Posted on 10/10/2004 3:19:56 PM PDT by schaketo
SAN FRANCISCO - The biggest social issue in this presidential race is the debate over whether gays should be allowed to marry.
Louisiana voters recently tilted 4-to-1 in favor of adding a ban on same-sex marriage to their state constitution, and 71 percent of Missouri voters did the same last month.
Voters in at least nine more states will weigh the question on their ballots in November, and legislation on the question has been introduced in at least 25 states this year.
President Bush supports amending the U.S. Constitution to ban gay marriage.
Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., the Democratic presidential nominee, doesn't support gay marriage, but he also doesn't favor amending the Constitution to outlaw it.
He thinks states should be free to recognize same-sex civil unions. (Vice President Dick Cheney also has said that he thinks the issue should be left to the states to decide, although he says he defers to the president's position on the issue.)
It's unlikely that concerns about gay marriage run deep enough to swing the presidential election. Rather, most analysts think the election will hinge on a host of issues, including the war in Iraq, the economy and which candidate voters are most comfortable with.
Nevertheless, the issue of gay marriage could motivate voter turnout, particularly in such swing states as Arkansas and Oregon, which have proposals to ban gay marriage on their ballots in November. And as the results from Missouri and Louisiana show, the anti-gay marriage vote is so overwhelming that it could help Republicans overall by drawing more pro-Republican voters to the polls.
"If it is close, anything can matter, and this could matter to some people," said Gary Mucciaroni, a professor of political science at Temple University in Philadelphia.
The gay marriage issue resonates deeply because it challenges a fundamental institution -- marriage. Polls show that Americans believe in equal rights for all citizens, but remain conflicted on whether they want to include same-sex marriage in that equation.
"We're uncomfortable with the idea of challenge to traditional institutions like marriage," said Craig Rimmerman, a professor of political science at Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, N.Y. "People are simply uncomfortable with the idea of same-sex marriage. It's a hot-button issue."
Allowing gays to marry implies that "gay relationships are as good as heterosexual relationships," Mucciaroni said. "For a lot of folks that's not the case."
Lou Sheldon, of the Traditional Values Coalition, a lobby made up of more than 43,000 churches, puts it another way.
"The marriage issue is related to a five-letter word: It's called child," he said. "When you put children into the mix, you get a mama-bear reaction."
The debate is fueling a burst of activism on both sides of the issue.
The anti-gay marriage Traditional Values Coalition and the National Center for Lesbian Rights, which favors it, each report that donations are pouring in. Many people are volunteering to register like-minded voters and host house parties to underscore the importance of voting in November.
In 2000, the Traditional Values Coalition struggled to rally its churches to get involved in the election.
"It was a drought, it was dry, it was like pulling an oxcart by hand," Sheldon said. "Now I can't keep up with those who've called."
Kate Kendell, the executive director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights, said the gay community is no different from other voters in holding strong concerns about the war in Iraq, health care and terrorism, but Bush's support of a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage is galvanizing them.
"I truly have never seen a more unified nor deeply motivated response in the gay community before," she said. "There were, perhaps, gay or progressive voters who saw Bush as somewhat more benign until his explicit support for a constitutional amendment, and I do know that for some people, that did solidify their opposition."
Steven Fisher, a spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, a pro-gay rights group, said it's not just gays and lesbians who are responding, it's also their friends and families.
"They see this (the drive for a constitutional amendment) as an effort to hurt their friends and family members," Fisher said. "Because of this attack we're seeing Republican families not voting for Bush."
The debate over gay marriage cuts across party and racial lines.
"Polls show that a majority of American oppose gay marriage, so these aren't all Republicans," Mucciaroni said. "It's also an issue that splits African-Americans."
Political scientists say that with gay marriage, Republicans have found an issue that energizes their base but doesn't turn off those who remain undecided about how they'll vote on Nov. 2. And Republicans have been able to frame the debate in a way that's not an attack on individuals, but a defense of traditional marriage.
The courts, too, have become a target for criticism by gay-marriage opponents, who blame "activist judges" for overstepping their bounds by permitting same-sex unions.
"Both sides are trying to focus on an issue that will motivate their voters to get out," said
Good comments.
Go re read you research, if in fact you did any. As I believe was said earlier, we have a maral issue we stand by here in this country. Also, any child who lacks a mother or who lacks a father, feels an empty void due to that missing parent of the other sex, male or female, mother or father, all their lives, and overcompensates in sometimes distructive ways to fill that void.
In fact, that is the main reason, when children are adopted they feel the biological need to find their birth parents, and when a divorce takes a parent away from that child, they are compelled to find that parent later in life. To have both parents is a biologically "normal" state of life. That is why you have so many saying marriage is about children. FACT
I think you need to recheck your reading comprehension. I pointed out that the Scandinavian demographics prove there is no inherent correlation between births being "out of wedlock", and children living with both natural parents. Scandinavia is full of male-female couples living together with their biological children, without possessing a government-issued marriage certificate. And the U.S, in which few jurisdictions recognize gay marriages or "civil unions", is chock full of children living with only one parent, either after divorce, or in situations where the father was never living with the mother in the first place (much less married).
Did you read about the homosexual lawyer who recently had a screaming fit in court because the word "homosexual" was used? He said it was demeaning and insulting, a "slur", and demanded that no one use it. There was an article about this on FR not too long ago.
In the UK it is illegal to publicly use the word "homosexual" - I don't know if under all cicrcumstances or by the media and gov't or what. But the word "homosexual" is considered negative, so the word "gay" is mandatory. (Exactly what circumstances again, I'm not sure.) But such control of speech is being slaveringly anticipated by the homo-nazis.
"Faggot" and "queer" have been around for decades, and homosexuals call themselves and each those words as well. You think you'll see media sycophants use those words?
Gay means happy, carefree and joyful. It does not indicate sodomy.
"A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely
overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the
common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be
subdued; but when once they lose their virtue then will be ready
to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal
invader." --Samuel Adams
Luckily, almost no one on earth agrees with you.
Your position isn't conservative--as you claim--it's ultra-libertarian. That's fine. Admit what you are. Embrace it. But you aren't a conservative, and you can't admonish conservatives for not being libertarians.
Untouched are my questions about the regulation of family practices. Does government have the right to require Christian Scientists to get medical attention for their children? What about corporal punishment? Obviously there is a point where this becomes harm. It isn't obvious to me that this point of law should be left up to individuals alone. Your argument has a problem, because in many cases it's up to the polity to decide when in fact any actual harm has occurred.
Untouched also the question of abortion. Regulation of personal reproductive procedure, or is there a human harmed in the process? Government needs to make that call, one way or the other, as a matter of life or death.
All pure libertarian arguments ultimately fail because the answer to the question of actual harm is seldom clear cut, and must be decided--by government--in advance. That is why government of, by, and for the people matters.
I just checked all of your comments, and you have an incredible number of egregious misspellings.
Do you mind if I ask how old you are? Have you ever voted, if you're old enough to vote?
I think you're missing my point, which is that the existence of government-issued marriage licenses has no inherent connection to whether a child grows up in a home with the same two parents all along the way. Married couples who stay together and raise children together are doing so because they want to -- they would not abandon their lifestyle if the government stopped issuing licenses for it, or starting issuing licenses for for other family arrangements. Given that the government-issued licenses accomplish nothing, and are intrusive into the lives of free citizens, they should be discontinued.
knifedge2112 aka iamapirate2112, jamama2112, jjbinxazz, mgandhi2112yahoocom, Darryl Revok, FRockville, divadevour, boycottliberalfnc, hillaryishitler, saruman2112. saruman2112, ReverendDaniel, VaporTrails, Gellieman, Vishnu2112, KuckFerry, RightWingTeenager, War On Pretzels, akfasf, fishermann1234, republicanshateminorities, proudpatriot2112, MuslimHater, tahiya911atyahoodotcom, doctorekhs, uownz, ConcernedConservativeLady, protectus111, protectus1111, hoowahh1, et al, nuked again.
Thanks, Jim. I smelled him/her/it immediately.
Just for the record, this is the freepmail I sent knifedge right before he/she/it got zotted:
"Why freepmail me? Why not post on the open forum?
I don't think you are conservative. I don't think you mean any of the things you say on your profile page. I think you are a troll attempting to make actual conservatives look like the whackjob that you appear to be.
I could be wrong. But I'm pretty good at sniffing out trolls.
Time will tell.
If you're not a troll, you must be a whack job."
These issues do not concern consenting adults. I never said there wasn't a proper role for government in regulating behavior towards children or non-consenting adults. Obviously these issues you mention -- and a lot of others -- present a lot of gray area over which reasonable people may debate exactly where government involvement is warranted. The decisions of one or more adults to set up housekeeping and raise a family does not. One-man-one-woman marriages are hardly devoid of horrible cases of child abuse and neglect, and government standards for intervening should be the same, regardless of what assortment of adults are in the home. There are married heterosexual fathers who rape their minor daughters and there are cohabiting gay men who rape their minor sons and there are polygamist fathers who force their adolescent daughters into "marriages" with much older relatives (in the latter case, often with a government-issued marriage certificate) -- all should be ruthlessly prosecuted for what they're doing to the not-capable-of-consenting minors. They should not be prosecuted or discriminated against by government for whatever they're doing with each other with mutual consent (and likewise, government should not be interfering with private citizens, businesses, landlords, and other private organizations, which wish to discriminate against any of these groups).
Homosexuals and heterosexuals already have equal and exactly the same rights in regard to marriage.
Exactly right. Even when the "divide" is 70% against gay marriage.
Exactly right.
The decisions of one or more adults to set up housekeeping and raise a family does not.
Exactly wrong.
You offer NO rationale for this particular area being off-limits except that it's your personal opinion that it should be off limits. Your personal opinion that it presents no harms. Your personal opinion that people who are so sexually confused that they've rendered themselves incapable of a basic biological function are capable of consenting. Your personal opinion that playing house with government approval is the same thing as being married (and that the state has the same interest in promoting pretend marriages as real ones). Your opinion is worth no more or less than mine. That's why the polity decides these issues, not people--like you, or activist judges--who think your merest unsubstantiated opinions trump all others.
As I said, you're making a libertarian argument, not a conservative one. The question of what constitutes harm is one answered for society by a number of institutions, NOT by individuals, except in the fantasy world of libertarian utopia.
I think that most of the gay organizations are starting to wish they had never pushed this issue in the first place.
Things must have been looking pretty good from their point of view. They had pretty much locked in equality in the workplace, knocked down an anti-sodomy law in Texas and have (generally speaking) succeeded in painting anyone who opposed their agenda as "fascist hate-mongers".
If they had stopped there, they could have gotten away with it -- but they had to push, nay, attempt to ram, gay-marriage down past America's tonsils and were unprepared for the backlash.
Gays don't really want to be married. Marriage is just a ploy to help them feel like they still belong to society.
So called "homosexuals" are queers, "african-americans" are blacks and "unmarried women" should be known as miss. All of these other terms came out of political correctness, which is another case for the books
You offer no facts but only lame insults. The few studeis that have been done show that these co-habitating couples who have children in these country are two to three times more likely split up than married couple. The family situation in these Scandanavian countries is an absolute mess thanks to the kind of godless society you would like to see.
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