Posted on 03/22/2013 7:16:39 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Just because things can be put on the same list doesnt mean they are necessarily similar. My attic contains within it thousands of comic books, an inflatable bed, a few jigsaw puzzles, some family pictures, and a Frampton Comes Alive! album. These things are, roughly speaking, in the same location, but theyre hardly of equal value, importance, or utility.
I bring this up for the simple reason that were hearing a lot about how the GOP must deal with abortion and gay marriage as if they are almost the same issue.
Well, in my house, I hear about my dog and my mortgage a lot. Theyre both important and complicated in their own ways but they arent all that similar.
I think some liberals and some conservatives like to lump all social issues together, at least in part because they find their opponents positions on them so unfathomable. Its like if an alien showed you a fnerk, a thrampahorn, and a zizzenbozzle, youd be forgiven for assuming theyre all somehow related to each other.
In fact, for a long time the shorthand for social issues was God, guns, and gays. And a lot of analysts thought they would move all together. It turns out that various social issues stand or fall on their own.
If youd predicted in the late 1980s that the country would become more pro-life, more pro-gun, and more pro-gay, the experts wouldve laughed at you. It drives some older liberals crazy that some young liberals are insufficiently pro-choice and it vexes some older conservatives that some young conservatives are insufficiently antigay marriage.
I myself have grown both more pro-life and more sympathetic to gay marriage.
Ive been in favor of civil unions for more than a decade back when it was considered a left-wing position, not a fallback right-wing one. And Id probably still prefer civil unions if we had settled on some arrangement that conferred the economic and legal benefits of traditional marriage without calling it marriage. Still, gays have an entirely understandable reluctance to settle for that and, besides, I think the argument over whether or not to call civil unions marriage has been all but lost, though theres a glimmer of hope the decision might eventually be left to the states (which I favor).
As for abortion, my migration has less to do with religious arguments and more to do with my growing distrust of the government. Who is and who isnt a human being with unalienable rights is just about the biggest question there is. And the fact that the answer is usually obvious that guy, not that fly only makes it more important.
The government has an obligation to protect the life and liberty of the subset of human beings we call Americans. If you commit a crime that obligation changes, of course, since the government also has an obligation to protect the rest of us from those who would do us harm.
Well, I consider a fetus a human being. It has done no harm, nor has it committed a crime punishable by death. More important, I dont like it when governments start getting clever about who counts as full human beings and who doesnt (See: Slavery, U.S.; or Holocaust, Nazi). There are few areas where a bright line is more vital or necessary. (I bet it wont be very long before science is able to tell us whether some fetuses will grow up to be gay or not. The politics of abortion will suddenly get more interesting, I suspect.)
But once youre born, and hopefully properly raised, the governments chief obligation is to stay out of your way whether youre straight or gay so you can pursue happiness as you define it not how, say, Michael Bloomberg or Pat Robertson defines it.
Which brings me back to gay marriage. Opponents of same-sex marriage insist gays have the same right to marry a person of the opposite sex as anyone else. Its a clever line, but it overlooks the fact that romantic love has been the paramount reason for marriage for quite some time. Telling people theyre free to be unhappy isnt all that persuasive.
The whole point of the American way is life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. So, come to think of it, maybe gay marriage and abortion have more in common than I thought.
Jonah Goldberg is the author of the new book The Tyranny of Clichés.
The far left (funded by NAMBLA) started the move toward pedophilia during the Clinton administration.
I heard on FOX about a college class that's teaching bestiality along with all their other vile acts, too.
Exactly. That was at Yale. Polygamy will be next. It’s already beginning in Netherlands.
I think I understand what Perdogg was getting at with that: if they want to hurt themselves (worst case) then why should I go out on a limb to stop them???, and very long weak limb these days (weak limb as the rapid and huge change in public opinion on this) That is a valid point.
Its in contrast with the libs who on every other issue like the soda's we drink they want to control us but this particular dangerous sort of sex is a constitutional right, to them.
My issue is this civil rights victim status creep that goes on , like O Connor joining the libs on the court to make same sex sodomy a US a constitutional right. They are a protected victim minority because of their feelings.
Reminds me of one of my favorite freepers from past times name :genetic homophobe
” The agenda is the destruction of the family resulting in total dependence on the State.
The left looks at 1984 as an instruction manual.”
Exactly.
” From what I have seen on gays there is no-one effectively arguing why that lifestyle is bad.
Only one side makes the case “
FACT.
National Review has been taken over by the gaystapo...
Dust off the soles of your feet.
GOLDBERG MENTIONS THE NAZIs ???
If it wasn’t for white heterosexual Christians with guns, Jonah would be a lampshade today.
Way to screw it up, Jonah Goldberg. Going pro-sodomy.
Wow, you SHOULD do this a living. That was Coutleresque (I mean that as a compliment, she is a good writer even if she's an idiot sometimes).
For most of my childhood there was a gay couple living right next door to me. My dad said they were brothers, when I grew up I realized one was Puerto Rican and the other wasn't. Whatever, they never bothered anyone.
I'm really sick of these activists acting like we want to come into their bedrooms or discotheque bathrooms and knock them out of their lover's arms. Not even with a ten foot pole would I do that! Screw your little gay hearts out just stop calling me a bigot cause I don't support giving you special and brand new legal and social protections, okay?
State sanctioned, licenced and rewarded sodomy. That is what they demand and it looks like they have convinced too many people its a constitutional right.
I saw Ralf Reed, Gary Bauer and Tony Perkins on the three Sunday shows trying to make the contrary case, but they were on their own and they came off a bit weak I guess to not offend anyone.
Contrast with Wayne LaPierre on NBC who came out swinging and made Bloomy the poster-boy of nanny state.
Rand Paul was on FNS and I get the impression that he is for same-sex marriage but is not ready to state it clearly, unlike Nicole Wallace from Bush administration who is now a outspoken 'marriage equality' avdocate. Rand was dancing with his words again like with illegal immigration.
As you've mentioned we have no voice on this issue. It's no wonder we've losing. We've allowed the other side to completely control the conversation. Guns is the one issue where we haven't and surprise surprise, the public is on our side.
As the useful idiot Goldberg points out in the article civil unions is now a conservative fall back position, just like keeping don't ask don't tell became the Republican position, suddenly the GOP was championing what the right strongly opposed in the early 90's because the ground has shifted under us while we've done nothing. We need a message and it can't be bible quotes.
” As the useful idiot Goldberg points out in the article civil unions is now a conservative fall back position, just like keeping don’t ask don’t tell became the Republican position, suddenly the GOP was championing what the right strongly opposed in the early 90’s because the ground has shifted under us while we’ve done nothing. “
Yep. our party has done nothing on this cause. Scared, as usual.
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