Posted on 07/06/2006 5:49:43 PM PDT by Sunsong
The conservative position is that people who are sexually dysfunctional should not be calling the shots or receiving any special rights, nor should they adopt or foster children, nor should children in schools be taught the propaganda that "gay is good".
You, on the other hand, consistently promote "gay" talking points and propaganda and have as long as I've noticed your comments. Fullbore leftist liberal crap, without exception. Couldn't possibly be further from conservative ideals or philosophy if you tried.
LOL - thanks for that. That's funny :-)
Here is where you lose your way. The conservative does not obsess on other people's sex lives. The conservative has more dignity and respect than that. What other people do or do not do in the bedrooms is not your (or my) business. Something for you to think about...
The "conservative position" should be "mind your own business." That goes for homosexuals as well as heterosexuals.
Me: "The legality of marriage just makes it "legal", period -- and this is not irrelevant, but it isn't everything either.".
You: "It is sophistry, used often by those intending to weaken marriage's protections, to suggest that since something other than legality 'sanctifies' marriage, that therefore the legal underpinnings of marriage are unimportant."
I never said that two people who wished to enter into marriage required no legal document to support that partnership. I did say that I don't believe that politicians should be charged with defining marriage, because they are unqualified for the job -- and unlike you, I believe that if we leave that definition in their hands, then no one is going to be pleased with the outcome.
"That is a very wrong, very un-conservative or even anti-conservative argument to make, that thoroughly miscomprehends the role of law in this case."
Quite, the opposite -- it is extremely "conservative" argue that politicians should not be allowed to interfere with our personal lives and personal liberties!
"As we all know, legal structures undergird our public morality and incentivize our behavior. ....Make marriage less palatable and less protected, and non-marriage thrives; allow polygamy/gay-unions as marriage, and culture decays; make divorce easier, and families get broken more. We see it already, as 'partners' get goodies once reserved for spouses, where the cultural inhibitions on sex, child-rearing, even family formation outside of marriage have fallen. etc. The negative consequences of the breakdown of family are too obvious and too legion not to notice."
Yes, and all that has happened without "gay marriage". What do you think will happen when(and I agree with sunsong that it is a matter of "when", not "if") gay marriage is allowed to be legislated?
I have no idea how old you are, but I will tell you that I am in my 50's -- and virtually no one my age or younger is "attracted" or "incentivized" by seeing marraige purely as "a cultural institution". And frankly, the incentives and rewards for marraige purely as a "legal institution" are already virtually nil. (As we have heard before, who wants to be "institutionalized"?) Are our taxes lower as a married couple? Not by much! Are we more protected as a spouse or are our children more protected by marraige? No. "Family law" is a joke, to anyone who has ever had to deal with it! In fact, mates and children would be better legally protected under the concept of a legal partnership, where the concept of "good faith" actually means something -- unlike the "no fault" apsect of "irreconcilable differences" in a divorce!
The people making the laws are like the curators at a great museum, and we entrust our important institutions to their temporary care to make sure the valuables of civilization not get stolen or damaged.
That is far-sighted and noble sentiment. However, it is about 180 degrees from where politicans actually see themselves. Politicans want votes and campaign money to get votes; they are careerists, not idealists. If they think passing "gay marriage" initiatives will get them votes, they will do it -- and in a few years, that younger generation will give them their votes for doing it. My argument is simply to take that right out of their hands, by never letting them define "marraige" to begin with!
Now some in our ranks want to extinguish this torch. The radical right has nearly ruined our party. Its members do not care enough about the Constitution, and they are the ones making all the noise. The party faithful must not let it happen. Anybody who cares about real moral values understands that this isn’t about granting special rights—it’s about protecting basic rights....."
God, where is a "Barry Goldwater Republican" when we need him?
Because what I am reading here is making the Libertarians look better and better!
Because what I am reading here is making the Libertarians look better and better!
I know what you mean. I liked your comparison of Consitutional conservatives and social conservatives. The reason that I support and have supported conservatives is because I value personal freedom so much. Even though freedom is messy and sometimes things go wrong in a free society....my belief is that in time they work themselves out. Look at prohibition, for instance - or the view of slavery of the Founders. Women didn't get the vote until the 20th century!!
A free society is not a perfect society. A dictator can get the trains to run on time and so could a theocracy. But freedom, though imperfect, allows every person who chooses to become all that they want to be - and no dictator or theocrat can accomplish that.
The idea of freedom, which is foundational to what America is, means that other people are free to do things that you and I don't agree with - as long as they don't harm others. And just as we defend to the death the right for someone to say something we disagree with - we fight for the right for people to do things that we don't agree with.
Thanks for your posts. I have learned from your sharing of some of your thoughts.
Thank you, too, Sunsong! We are on the same page and I have learned from you as well!
BB
Amen Brother, Amen.
Ditto (Except the Wife passing part, although I dare say I'd almost have preferred that to what my Ex "Cruella De Hosebag" put me through, but I digress)
Well for starters THAT is the ONLY thing that "homosexuality" is all about -the ONLY thing differentiating it from the ordered norm... As I do oppose the homosexual agenda THEN it would necessarily follow that this opposition is specifically rationally premised.
The left prefers delusionally premised thought and action e.g. gay this or that or rainbow this or that or whatever else the leftists wish to consider clothing for the nude homosexual emperor; HOWEVER, it all comes down to sex -that is it...
LOL! It does seem like too often the good ones leave us too soon --- but the bad ones just won't die!
News Flash -politicians e.g. elected representatives define specifically as charged by the people electing them who does and does not merit marital accomodation and privelege. You may wish it was not so; however, society has always decided which activities either merit sanction or reward AND there is no rational basis for suggesting otherwise...
Why should marriage and with it the societal accommodation and privilege be limited to only heterosexual couples that wish to marry?
Simply put, because society has decided so. As evidenced in tradition, conventional wisdom, common law, and enacted law. Society -the people through elected representatives, in legislative bodies have enacted legislation that is premised alone upon the rational basis of procreation -society has decided such... Unlike those arguing for a leftist utopian socialist village ideology would suggest, marriage has never been accommodated, merited privilege, and rewarded simply to foster and promote love or even monogamous sex...
Incidental exceptions, e.g. couples who choose to contracept, do not negate the basis, they test it and in doing so clearly contrast against and specifically identify the basis that some attempt to deny as one very much existing and relevant. Case in point, Griswold v. Connecticut where premised upon a right to privacy it was decided that individuals have the right NOT to procreate via use of contraceptives...
One can clearly see that with Griswold it is that contrasted with the exception that demonstrates clearly the rule, the rational basis of procreation exists!
Regardless a legislature has not chosen to handle exceptions to the basis, e.g. those that choose to contracept, exceptionally by incorporating more rules or by changing totally the basis or doing away with ANY marital accommodation -that is their prerogative, not something for the courts to decide.
Again, as evidenced in Griswold v. Connecticut, there is no supposed heterosexual (or homosexual) right to be accommodated and rewarded by society for entering into non-procreative marriage -such marriages are exceptions incidental to the basis of procreation with such incidence being premised in the right to privacy (just as abortion is). Unlike privacy, marital accommodation, subsidy, and reward is a societal privilege premised upon legitimate and rationally based societal discrimination -marital accommodation, subsidy, and reward is NOT a right...
It is only by illegitimately ignoring the rational basis of procreation - illegitimately conflating the right to privacy (which prohibits the State from enforcing procreation) with the privilege accorded marriage (rationally based in procreation as provided for legislatively by the State) that one can even attempt to argue the ability to choose to engage in homosexual sex with another as something that merits anything from society.
In essence, homosexuals do not get a "free pass" under the privacy right like non-procreative heterosexuals do BECAUSE homosexuals objectively can not possibly ever procreate homosexually...
The ability to procreate and the possibility of procreation -something two homosexuals can not do no matter how much they try...
Some may argue -but what of no-fault divorce laws? Did not the "procreative position" as to rational basis lose most of its force in the 1970's when almost every state passed no-fault divorce statutes?
The legal impact of no-fault divorce laws could be argued both ways and I would suggest that in resolving apparent contradictions between the two ways one would necessarily find the truth as to just what the continued rational basis premising accommodation and privilege of heterosexual marriage was and even more so is now as evidenced by direct correlation to continued societal accommodation and privilege.
e.g. no fault divorce simply is an admission that love can not be legislated and as such is by default not a rational basis premising ANY accommodation and privilege (therefore promoting love via homosexual marriage is a non-starter)...
e.g. no fault divorce simply is an admission that keeping a couple together in the interest of raising children can not be legislated and as such is by default not a rational basis premising ANY accommodation and privilege (therefore promoting raising of children via homosexual marriage is a non-starter)...
IF society has not and does not reward love and child rearing with the benefits reserved marital privilege then what is the rational basis? -- The answer is obvious --PROCREATION
No, that is nothing but your opinion. Homosexuality is about a sex act in your mind. The *issue* is about much more than that. I am just repeating myself here - but you are free to keep your head in the sand and insist that everyone look at this the way that you want them to - but you will fail. The discussion and national debate will go on without you. And you will only get more angry and hateful as things don't go your way.
I would suggest that you open yourself to listening to others and reading what those who disagree with you have to say. It would serve you and your cause to understand what you are up against.
Your view that homosexual partnerships is ONLY about a sex act will not have much, if any, influence on the national debate because it is too obviously limited for most people.
actually no.
homosexuals have very short relationships and thus very little assets to be divided.
Most likely anything under two years is a looser for lawyers.
The other end of the spectrum is the homosexuals who want to adopt children since the majority of states do NOT allow or restrict the sex partner of the homosexual to adopt the child. Six states have outright bans or such limits that essentially ban homosexuals adopting children.
The purpose of homosexual marriage is to make marriage meaningless. The ABA's model divorce code is based on the idea that marriage is a SEX contract and children are mere accessories of breeding couples. Children would cease to be part of marriage. All children in essence would be treated as illigitimate.
I see it as creating more work for lawyers in the form of screwed up children who end up in the criminal justice system or in the mental hospitals.
" Quite, the opposite -- it is extremely "conservative" argue that politicians should not be allowed to interfere with our personal lives and personal liberties!"
YOU LOST ME RIGHT THERE. This speaks of a fundamental misunderstanding in what is going on with legal definition of marriage, its falls into logical errors and canards about what marriage legally is.
It is quite unconservative indeed to speak of a legal definition of marriage as if it would "interfere with our personal lives" as if that is a black mark. *ALL* laws '"interfere with our personal lives" and only an anarchist opposes all laws. The question is to what extent those laws protect the essential freedoms and the institutions (like families) needed to vouchsafe those freedoms long-term; and the claim that 'personal liberties', which are safeguarded by marriage are under attack by those same laws is sophisty.
Defining marriage legally is no different nor more imposing on personal lives than defining property rights legally; indeed they are much the same concept applied in different arenas, because they both are the legal structures that align with the proper creation of a free society - in the one case the free market, in the other the family. Both are vital to western freedom.
Freedom requires legal safeguards or it is merely anarchy. Property rights are a cornerstone of our real freedoms, as Russell Kirk and other have pointed out. The conservative view is that property rights are fundamental not just because they preserve prosperity but because they preserve the independence of action.
The purpose of Government is to protect our rights, and those require appropriately crafted legal definitions, such as definitions of property and definitions of contracts. The marriage contract is the most important example in law.
Mmarriage is a protection: A protection to women who are granted the equality of exclusive relations on a legal basis; protection to children, who in custody are the charges of their parents; a protection to men who are interested in creating a legacy, ie contributing to civil society by investing in the next generation.
Abolish marriage and you abolish the possibility for conservative civil society Governance within a generation. We are always 20 years from barbarism, because civilization depends on how the next generation is raised. We cannot have enduring civilization without families and we cannot have healthy families without marriage.
"Yes, and all that has happened without "gay marriage". What do you think will happen when(and I agree with sunsong that it is a matter of "when", not "if") gay marriage is allowed to be legislated?"
I am opposed to 'gay marriage' as a distortion of healthy marriage as I would be if someone defined 'property rights'.
I am aware of the many ways current marriage law is flawed. I personally know the warts in the Family law and courts, and the hurt done to men in divorces due to our current anti-family anti-marriage feminist bias that has infected family law. I support making the laws better - not worse.
But you didnt simply say marriage is flawed and you want to tweak the laws or improve them. No - you decided to throw the baby out with the bathwater and take 'politician out of the marriage definition' ... this is a notion that on many levels is simply impossible and thoroughly and fundamentally wrong.
"I did say that I don't believe that politicians should be charged with defining marriage, because they are unqualified for the job"
Yes, and I have been vehemently arguing against this sincere, yet very wrongheaded notion from the get-go.
You acknowledge marriage is a good thing - great; you know that marriage law is imperfect - agreed. But then you put 2+2 together and come up with zero, imagining that since politicians are imperfect, somehow getting out the marriage business will 'solve' something. If solving thirst by drowning a man is a solution, maybe.
If pols dont define marriage, there will *still* be courts deciding child custody, or a 'wild west' of responsibilities/irresponsibilities for children. There will still be men and women cohabitating and having relations, but with no legal recognition of the healthiest forms of such relations, etc. The culture will continue, only crippled by lack of structure to protect an institution.
Consider if, analogously, the errors of 'eminent domain' could be solved by simply abolishing any legal recognition of property rights in the law. It would be a horror show, and you know it. We cannot have freedom with property rights and we cannot have property rights without laws defining and protecting same.
I am opposed to your view that we need to destroy the legal concept of marriage in order to save it. The notion that marriage rights (ie traditional family) or property rights (ie capitalism), can survive without the proper legal protections is muddleheaded nonsense as dangerous as the worst Socialist utopianism. If you want to see consequences of anarchistic lawlessness in action, visit Somalia.
I am being hateful now?
LOL - NO NO --- I am being rational.
The leftist "homosexuality is something beyond sex" platitude is sheer delusion. I suggest you set aside the delusion you seem to have bought into that attempts to conflate being innately human with homosexual activity and then reevaluate everything you thought you knew and see just where you really stand on any "homosexual" issue... THEN you will realize that the only legitimate debate involves how best to stop the delusional that are promoting the delusion.
homosexual: Definition, Synonyms and Much More From Answers.com
homosexual
adjectiveOf, relating to, or having a sexual orientation to persons of the same sex.
noun Usage Problem.
A homosexual person; a gay man or a lesbian.
USAGE NOTE: Many people now avoid using homosexual because of the emphasis this term places on sexuality. Indeed, the words gay and lesbian, which stress cultural and social matters over sex, are frequently better choices. Homosexual is most objectionable when used as a noun; here gay man and gay woman or lesbian and their plural forms are called for. It is generally unobjectionable when used adjectivally, as in a homosexual relationship, although gay, lesbian, or same-sex are also available for adjectival use. See Usage Notes at gay.
As I have stated, the only thing that differentiates "homosexuals" from heterosexuals is SEXUAL ACTIVITY.
However, maybe I missed something and YOU can you provide insight beyond more than touting the "homosexuality is something beyond sex" concept or this "gay" or "lesbian" this or that and educate me on just what comprises the "cultural and social" differences which are exclusive to and encompass male and or female homosexuals?
In other words -is there something fundamental that I am not aware of premising the terms "gay" & "lesbian" OR is it simply as I claim a leftist "usage suggestion" -propaganda parroted by both witting and unwitting tools of the left?
"The idea of freedom, which is foundational to what America is, means that other people are free to do things that you and I don't agree with - as long as they don't harm others. And just as we defend to the death the right for someone to say something we disagree with - we fight for the right for people to do things that we don't agree with."
Freedom is hindered, not advanced, by undermining the family and changing the traditional definition of marriage.
Claims that freedom requires treat gay partners and married couples the exact same under law is nuts.
You think freedom can survive without the right kind of enduring instituttions that carry civil society forward?
Hardly. See my previous post.
Legally homosexuality is ONLY about sex.
To allow homosexual marriage is to create a special class of marriage which is ONLY based on the sex act as a rewared to the INDIVIDUAL for the sex act of sticking their genitals with a member of the same sex.
There has NEVER been a love test for marriage. It is all about SOCIETY rewarding an INSTITUTION which promotes that society. Homosexuality contributs absolutly NOTHING to the furtherance of that society.
Marriage is not about how an individual pops off an orgasm, marriage is about how Marriage as an institution benefits society.
Homosexuals are free to go down to their local office depot and buy a cohabitation agreement for $24.95 (plus tax) and enter into a contract. However such a cohabitation agreement does not give the "pop off an orgasm" act official sanction in the eyes of society. Thus the homosexual activists in order to justify their sex act seek to define marriage as a reward for a sex act by an individual instead of the benefit to society.
The fact is homosexuality is ONLY about sex is a RESOUNDING point which has lead to 100% passage of all marriage amendments when put to the vote. Homosexuals should keep their sex acts in the bedroom and away from the public, homsexual marriage is nothing less than homosexual effort to bring their orgasms into the public to FORCE accptance as a matter of law.
NY's opinion is very clear that their sexual PREFERENCE does not rise to a fundamental right.
Only time will tell if lawyers make money on gay divorces, but I hope it doesn't come to that. I hope we see a day very soon when there are absolutely NO GAY "MARRIAGES."
"You harm your body with negative emotions like hatred, jealousy, envy, blame, hostility etc. And the *object* of your hatred, jealousy, envy, blame, hostility etc"
You are right.
Those who are advancing gay marriage are doing so under the delusion of envy and hostility against traditional marriage and family. They wrongly want to blame others for the differences taht exist and are projecting to others that jealousy and inner blame that they feel. They wrongly need to validate their own behavior by imposing on society a false parallelism between their actions and married couples.
It is a very negative attitude and it is very unhealthy.
It would be much better to recognize that it is a different situation not accordable the same legal standing and Move On.
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