I understand what your are saying. And I fully agree that some of this equal protection affirmative action nonsense went way too far. I agree with you 100% in that respect. I don't like it either. But I think that sort of thing goes in spurts and it appears that we are shifting away from this rampant and oppressive political correctness.
It's true though that allowing gay marriage would result in gay couples gaining more rights and more protections under our laws. It will make it easier for them to file those insipid discrimination suits. I will concede that. But when the smoke all clears, things just wouldn't be that much different than they are now except it will be more fair and free here and the ever vocal gay rights movement will eventually run out of things to gripe about and most of them will just go home.
This is not my issue. Too me, the whole gay rights thing is more of an annoyance than anything else. I do not feel threatened by homosexuals, nor do I care if they marry. It's no skin off my back. I would just as soon concede to these people and let them have what they want. It's just my nature to live and let live. I don't care what anyone else does as long as they don't bother me or people I care about.
I can see that you will never agree with me on this. You probably believe that allowing gay marriage would just be a first step into much worse moral depravity in our society. I just don't believe that. I think that's misplaced alarmism. Like I've said elsewhere in these threads, if anything is going to prove to be our undoing, I would just as soon that it be freedom. I don't think government should be in the business of limiting what people do unless the conduct they are limiting causes significant unjustifiable harm to others or creates a substantial and unjustifiable risk thereof.
But when the smoke all clears, things just wouldn't be that much different than they are now except it will be more fair and free here and the ever vocal gay rights movement will eventually run out of things to gripe about and most of them will just go home. If you really believe that, then you are terribly naive. That's why I used the parallel example of the modern "civil rights" movement. Minorities in this country have very little to complain about, but that doesn't prevent a number of them from creating an entire industry out of filing idiotic lawsuits, pursuing grievances where none exist, etc.
You probably believe that allowing gay marriage would just be a first step into much worse moral depravity in our society.
If you go back through my posts on this thread, you'll notice that I didn't make a single statement of moral judgement on any of them. The argument against gay marriage can stand up on legal and practical grounds without ever making a statement about public morality.
The reality is that aside from any moral issues that people might feel are at stake, homosexual conduct is inherently "disordered" in nature. This is why, for example, homosexuals in general (men in particular) have a higher incidence of almost any physical or psychiatric pathology that you can think of (drug abuse, alcoholism, most contagious diseases, etc.). That's not a value judgement -- that's a statement of fact.
The response to this kind of situation is not to "shove them in a closet," so to speak -- but nor is it appropriate to pretend that there is anything normal about it. The person who picks a drug addict up off the street, takes him home and gives him a warm meal and a place to sleep, and then returns him back to his place on the street is not doing him any favors -- in fact, he is enabling the drug addict to continue on a very destructive path.