Comments on: Does Gay Marriage Threaten Religious Freedom?

By: Observer

Observer — Sat, 10 Jun 2006 17:24:22 +0000

For the love of God, let the homos marry!!!

Show some tolerance for once in your Republican life.

By: Randy Blue

Randy Blue — Sat, 10 Jun 2006 05:54:19 +0000

Yes thanks for your honesty. That is very refreshing on the net these days.

By: DD

DD — Wed, 20 Jul 2005 05:37:49 +0000

St Lou Guy Wrote:

“Our system of government, when it works, was designed to protect minorities from the tyranny of the majority”.

Key word is tyranny.

I doubt our government will be under tyrannical rule.

A point in Mary Ann’s article:

“Whether one is for, against or undecided about same-sex marriage, a decision this important ought to be made in the ordinary democratic way–through full public deliberation in the light of day, not by four people behind closed doors”.

I think our founding fathers wanted balance in our government……..to be ruled by many, as well as protecting the minority.

By: St Lou Guy

St Lou Guy — Tue, 19 Jul 2005 20:40:42 +0000

I found this string and found its contents very thought provoking. I find it somewhat hard to swallow that treating Gays as equals in society will somehow push religion to the sidelines, the analogy was that it would be like as it was put “a ban on race or gender”. I am confused by this…you could establish a religion that discriminated against race or gender - some would say the Mormons do now. I am not certain I agree with that contention, but I feel as if what you are really seeking is the right to profess items as religious tenets and not be challenged….good luck with that. You have the rights to espouse any views you like, under religious or other organizational structures. I have the right to disagree. To attempt to deny equal treatment to any people(s) from scriptural reading that at their very best were warped in their translation is not, in my opinion, palatable. Our system of government, when it works, was designed to protect minorities from the tyranny of the majority. The reason you do not see religions sprouting up espousing that interracial marriage or rights for Blacks should be denied is not becuase they couldn’t attempt to justify such behavior from scriptural reading (they did prior to the 60’s) Its because Americans got tired of seeing minorities treated like second-class citizens, even by “people of faith” and passed laws to attempt to level the playing field. If those laws didn’t exist and societies views had not been shaped by them, we would still see bans on interacial marriage in some states on the grounds of religious tenets. Fortunately that is not so much the case these days, and the number of americans who count themselves as religious has grown both in numbers and in percentage, the changes in societal thinking did not marginalize religion at all. If you saying that the preacher can’t jump up in the pulpit and condemn some race without reprecussion, I agree..but it sure isn’t because they are marginalized, it is becuase as a society we view social justice as being more important than any one religions view on race, gender or sexuality. Heck, the churches themselves cannot agree on what the scriptures mean regarding homosexuality. I am gay and I can’t bend them to say that its allowed, but I sure think its a stretch of translation to say its banned. If there is no clarity, in a democracy I think we err on the side of equality for all peoples in these United States, I think I read in one of those documents the forefathers wrote that that was how we were supposed to do it. I know it seems like we have implemented it in steps…but as we become a more informed people, we begin to see that marginalizing or keeping anyone from equal protections and rights under the laws make us a weaker, not stronger society.

By: HispanicPundit

HispanicPundit — Sun, 10 Jul 2005 18:04:57 +0000

Good stuff Eric, and no, you didn’t insult anybody.

Theres a few things I want to respond, but I don’t have the energy right now (to adequately address your points, it requires a somewhat long response). I am studying for a Monday quiz and a Friday midterm for my summer school class.

Hopefully when all of that is done I’ll have the energy to respond.

By: Eric

Eric — Sun, 10 Jul 2005 10:04:58 +0000

Well, I honestly don’t see what the ‘problem’ is with gay marriage. Perhaps that’s because I’m gay. Perhaps it’s because equal protection and rights and all that other legal nonsense is the ‘right’ thing to do (from a lefty perspective).

Do I want to commit myself to someone for the rest of my life and provide a loving, nurturing and caring environment for that person in which he can thrive as a person? Undoubtedly.

Do I want to get married? I, and many of my close friends, would only want to get married if it would confer the same rights and such that are currently conferred to heterosexual couples. You might say, “Why wouldn’t you want to get married? Isn’t that what ‘you people’ have been struggling for for so long?” The so-called sanctity of marriage has been long-since annulled by reality television, dramatic celebrities, Las Vegas and the ever-changing and ever-disappointing American cultural ideals that seem to always point to materialism and immediacy as opposed to emotional engagement, true commitment and the patience that a loving relationship deserves and necessitates. Why would I want to spend countless hours of stressful, self-induced torture painstakingly putting together a symbolic ceremony that has been cheapened to the tune of millions of dollars behind the cameras of cable television as of recent? Would it be so that I can show off a hunk of metal wrapped around one of my digits? Would it be so that I could ‘prove’ my devotion and love in front of everyone that received an invitation?

Well, here might be some news for some people. Nobody needs a ring to symbolize unity and commitment if they make it a point to show their dedication to the aforementioned on a regular basis. Actions speak louder than words, and even words speak louder than Tiffany & Co.

Additionally, proving your love to to your significant other needs only involve your significant other. If you love that special someone enough, it will become quite obvious to everyone around you and all those that you interact with on a routine basis. Sometimes it even occurs much to the lament of the single people in your life. They’ll get over it and they’ll be just as happy for you, with or without the reception and the cake.

For all the homosexual people that I know, marriage is not about religion and it’s certainly not about all the things it would seem that the heterosexual sanctity of marriage has apparently come to mean. It’s about equality.

Regarding a ‘god-type’ and His/Her/Its ‘manual’: I find it amusing how convenient that line of Leviticus is to *everyone* that is against gay marriage and homosexuality in general. If it’s such an abomination, and if the ‘manual’ is to be taken quite literally (at least that’s the way I’ve always heard it put to me), then flip back a bit and look at Leviticus 11:7 or Leviticus 10-12. These few verses are just an example of how it’s also “abomination” (read “sinful” a.k.a. “burn in hell”) to eat swine and shellfish. There are many, many other things that the ‘good book’ tells us not to do, or to do, that we indulge in or refrain from, whichever is the exact thing that we’re not supposed to be doing. I really wish that some people would re-think that whole “mote and beam” thing before bringing religion into the scene. If those people that tell me that I need to repent and that I can be ’saved’ have no guilt chowing down at Red Lobster after the morning service every other week or so, then I can certainly fall asleep every night next to the one I love without a twinge.

Regarding ‘the institution’ being destroyed by allowing same-sex marriages: Who Wants To Marry a Millionaire?, Temptation Island, Who Wants To Marry My Dad?, Britney Spears, The Bachelorette… I don’t think I need to go on any longer. Marriage already is a power grab in and it’s colored green. ‘Straight America’ is doing a swell job of destroying its own precious “sacred institution of marriage” without us. Giving the same rights and equality under the law to same-sex couples most certainly would not be the end of the world, nor of the sanctity of the aforementioned institution. The relgious aspect of marriage isn’t once that any of my gay friends ever even want to come close to. Like I mentioned before, it’s about legal equality. The same doomsday prophets and naysayers said many of the same types of things when it came to granting equality based on race or gender. Did the sky fall?

Regarding procreation and the worthiness of a couple: So I guess it’s safe to say that those heterosexual couples in which one is congenitally infertile or perhaps paraplegic or otherwise unable to produce offspring are “lesser”? If that’s the way you feel then that’s the way that you feel, but I’d always thought that a union was about two people loving and sharing their lives together, in good times and in bad, with or without children. Did they recently splice in “…and produce plenty of offspring…” somewhere into the vows?

So where do I stand? After reading all of this, you might think that I’m a proponent of gay marriage. As it turns out, I really don’t care. I simply want to be seen and respected and acknowledged as just as much of a human being and a person as my good friends of years and years. Yet I can’t have that. At least not yet. Does that mean that I want to walk down the aisle at some point? Some days I think it’d be nice and other days I’d rather the ‘traditional’ part of America keep the ceremonies and throwing of rice all to themselves because the symbolism of the whole ordeal is quickly becoming an ugly shadow of what it was when my parents were married (and it still means the same to them, even though the rest of the nation seems to have changed its mind).

If I’ve offended anyone with my comments, forgive me for being unapologetic, but I’m just “leaving a comment”. I didn’t come here to troll or incite flames, but if I did, that’s simply a result of the way that I voice myself, I suppose. Perhaps I shouldn’t be googling at 4am.

Thanks,
Eric

By: HispanicPundit

HispanicPundit — Sun, 03 Jul 2005 17:03:23 +0000

DD,

No, sorry.

Myke,

You keep referring to countries with relatively recent gay marriage laws as examples that what conservatives predict will not happen, but as I have said repeatedly, social changes take time (which again is why the Canada article I linked to in this blog is so important, the fact that religious freedom is threatened so early in Canada leads one to believe that religious freedom will start to go elsewhere much quicker than the speed of normal social changes), certainly atleast one generation of time.

For example, conservatives predicted that legalized abortion would lead to the acceptance of infanticide, and everybody thought pro-lifers were crazy, yet now we have university professors openly admiting they support a weak form of infanticide. Many other examples of conservatives being right can also be given.

In addition, Matthew Yglesias himself admits that with the allowance of gay marriage polygamous relationships are sure to be around the corner, he writes,

Now I think it’s just great that the slope has slipped as far as it does, and hope it will slip more. So I have mixed feelings about the pragmatic political necessity of convincing people that the slope will not, in fact, slip. But it seems to me that gay marriage probably will lead — not as a matter of metaphysical certainty, but just as a matter of banal causal fact — to some kind of legal recognition of polyamorous relationships at some point down the road. And I think that’s fine. Just like I’m not particularly frightened of the prospect of human/animal hybrids or a world where pushy transgendereds abolish gender-segregated bathrooms.

But I think you are still missing my greater point here, that being that if gay marriage is allowed, it strips marriage of its objective meaning, and marriage now becomes nothing more than a power grab.

If you think I am wrong, than please tell me, on what basis would you deny allowing polygamous unions to also marry?

By: DD

DD — Sun, 03 Jul 2005 16:55:07 +0000

HP: Is there a way we can edit our comments?

By: DD

DD — Sun, 03 Jul 2005 16:48:40 +0000

Myke here are some valid points that the author made in the article:

Advocacy of legalized polygamy is growing. A network of grass-roots organizations seeking legal recognition for group marriage already exists. The cause of legalized group marriage is championed by a powerful faction of family law specialists. Influential legal bodies in both the United States and Canada have presented radical programs of marital reform. Some of these quasi-governmental proposals go so far as to suggest the abolition of marriage………..When Tom Green was put on trial in Utah for polygamy in 2001, it played like a dress rehearsal for the coming movement to legalize polygamy. True, Green was convicted for violating what he called Utah’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy on polygamy. Pointedly refusing to “hide in the closet,” he touted polygamy on the Sally Jessy Raphael, Queen Latifah, Geraldo Rivera, and Jerry Springer shows, and on “Dateline NBC” and “48 Hours.” But the Green trial was not just a cable spectacle. It brought out a surprising number of mainstream defenses of polygamy. And most of the defenders went to bat for polygamy by drawing direct comparisons to gay marriage.

During the 2004 election, approximately 120 million voted. Approximately 25% of those people voted for Bush, and approximately 25% did not.

Source: http://www.au.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=7078&abbr=cs_

There is really no confidence in leading ‘the people’. Political scientists say that “special interest gourps” love these situations because it increases their legislative power. I agree with that. I think it is probably that polygamy will be legalized.

The article said: “The ideas behind this movement have already achieved surprising influence with a prominent American politician”.

I will have to find out which prominent politician this article is referring to. I would venture to say it is a Utah politician. The Mormon population is huge there.

Myke wrote: “Also, the author themselves described the very liberal professors and organizations as radical. He fears that those on the fringe groups and individuals would gain momentum from the gay marriage/civil union issue itself but there is no evidence of this”.

Make note of the following within the article:

Writing in the Village Voice, gay leftist Richard Goldstein equated the drive for state-sanctioned polygamy with the movement for gay marriage. The political reluctance of gays to embrace polygamists was understandable, said Goldstein, “but our fates are entwined in fundamental ways.”
Libertarian Jacob Sullum defended polygamy, along with all other consensual domestic arrangements, in the Washington Times. Syndicated liberal columnist Ellen Goodman took up the cause of polygamy with a direct comparison to gay marriage. Steve Chapman, a member of the Chicago Tribune editorial board, defended polygamy in the Tribune and in Slate. The New York Times published a Week in Review article juxtaposing photos of Tom Green’s family with sociobiological arguments about the naturalness of polygamy and promiscuity.

In regards to the ACLU and what the ACLU Utah legal director says:

The ACLU’s Matt Coles may have derided the idea of a slippery slope from gay marriage to polygamy, but the ACLU itself stepped in to help Tom Green during his trial and declared its support for the repeal of all “laws prohibiting or penalizing the practice of plural marriage.” There is of course a difference between repealing such laws and formal state recognition of polygamous marriages. Neither the ACLU nor, say, Ellen Goodman has directly advocated formal state recognition. Yet they give us no reason to suppose that, when the time is ripe, they will not do so. Stephen Clark, the legal director of the Utah ACLU, has said, “Talking to Utah’s polygamists is like talking to gays and lesbians who really want the right to live their lives.”

Can legalizing polygamy lead to polyamory? See a trend taking place below:

“Polyamorists trace their descent from the anti-monogamy movements of the sixties and seventies–everything from hippie communes, to the support groups that grew up around Robert Rimmer’s 1966 novel “The Harrad Experiment,” to the cult of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. Polyamorists proselytize for “responsible non-monogamy”–open, loving, and stable sexual relationships among more than two people. The modern polyamory movement took off in the mid-nineties–partly because of the growth of the Internet (with its confidentiality), but also in parallel to, and inspired by, the rising gay marriage movement.

Unlike classic polygamy, which features one man and several women, polyamory comprises a bewildering variety of sexual combinations. There are triads of one woman and two men; heterosexual group marriages; groups in which some or all members are bisexual; lesbian groups, and so forth. (For details, see Deborah Anapol’s “Polyamory: The New Love Without Limits,” one of the movement’s authoritative guides, or Google the word polyamory.)

Polyamorists are enthusiastic proponents of same-sex marriage. Obviously, any attempt to restrict marriage to a single man and woman would prevent the legalization of polyamory.

Myke wrote:

“Also, the author themselves described the very liberal professors and organizations as radical”.

I believe the below individuals ARE radical. They are trying to change what is considered customary.

And like Ettelbrick, Polikoff is part of a movement whose larger goal is to use legal gay marriage to push for state-sanctioned polyamory–the ultimate subversion of marriage itself. Polikoff and Ettelbrick represent what is arguably now the dominant perspective within the discipline of family law.

Cornell University law professor Martha Fineman is another key figure in the field of family law. In her 1995 book “The Neutered Mother, the Sexual Family, and Other Twentieth Century Tragedies,” she argued for the abolition of marriage as a legal category. Fineman’s book begins with her recollection of an experience from the late seventies in politically radical Madison, Wisconsin.

But it’s University of Utah law professor Martha Ertman who stands on the cutting edge of family law. Building on Fineman’s proposals for the abolition of legal marriage, Ertman has offered a legal template for a sweeping relationship contract system modeled on corporate law. (See the Harvard Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Law Review, Winter 2001.)

In 1996, in the Michigan Law Review, David Chambers, a professor of law at the University of Michigan and another prominent member of this group, explained why radical opponents of marriage ought to support gay marriage. Rather than reinforcing a two-person definition of marriage, argued Chambers, gay marriage would make society more accepting of further legal changes. “By ceasing to conceive of marriage as a partnership composed of one person of each sex, the state may become more receptive to units of three or more.”

Finally, Martha Minow of Harvard Law School deserves mention. Minow has not advocated state-sanctioned polygamy or polyamory, but the principles she champions pave the way for both. Minow argues that families need to be radically redefined, putting blood ties and traditional legal arrangements aside and attending instead to the functional realities of new family configurations.

The article you read also addressed conjugality which is another concern we should keep in mind.

The article brings up valid points in regards to these radical people……or people who are trying to change what is considered customary.

Gay ‘marriage of convenience’ probable?

I think the article brings about valid concerns where it states:

IRONICALLY, the form of gay matrimony that may pose the greatest threat to the institution of marriage involves heterosexuals. A Brigham Young University professor, Alan J. Hawkins, suggests an all-too-likely scenario in which two heterosexuals of the same sex might marry as a way of obtaining financial benefits. Consider the plight of an underemployed and uninsured single mother in her early 30s who sees little real prospect of marriage (to a man) in her future. Suppose she has a good friend, also female and heterosexual, who is single and childless but employed with good spousal benefits. Sooner or later, friends like this are going to start contracting same-sex marriages of convenience. The single mom will get medical and governmental benefits, will share her friend’s paycheck, and will gain an additional caretaker for the kids besides. Her friend will gain companionship and a family life. The marriage would obviously be sexually open. And if lightning struck and the right man came along for one of the women, they could always divorce and marry heterosexually.

In a narrow sense, the women and children in this arrangement would be better off. Yet the larger effects of such unions on the institution of marriage would be devastating. At a stroke, marriage would be severed not only from the complementarity of the sexes but also from its connection to romance and sexual exclusivity–and even from the hope of permanence. In Hawkins’s words, the proliferation of such arrangements “would turn marriage into the moral equivalent of a Social Security benefit.” The effect would be to further diminish the sense that a woman ought to be married to the father of her children. In the aggregate, what we now call out-of-wedlock births would increase. And the connection between marriage and sexual fidelity would be nonexistent”.

All in all, I think the article brought up some very good points, one thing that I believe the article failed to address which has been at the back of my mind, (particularly when the article was addressing ‘grassroots’)……..

……….with the introduction of polygamy and polyamory in the works…..will this also bring about change of the appropriate ‘age of consent’?

It was ‘typically’ acceptable in the mid 19th century for the appropriate age of consent to be between ten through to thirteen.

Fifteen through eighteen had become the ‘norm’ in many countries by the end of the 20th century.

If Utah is trying to go back to their ‘grassroots’, their grassroots also include having sex with 10 year olds.

If and when polygamy is legalized, will these same ‘groups’ push the legal age of consent to the grassroots of age 10 - 15?

By: myke

myke — Sun, 03 Jul 2005 15:03:08 +0000

HP & DD — I did read the article pointed out above and there was nothing there that comes even close to proving that legalizing gay marriage will lead down the road to polygamy. The author spoke of “a politician” that supported it but didn’t name them. Also, the author themselves described the very liberal professors and organizations as radical. He fears that those on the fringe groups and individuals would gain momentum from the gay marriage/civil union issue itself but there is no evidence of this. What correlations he trys to make are weak at best. Again, I can point out the Netherlands and say that polygamy hasn’t sprouted up as a major issue though gay marriage has been legal there for several years … though I know you’re going to point out to me that you consider that country as a weak example in the same vein that i consider the correlation to polygamy to be weak. Or we could look at vermont where civil unions have been legal for several years. I haven’t seen any strong evidence that polygamous groups are pushing for the same ability.

I’d have to say that every social change to a sacred institution inevitably will lead to some radical notion of change elsewhere. But society will continue to see the radical as just that in more cases than not and they will stay on the fringe .. polygamy inlcuded. Another point of note .. one thing that is often included in polygamy and is not (& won’t ever be) a socially acceptable part of our society is the arrangement of young girls being forced to marry much older men. Do you honestly think that the majority of our society will ever accept this?

Look, change in societal norms is constant. Whether it be a woman’s right to vote and acceptance of women as equal to men in society or societal acceptance of gays as positive members of our culture. This doesn’t mean that a landslide will open up leading to the fall of that very society and culture. We’ve seen it over and over again, guys. Change may come in fits and starts but it is inevitable in any maturing society. However, it is also worthy of being pointed out that their are some things that won’t ever be accepted as a result of other changes .. incest .. forced marriage … girls not even in their pre-teens marrying. Those issues right there are much easier to equate in conversation than two committed gay individuals marrying and polygamy.