Again, something I support. The tax credit was but a expedient political bribe anyhow, not philosophically based. The gays want money, not to be approved by God. Monetary claims should be in a civil court with the rest of them. By eliminating the tax-credit we take away thier incentive to seek validation.
Finally, it's always so refreshing to read Brad and his 'democratic' principles as opposed to 'republican' ones others have. Chris makes the point we would never have had an end to slavery if we abided States rights. It was a republican idea to grant freedom from slavery by the Feds over the objection of States and a 'super-majority'. Did you know that technically no person of any State is entitled to any form of rights in a criminal procedure? The right is found only when the State creates rules of procedure, thus it is a statutorily created right. How do we get from there to a gay from Hawaii( I think it was from Hawaii, but may be mistaken) has a right to protection in the several States because he has a right in Hawaii? Because the feds are going to MAKE us abide it. Oh what tangled web we weave...
Reply #13 from JoeUser Forums Top

Slavery is abolished because the states passed the 13th amendment. It was abolished because of popular support.

Don't try to rewrite history that some "super majority" supported slavery. It required a super-majority to abolish it (by definition).

So the comparison between slavery and gay marriage is not apt.

Reply #15 from JoeUser Forums Top
I think that there are problems with the way the whole issue is being handled, on both sides.

First, I think many who argue the case (for and against) blur and merge the concepts of marrage as a civil contract versus a religous sacrament.

Second, as it stands today, civil unions (I don't like the term, reminds me of PC claptrap) do not provide equal protections under the law.

Third, homosexual couples have been adopting and raising children for years and children raised in those households have no higher rates of abuse, criminal behavior or mal-adjustment when compared to children raised in hetero households.

Fourth, as to arguing against agy marrage due to the potential for fraud and abuse, the system is already rampant with fraud and abuse, how will allowing a small number of gay marrages make it worse?
Reply #16 from JoeUser Forums Top

The bottom line is that most people are against it and in a democracy, that's how it works except when a law violates the constitution and there's nothing in the constitution that ensures the rights of marriage to anyone. Marriage is only recognized by the government because of enacted law, not because of the consitutution.

The constitution does not state either way on gay marriage or imply either way. The issue should be left to the legislature to decide, not the courts. If your arguments are sound and reasonable, they will convince the majority of Americans of their validity and they will reward you by voting for legislatures to make it law.

The courts are definitely not the way to go. When people use the strawman argument of people favoring slavery they are showing a gross misreading of history. As the Dred Scott case demonstrated, the courts overturned legislatures that were trying to outlaw slavery. It required a constitutional amendment to ban slavery. So it's a bit insulting to see people turning history on its head to push their agenda.

What is needed here is for the courts to stay out of it. Let the people decide what is and isn't okay on this issue. It's really as simple as that. It's part of living in a democracy. I consider the amount of my income and my company's income that the government confiscates to be a violation of my civil rights too. But I respect and abide by the rules of a democracy. Gays should do the same thing. Crying it's not fair is  not an argument.

Reply #17 from JoeUser Forums Top
Bad example. Any child can pray to themselves in any public school in this country, which oddly enough is what the Bible favors.

Matthew 6:5 - And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.

Strangely enough you can take your child to school and stand on the public sidewalk and pray right there as well. In the car before they go into the school. Same thing at the end of day.

And the Courts have been giving leeway to student led v. school sanctioned prayer.

Disingenuous whining because they don't get to proselytize.
Reply #18 from JoeUser Forums Top
One last nit-pick since Brad forces the issue. Georgia didn't have a 'super-majority' to abolish slavery there, but it was. Maryland didn't. It was about to join the seccession and dissolve the government completely. It was Lincoln's voiding the Constitutional provision for it, voiding habeas corpus, declaring martial law and openly sending 'federals' to imprison and murder Citizens of a Sovereign State, that started the Civil War.
In application to this discussion, gays, it is my reading of it, they are claiming that if a Sovereign Citizen of Hawaii can marry, then a gay in Georgia can, as they are entitled to the protection of a Citizen of the several States. It is once again, Federalism which is dictating what the 'super-majority' of a Sovereign State can do. Legislatures are being voided by a Republican Administration once again.
Finally, it is an annual finding of Law students that in FACT, the original 13th amendment was ratified by the thirteenth State when Virginia published its ratification of it, on the date of 12 March 1819.. That 13th amendment said: "If any citizen of the United States shall accept, claim, receive, or retain any title of nobility or honor, or shall without the consent of Congress, accept and retain any present, pension, or emolument of any kind whatever, from any emporor, king, prince, or foreign power, such person shall cease to be a citizen of the United States, and shall be incapable of holding any office of trust or profit under them, or either of them." The act thereby declared all those possessing the title of "Esquire" (lawyers) were beholden to the British, as officers of that Court and so were stripped of their ability to control our Congress.
I don't revise history Brad, but Lincoln did.
Reply #19 from JoeUser Forums Top

Whatever fantasy you want to have Wahkonta is okay with me. But if you want to debate the cause of the civil war feel free to create your own post and write your own theories on it there.

The bottom line is that how the constitution is amended is very clear cut. The 13th amendment was passed not by judges but by the people. It was not imposed by Lincoln or any other boogeyman.

If gays want to get married, the onus is on them to convince the majority of its validity and get their legislatures to pass laws allowing it.  That's how it works in a democracy.

 

Reply #20 from JoeUser Forums Top
When the courts decide to over-interpret the constitution, they begin to legislate. All the 'majority' rhetoric is meaningless, because the courts couldn't care less about popular opinion, they *interpret* the law. The problem is, political interests use the courts to circumvent the legislative process, and the voters are cut completely out of the process.

This is just an end-run around the legislative process. If you can't lobby hard enough to change the minds of legislators, get the courts to force change on everyone.
Reply #21 from JoeUser Forums Top
Brad
Your idea that marriage hasn't anything to do with religion, is at best a foolish notion. Marriage comes straight from the bible just as Betty Crocker's fresh hot cookies come from the oven. Theres no way around that fact I don't care if you're agnostic or whatever you are. Marriage is a religious tradition. People do it to keep from being fornicators which is according to the bible a sin, among other reasons. That is just one purpose of marriage. To make it legal. Ever hear marriage referred to as that? We made it legal?
What I would like to know is, while straight people take their marriages for granted daily by committing adultry and breaking their vows of committment and many divorcing, who are they to tell any other 2 people that love each other that they can not be married?
No Brad no one is trying to use governmental tools to hijack your so called super majority traditions. But it is the complete right of gay people, who are not by the way second class citizens and who do pay taxes just the same you and everyone else does, to ride the same plane as you do and not have to take the back seats.

w Wakonta

Wanting a tax credit has nothing to do what so ever with gays wanting egual rights. They want equal rights because they are tired of being discriminated against and being treated as second class citizens. Monitary gain has nothing to do with it. Stop pretending to be an authoritarian on something that you know nothing about. GCJ
Reply #22 from JoeUser Forums Top
If marriage is simply a religious idea, then for the government to change what that idea means is an insult to religions everywhere, and for homosexuals to refuse to respect the religious beliefs of a group makes them look bad. What's next? A group of Pagans demanding that the Christian belief in Jesus as Lord and Savior be changed to a belief in Wonder Woman being the Daughter of God?
I don't agree with every belief from every religion, but I'm not going to try to legislate that their beliefs be changed to mine, so why should homosexuals do that?
Reply #23 from JoeUser Forums Top

GCJ: When did I claim that religion has nothing to do with religion? My article implies the opposite (or tries to). That the government shoudl never have gotten involved in teh marriage business in the first place. I think marriage is in a murky gray area in between at this point.

MY opposition to gay marriage, on the other hand, has nothing to do with religion. It has to do with respecting the desires of the majority of Americans. We have a government based on the rule of law. Judges legislating from the bench is not the way.

Reply #24 from JoeUser Forums Top
I think Messy Buu has a point. I do not think there is a way to put marriage in non-religious terms. Atheists, agnostics and others not married in a church but they are still legally wed, with all the rights and responsibilities included. Now I think that the amendment could not touch upon the religious aspect of marriage, but it could hit the civil aspect. A civil union could only be between a man and a woman.
While the super-majority argument is interesting and the congress did pass the amendments, it took a Supreme court decision to strike down the "seperate but equal" argument.
Also, people on both sides are saying what majority supprts which. What we need to know is how the opinion question was asked.

What does the majority say about giving full legal rights to a long-term emotional partner?

Jalbert
Reply #25 from JoeUser Forums Top
InfoGeek: Most states expressly outlaw gay marriage. If gays want the "right" to get married they need to convince their legislatures to pass laws allowing them to get married. That is how the system works.