[quote]Grneyes wrote:
Ahhh…I get it now. You think marriage is for CHILD REARING!!![/quote]
It is. Otherwise, society would give two craps about your relationship. You wouldn’t be afforded anymore privilege than a pair of roommates. As for those that don’t have children, already dealt with.
Only two? Heartless bigot.
[quote]ZEB wrote:
One cannot change a 5000 year old institution without it “suffering” in some way. And what’s even more scary is that the damage will not be seen right away. It will take years for these chickens to come home to roost.
Between the the incredibly poor health statistics that follow homosexual men like a shadow, to the long term influence that may damage children, to thier promiscutiy (even when in so called committed relationships), to any number of other things. We have no idea what this horrific social experiment will bring forth. But I have a really good idea that it’s not going to be good just from what I’ve seen and read about this particular group.
[/quote]
It has changed numerous times through history. These modern norms for marriage were created with the rise of modern states in the 19th century and the purpose of it all is basically to secure that the state has enough gunfood readily at hand when needed. That’s the original reason why modern states/countries sanction and protect marriage.
But I do undestand your point and share your fear for the disintegration of family structures and the social problems that comes with it. But I still can’t see how it has anything to do with homosexuals and I’m totally unable to see the mechanism how homosexual marriages or unions or whatever would undermine the family structure. It’s already undermined by the actions of heterosexuals themselves on one hand and societal changes on the other.
The traditional western family was also more than just the parents and the kids, as you certainly know. It was a survival machine were everybody from small children to grandparents had a role to play. Modern families can’t directly be compared with that. In those times a marriage between two men would truly have been outrageus.
I’m all for family values, why wouldn’t I, father of three of whom two have already succesfully left the nest. From my point of view family values don’t even necessarily need formal marriage, though me and my wife are married not only once but twice, first secularly, and then just to make our grandmothers happy got a blessing from the church, with ceremonies and all 
Um, you still haven’t explained to us why we’re supposed to reward romantic relationships with special statuses and privileges…You continue to answer without actually dealing with the question. What is it about gay romantic relationships that is so critically important to humanity. There must be some irreplaceable service it provides to justify your discrimination over ever other form of human relationship (but one).
Romance, isn’t an answer, it simply describes the friggen nature of the relationship. What the heck does their romance have to do with anything? I’ve already pointed out the obvious reason why we do privilege hetero marriage. Now you tell me what justifies your new novel discrimination; raising homosexual ‘romance’ up onto a pedeastal.
At least us traditional marriage folk easily provide an argument for the present 1 man and woman model, justifying our discrimination and privileging between human relationships. You on the otherhand have yet to give us a rational argument for privileging a mere one more human relationship (you titan of tolerance). You want us to favor homosexual relationships without ANY justifiable reasons. Who is the bigot here? The one with rational reasons for discriminating, us? Or the person, you, wanting society to discriminate based on some irrational emotional attachment?
[quote]Grneyes wrote:
[quote]ZEB wrote:
[quote]kaaleppi wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
2. It’s the launching pad for a much broader goal. That being redefining marriage to mean pretty much nothing to society.
[/quote]
I’ve said it before and repeat it again, it has already been done, by good heterosexual married couples, there is nothing left for you to save. That somebody somewhere has a lasting relationship is nothing more but an anachronism. Maybe the western world should introduce iranian style temporary marriages as an alternative to lifelong committment.[/quote]
Maybe you better check the statistics on that one. The divorce rate is not as high as you may think for those who have been married only only once. Those who have been married multiple times drive up the divorce rate for everyone. Taking away those who have been married multiple times the divorce rate is only something like 25%.
If gay marriage is allowed in all 50 states the divorce rate will skyrocket. It has been demonstrated in multiple studies and survey’s that homosexual men are quite promiscuous. And even those who consider themselves in a long lasting relationship have two to three sexual encounters outside their partner on a yearly basis.
[/quote]
So do lots of heterosexual men and women…what’s your point? [/quote]
You can’t understand my point from what I’ve written? (eye roll) Statistically homosexual men have proven themselves to be promiscuous far beyond that of normal heterosexual men.
[quote]Makavali wrote:
Please, you can hardly talk. Disguising your prose as substance when in reality you know if you said what you mean plainly you know people would ignore you.[/quote]
Oh no - another “attack of the prose”! Sorry, Mak - I speak plainly enough. That’s what gets me in trouble with the likes of Forlife. He knows exactly what I mean, and he doesn’t like it.
It shouldn’t be - I reply to Forlife for the sheer lazy sport of continuing to refuting his weak and ever-more-bizarre arguments, or remind him that these arguments have already been addressed.
As for you, you haven’t added anything worthwhile to this thread, or frankly much of anything for a while. Tirib doesn’t need me to fight his battles, but your imbecilic (and irrelevant) reply to his post here deserved additional attention - after all, it’s troll season.
[quote]therajraj wrote:
[quote]ZEB wrote:
[quote]therajraj wrote:
[quote]ZEB wrote:
An interesting fact, gay marriage has been legal in the Netherlands now for over ten years. And statistics indicate that the average duration of a homosexual union to be one and a half years!
They are a promiscuous bunch. But then we all know that and most homosexuals will not deny it. In fact,
Here are just a few statistics for those who have bought into the pro homosexual media slant:
The failure of gay marriage in the few states that allow it will in all likely hood be caused by their own actions.
[/quote]
Same-sex marriage has been legal in Ontario for 8 years. Divorce rates have not changed in that time period.
[/quote]
In Ontario, like other places that have legalized homosexual unions, there is a big rush to get married when gay marriage laws are passed. Then it slows down to a trickle and in Ontario’s case it practically stopped. Ontario is one of those areas where not many homosexuals have actually gotten married. So I guess that wouldn’t effect the divorce rate would it? [/quote]
I can’t find a statistic for the divorce rate between same sex marriages, but there were 6,524 same sex marriages in Ontario between 2003 and 2006 (the most of any province).
In any case the divorce rates of same sex marriage will never have a large effect on the divorce rate because as you said they make up less than 1% of the population (I actually didn’t realize that until you pointed it out).
If those interested in gay marriage account for only 1% of the population, how can divorce rates ever skyrocket from the result of high divorce rates in the gay community?[/quote]
They can’t. I never made that claim.
[quote]kaaleppi wrote:
[quote]ZEB wrote:
One cannot change a 5000 year old institution without it “suffering” in some way. And what’s even more scary is that the damage will not be seen right away. It will take years for these chickens to come home to roost.
Between the the incredibly poor health statistics that follow homosexual men like a shadow, to the long term influence that may damage children, to thier promiscutiy (even when in so called committed relationships), to any number of other things. We have no idea what this horrific social experiment will bring forth. But I have a really good idea that it’s not going to be good just from what I’ve seen and read about this particular group.
[/quote]
It has changed numerous times through history. These modern norms for marriage were created with the rise of modern states in the 19th century and the purpose of it all is basically to secure that the state has enough gunfood readily at hand when needed. That’s the original reason why modern states/countries sanction and protect marriage.
But I do undestand your point and share your fear for the disintegration of family structures and the social problems that comes with it. But I still can’t see how it has anything to do with homosexuals and I’m totally unable to see the mechanism how homosexual marriages or unions or whatever would undermine the family structure. It’s already undermined by the actions of heterosexuals themselves on one hand and societal changes on the other.
The traditional western family was also more than just the parents and the kids, as you certainly know. It was a survival machine were everybody from small children to grandparents had a role to play. Modern families can’t directly be compared with that. In those times a marriage between two men would truly have been outrageus.
I’m all for family values, why wouldn’t I, father of three of whom two have already succesfully left the nest. From my point of view family values don’t even necessarily need formal marriage, though me and my wife are married not only once but twice, first secularly, and then just to make our grandmothers happy got a blessing from the church, with ceremonies and all
[/quote]
Well it is indeed one very large and dangerous social experiment isn’t it? And as I’ve said we won’t know the harm that it does, or lack thereof, for many years to come. And we are doing this why? Very loud gay groups who have money and lobby power. Furthermore, we cannot with good conscience withhold marriage from polygamists or incestuous couples, or any other sort of consenting perverted adult unions can we? How can we rationalize doing that? Soon they too will have the organization, money and political power to get the same rights.
And so it goes…
[quote]Grneyes wrote:
LOL…you think marriage to an infertile person is going to stop a fertile person from possibly having children outside that marriage? No, that fertile person is going to try his or her damnedest to have kids, if they want kids. They might even, wait for it…DIVORCE that infertile person!!! Marriage, we should know by now, will not and does not stop a person from having sex with someone NOT his/her spouse. [/quote]
Sure, under a properly understood regime of marriage. Part of the marriage regime is attaching shame to infidelity (and dangers of out of wedlock children). And, yes, it worked just fine (as good as it could), until we suddenly decided that infidelity wasn’t so bad after all (a terrible social choice).
When marriage was marriage, this mechanism worked like it was supposed to. When we later decided that marriage was, oh, just a pat on the back for wanting to co-habitate with someone that was as disposable as the next fad, that mechanism has ceased to work well.
[quote]Makavali wrote:
[quote]Cortes wrote:
Forlife, the next time you bring up confirmatory bias in one of the religious threads I’m going to throw up the link to this thread. You clearly are not exempt.
You mind telling us just what the purpose of marriage is, if it aint what Sloth and TB here posit?[/quote]
Marriage doesn’t have a single purpose, despite what people might think. Marriage has multiple purposes, which don’t all have to be fulfilled.
[/quote]
Perhaps you’d like to let us know what those other purposes are, then, because the question’s been hanging around like a hot fart on a still day for pages now and I still have yet to see anyone from your side even attempt to provide an answer to it.
[quote]ZEB wrote:
If gay marriage is allowed in all 50 states the divorce rate will skyrocket. It has been demonstrated in multiple studies and survey’s that homosexual men are quite promiscuous. And even those who consider themselves in a long lasting relationship have two to three sexual encounters outside their partner on a yearly basis.
[/quote]
[quote]
I don’t know, I guess that depends on the topic and the amount of change. People want to change the 5000 year old institution of marriage for what? Less than 1% of the population (the percentage of gays who are interested in marriage)? How does that help society? While I can think of a number of ways it can hurt it and the institution of marriage. And many of them has been discussed on this thread. [/quote]
You did.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]forlife wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Further, even in infertile couples, most likely one of the individuals is fertile, and their marriage continues to support the traditional mission of marriage by discouraging that the fertile-but-married individual from getting in the business of illegitimate children.
[/quote]
Yep! And even when both are infertile, what the child sees is that men and women grow up, take vows, and marry. Nature and numbers fullfills the actual purpose. Infertile couples still exhibit the desired model, period. They support the frequency to which this arrangment is encountered, making it a deeply ingrained norm. I for one won’t go over this point, again. I just will not play these stupid games on this forum anymore.[/quote]
How about addressing my point that what the child sees are people getting the benefits of marriage with no intention to ever have children? This directly threatens your model of marriage, because it removes the motivation to have children and offers a CONFLICTING model, whereby people can marry without ever having children.
If people can get married without having children, why the hell would they be motivated and incented to follow your model?
They wouldn’t, and you know it as well as I do.[/quote]
Knock it off. Your question implies that it’s better to have THOSE men and women ordering sex outside of marriage. As if THAT would be a preferable model to those same children…
The model, one last time, is that men and women come together as opposite sexes, ordering sex within a committed relationship. Nature and numbers, regardless of private intent or biological dysfunction, ensure the purpose. In the meantime, the better model is that the infertile, or the not ready, or the never, are ordering sex within committed relationships with the opposite sex (that smallest unit). The only alternative (which you should have realized) is that we make a model of sex outside of marriage for the opposite sexes. That’s it forlife, I mean it. There’s only so much trolling a debate I’ll tolerate.[/quote]
I’m under no illusion that anything I say would change your opposition to gay marriage, and that’s ok. This will be my last post to you on this, because I’ll just be repeating myself.
Your latest post is a clear admission that you see the value of marriage as providing a morally acceptable structure for straight couples to have sex. I suspected this all along. It’s not that marriage is about ordering biological offspring as you claimed earlier. Now it’s a moral model, based on your conviction that sex outside of marriage is wrong.
Your opposition to gay marriage is similarly based on your moral conviction that gay sex is categorically wrong, whether inside or outside of marriage.
This is what I’ve been saying all along. The battle for gay rights is ultimately, unavoidably, a MORAL debate. People who are morally opposed to homosexuality will resist gay marriage to their dying day, and no amount of logic or evidence will make any difference to their views.
I’m ok with that. Why? Because the tide of public opinion has moved inexorably toward supporting equality for gays. We have made revolutionary progress just in the 8 years that I’ve been out as a gay man, and that progress will continue.
In the meantime, I’ll do my best to educate people, break down the stereotypes, and personalize the discussion where I can. When people actually know gay men and women, especially when those people are friends and family, their perspectives change. And that, far more than any discussion in a bodybuilding forum, is what will move us forward as a society capable of respecting and even appreciating people that are different from us.
[quote]Cortes wrote:
[quote]forlife wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Further, even in infertile couples, most likely one of the individuals is fertile, and their marriage continues to support the traditional mission of marriage by discouraging that the fertile-but-married individual from getting in the business of illegitimate children.
[/quote]
Yep! And even when both are infertile, what the child sees is that men and women grow up, take vows, and marry. Nature and numbers fullfills the actual purpose. Infertile couples still exhibit the desired model, period. They support the frequency to which this arrangment is encountered, making it a deeply ingrained norm. I for one won’t go over this point, again. I just will not play these stupid games on this forum anymore.[/quote]
How about addressing my point that what the child sees are people getting the benefits of marriage with no intention to ever have children? This directly threatens your model of marriage, because it removes the motivation to have children and offers a CONFLICTING model, whereby people can marry without ever having children.
If people can get married without having children, why the hell would they be motivated and incented to follow your model?
They wouldn’t, and you know it as well as I do.[/quote]
Forlife, the next time you bring up confirmatory bias in one of the religious threads I’m going to throw up the link to this thread. You clearly are not exempt.
You mind telling us just what the purpose of marriage is, if it aint what Sloth and TB here posit?
[/quote]
I’ve said, explicitly and repeatedly, that I am as subject to confirmatory bias as anyone else. If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t be human.
Standard definition of marriage from Wiki:
[quote]Marriage is a social union or legal contract between people that creates kinship. It is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually intimate and sexual, are acknowledged in a variety of ways, depending on the culture or subculture in which it is found. Such a union, often formalized via a wedding ceremony, may also be called matrimony.
People marry for many reasons, including one or more of the following: legal, social, libido, emotional, economic, spiritual, and religious. These might include arranged marriages, family obligations, the legal establishment of a nuclear family unit, the legal protection of children and public declaration of commitment. The act of marriage usually creates normative or legal obligations between the individuals involved. In some societies these obligations also extend to certain family members of the married persons. Some cultures allow the dissolution of marriage through divorce or annulment.
Marriage is usually recognized by the state, a religious authority, or both. It is often viewed as a contract. Civil marriage is the legal concept of marriage as a governmental institution irrespective of religious affiliation, in accordance with marriage laws of the jurisdiction.[/quote]
Note that the standard definition doesn’t state having biological children is required, or is even the primary purpose of marriage. There are many valid reasons for marriage, and ordering biological children, while a worthy cause, is only one of those reasons.
[quote]forlife wrote:
Your latest post is a clear admission that you see the value of marriage as providing a morally acceptable structure for straight couples to have sex. I suspected this all along. It’s not that marriage is about ordering biological offspring as you claimed earlier. Now it’s a moral model, based on your conviction that sex outside of marriage is wrong.[/quote]
Sloth doesn’t need me to answer for him, but here is where you get it wrong (again): ordering biological offspring in a particular way is and always has been a moral issue. We don’t simply care that children are raised by their two parents for simply utilitarian reasons.
Which is, of course, why society privileges one form of child ordering and condemns the others.
Marriage is and always had the primary mission of ordering the birth and raising of children in a particular way. This cannot be disputed; it’s not up for debate.
If we want to change that mission, fine. Gay marriage advocates simply need to argue why we need that change and try and convince skeptics why this would be a good idea. In some cases, they have been successful at doing so - see New York.
But this plain idiocy that, in fact, marriage has been misunderstood for centuries as being about children when it has really - really, really, no trust me, despite everything we know about the cultural history of marriage - about honoring people’s affections for one another merely for the sake of honoring…people’s affections for one another and not much else - is the single worst argument for gay marriage I have ever heard.
It is dumb as hell. And desperate. And counterproductive to the movement.
Forlife, for all of your criticism of religious folk and your denunciation of their belief in something irrational, you are as guilty as the worst “Bible-thumper” you claim to distinguish yourself from. What you have said - and will say - regardless of logic, reason and common sense in support of your crusade deserves pity.
[quote]forlife wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]forlife wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Further, even in infertile couples, most likely one of the individuals is fertile, and their marriage continues to support the traditional mission of marriage by discouraging that the fertile-but-married individual from getting in the business of illegitimate children.
[/quote]
Yep! And even when both are infertile, what the child sees is that men and women grow up, take vows, and marry. Nature and numbers fullfills the actual purpose. Infertile couples still exhibit the desired model, period. They support the frequency to which this arrangment is encountered, making it a deeply ingrained norm. I for one won’t go over this point, again. I just will not play these stupid games on this forum anymore.[/quote]
How about addressing my point that what the child sees are people getting the benefits of marriage with no intention to ever have children? This directly threatens your model of marriage, because it removes the motivation to have children and offers a CONFLICTING model, whereby people can marry without ever having children.
If people can get married without having children, why the hell would they be motivated and incented to follow your model?
They wouldn’t, and you know it as well as I do.[/quote]
Knock it off. Your question implies that it’s better to have THOSE men and women ordering sex outside of marriage. As if THAT would be a preferable model to those same children…
The model, one last time, is that men and women come together as opposite sexes, ordering sex within a committed relationship. Nature and numbers, regardless of private intent or biological dysfunction, ensure the purpose. In the meantime, the better model is that the infertile, or the not ready, or the never, are ordering sex within committed relationships with the opposite sex (that smallest unit). The only alternative (which you should have realized) is that we make a model of sex outside of marriage for the opposite sexes. That’s it forlife, I mean it. There’s only so much trolling a debate I’ll tolerate.[/quote]
I’m under no illusion that anything I say would change your opposition to gay marriage, and that’s ok. This will be my last post to you on this, because I’ll just be repeating myself.
Your latest post is a clear admission that you see the value of marriage as providing a morally acceptable structure for straight couples to have sex. I suspected this all along. It’s not that marriage is about ordering biological offspring as you claimed earlier. Now it’s a moral model, based on your conviction that sex outside of marriage is wrong.
Your opposition to gay marriage is similarly based on your moral conviction that gay sex is categorically wrong, whether inside or outside of marriage.
This is what I’ve been saying all along. The battle for gay rights is ultimately, unavoidably, a MORAL debate. People who are morally opposed to homosexuality will resist gay marriage to their dying day, and no amount of logic or evidence will make any difference to their views.
I’m ok with that. Why? Because the tide of public opinion has moved inexorably toward supporting equality for gays. We have made revolutionary progress just in the 8 years that I’ve been out as a gay man, and that progress will continue.
In the meantime, I’ll do my best to educate people, break down the stereotypes, and personalize the discussion where I can. When people actually know gay men and women, especially when those people are friends and family, their perspectives change. And that, far more than any discussion in a bodybuilding forum, is what will move us forward as a society capable of respecting and even appreciating people that are different from us.
[/quote]
Not one part of this post dealt with any question I’ve asked. What critical function does homosexuality provide humanity that justifies discriminating against all other (but one) human relationships? Nothing. You’re not fighting discrimination, that’s the lie of it all. You actually want discrimination to favor your relationship, elevating and privileging it.
If marriage was just about ‘romance,’ I wouldn’t support state recognized marriage AT ALL. They’d have a bartender marry (if outsider even recognized such a concept) them off, and have any arrangments dealt with just like John Doe and his long time roommate would have to. Someone’s decision to be a party in some long term romance isn’t anymore special than the friendship of life long bachelor/bestfriends. It’s a completely subjective emotional opinion which the government WOULD have no business with. Romance doesn’t make you a superior person…
However, in the real world, heterosexuality does provide a critical function to humanity by, well, continuing it. Though not only continuing it, but also with the capability of doing so within intact households, providing a more conducive enviroment for maximizing healthy child-rearing.
You–noone–have/has yet to justifiy further ‘bigotry’ by elevating homosexuality above all human arrangments and relationships (except for one). AND that is exactly what you’re arguing for. Unless of course you’re the type who, when pressed, admits that the push for homosexual marriage really is about ushering in such. If not, then justify your ‘bigotry.’
[quote]Grneyes wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]therajraj wrote:
Why put mixed-marriages on a pedestal?
[/quote]
Because they can fullfill the most basic and critical role for civilized humanity just a well as a racially homogeneous couple. Rearing children in intact homes, with both biological parents present in a committed relationship. Humanity goes on without missing a beat if homosexuality disappeared. If heterosexuality vanished, humanity would disappear.
Not one person supporting gay marriage, yet denying an even larger agenda for marriage, has ever friggen explained why they choose to privilege a mere one other form of relationship above every other imaginative possibility. What is this special function and role of the homosexual that justifies discriminating against other human relationships? What critical role to humanity as whole, and US perpetuity, justifies it being raised above John Doe and his bestfriend-roommate, polyamorous relationships, a social network of single mothers/fathers/widows, etc.
Why does the ‘bigotry’ end with the whopping addition of a mere one form of human relationship to a privileged status? How has ‘bigotry’ even ended by discriminating yet again, which is matter-of-fact what transpires when you privilege one over others? It’s like saying you’re not a ‘bigot’ because you decided the Irish are white enough to join your golf club. What gives?
I’ll repeat myself again.
Pro-GAY marriage is a position taken up by faddish cultural drones. It’s a position which doesn’t have a single hour of actual thought put into it. I know this because it falls apart instantly when they agree that they’d not want the polyamorous-or whatever-afforded the same state status and privileges. They turn into stuttering fools when they realize they’re still discriminating, and doing so without any critical justification for it. The whole “consenting adults,” anti-‘bigotry,’ anti-inequality act goes out the window in a blubbering display of contradicitions and foot-shooting.
Pro-GAY marriage is a position taken up by the anti state marriage folks. They do have a logical reason for supporting gay marriage, consistent with a philosophy. It’s the first step in throwing state marriage into an irreversible tailspin, where it now must recognize any and all imaginative human relationship to be just as privileged, and to even carry the same label if they choose. After all, every single pro-gay argument will be easily recycled for the new novel arrangment being considered. And when it becomes unmanageable for it (the state), it’ll get out of the marriage business completely. We’ve seen them on this here board.[/quote]
Ahhh…I get it now. You think marriage is for CHILD REARING!!! What about all those couples that get married that do NOT want kids? Should we refuse to let them marry? Should I tell my friends David and Julie, because they don’t want kids, they shouldn’t have been allowed to marry? That they should “live in sin” for the rest of their lives? Or maybe they should have remained virgins? Where did having kids become a REQUIREMENT for marriage? Please, point out the statute for me.
I am not anti-state gov’t. I am for gay marriage because I don’t understand why two people, who love each other and want to commit to each other for life should be denied the same rights and benefits my husband and I have just because they are the same sex. What harm does it to me? To my husband? To allow those same benefits to a long-term committed homosexual couple? [/quote]
Thank you. It’s nice to know there are people out there who do understand.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
Not one part of this post dealt with any question I’ve asked. What critical function does homosexuality provide humanity that justifies discriminating against all other (but one) human relationships? Nothing. You’re not fighting discrimination, that’s the lie of it all. You actually want discrimination to favor your relationship, elevating and privileging it.
If marriage was just about ‘romance,’ I wouldn’t support state recognized marriage AT ALL. They’d have a bartender marry (if outsider even recognized such a concept) them off, and have any arrangments dealt with just like John Doe and his long time roommate would have to. Someone’s decision to be a party in some long term romance isn’t anymore special than the friendship of life long bachelor/bestfriends. It’s a completely subjective emotional opinion which the government WOULD have no business with. Romance doesn’t make you a superior person…
[/quote]
That’s really how people see marriage today. A deeply romantic committed relationship between 2 people.
It does not matter if you think government should not be in the marriage business that’s not the issue being discussed.
More and more same-sex marriage couples are raising children.
It appears as though married gay couples ARE providing something to society: Stable households for children.
[quote]therajraj wrote:
You did.[/quote]
No, you did.
[quote]ZEB wrote:
[quote]therajraj wrote:
You did.[/quote]
No, you did.
[/quote]
??
You don’t think you made conflicting statements?
In one post you say gay marriage will sky rocket if legalized nationwide and in another you say less than 1% of the population is interested in gay marriage.
[quote]therajraj wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
Not one part of this post dealt with any question I’ve asked. What critical function does homosexuality provide humanity that justifies discriminating against all other (but one) human relationships? Nothing. You’re not fighting discrimination, that’s the lie of it all. You actually want discrimination to favor your relationship, elevating and privileging it.
If marriage was just about ‘romance,’ I wouldn’t support state recognized marriage AT ALL. They’d have a bartender marry (if outsider even recognized such a concept) them off, and have any arrangments dealt with just like John Doe and his long time roommate would have to. Someone’s decision to be a party in some long term romance isn’t anymore special than the friendship of life long bachelor/bestfriends. It’s a completely subjective emotional opinion which the government WOULD have no business with. Romance doesn’t make you a superior person…
[/quote]
That’s really how people see marriage today. A deeply romantic committed relationship between 2 people.
It does not matter if you think government should not be in the marriage business that’s not the issue being discussed.
More and more same-sex marriage couples are raising children.
It appears as though married gay couples ARE providing something to society: Stable households for children.[/quote]
I’ve made this point as well, but apparently adopted kids don’t benefit from having married parents…marriage is only beneficial for biological kids.
[quote]forlife wrote:
I’ve said, explicitly and repeatedly, that I am as subject to confirmatory bias as anyone else. If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t be human.
[/quote]
Okay, well, if you’d like an object lesson in what it looks like when it’s coming from you, it is on full display here. You just need to be honest enough with yourself to recognize it.
Putting aside for a moment the canned progressivist pabulum; momentarily setting aside the problematic source of the definition, even ignoring that its overwrought legalese looks suspiciously designed to use a whole lot of words to say not much of anything at all, you know what really jumped out at me?
Here, I’ll post just the definition portion of your quote once more:
[quote]
Marriage is a social union or legal contract between people that creates kinship. It is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually intimate and sexual, are acknowledged in a variety of ways, depending on the culture or subculture in which it is found. Such a union, often formalized via a wedding ceremony, may also be called matrimony.[/quote]
Did you see it? I’ll bet you didn’t. That’s because it’s NOT THERE. Whoever wrote this choked strained dying definition of “marriage” didn’t even think to include the words “family” or “children” anywhere in the definition!
You don’t find that to be fucked up?
See, here’s where I’m pointing out your blinding display of confirmatory bias. You NEED the premises of your argument to fit a certain way because of the corner you have painted yourself into. So what you are doing now is hacking and gnawing and banging away at the definitions of what should be commonly understood terms. Any sane person understands that society discriminates in favor of married heterosexual couples because, on the whole, they tend to perpetuate said society and stabilize it (for all of the reasons that have been demonstrated ad nauseum up to now in this thread).
If any normal person starts telling me up is down and left is right, call me a skeptic, but I just can’t help wondering what he’s selling.