How, exactly, does gay marriage threaten me?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Marriage is between a man and a woman. Civil unions, fine, but not marriage. Just imagine a royal wedding at Westminster Abbey with a future Prince Rupert, Prince of Wales and John Jingleheimer Schmidt?

That's so disrespectful! It just doesn't fit:
The name is John JACOB Jingleheimer Schmidt!

And I think you are also wrong about the ratings. I bet the first royal gay wedding will probably bust the Nielson charts.

The future Prince Rupert is not marrying a dog! He is, for the sake of argument, marrying John Jingleheimer Schmidt not John JACOB Jingleheimer Schmidt. I do agree about the Nielson charts and I hope that I will still be among the living when this public coupling occurs, which will be never.

[Anonymous]

"The future Prince Rupert is not marrying a dog! He is, for the sake of argument, marrying John Jingleheimer Schmidt not John JACOB Jingleheimer Schmidt. I do agree about the Nielson charts and I hope that I will still be among the living when this public coupling occurs, which will be never. ""

There have been many royal wedding where the bride was a bow- wow. Queen Victoria was fat and fugly.

[Anonymous]

It doesn't threaten you. It doesn't threaten the "sanctity of marriage".

If we must fall back to the civil union argument, fine, every person shall be entitled to the same civil union. Leave marriage to the church.

This would be fine except that "marriage" is a legal definition not just a religious construct. Contract laws, immigration policies, family laws, estate laws, insurance policies, privacy laws, even criminal laws all refer to the legal definition of spouse which derives from marriage not a civil union. If you want to say that everyone gets a civil union and marriage is left just for the church you need to strike out the legal definition of marriage and reference to it in all federal and state laws. Considering there are still state laws and county ordinances out there about how many pigs you can bring into town on certain days, this is unlikely to happen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

It doesn't threaten you. It doesn't threaten the "sanctity of marriage".

If we must fall back to the civil union argument, fine, every person shall be entitled to the same civil union. Leave marriage to the church.

This would be fine except that "marriage" is a legal definition not just a religious construct. Contract laws, immigration policies, family laws, estate laws, insurance policies, privacy laws, even criminal laws all refer to the legal definition of spouse which derives from marriage not a civil union. If you want to say that everyone gets a civil union and marriage is left just for the church you need to strike out the legal definition of marriage and reference to it in all federal and state laws. Considering there are still state laws and county ordinances out there about how many pigs you can bring into town on certain days, this is unlikely to happen.

I disagree with your logic. Laws are changed every day, espeically the important ones. The outdated ordinances do not change because they are not important and society isn't demanding them to be changed. Changing the definition of marriage or moving the term all together would not be that lengthy of a process. It is important, especially when it is in conflict with equality laws.

[Anonymous]

We have reality tv and game shows in which a spouse is the top prize. I don't see anyone complaining that these shows harm the sanctity of marriage.

Government needs to get out of the marriage business if it's considered a holy union. Civil unions for all! And, I don't give a damn about how much is affected. If you were a gay parent with no legal protection in matters of custody, you wouldn't either.

It's a matter of trying to force some to live by the religious beliefs of others. It's bullshit. A big contributor trying to get these amendments passed is the LDS church.

Virginia passed the amendment here in 2006, and now those who oppose it are no longer a majority. Amendments should not be used for short-lived, hot button issues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Only issue would be whether his garb was too dull.

As long as at least one of them has a full head of hair, it's fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Marriage is between a man and a woman. Civil unions, fine, but not marriage. Just imagine a royal wedding at Westminster Abbey with a future Prince Rupert, Prince of Wales and John Jingleheimer Schmidt?

Not trying to be snarky... but this is it. Many religions view marriage as sacred, a sacrament, something "holy". So since they also view homosexuality as a sin, they can't accept sinners into a sacred institution. That is why many are ok calling it a civili union - because it has no religious meaning.
The problem is - no religion "owns" marriage. There is no patent on it. States issue marriage licenses, as well as religions perform marriage ceremonies.

If two people marry with a justice of the peace, most churches do not consider that a sacramental marriage. In fact in the eyes of God you are not married at all. But this causes them no concern for the sanctity of marriage. Why not?

[Anonymous]

The government should also keep out of a woman's right to choose but it doesn't.

[Anonymous]

A father marrying a son, or a brother marrying a brother or a brother and sister marrying and having children does not threaten me either. Therefore they should be legal and all rights afforded to married couples should be afforded to those unioins too. Anything should go so that no one's "basic human right" is infringed upon. Who cares about tradition, this is about modern progress.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A father marrying a son, or a brother marrying a brother or a brother and sister marrying and having children does not threaten me either. Therefore they should be legal and all rights afforded to married couples should be afforded to those unioins too. Anything should go so that no one's "basic human right" is infringed upon. Who cares about tradition, this is about modern progress.

By your logic, then we should still be restricting to marriage within our race.

Clearly tradition is an insufficient guide to right and wrong.

[Anonymous]

By the logic of most on this thread, there should be no limits on marriage between any two consenting adults. It is a "basic human right" as some have put it. Please state any rationale you would have to prohibit marriage by consenting family members.

[Anonymous]

OP, the term marriage has been used in the bible to describe a union between a man and a woman. To some people, it is therefore a religious term. All along, we were supposed to separate church and state, but we forgot that marriage was really a biblical (church) thing. We just accepted it because it was so much a part of our culture.
When the government comes in a redefines the term to include same sex couples, it is as if the government is rewriting biblical customs, which is an offense to some. So what many people say is that if the government wants to recognize unions between men and women, they should do so in a civil fashion, rather than religiously. That would mean civil unions.
That said, the government should also stop recognizing hetero marriages too.
The threat is that the government could then come in a redefine other religious values like say baptism. For instance, they could baptize animals and so on. Offensive to some people.
Governments should not marry or baptize or bar-mitzva or confirm. That is for the churches to do. If a church wants to marry two men, go for it. If a church wants to baptize a dog, go for it. If a church wants to confirm a baby, go for it.
It is as if the government has taken over the custom.

[Anonymous]

There is a simple, scientific rationale for banning marriage between family members, and that is that it can lead in relatively short order to devastating genetic problems in the offspring. I remember learning that in 6th grade social studies a long time ago as an explanation of why so many of the Egyptian Pharaohs had oddly misshapen faces and bodies.

So obviously, this argument is completely irrelevant to the issue of gay marriage.

The idea that kids get somehow traumatized by having gay parents is solely a byproduct of the bigotry they experience around them, much as biracial children in the not-so-distant stone age before miscenegation laws were repealed must have felt about being stigmatized for their background. If society treated gay parenting as normal, the kids would be fine. (We have friends who are gay parents and have adopted children--the kids are happy, healthy, well-adjusted and adore their wonderful moms who absolutely dote on them. But I do worry about them being stigmatized later on in middle or high school).

Hopefully, as the bigots age out and die off, this fight will become just a shameful episode in our past, like Jim Crow and other forms of discrimination.

And for the bigots who feel this is about the sanctity of the union between a man and a woman, a few words: John Ensign. Newt Gingrich. Whoever that loser was in the House of Representatives who was texting topless pictures of himself to women on Craigslist. Or the guy who was sexually harrassing his male pages, whose name I've also forgotten. Ted Haggard. Pedophile priests. You're just a bunch of miserable hypocrits.

--Happily married, heterosexual mother of two in VA

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:By the logic of most on this thread, there should be no limits on marriage between any two consenting adults. It is a "basic human right" as some have put it. Please state any rationale you would have to prohibit marriage by consenting family members.

Genetics. Duh. It is and has always been the reason.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:By the logic of most on this thread, there should be no limits on marriage between any two consenting adults. It is a "basic human right" as some have put it. Please state any rationale you would have to prohibit marriage by consenting family members.

Genetics. Duh. It is and has always been the reason.

And don't expect to find great examples in the bible. Plenty of incest there.