40 Comments

1. Adam
   Posted November 17, 2009 at 12:57 am | Permalink

   It will be curious to see how the DC vote plays out. The religion seems to play a big role in the City as far as supporting the sick and afflicted. Religions in general help in clean up efforts in disaster releif, help in shelters and many other things. The other side claims the church uses its power to deny rights in the name of religion. Which is it? Do churches go and help so much, yet turn their backs on the gay rights? NOt. There are domestic partnerships that give rights. Religion only wants marriage preserved. Afterall if the religion didn't care? Why are they helping the city so much in matters related to the poor and afflicted?

2. Brandon
   Posted November 17, 2009 at 11:06 am | Permalink

   The Catholic Church provides a limited amount of services in DC and has a fairly small presence there. They voluntarily receive money from the city do provide these services and are not using their own funding to do it. If they cannot follow the law in DC, then without a doubt they should not be given the money to provide these services and another organization can do it instead. If the Catholic Church cannot agree to not fire people who are gay (which would be avoidable if they did a better job in the hiring part of the equation), they don't get government money to provide these services. It's fairly simple. The city won't be held hostage precisely because it doesn't need the Church to do what they are doing, as the Catholic Church provides only a small fraction of all of these services in DC. Most people in DC are not Catholic.

3. Rene Olmer
   Posted November 17, 2009 at 11:37 am | Permalink

   "The Catholic Church provides a limited amount of services in DC and has a fairly small presence there. They voluntarily receive money from the city do provide these services and are not using their own funding to do it."

   Catholic Charities amplifies the meager monies set aside by the state by adding to it countless thousands of hours of donated time and means. They have partnered with the city of D.C. providing for the city's poor for many years. It's a shame that you would minimize this either out of sheer ignorance or out of a desire to belittle and make small their work for the people of D.C. It may not seem much to you as you sit in your warm house with your fridge full of food, but their service means a lot to those who are without. The cities' dollars will not stretch as far or as efficiently without valuable partnerships with organizations like Catholic Charities.

4. Rene Olmer
   Posted November 17, 2009 at 11:40 am | Permalink

   "Most people in DC are not Catholic."

   Unlike those supporting the gay agenda, Catholics care about and help people regardless of whether or not they agree with Catholic doctrine.

5. Robert Mann
   Posted November 17, 2009 at 11:46 am | Permalink

   “We are not threatening to walk out of the city,” Gibbs said. “The city is the one saying, ‘If you want to continue partnering with the city, then you cannot follow your faith teachings.’ “

   This is exactly what people have warned about and what gay activists have denied. It is interesting now to see them blame the cold shoulder they've turned toward charity groups on the charity groups themselves. Do they think the public can't put two and two together?

6. WTFBlog
   Posted November 17, 2009 at 12:14 pm | Permalink

   Unlike those supporting the gay agenda, Catholics care about and help people regardless of whether or not they agree with Catholic doctrine.

   Care about people? Thats why they want the homeless to stave to death right?

7. Robert Mann
   Posted November 17, 2009 at 12:42 pm | Permalink

   "Thats why they want the homeless to stave to death right?"

   Actually, I was wondering if all the gay activists out there were going to organize and feed the homeless now that D.C. is kicking Catholic Charities out. Put your elbow grease where your activism is.

8. Chris Baker
   Posted November 17, 2009 at 12:50 pm | Permalink

   Authentic marriage is of necessity between a man and a woman, while what the homosexuals want is best described as "imitation" marriage - a mere shadow of authentic marriage. Catholics tend to be some of the strongest advocates of authentic marriage and we all thank them for that. As for the advocates of imitation marriage for homosexuals promoting "equality," that's like comparing an imitation flower to a real one: their arguments are frankly laughable.

9. Chris Baker
   Posted November 17, 2009 at 2:06 pm | Permalink

   Continued: There is also an important issue over whether enacting “imitation” marriage for homosexuals subtly degrades men's masculinity and women's femininity. That's something no one has talked about, but I believe from my own state’s experience with rejecting imitation marriage for homosexuals that it does. That may be why, in part, the voters have rejected enacting imitation marriage for homosexuals. I’m sure the AMA, the newly declared experts on marriage, would strongly disagree but there is a real question over whether legislators, or city councilors in this case, can decide such an important issue.

10. Duane Sempsrott
    Posted November 17, 2009 at 4:02 pm | Permalink

    I tried to send an email to the DC Council Chair, but there was not a "Send" button.

11. LT
    Posted November 17, 2009 at 6:56 pm | Permalink

    Okay, so you're saying religious liberty gives an exemption from the Equal Protection Clause. Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think there has been a higher court ruling in favor of your argument since Wisconsin v. Yoder in the 70's.

    So let's say that the Catholic Church strongly believed that interracial relationships were wrong and refused to give employee benefits to interracial spouses. Would this still be an acceptable use of the religious liberty argument?

    I'd also like to add that very little (if any) liberty is being infringed upon. Catholics still have a right to practice their religion and hold whatever beliefs they choose. They simply won't be able to act on them in a discriminatory manner, just like an Orthodox Jewish employer wouldn't be able to deny employee benefits to someone who eats pork, for example.

12. Marty
    Posted November 17, 2009 at 7:40 pm | Permalink

    According to LT's logic, the catholic church is in violation of the law because they refuse to hire female priests.

    I know, it's only a matter of time before they come after them for that one too.

13. Jacque
    Posted November 17, 2009 at 7:51 pm | Permalink

    yeah, you know the separation of church and state goes both ways. The state ought not interfere with the church, at all. Not through fines, not through laws, not through IRS intimidation, churches are their own entity. Free.

14. Chairm
    Posted November 17, 2009 at 8:46 pm | Permalink

    LT, the racial analogy you proposed is profoundly flawed. There is one human race and its nature is two-sexed, not one-sexed.

    Also, the Equal Protection Clause does not empower identity politics over and above the rule of law, as you just suggested.

    SSM argumentation is corruptive in many ways. You demonstrate how it corrupts the basic understanding of equality in constitutional jurisprudence.

    Contary to your comment, precedents such as the Loving marriage case, provide a repudiation of the assertion of supremacy via identity politics. The SSM campaign has yet to justify its own assertion of supremacy via the gay version of identity politics.

    Your remark rebukes itself. I'm just pointing that out to you and to readers.

15. Chris T.
    Posted November 17, 2009 at 10:50 pm | Permalink

    The D.C. government pays over half of the budgets of the civil services that the Catholic Church provides. (For some services, the gov't pays as much as 90%.)

    No one is telling the Catholic Church that they can't continue to serve God by helping the poor, they are saying that if they don't follow the government's rules, they won't receive GOVERNMENT funding. The Church can continue to use private donations if they want to help the poor.

    In my opinion, using the government funds to help the poor is a good social service, and good business, but isn't the laudable service of god. Serving God comes from the individual tithing, volunteering, etc, which would not be affected by D.C. funding.

    Besides, I pay A LOT of D.C. taxes, and I feel that people seeking and receiving my tax dollars should follow the government's rules.

16. Deanne
    Posted November 17, 2009 at 11:45 pm | Permalink

    Well I hope you like paying those taxes Christ T, because by giving religious groups the cold shoulder in this, you'll end up paying more to replace their donated hours and resources. Replacing Catholic Charities is only one part of the difficulty. The fact that the law is so exclusionary is quite eye opening. My way or the Highway right D.C.? That's the way to make friends and pool community resources. Are the gay activists going to man the soup lines?

    It's ridiculous for the government to shun the expertise and good services that religious groups are standing ready to provide, simply because they can't tolerate religious thought.

17. Kevinn
    Posted November 17, 2009 at 11:51 pm | Permalink

    It’s ridiculous for religious groups to expect to break laws that they feel constrain their religious beliefs. Laws are supreme over religious mythologies, especially when human rights are at stake. It’s interesting, the Catholic Church in DC doesn’t appear to object to legal pre-marital sex, legal adultery and legal divorce, all prohibited by the Bible. And I’m sure more than a few of its employees use legal birth control, another Catholic faith prohibition. Why are they singling out gay people for punishment?!

18. Chairm
    Posted November 18, 2009 at 3:14 am | Permalink

    Freedom of conscience is a human right. SSM, is not.

    The former is not licensed and needs no justification from Government.

    The latter has no justification for society issuing a license. That lack makes a mockery of the call for people to follow "government rules".

    Imposition of anti-Catholic policies on Catholic agencies and indviduals is just a way to villify all marriage defenders -- Catholic and non-Catholic alike. The imposition would fall upon all citizens of DC (not just those who are against the SSM-merger but also those who are indifferent and those who are in favor) and as such is an assault on freedom of conscience for all.

    The reverse is not so.

    And that illustrates this move of the DC Council would be in accordance with subverting civil society to Government. Maybe that fits SSM argumentation and the SSM campaign's version of supremacy in the name of identity politics. It sure looks like it based on comments by SSMers.

    But it is not in keeping with the fact that The People have a government, not the other way around. The Catholic Church is defending more than marriage in this circumstance: it is defending also the human rights of us all and the common good across the board.

    SSMers, not so much.

19. LT
    Posted November 18, 2009 at 4:57 am | Permalink

    Chairm:

    "There is one human race and its nature is two-sexed, not one-sexed."
    This comment is laughable. I'd love for you to meet some of my relatives who were kept from using certain bathrooms and restaurants and swimming pools because of race and tell them "there is one human race!" Also, nature is not two-sexed. The scandal this summer over athlete Caster Semenya should be evidence enough that humans don't just come in two flavors, XX and XY.

    This is where we are different. You see things in black and white, right and wrong, majority and minority. It seems that you believe the rights of the majority should trump the rights of the minority as evidenced by your constant reference's to a "People's Government" (America is a republic and not a democracy btw). I'll use an example from John Locke (who was famous for his ideas on limited government, to put this in perspective): If 50% of the population and one man vote for something, have the people really "spoken"?

    I, for one, believe strongly that America has always been about protecting the rights of minorities and righting the wrongs that we inevitably do to those we fear and misunderstand. America is also about religious freedom, meaning you can practice your religion to your heart's content. But to paraphrase Wisconsin v. Yoder, in order to gain exemption from the Equal Protection Clause, there must be some proven detriment (i.e. the dissolution of a small, isolated, and rural religious community due to outside influence). Now, correct me if I'm wrong but Catholic Charities still operate in Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, and Iowa.

    So what's so different about DC? If the Catholic Church can somehow force themselves to keep helping the needy even though they are burdened by these horrible laws that require them to treat gay employees as equals, then why can't they do it DC? Politics, methinks. And the Church has no place in politics. They picked the wrong city, my friend.

20. Nicholas
    Posted November 19, 2009 at 2:15 am | Permalink

    LT,

    So, then, if SSM is approved by that same 50% + one, would you still claim the people have not spoken or does this idea only apply to when the side you support "wins?"

    Indeed, Catholic Charities does operate in numerous states. But wouldn't what they do in one state set a precedent for what happens in the others? At that, since when does government dictate the tenets of faith? Doesn't adherence to one's faith/faith practice, belief/belief system supersede anything else? In other words, is my allegiance to God subservient to that of the State?

    Lastly, your one "example" of there being more "flavors" to humanity is dubious. Are you suggesting, then, that we are all unaware of our "true" identity and sexuality? Isn't being male and female enough? Why do we need to continue to interchange and confuse the two genders/sexes to the point that we do? What is the endgame?

21. Chairm
    Posted November 19, 2009 at 5:10 am | Permalink

    LT, racialism is real, however, humankind is not divided into sub-species based on skin color or bumps on the head.

    There is one human race.

    If the nature, or the essence, of humankind is not two-sexed, is it one-sexed?

    Nope.

    Is it three- or four-sexed? Nope.

    Is it no-sexed? Nope.

    This is illustrated by the essence of human procreation: it is opposite-sexed.

    Your retort is a stretch on par with declaring that the human form is NOT two-legged because you know of an individual who does not have two legs. You err by confusing categories.

    You did the same when you mistook racialism as evidence of subspecies of humankind.

    * * *

    Also, you present a black and white view of the marriage issue, in your own comment. Does that negate your view as you complained it ought to negate mine? No, but unlike yourself, I haven't anchored my view of marriage on the existence of racialism nor on the random occurence of anomalous conditions.

    * * *

    I've not used the phrase, People's Government. Your retort, such as it is, is that in a replublic the Government has a people, not the other way around.

    Your notion of minority is based on gay identity politics, not on limited government which stands against the over-reach that the SSM campaign demands of Government (capital G). Each of us is a minority of one, hence my comment emphasized freedom of conscience which applies to direct demoracy as it does to replublican democracy.

    My view of the corruptive influence of the SSM campaign does not rely on what you prejoratively label "the rights of the majority". Your retort, however, relies on pressing the supremacy of group identity (i.e. group rights) over the principles of good governance, over constitutional jurisprudence, and over the core meaning of foundational social insitutitions of civil society.

    Your retort leans heavily anti-linmited government (small g); and if you support the merger of SSM and marriage as per SSM argumentation, then, you share the totalitarian impulse that oozes from the assertion of supremacy of gay identity politics. Reframing such an assertion as "the rights of the minority" only emphasizes the impulse that is anti-democratic and anti-republican and anti-rights.

    There is no special reason for special status based on gayness. And gayness is the chief feature of SSM that SSMers have emphasizes over and over.

    That is closely analogous with the racialist identity politics -- which, by the way, your retort relied upon when denying that there is one human race.

    The assertion of white supremacy via the marriage laws was repudiated some time ago. You would revive a racailist-like assertion in the name of gayness.

    I do not fear you. I disagree with SSM argumentation. It is profoundly flawed and self-defeating. It is steeped in the emotivism of group identity. History teaches that the assertion of supremacy via group identity is one of the most reliable sources of bigotry, injustice, and, yes, suppression of individual rights such as freedom of conscience.

    * * *

    The Equal Protection Clause says zilch about "gay marriage" and zilch about elevating gayness over and above the rights of all Americans.

    Likewise, the marriage laws do not discriminate (neither justly nor unjustly) on the basis of gayness. There is no gayness criterion for ineligibility in marriage law; and no straightness criterion. Your gay-straight dichotomy is false. Defenders of marriage have NOT pressed that dichotomy into the law -- the SSM campaign and its argumentation have injected into the law that which is NOT there.

    Marriage is not SSM. SSM is not marriage. The core meanings are very different. SSMers would merge non-marriage with marriage and call it "equality" when such a merger must gut marriage of its essentials, its universal features, which actually means that the SSM-merger produces a replacement of marriage with recognition of some other thing.

    There is no good reason that all unions of husband and wife must be treated as if they lacked either husbands or wives. No justification for the merger means there is no special reason for special status.

    But that is what SSM argumentation does. It removes the special reason for marriage's special status; and it does this by substituting gayness as special reason for special status for SSM. It is a profoundly anti-social effort to which you, LT, have attached yourself.

    SSM is not a foundational social institution. It is sex-segregative. It cannot provide for responsible procreation. But whatever its merits, and demerits, SSM ought to be made to stand on its own two feet instead of piggybacking on marriage. Afterall, the core meaningn of marriage is extrinsic to SSM; and the core meaning of SSM is gay identity politics.

    The SSM campaign's goal of a merger puts it in direct conflict with marriage. And in seeking to move the big hairy hand of Government (upper case G), the SSMers seek to force Government to side with the "faith" in gayness over the freedom of conscience of all citizens, gay or not.

    Gay identity politics is what SSM is all about. For SSMers, it is not about justice but about "just us".

    Hence the hostility toward Catholic Charities and toward all who dissent against the supremicist who push for the specious substitution of marriage.

22. Chairm
    Posted November 19, 2009 at 5:33 am | Permalink

    LT, the laws in question do NOT "require them to treat gay employees as equals".

    You again confuse categories.

    The SSM merger would require people to treat a subset of non-marriage as marriage.

    There is no gayness requirement for a license to SSM -- not in the proposed SSM-merger.

    Unlike marriage, there are no objective criteria that would make of SSM a public sexual type of relationship at law.

    But SSMers make it no secret that gayness is the core of SSM. To force a false equivalence, the merger would gut marriage of its core meaning and into the hollow the SSM merger would pour the corruptive influence of gay identity politics.

    The Government has no business doing that to Catholics and non-Catholics alike. It certainly has no business pressing gayness into the marriage law much less into how religious organizations operate in partnership.

    In those other states, LT, the SSMers have been a little more cautious due to the political calculus of the national SSM campaign. They may restrain themselves, for the moment, but their argumentation and rhetoric points in the same direction as what has occured in Massachusetts, Canada, and the UK -- and possibly now in DC.

23. Chairm
    Posted November 19, 2009 at 5:42 am | Permalink

    Why did the DC council deny voters the opportunity to vote on the SSM-merger?

    Politics. Me-thinks, you-thinks, we-all-thinks, politics.

    You, LT, have picked the wrong cause if you are interested in limited government, representative democracy, and republicanism.

24. Chairm
    Posted November 19, 2009 at 7:43 am | Permalink

    Hang on. Back-up the truck.

    LT said: "And the Church has no place in politics."

    Did you just single-out the Catholic Church for exclusion? Or did you mean all religions?

    Whether your remark is anti-Catholic or anti-religious, it belies a desire to set Government (upper case G) against freedom of conscience. That's the problem which you have tried to portray as the solution.

    SSMers often give good reason to believe that they actually stand against that which they've posed as standing for. Some SSMers do this inadvertently by overplaying the pose; others admit it forthrightly.

    LT said: "They [the Catholics] picked the wrong city, my friend."

    What did you mean by 'wrong city'? If you mean what you say and you'd say what you mean, be forthright on this point.

25. LT
    Posted November 19, 2009 at 6:00 pm | Permalink

    Whew, that's alot of replies, Chairm, so I hope you don't mind I if take this one chunk at a time.

    1.
    I'm all for limited government, but only if society applies Mill's Harm Principle (you may act however you wish, no matter how foolishly/dangerously, as long as you don't hurt or impinge on the rights of others). I also understand that equality is a far-off principle that will never truly be reached. The best we can hope for is equality of opportunity, since we can never achieve equality of results. Now, when it comes to marriage equality, I see the Harm Principle being dashed to pieces. Essentially, voters are telling me that what I want to do is foolish and make evidence-less claims that I will destroy society somehow. So they change the law so that I can't do something that won't affect them (the law or the action, because I doubt the Yes on 1/Yes on Prop 8 folks would actually be leaping at the chance to marry a member of their own gender). Do you see the insanity in this? I'm sure John Stuart Mill and John Locke are rolling in their graves. This so-called, "legislation by popular opinion" makes me cringe. But I realize now that America is slow. I mean, it took us 200 years to realize that slavery was wrong (and we had to have a war over it), till the 50's to realize that segregation was wrong and we're still working on racism. It took us until the 20's to grant women voting rights and we still don't have an Equal Rights Amendment. What do all of these things have in common? None of these progressive measures were voted on.

    2.
    When you write about sexual orientation not being part of the criterion for marriage eligibility, I gotta say, I agree with you. I wish I were heading the gay rights campaign because from a legal standpoint (until sexual orientation is truly, legally enshrined as a federal suspect class) I can't argue that marriage laws really discriminate against gays. However, marriage laws do discriminate based on gender. The current marriage laws say that any man can marry woman but I, a woman, cannot, solely because of my gender (and vice versa).

    3. I am an atheist, but I am not anti-religion. I am against religion being a dominating influence in government because I should not have to subscribe to the religious beliefs of others. I have to respect them and respect your right to have them (a courtesy that, curiously, is never returned. I would never grill someone on their religious beliefs but you have no idea how many times I've been cornered by folks asking, "how can you not believe in God?" after admitting to being an atheist. Sometimes I'll just hold my tongue or lie in certain companies to avoid the "Spanish Inquisition." I guess religious freedom is only a one way street...). I don't know about "God being subservient to the State" (- Nicholas) but I do know that religion is a choice, not an immutable characteristic, like race or sexual orientation (let's not get into an argument about this one, please). Therefore I find it very difficult to swallow religious-based outcries against the following laws because the belief that is being challenged is a chosen one.
    To be continued...

26. Raynd
    Posted November 19, 2009 at 7:26 pm | Permalink

    “Marriage is neither a conservative nor a liberal issue; it is a universal human institution, guaranteeing children fathers, and pointing men and women toward a special kind of socially as well as personally fruitful sexual relationship. Gay marriage is the final step down a long road America has already traveled toward deinstitutionalizing, denuding and privatizing marriage. It would set in legal stone some of the most destructive ideas of the sexual revolution: There are no differences between men and women that matter, marriage has nothing to do with procreation, children do not really need mothers and fathers, the diverse family forms adults choose are all equally good for children. What happens in my heart is that I know the difference. Don’t confuse my people, who have been the victims of deliberate family destruction, by giving them another definition of marriage.”

    –Walter Fauntroy-Former DC Delegate to Congress Founding member of the Congressional Black Caucus Coordinator for Martin Luther King, Jr.’s march on DC

27. Nicholas
    Posted November 20, 2009 at 1:25 am | Permalink

    LT,

    I appreciate your candor in answering the questions I posed. The thing is, though, to your own admission, that "religion is a choice", even your atheism is therefore a choice. That being the case, then, how is your atheistic belief not part and parcel of your view on SSM? Or, can you compartmentalize your "faith practice" from your life such that your left hand doesn't know what your right hand is doing? And if this is true, then, is not your atheistic belief not "forcing religion" and "boxing" in the government into choosing sides?

28. Chairm
    Posted November 21, 2009 at 4:17 am | Permalink

    LT, independently of whatever you might do with your choices and actions, the defense of marriage is not about YOU. It is not about gayness.

    It is about marriage. Take that to heart because I mean what I say and I say what I mean.

    The proposal to merge SSM with marriage may be something you'd like society to starting doing -- for YOUR sake or for the sake of gay identity politics -- but it does NOT follow that this is in keeping with limited government (even if we adhered to your description of limited government).

    In fact, such a merger contradicts the very notions that you have posed as being in favor of.

29. Chairm
    Posted November 21, 2009 at 5:13 am | Permalink

    LT your dodges look very familiar. We've seen them here before in NOM's comment sections. Are you commenting under different moniker now?

    * * *

    You laughed and derided my point about the one human race. You dismissed the directly related point about the two-sexed nature of humankind.

    Yet you stand corrected.

    And still you would equate the defense of the core of marriage with the evils of racism and slavery.

    The SSM-merger does not fit with limited government. It does not fit on the trajectory that you proposed with the three items from history that you listed.

    You introduced the list to make a claim that your cause is a just cause.

    It is not.

    My meaning is that you have not justified the merger of nonmarriage with marriage.

    SSM is a subset of nonmarriage. It is substantively a different thing than marriage. Its core is gaycentric identity politics. That is what distinguishes it from the rest of the nonmarriage category of living arrangements and types of relationships.

    There are two things under discussion. Marraige is one thing. SSM is another thing.

    Whatever your personal choices and actions, marriage appears not to be of interest to you. SSM may be of interest to you.

    And so you imagine that the core of marriage must be abolished from the law and the culture for the sake of establishing the supremacy of gaycentric identity politics.

    That makes your cause closely analogous with that of racialist supremacy which has been repudiated. You have offered zilch that would refute that repudiation.

    * * *

    The marriage laws discriminate between marriage and non-marriage.

    Your view that the man-woman criterion is unjust discrimination based on sex has been rejected even by pro-SSM court opinions. Your complaint assumes that society may not discriminate between marriage and nonmarriage. We can discuss that further, if you wish, but sex discrimination is simply a dead-end for SSM argumentation.

    * * *

    You made a remark about "the Church" and I asked if the exclusion you demanded was of a particular church of of religion.

    I see that you hedged but that you did mean all religion.

    If you did not mean exclusion, then, please reconcile with your remark: “And the Church has no place in politics.”

    We could return to the three historical items you listed earlier. Each of these relied very much on the place of religion in politics.

    You, as an Athiest, may wish it otherwise, but the Government is not empowered to grant nor to deny the place of religion in politics.

    Your remark points toward totalitarianism and away from the principles of good governance (as per republican democracy) and away from limited government (as per even your own brief descrption of it).

30. Chairm
    Posted November 21, 2009 at 5:53 am | Permalink

    Regarding the remark about religion being a choice:

    Each individual is endowed with a conscience unique to that individual. This possession is a gift, not a choice. It is immutable.

    What one does with that gift may fall under the realm of choice, sure, but that comes to acting on one's conscience.

    Now, whether or not you think the conscience is God-given or is somehow a fluke explained by the theory of evolution or some other cause, it is an axiom of America's founding that it is self-evident. Indeed, this is the basis for majority rule -- for votes whether they be votes in an election, in a legislature, in a referendum, in a panel of judges, or in a jury (criminal, civil, or Grand Jury).

    Freedom of conscience is not like race. There is one human race.

    Freedom of conscience is not like a racialist distinction. While skin color and ancestory are not changeable by the individual, racialist group identities certainly are mutable. They are social constructs.

    Same-sex sexual attraction is not one and the same as gay identity. The attraction may be -- or may not be -- inborn, but no socio-political identity is inborn.

    Gay identity is a social construct. Individually, it is formed from a choice based on subjective criteria. Freedom of consience applies, but there is choice is behavior and in identifying with this or that identity group.

    One might stretch an analogy by claiming that a church is an identity group, but that would still rely on the individual choosing to exercise his freedom of conscience, which is still understood to be a given rather than something constructed.

31. Kevin
    Posted November 21, 2009 at 2:54 pm | Permalink

    Human procreation is two-sexed but human love and companionship can be two-sexed or one-sexed. Since marriage is about recognition of a committed couple, instead of procreation, it only stands to reason that both kinds of couples be granted the same rights. Same-sex marriage is a subset of marriage; otherwise it would be called same-sex non-marriage.

    Revising the definition of marriage is a time-honored tradition. What marriage means to society changes over time. Just as society has revised marriage from a lifetime commitment to a “so long as I’m happy” commitment, it is now revising marriage to include single-sex and dual-sex couples.

32. Chairm
    Posted November 22, 2009 at 4:40 am | Permalink

    Human love is more often not sexualized. Sexualized or not, it is not restricted to twosomes. Nor to unrelated people. Nor to adults, for that matter.

    Love exists outside of marriage and can be absent within marriage. The Love is not a legal requirement; Government does not mandate human love for those who marry; nor does the law and Government force those who love to marry.

    On that basis the gay-straight dichotomy remains false. The arguments made by SSMers sayso.

    Tradition is no justification for SSM. SSMers sayso when they trash tradition. The historic and anthropologic record shows that there has not been a tradition of merging SSM with marriage, much less for merging nonmarriage with marriage.

    Marriage has universal features even though it also has variable features. The existence of the latter does not negate the constancy of the former. Rather, it reinforces the core meaning of marriage as a foundational social institution.

    There is no tradition, honored or otherwise, in abolishing the core of marriage as per the SSM-merger.

    Meanwhile, there is one human race and its nature is two-sexed. The nature of human community is both-sexed and the nature of human procreation is opposite-sexed. From this marriage arises as foundational to civilizations far and wide.

33. Kevinn
    Posted November 22, 2009 at 9:55 am | Permalink

    “Love exists outside of marriage and can be absent within marriage. The Love is not a legal requirement; Government does not mandate human love for those who marry; nor does the law and Government force those who love to marry.”

    I invite you to proclaim to your spouse that you chose him or her not because of love or commitment but because he or she was merely someone of the opposite sex. Love and commitment are the motivation to marry, not the standard the government applies for marriage. A stronger argument, if it were possible, would be to say that same-sex couples do not experience love, or cannot commit to each other, and therefore should not be permitted to marry. But so long as same-sex couples are motivated by, and experience, love and a desire to commit, it seems odd to deny them access to the institution that formalizes love and commitment: marriage.

    Reducing marriage to merely a “union of one man and one woman,” as many state constitutions now do, renders marriage a dreary, loveless, commitment-free zone, doesn’t it? I thought we were trying to “promote, protect and defend” marriage, not make it dreary, loveless and free of commitment! It doesn’t sound very appealing to define marriage as nothing more than a union between one man and one woman!

    If marriage were nothing more than the sexualized union of one male and one female, any sexually capable male could marry any sexually capable female. Since most of us are a bit more particular about whom we marry, there must be more to marriage than mere “opposite genderness.” And if marriage is nothing more than two opposite sex persons having sexual intercourse, and procreating, there would be little reason to divorce, so long as neither person had a sex change operation, and the union produced children.

    How very odd to insist that marriage is nothing more than the union of one man and one woman! What a horrible public relations campaign! No wonder marriage is falling out of favor and few marriages last a lifetime. I feel blessed that my marriage was not so mundane, even if short-lived!

34. Kevinn
    Posted November 22, 2009 at 10:14 am | Permalink

    In fact, now that I think of it, doesn't a state constitution that describes marriage as simply the union between one man and one woman invite incestuous marriages? Why can't the theoretical brother and sister now insist that their right to marry has not been precluded, given this official dreary definition of marriage?!

35. Chairm
    Posted November 23, 2009 at 5:45 am | Permalink

    The concession is obvious: love is not the government standard.

    To justify the special status of marriage, special reason is required. SSM falls far below that standard.

    The core meaning of the social institution of marriage does NOT mean that marriages exclude love. Far from it. The integration of the sexes is combined with responsible procreation. This combination fosters the bond between husband and wife and their children.

    SSM might be about something else -- some vague notion of "gay love" -- but there is no core meaning expressed in the laws. SSMers insist on legal requirements but reject and seek to dinminish if not outright abolish the man-woman requirement and the marital presumption of paternity which is entailed in the consent to marry -- consent of each man and woman as well as the society that accords special status to the union of husband and wife and the social institution into which they enter.

    That standard does not draw eligibility and ineligibility based on gayness.

    Lines based on relatedness, for example, are drawn around the core of marraige and not around some vague notion of "human love".

    Loving relationships between some related people are ineligibile for marriage. Why? The societal concerns about sex integration and responsible procreation form the basis for drawing lines of eligibility and ineligibility. Siblings are ineligibile to marry each other even if they were to accept an invitation to declare that they loved each other -- sexually or nonsexually.

    But not all related people are ineligible; only some -- and that is not based on "human love" -- for that is not the government or legal standard.

    SSMers cannot justify such a line based on some vague notion of "love". What kind of love? How much love? And, as per SSM argumentation's attack on the core of marriage, what legal requirement makes that particular version of love compulsory?

    On the contrary, SSMers fluff up "love" and make it so vague that it stands as a mere sentimental trope rather than a standard for making law, social policy, or sustaining civil society's foundational social institution. It would mean anything but really nothing.

    And that makes drawing the boundaries around marriage a purely arbitrary function. There is no standard of justness, just reliance on the emotivism of identity politics. That contradicts one of the central complaints of SSM argumentation: that the marriage law's man-woman criterion is arbitrary and thus unjust. SSMers would commit the very thing they supposedly stand against.

    At this point SSMers are likely to shrug and say that line-drawing is itself an intrusion that cannot be justified. Or somesuch.

    Two gay men show up for a license to SSM; they delcare that they are not sexually attracted to one another but are nonetheless eager to gain state and federal benefits; and they love each other as brothers; in fact, they are siblings born of the same mom and dad.

    Eligible to SSM or not? Why or why not?

    Make it three gay men -- all three siblings born of the same parents. Eligible to SSM or not?

    Take the love part out of the equation. Eligible to SSM or not?

36. Chairm
    Posted November 23, 2009 at 5:50 am | Permalink

    Typo corrections:

    "And that would make drawing the boundaries around the SSM-merger a purely arbitrary function. There would be no standard of justness, just reliance on the emotivism of identity politics. That contradicts one of the central complaints of SSM argumentation: that the marriage law’s man-woman criterion is arbitrary and thus unjust. SSMers would commit the very thing they supposedly stand against."

    It would be unjust; SSMers concede that, too, when they cannot or choose not to provide justification for special status much less for drawing lines around what SSM/marriage would be and would not be.

37. Kevinn
    Posted November 23, 2009 at 9:14 pm | Permalink

    “The concession is obvious: love is not the government standard.”

    Nor is being a good driver required to get a driver’s license, or being a good hunter to get a hunting license. Try to distinguish WHY people want to marry, not just the eligibility to marry. You’ll better understand why same-sex couples want to marry, just as opposite-sex couples do.

    “To justify the special status of marriage, special reason is required”

    To qualify for the special status of marriage, a couple must be composed of two consenting adults. That’s all it takes to get a marriage license. Or should be.

    “SSMers insist on legal requirements but reject and seek to dinminish if not outright abolish the man-woman requirement and the marital presumption of paternity which is entailed in the consent to marry — consent of each man and woman as well as the society that accords special status to the union of husband and wife and the social institution into which they enter.”

    Yes, they seek to abolish the man-woman requirement. Duh. I don’t think they care about any “marital presumption of paternity,” a notion that apparently kicks in if children are involved, which they may or may not be, and which are not a legal requirement to get, or stay, married.

    Two straight men show up for a license to get married; they delcare that they are not sexually attracted to one another but are nonetheless eager to gain state and federal benefits; and they love each other as brothers; in fact, they are siblings born of the same mom and dad.

    Eligible to marry or not? Why or why not?

    Make it three straight men — all three siblings born of the same parents. Eligible to marry or not?

    Take the love part out of the equation. Eligible to marry or not?

    Really, Chairm, I think you can do better than this!!

38. Nicholas
    Posted November 24, 2009 at 3:51 am | Permalink

    Kevinn,

    "To qualify for the special status of marriage, a couple must be composed of two consenting adults. That’s all it takes to get a marriage license. Or should be."

    Really, two consenting adults is all that is needed to get a marriage license? Wow, then why did I go through all the hubbub to get married? Was I mistaken about marriage? Could it really be about the benies all along? Surely, there is more to marriage then what you propose (pun intended). I mean, if all marriage takes is "two consenting adults," doesn't that minimize marriage to no more than an aquaintance type of relationship? And if this is all it is, then why get married? What would be the need then to have relationship recognized via a marriage license?

39. Chairm
    Posted November 24, 2009 at 5:09 am | Permalink

    If the SSMer could justify the prohibition of siblings -- gay or otherwise -- from SSM, he would have spelled it out.

    He did not. That's another concession.

    Also note how the SSMer deliberately evaded the problem of why society accords a special status to the social institution of marriage. Instead of the societal significance of marriage, the SSMer hyper-personalizes and flees from the central problem of SSM argumentation.

    There is no offered justification for a society issuing a license for the thing the SSMer demands be treated on par with marital status.

    Marital status is a special status. It is a social and legal status to which society, as a whole, consents to accord the social instituton of marriage.

    This is so for special reason. That reason is found in the core meaning of this foundational social institution. That core, that special reason, for special status does NOT apply to any one-sexed arrangement, regardless of gayness, regardless of straightness, regardless of adult consent.

    SSMers do not understand the profound flaw in their argumentation. There is no special reason for special status for SSM. None.

    Their own argumentation concedes this when SSM is described as merely an agreement between consenting adults whose private reasons suffice for society to accord a special status for this thing, SSM.

    Hence the questions about consenting siblings -- in twosomes or moresomes. A declaration of love would not transform consent into eligibility. SSMers know this to be true but either are in favor of changing the boundary, based solely on consent, or hypocritically deny that the consent of some adults is on par with the consent of adults in a particular identity group -- the gaycentric group.

    The questions asked earlier specifically included scenarios with gay individuals. These siblings would be eligible for SSM, according to the pro-SSM response above, just as non-gay siblings would be eligible for SSM.

    The SSMer provided no justification for exclusion. There is none that SSM argumentation can provide.

    Meanwhile, the core of marriage provides the just basis for legitimately drawing lines based on relatedness and on number. Once again, these lines are not drawn on the basis of consent alone nor on the basis of gayness or nongayness. The core of marriage is not sex neutral even if it is neutral regarding the gayness of the persons who'd show-up for a license to marry.

    SSM is one thing. Marriage is a different thing. The core meanings are different, as the SSMer above has conceded again.

40. Chairm
    Posted November 24, 2009 at 5:18 am | Permalink

    The marital presumption is entailed in the consent to marry. That consent comes from the man and the woman; and also from society. This is a vigorously enforced legal requirement.

    As the SSMer above concedes, the core of marriage does not fit the one-sexed arrangement. And that is so regardless of the gayness or nongayness of the one-sexed arrangement.

    On the other hand, the marital presumption of paternity kicks-in immediately, upon consummation of the marriage, and even if one of the married individuals later decided to divorce and to take on a gay persona, the husband would be presumed the father of children born to his wife during their marriage.

    And that is so -- regardless of gayness or nongayness of the husband and his wife.

    See, marriage's core meaning is truly neutral toward gayness.

    SSM is not -- according to SSM argumentation -- since the chief feature of SSM is gayness and it is this that SSMers insist society must honor with a special status.

    If they deny it, well, then, their inability to provide a special reason for special status for SSM becomes magnified. This lack of justification means that the pro-gay bigotry of the hardliners among the SSM campaign is front and center -- because they seek to use gayness to pick an identity group out of the nonmarriage category of relationships and arrangements. That favoritism is also unjustified by SSM argumentation.

    The net result is a campaign in the name of gay identity politics which blatantly denies justice and instead is all about gaycentric vesion of "just us".