Gay Marriage

[guywithashovel]

This is something I don't understand about this right-wing, conservative types. They don't want the government to provide health care. They don't want the government to protect the environment. But darn it, they want the government to tell us who we can and can't get married to.

[rdp78]

I don't have problem with gay marriage and I think if you want to get married to someone of the same sex I think it's okay by me. It's none of my busines and as long as they are in love with each other that it's all matter. Now I admit I am trying to get used to the idea of homosexuality being part of human nature and that a gay person is no different then me or anyone else.

[fireheart17]

I used to be against gay marriage, just because I thought it was the right thing, after all I am from a Christian upbringing.

But then I thought to myself, would gay marriage really be all that big of a problem? Is society going to instantly crumble the moment it is allowed? Is it going to even affect my life at all? What is the "sanctity" of marriage, and haven't straight people managed to screw that up enough already!? Marriage is becoming a joke, celeberities get divorced after a ridiculously short time of being wedlock, sitcoms consistently mock husbands and wifes with their stereotypes. It's common for people to live together and start families without ever thinking about marriage.

Marriage is screwed up enough. Yeah homosexuality may or may not be in accordance with the Bible but I fail to see how allowing two loving individuals marry can screw it up more.

Hooray for sanity!

There's actually a cartoon that sums up your viewpoint exactly...

[MMATM]

Ah, good call Boozy. I didn't think of that but you're right. So maybe the issue from which my argument stems could be resolved simply by saying what we mean and to hell with who we offend? "Sex" is only a "dirty word" because the powers that be have associated so many vile connotations with it. Particularly religion, but that's a spiel for another thread. So in fact "gender" is fluid, rather than as (relatively) cut-and-dried as "sex". My bad.

[Boozy]

Gender, as biology has it, is essentially two-sided.

The term gender is used to denote a sociological and psychological construct. Its about behaviour and self-identification.

Sex is the biological term and is absolutely two-sided.

The term gender has been hijacked and used when sex is meant, because sex is a dirty word in American culture. For example, how many of us have filled out forms with a field for "Gender"? They want us to write, "Male" or "Female", not something like, "Feeling feminine today, although I've always been a tomboy." The form should obviously ask us for our "Sex", but it doesn't.

Maybe all these places have had too many people write, "Yes please."

[MMATM]

I'm totally in support of them as well, but one quote sorta annoyed me:

"bravely and calmly taking us all towards a better understanding of the fluidity of gender."

Gender, as biology has it, is essentially two-sided.

While it is possible to have both male and female characteristics (we all have both male and female hormones, in any case), one's reproductive gender is one's true gender. For example, if you are legally female, but have functional male genitalia, then you are biologically male, regardless of your physical appearance or characteristics outside the genitalia. And vice versa, of course.

As for mental/psychological genders, those are an entirely different story. It is completely reasonable (and, dare I say, "normal") for a man to identify as a woman or for a woman to identify as a man. This does not change the fact that the man is still anatomically male and the woman anatomically female.

Changing one's gender, by the modification of the body through surgery and/or hormone injections, can change one's anatomical (and therefore biological) gender. Mr. Beatie, despite being legally male, is not biologically male (as "he" still possesses all of the essential aspects of the female anatomy, and those are all still functioning). While I respect his decision to identify as a male, to change his legal status to male, and to change his body to that of a male, I cannot agree with the claim that he is a "pregnant man" when he is still biologically female.

In cases where neither reproductive organ is present (or both are present), the gender of the individual can be given as either, neither, or both established genders because our society (and genetics in general) has no system for the classification of multi-gender individuals. It sucks, but it's true.

Note that my disdain is aimed only at the offensive comment indicating that gender is some sort of continuum. If the comment refers to the ability of people to change their gender then my ire is misdirected and should be discounted.





BUT! Gay marriage? Fine with me. The only legal grounds to deny gay couples the right to marry is that no church can be forced to perform any ceremony that violates its beliefs (or even that doesn't violate its beliefs) by any government. Thus, if the Catholic Church denies gays the right to marry within Catholic churches, then gays cannot marry within those churches.

The way to fix this issue is to completely negate any and all rights and obligations associated with marriage in a church and reassociate them with civil unions, finally severing the tie between the Church* and the law. In this way, Church marriages (and any other Church ceremonies and proceedings) would carry no legal weight. This should have been done years ago, before the whole gay marriage dispute came up, but now that it's finally caused a problem it should be done ASAP.

As for the gay couples who cannot get married in the church of their choosing, because said church is intolerant of homosexuals and refuses to marry them, I'm sorry but they're SOL. Rights go both ways, and the church has as much right to prevent gays from marrying within their walls and their doctrine as gays have to marry via any means equal to today's Church-sanctioned marriages.

I fucking love my home state of Massachusetts, by the way.


*"Church" in this case refers to any institution that is or resembles a religious institution and operates outside of secular law.

[Saydrah]

Just FYI, the last paragraph of that article is incorrect. Mr. Lee Mingwei is an artist and has been "pregnant" on his website for 9 years.

Accurate article:

http://www.disaboom.com/Blogs/disabl...ible-quot.aspx

I am also in total support of the Beaties!

[Zyanya]

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599...-23109,00.html


I'm in total support of this couple.

[Seshat]

I used to be against gay marriage, just because I thought it was the right thing, after all I am from a Christian upbringing.

But then I thought to myself, would gay marriage really be all that big of a problem? Is society going to instantly crumble the moment it is allowed? Is it going to even affect my life at all?

THANK YOU!

That's exactly what I ask of people who are against gay marriage for religious reasons. I want you to ask yourselves exactly those questions.

Now, if you ask those questions and end up deciding 'yes, it is that big a problem' or 'yes, it is going to affect my life'; well, I'll probably look at you in sheer bafflement and ask 'how?' But hey, at least you thought about it. You might even be able to give me an answer!

But all I truly ask is that you think it through like that. And you have. So - YAY! Thank you.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

You can't argue with that.

No, you can't argue with it, but constitutionally, you can't base laws on it either. I realize that in this country the "separation of church and state" is a sick joke, but that's why the idea that we can legally deny citizens equal rights because they are "sinning" makes my head explode.

And don't even get me started on the whole "gay marriage is threatening the marriages of straight couples" horseshit. Really, Mr. Legislator? And which of your marriages is being threatened, exactly? Your third one or your fourth one?"

God forbid we have those Godless queers threatening Brittany Spear's right to get married for a couple hours and then getting an annulment. Oh, my gosh, with all the straights divorcing and remarrying, I suppose that IS quite a few marriages that are being threatened by a gay couple's wish to live a quiet monogamous life with equal rights under the laws of their country.

Ptah.

[miffed]

I used to be against gay marriage, just because I thought it was the right thing, after all I am from a Christian upbringing.

But then I thought to myself, would gay marriage really be all that big of a problem? Is society going to instantly crumble the moment it is allowed? Is it going to even affect my life at all? What is the "sanctity" of marriage, and haven't straight people managed to screw that up enough already!? Marriage is becoming a joke, celeberities get divorced after a ridiculously short time of being wedlock, sitcoms consistently mock husbands and wifes with their stereotypes. It's common for people to live together and start families without ever thinking about marriage.

Marriage is screwed up enough. Yeah homosexuality may or may not be in accordance with the Bible but I fail to see how allowing two loving individuals marry can screw it up more.

[Seshat]

Oh, no - those would be children of SIN! I'm sure SportinGoods' mother would have a lot to say about that - none of it good.

[tropicsgoddess]

What about the children of widows? Divorcees?

What about marriages which don't have children?

Or the kids born out of wedlock? It's more common and less taboo than it was back in the day, but I just don't see the fuss about if a single gay parent and their partner raising a child as opposed to a single straight parent with their partner raising the child.

[Seshat]

1> Gay marriage is detrimental to the conservative idea of a family unit. Without a mother and a father (Figure) the child raised will turn out emotionally scarred and twisted.

What about the children of widows? Divorcees?

What about marriages which don't have children?

(Until there has been a significant study on the effect of same sex parents on child development she will not waiver on this idea)

There almost certainly have been many such. I can't imagine that post-grad students in psychology, sociology and anthropology have left such a promising topic unstudied.

Whether she'd accept the studies is another matter.

2> The amount of estrogen and progesterone in the tap water (along with soy products) Is causing boys to become "femanized". This increase in estrogen supply has caused more people to become "unnaturally" gay. She refuses to pay taxes for the alleged "nancyfication" of American men.

Can she cite any studies?

3> The Lesbian and Gay community has "forced" their beliefs on the American culture and in one decade has made the unthinkable acceptable. Just the mere idea that they are proud of this makes her ill.

Forced?

One decade?

If it helps any: I don't know anyone in the LesBiGay community who would agree with the first sentence of that quote, much less be proud of it.

Pleased that they no longer have to hide for fear of brutalisation, yes. Proud of having achieved a measure of acceptance, yes.

Eh, she'd probably 'be ill' at that anyway.

My thoughts on the acceptance Les/Bi/Gay people have achieved is: would she prefer them to have to hide for fear of being physically beaten up, socially ostracised, and generally abused?

What would Jesus think? What would Jesus do?

Heck, what did Jesus do? According to the Gospels, he went out to the socially ostracised people and opened his arms to them, accepted them and treated them lovingly.

4> Being Gay is now a trend (see above)

. . .

I can't think of any way to dispute that that people like she seems to be would accept.

5> The tax breaks from marriage between a man and a woman should not be extended to a same sex relationship.

That's fine. I have no problem with no marriages or civil unions generating tax breaks. Equal treatment works for me.

Thats an extreme conservative point of view, not my own of course but offered for debate.

Not a problem. It does help to hear how they think.

[AFPheonix]

It's a view that if she bothered to do any research could be easily disproven. But then, that's typically the crux of the problem, isn't it? It's not so much that they want to know the truth, it's that they think they know the truth regardless of whether data supports it or not. It's the difference between people who wish to learn and those who are perfectly happy to remain ignorant.

It's sad, really.