Gay Marriage: should the government ban it?

[quote=“Okami”]One question:

Wipt: I never said it bothered me. Please do not misquote or put words in my mouth. I said I think it’s a farce. If two gay people want to get married then let them. I didn’t say it should be illegal nor legal as that is not for me to decide. I expressed my opinion of it. Labeling me and assuming that I have opinions that I don’t have is intellectually dishonest and slander. Please find some real demons, because none reside under this handle. :smiling_imp:

Okami[/quote]

Well, I never said that you said it bothered you. I didn’t misquote you or put words in your mouth, either. Intellectually dishonest? Slander!!!? What the hell are you talking about? As for labels, it seems to me that you have slapped a label on yourself; your words say it all. And I haven’t seen anyone assume that you have opinions other than those which you, yourself, have not so eloquently expressed.

Go on, express your opinion. No one is trying to deny you that right. But someone else’s opinion about your opinion hardly amounts to intellectual dishonesty or slander. Get a grip!

This is my last post on this subject. I hate being taken out of context and misconstrued which seems to be on everybody’s to do list when they write a post and reference me.

Neo, we have a couple points to go over mate.

I can’t believe you don’t see where and how this is wrong. You can’t hide your skin color, but you can hide the fact that you’re gay. Blacks as a group come from poorer families, where as gays tend to be educated and well-off. A boss will not look at an applicant and be able to say, he’s gay so I won’t hire him. This is not the case with black people. I can’t get a job in the area I grew up in unless the boss knows I’m white or I change my name(I have what could be called a typical African American name). I’ve applied for jobs as a waiter and been called in to be a dishwasher, though I had years of experience as a waiter on my application. I learned to change my name when I was desperate applying for crap jobs and no one was calling me back. This doesn’t happen to gay people. I’ve never seen a poor rundown gay neighborhood with liquor stores on every corner. Yes they are both minorities, but there experiences are as different as night and day. You never forget the look on their face and the tone of their voice when your black friends lament about being tired of going to his friends’(yes that’s plural) funeral. I don’t think anything under gay qualifies for that except AIDS and that’s not a gay specific disease(No disease is).

[quote=“Neo”]In your long post, you seem to now restrict your argument to the more narrow point that there is no need for the additional legislation when they are already covered. Seems like you’re basically saying we shouldn’t have gay marriage because it would be a lot of legislative trouble in the 50 states.

Well, since the social structure, coverage and support apparently exists already (as you seem to state), then all the more reason to just go ahead and draft the additional legislation. I’m sure we can find a few gay supporters out there to craft the legislation, and it’ll be no skin off of your back. I promise you, it won’t require even 10 minutes of your time.[/quote]
Considering the considerable problems facing most states in the US. I find Gay marriage to not take precedence over education, infrastructure, job creation, educational reform or many other things. If gay marriage is so damn popular and such a hot bed issue, then why hasn’t the gay lobby already written this bill and presented it to state legislatures? Gays are very politically and socially active. So far we have what, Vermont? That doesn’t seem to be a big precedent to me. We have trouble getting some states to take sodomy laws off the books, how much harder and more time consuming would it be to pass gay marriage legislation?

For the record and before anyone else distorts my views and meanings, I neither support nor object to gay marriage. I consider it a non-issue of little importance taking up far too much attention that could be directed elsewhere. I do not care one iota if someone is gay or not. That is their private choice and none of my business.

Done with this topic and being misconstrued,
Okami

I’ll let Okami’s words speak for themselves, especially the ‘own private choice’ bit, but I wonder if he feels that black people who can pass for white should hide it from everyone, and how he feels about that. If all black people and other minorities could somehow disguise themselves as white people, then should they? Would it then become a ‘non-issue’?

Though Okami is apparently not interested in continuing this discussion, I will respond because others surely are.

Without wishing to be accused of misrepresenting your comments, I take “marriage” as state and national recognition of a two-person loving relationship. The religious arguments only take us backwards. The “use” of this marriage is its benefit to a fair society: it will give equality to all couples and afford all of them the same rights that recognition provides.

[quote=“Okami”]
Gay marriage is a farce because the whole legal framework is already there.

I don’t see the use of it though with the already existing legal framework that I have mention being in existence. There is no majority suppressing their rights to have shared access to property and investment, just missing some measly benefits from majority of businesses and gov’ts(US, state, and local). there is no one saying they can’t have a life partner. So where is the problem and why is it such a pressing concern?[/quote]

Let

You must have been hanging out with a pretty low crowd of gay people. This certainly doesn’t describe the monogamous, boring gay couples I know who have no interest in bathhouses and orgies. In fact, I don’t know any lesbians who have been to orgies, short of the ones you read about in Hustler magazine. If gay people are far more hedonistic, what’s up with the straight extramarital affairs and whorehouses that dot Taiwan and just about every other country but the Vatican? (And we’ve already got an inclination of what goes on there.)

I wouldn’t even want to work with someone at work who told me every detail of every orgy they’d been to each week, gay or straight. A little inappropriate to talk about on the job, don’t ya think?

Who cares if they have higher divorce rates and shorter relationships? Doesn’t this mean more business and job creation for therapists, divorce attorneys and religious institutions who need to save the souls of others? Isn’t that a good thing? Don’t we want to create jobs and live comfortably?

Just a note to Okami, and nothing personal but do you know that in Japanese, OKAMI means “old pot”, which is slang for a gay man? You might want to think about changing your user name here.

For those who think the battle is over: “Top Senator Backs Amendment Banning Gay Marriage”

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&ncid=578&e=3&u=/nm/20030629/ts_nm/congress_marriage_dc

Every once in a while, I wonder whether I should vote Republican, since I am conservative on fiscal and economic issues and tend to be hawkish on foreign policy issues.

It’s reading articles like this that make me realize why I always vote Democrat. For crying out loud, he is the fricking leader of the US Senate and he believes this stuff? Might as well have Trent Lott back heading the Senate. Maybe even Jesse Helms.

This is a total non-sequitor. I think you’ve missed the point. Discrimination is wrong. The experience that each person goes through is different. One black person’s experience is also totally different from another black person’s experience. A poor inner city black person’s experience is different from a rich suburban black person’s experience. That doesn’t make it right to discriminate against one black person but not the other. Nor does it make it right to discriminate against a rich gay person just because he can get jobs you can’t.

I’m sure gay people have plenty of their own unique problems that are just as bad in their own way. At least if you’re black, you have the social support of your own family. I can’t imagine what it would be like to be rejected by my own family because I was gay.

Also, I guarantee you no one has had it as bad as any hate crime victim that has been tortured, beaten up and killed. I am sure a gay kid who was killed would scoff at you for thinking your problems were worse than his. He’s dead, you’re alive.

Yes, what an evil bigot he is. First he rejects the ruling of the supreme court and then he goes on to compare the “illegality” of consensual same-sex sex with prostitution and drug abuse.


Meanwhile, in the UK

[quote]The government will today unveil a social revolution giving same-sex partners legal rights, which will make them married in all but name. The changes will give gay and lesbian couples rights over pensions, inheritance tax, property, social security and benefits which have long been taken for granted by married heterosexual people.
They will also take on responsibilities, and one partner may face paying alimony to the other in the event of the legal partnership being dissolved. [/quote]

Hallelujah!

I’ll be returning to the UK with my Taiwanese BF next year. The laws really have improved over the last few years, and we now only need to prove 2 years cohabitation in order for him to get his residency. :sunglasses:

I was once puzzled by a statement I saw written on a wall in hawaii (very PC and racially mixed) it said “racists are queers”…I thought that was soo frickin stupid, they are criticizing prejudice yet using another form of prejudice in doing it. You often see jokes where they equate racists like neo-nazi’s with homosexuals, but in a way those people who say that are just as bad, they are just prejudice in a different way. Pretty ironic

WASHINGTON, July 30

Oh let people marry. If a gay couple can have a long term committed relationship, good for them. Let them legalize thier union.

Many states (Oregon is one) allow domestic partners of State employees to be covered by the employee’s health benifits. When the State of Oregon started letting hetro couples have this beni, the State determined that a gay couple that met the same criteria (I think it was 5 years of co-habitation) they also were allowed to qualify. 'Bout time too.

:unamused: Sheesh…what’s next on the agenda?

WASHINGTON, August 26 President Bush said today that federal government lawyers are working on legislation that would seek to ‘protect’ black people from the dangers of swimming.
“I believe black people don’t swim well, and I believe we ought to codify that one way or the other, and we have lawyers looking at the best way to do that,” Mr. Bush said at a news conference. “Next we’ll be looking at a law against Asian and women drivers, with special clauses for female Asian drivers,” he continued.

Bush said yesterday:

Great. He’s dealing with this from the angle of sin. :unamused: :shock:

Thank God I’m from Canada. :smiley:

Risking being called a Bushwhacker once more I voted “no”.

I think George Bush should piss off.

Why? Is he standing in the way of your nuptials?