Star Trek's Sulu comes out of the closet

[Night Marshal]

The some the problem with the Gay rights movement is that it rushing to get Court decision rather that building up a wide base of support force law maker to change to law like the womenÆs movement or civil rights movements later. You can see the signs that the change is coming its only a matter of time and I know to the people who are alive right now the wait is painful but in the end the people that come after you will remember you with honor.

I would also think the Gay rights movement has to move above being a Democratic issue to a issue both Republicans can support. And don't tell me that you don't think christens won't support you I'm Republican, Christian and happy married but I can see when someone wants a right given to them and honestly I don't see the harm in it. Sure you won't get everyone but you never do.

[SpooRancher]

Well, I'm neither Republican nor Democrat. I'm Libertarian. And my take on the "gay marriage" issue is this:

All government recognized unions should be Civil Unions. If the people involved wish to call their union a marriage, let their church perform a "marriage" ceremony. That would then be different depending on the religion of the people involved. Wiccans and other pagans would have no problem allowing "gay marriage" at that point.

Another thing. We are limiting this to "one man and one woman". What about polygamy? Where does the government get off saying that consenting adults cannot enter into a polygamous relationship of their own free will? If the people involved in the relationship have no problem with one man and two women, or any other such amalgamation, where is it for people outside the relationship to get involved?

Sex, like everything to do with "marriage" is something that should be discussed among the people involved in the situation, not bystanders.

[Dr Maturin]

Nope. Marriage conveys distinct legal rights. It's not just about acceptance it's (just to name one item) about having the right to have your life partner automatically your next of kin. Even leaving religion completely out of the equation, marriage is a legal and social contract, not just a social sanctioning of sexual relations.

There are other ways around that without calling it marriage. Marriage is, and was, between a man and a woman. That's the definition. When same-sex couples marry, it's something else. Let's call it the bonding. They could get all the same legal rights but without getting the title of a "married couple." One way of looking at it is like this:

Phil: So, you been workin' here long, John?
John: Yep. Twelve years.
Phil: You married?
John: Oh yeah...eight years.
Phil: To a man or a woman?

[Jan]

There are other ways around that without calling it marriage. Marriage is, and was, between a man and a woman. That's the definition.

"And was?" Since when? I take it that you're not aware that there seems to be evidence that the Catholic church used to have a same-sex wedding ceremony? What 'is now', isn't as 'ever has been' and certainly isn't as 'ever shall be'.

When same-sex couples marry, it's something else.

Why is it something else? A difference that makes no difference *is* no difference.

Let's call it the bonding. They could get all the same legal rights but without getting the title of a "married couple." One way of looking at it is like this:

Phil: So, you been workin' here long, John?
John: Yep. Twelve years.
Phil: You married?
John: Oh yeah...eight years.
Phil: To a man or a woman?

So 'Married' would be for a man and a woman. 'Bonded' for a same sex couple. What about SpooRancher's polygamous union, which I have no problem with at all? How about 'Joined'? Then you've got:

Phil: So, you been workin' here long, John?
John: Yep. Twelve years.
Phil: You married?
John: Nope
Phil: Bonded?
John: Nah
Phil: Joined?
John: Yeah, 8 years now. Engaged to a fourth member but he's dragging his feet.

Why would we need the 20 questions? In other words, if it looks like a duck, acts like a duck and quacks like a duck, it IS a duck. If a religion has issues with that, let them change things and offer 'sanctifications' if they like. They can do whatever they feel their god requires but a government should treat everybody equally.

We already have a perfectly usably word for both (or all) parties to the marriage, nicely gender-neutral: Spouse.

Jan

[Dr Maturin]

I don't know if your conversation piece was made in response to mine by mistaking that I wanted marriage to be between a man and a woman for simplicity of converstion, but if so, then you missed my entire point, which was that when someone says they are married, it should instantly be known what said marriage entails.

It wouldn't surprise me if the Catholic Church once married animals. They are so wishy-washy that nothing they do can be taken seriously.

And how can you support a polygamous union considering the psychological and emotional impact on the children (and for that case, the adults themselves) involved?

[Jan]

I don't know if your conversation piece was made in response to mine by mistaking that I wanted marriage to be between a man and a woman for simplicity of converstion, but if so, then you missed my entire point, which was that when someone says they are married, it should instantly be known what said marriage entails.

No, I simply used it as an example why your wanting to call the same relationship different things stikes me as kind of silly. The word isn't just a social shorthand and there's no reason why further elaboration woud be a bad thing. It happens all the time when somebody refers to 'my roommate' because it's simply no big deal to share living quarters platonically with a member of the opposite sex (leaving alone that many gay couples default to 'my roommate' if they're not comfortable saying 'my partner' or 'my spouse'). Saying 'I'm married' simply denotes that that person is in a committed and socially recognized relationship contract and doesn't need to include gender or numerical information.

It wouldn't surprise me if the Catholic Church once married animals. They are so wishy-washy that nothing they do can be taken seriously.

And now you're missing my point. The point was that you said:

Marriage is, and was, between a man and a woman.

and I gave one example of how 'and was' was false. You didn't answer my question as to when, to your mind, marriage became restricted to being between a man and a woman because there are certainly other historic examples where your statement simply isn't true..

And how can you support a polygamous union considering the psychological and emotional impact on the children (and for that case, the adults themselves) involved?

Show me the recent studies on those impacts, please, if you're going to use that as an argument. If the contract of marriage has a component of providing a stable, safe environment for children, then one would think that a polygamous household would provide more stability, not less. As it is now, we've got a system whereby one partner can be absolved of all but financial responsibility for children the moment s/he gets bored. How stable and safe is that when the number is only two? Zap, with the stroke of a judges pen, a child can lose 50% of whatever stability s/he had. Having had one parent disappear from it's life, how protected is that child likely to feel knowing that anything might happen to the only one left?

And again, what psychological and emotional impact on the adults involved? Would there be any more of them for somebody in a polygamous marriage if a spouse divorced the group? Or would there be fewer, in fact, due to the support available from the remaining members?

Unless you mean jealousy. Sorry, can't address that one because I'm simply not wired to understand that kind of possessiveness. One can love and commit to another person without requiring exclusive rights to that persons love or sexual favors.

Jan

[vacantlook]

It wouldn't surprise me if the Catholic Church once married animals.

[snark]

Why not? God first tried to do so with Adam. What? You mean you didn't know that God first tried to see if any of the animals he created were suitable mates for Adam before it dawned on God to create Eve?

The Lord God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him."

Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them... [blah blah blah].

But for Adam no suitable helper was found. So the Lord God [made Eve].

Genesis 2:18-22

Blandly dismiss it as personally desired, but silly ol' God had to actually parade the animals before Adam before he knew that a suitable mate for Adam wasn't among them. Something makes me think God just wasn't very bright. Either that or some idiots wrote some of the Bible.

[/snark]

Alas, biblically, God created Eve to be a suitable helper for Adam, and thus we have the first marriage of the Bible. God seems to like people working together. It would seem that God's primary concern with arranging Adam's marriage is "suitablility." A woman is just not a suitable mate for a gay man. Thus using God's initial marriage criteria of suitability as the basis for marriage, one could very well say that God can be listed in the "yay gay marriage" column.

[snark]

Oh, and I think we should start giving out free bouquets of roses. But people can only have such a bouquet if they agree to always call their bouquet not a bouquet of roses but instead must call it a bouquet of poop. That way everyone can differentiate between this free bouquet and bouquets purchased as they're clearly two completely different things.

[/snark]

[Shr'eshhhhhh]

I had this explained to me before. According to the newish Pope, gay people are ok, not necessarily evil (just morally disordered) until they have sex with each other. Which (because men can't make babies together) is a sin.

What about infertile couples or married couples of a certain age? Wasn't John the Baptist's mother Elizabeth 'barren' and 'passed the age'?

In order to concieve the herald of Christ, St Liz and Mr The Baptist Snr must have had sinful non-baby sex.

The Bible is weirder than the weirdest babblings of a weird bunch of weird people, in my not so humble opinion.

[Jan]

I had this explained to me before. According to the newish Pope, gay people are ok, not necessarily evil (just morally disordered) until they have sex with each other. Which (because men can't make babies together) is a sin.

Good point, Shr'eshhhhhh. You know...I just started wondering why 'marriage' can be an activity restricted to a man and a woman but 'sex' isn't. Seems that it applies to all sorts of hookups. So I checked out a handy online dictionary and found this definition for the word sex:

the sum of the structural, functional, and behavioral characteristics of living things that are involved in reproduction by two interacting parents and that distinguish males and females

...emphasis mine. So it's obvious that the Pope is incorrect because gays and lesbians can't have sex because they're not involved in reproduction. Isn't that a relief? And all this time people've been worried about how tab A might interact with slots B or C. Or how slot A might interact with slots B or C and calling it sex.

What's that? It's the same thing, it's all sex? Funny, that's exactly what I said about marriage...

Jan

[Dr Maturin]

No, I simply used it as an example why your wanting to call the same relationship different things stikes me as kind of silly.

But it isn't the same thing. This was written by my female homosexual friend:

Deleted due to Jan's unnecessary coronary

[Ranger1]

What ever floats their boat,im ok with that.

Thank god (uh huh) i dont believe in the almighty...come on sparky,lets go hunting for some wabbits.

[Jan]

<quick dive under the desk for Moderator hat> First off, did you repost that with permission, ZD? If not, please edit most of it out and post a link to the original instead. <dumps Moderator hat back under desk>

There are several points about that quote I disagree with but the main one is that if all of this has been about state and federal revenue, this society is even more fucked up than I'd ever imagined. Thankfully, I don't.

Governments have been more than slightly adept at generating revenue and replacing lost revenue streams since the beginning of government. In addition, most tax incentives are for children (those cute little deductions), not for marriage. In fact there's still a 'marriage penalty' in the standard deduction for married couples filing jointly. I don't think anybody's naive enough to think that children result only from married parents.

I sincerely hope that your friend and her spouse have medical powers of attorney designating each other as decision-makers in case of incpacity. Because without that, the hospital will find somebody else to make those decisions for them. Somebody who might not follow their wishes. Among other things, that marriage license she distains conveys 'next of kin' status to spouses.

BTW, why did you make a point of her sexuality? It was already clear in the post and I don't see that her lesbianism lends any weight to her opinion.

Jan

[Dr Maturin]

<quick dive under the desk for Moderator hat> First off, did you repost that with permission, ZD? If not, please edit most of it out and post a link to the original instead. <dumps Moderator hat back under desk>

There are several points about that quote I disagree with but the main one is that if all of this has been about state and federal revenue, this society is even more fucked up than I'd ever imagined. Thankfully, I don't.

Governments have been more than slightly adept at generating revenue and replacing lost revenue streams since the beginning of government. In addition, most tax incentives are for children (those cute little deductions), not for marriage. In fact there's still a 'marriage penalty' in the standard deduction for married couples filing jointly. I don't think anybody's naive enough to think that children result only from married parents.

Someone is behind on the laws. "Bush's" wonderful tax cuts have repealed the so-called "marriage pentalty," at least temporarily.

I sincerely hope that your friend and her spouse have medical powers of attorney designating each other as decision-makers in case of incpacity. Because without that, the hospital will find somebody else to make those decisions for them. Somebody who might not follow their wishes. Among other things, that marriage license she distains conveys 'next of kin' status to spouses.

Well, it's not really my business what she does, but given her innate brilliance, I'm sure she's thought that far ahead, especially given her hate of Michael Schiavo and that fiasco that took place down in Florida.

[Jan]

<Moderator speak> Er...about that repost. IS it with permission?? </Moderator speak>

Someone is behind on the laws. "Bush's" wonderful tax cuts have repealed the so-called "marriage pentalty," at least temporarily.

Ah, thanks. I lost my 'penalty' before that happend. <g>

Well, it's not really my business what she does, but given her innate brilliance, I'm sure she's thought that far ahead, especially given her hate of Michael Schiavo and that fiasco that took place down in Florida.

I'm hope so. My point was that marriage conveys more rights than simply incentives to have children as your friend suggests. Anybody with the least amount of sense knows that the incentive vs. cost is still *way* out of kilter anyway.

Jan

[Shr'eshhhhhh]

"Honestly, I haven't even started yet. I could go on for ages about the degeneracy of a large segment of the "gay community," with their obscene "pride parades" and their disgusting behavior, vulgar in public and recklessly promiscuous in private."

I couldn't agree more, somehow it's alright for some gay people to gerate half naked in public in the name of their 'so called' human rights. But when straight girls walk around in the height of winter wearing nothing more than a lycra belt mascarading as a dress, and it's put down as mere 'street fashion'. And what the brave young heterosexual men who shout obscenities at them from building sites and fast cars, aren't they expressing their repressed sexual identity? Why can't gay men just wind down their car windows and turn the air blue like their straight neighbours instead of giving out balloons on floats and wearing leather fetish wear in built up areas.

"I could talk about the many gay people I've encountered who were disrespectful, unpatriotic, and sleazy, not just in the usual way but in ways that were directly related to their homosexuality and their unabashed desire to promote their agenda through any means possible."

Do these people have webcam feeds?

" 'I could talk about Michael Rogers and John Kerry and the way they used homosexuality as a weapon. I could talk about a hundred more reasons why I think gay marriage is a bad idea, and why I think the people trying to promote it are bad people doing bad things for bad reasons."

That's just nit-picking isn't it?