Gay Marriage Discussion

[twojarslave]

[quote]NorCal916 wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:
Gay marriage has, in my estimation, been great for Maine. This is purely anecdotal, but these are my observations.

I’ll go out on a limb and say that Maine is considered “attractive” to homosexuals, not just because of our laws (first state to legalize gay marriage by referendum) but also because of the “mind your own damn business” attitude that is prevalent here. I don’t recall any stories of random assaults or any of the truly horrible stuff you hear about elsewhere. Just as I can go about my atheist life with no slack-jawed yokels judging me for not believing their made-up stuff, they can go about theirs without some slack-jawed yokel judging them for their lifestyle choices.

So let’s go out on a limb and suggest that gay people are moving to Maine. An influx of fabulous, if you will.

GREAT!

Every, and I mean EVERY gay person with whom I am acquainted…

1. Works (and pays taxes)
2. Is generally successful (pays even more taxes)
3. Is healthy (not a social burden spending tax dollars on public health benefits)
4. Contributes positively to the community by virtue of the above points.

So, in other words, a bunch of healthy and successful people with no children to weigh them down see Maine as an attractive place to live.

GREAT! Keep 'em coming.

Pun intended.[/quote]

Well that sure is progressive. Who needs children or families when you can have some wealthy queers from San Francisco move in? Besides, children don’t pay any taxes at all. They’re just parasites.[/quote]

Lol. No fuckin shit. Ever been to San Fran?? You can take about 1 million of our sexually degenerate individuals. I sure enjoy taking the kids to the park in Northern California and always have to do “room clearing” before letting the kids use a public restroom. Care to ask why???[/quote]

I can’t speak for California, but Maine’s public decency laws remained intact when gay marriage was legalized. Wanton public cavorting in the presence of children has not been an issue in the Pine Tree State.

[countingbeans]

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
Unless you’re making the claim that they are all falsely imprisoned due to government corruption, it is irrelevant to this topic.

Equal under the law doesn’t mean free from consequence for your actions.
[/quote]

I assume he means the law isn’t equally applied, which in all fairness is probably true. [/quote]

How is the number of people in prison any sort of measure of this?

I’d say we likely could get away with a swift reduction of pure volume of people in prison, and that non-violent crimes might be better punished in other ways, however, unless you guys have some statistic that shows how people are being falsely incarcerated, you’re still limp here.

[jjackkrash]

It must be a slow news week.

[countingbeans]

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

I can’t speak for California, but Maine’s public decency laws remained intact when gay marriage was legalized. Wanton public cavorting in the presence of children has not been an issue in the Pine Tree State.
[/quote]

Because it’s too cold to be naked too far removed from a wood stove 9 months out of the year.

And you have bears up there man… NOt the ones with cubs either.

[twojarslave]

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:
Gay marriage has, in my estimation, been great for Maine. This is purely anecdotal, but these are my observations.

I’ll go out on a limb and say that Maine is considered “attractive” to homosexuals, not just because of our laws (first state to legalize gay marriage by referendum) but also because of the “mind your own damn business” attitude that is prevalent here. I don’t recall any stories of random assaults or any of the truly horrible stuff you hear about elsewhere. Just as I can go about my atheist life with no slack-jawed yokels judging me for not believing their made-up stuff, they can go about theirs without some slack-jawed yokel judging them for their lifestyle choices.

So let’s go out on a limb and suggest that gay people are moving to Maine. An influx of fabulous, if you will.

GREAT!

Every, and I mean EVERY gay person with whom I am acquainted…

1. Works (and pays taxes)
2. Is generally successful (pays even more taxes)
3. Is healthy (not a social burden spending tax dollars on public health benefits)
4. Contributes positively to the community by virtue of the above points.

So, in other words, a bunch of healthy and successful people with no children to weigh them down see Maine as an attractive place to live.

GREAT! Keep 'em coming.

Pun intended.[/quote]

Well that sure is progressive. Who needs children or families when you can have some wealthy queers from San Francisco move in? Besides, children don’t pay any taxes at all. They’re just parasites.[/quote]

You are presenting a logical fallacy of a false dilemma. There is plenty of room in Maine for both gays and heterosexuals. Allowing gays to marry has not, to my knowledge, prevented a single heterosexual couple from starting a family.
[/quote]

It’s a question of value. Traditional marriage is more valuable as it is geared towards reproduction and child rearing. It is the children and the family that creates and nurtures them that creates the value. You actually realise this - even if only subconsciously - because you are trying to add value to gay unions by saying how they have benefited your state. You are trying to raise the social value of gay unions to the level of traditional families - unsuccessfully I might add.[/quote]

And now we get to your next logical fallacy, the straw man.

Nowhere did I claim that gay unions present the same social value of a heterosexual union. The reasons for this are self-evident for a species intent on long-term survival.

I simply claimed that they can be a positive social force, which is absolutely true. Raising children is not the only way to contribute positively.

I’d gladly trade a heterosexual who moved to Maine because his Massachusetts state benefits expired for a homosexual engineer who moved here to live his life without being hassled by backwards rednecks in Alabama.

[SexMachine]

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
It’s quite another to contend that refusing to recognise gay marriage “demeans” gay couples whose “moral and sexual choices the constitution protects.”
[/quote]

That language has no place in a ruling on the matter, and simply invites more government into the lives of people.

Sexual orientation is in fact moot on the subject, irrelevant if homosexual people would use same-sex marriage or not, as far as the state need be concerned.

The state’s criteria should be as follows:

1. Are the parties adults?
2. Do the parties consent to the contract?
3. Does the contract violate the rights of any other person?

That is my major complaint with the whole ordeal. It became about who can be more compassionate for gay people, and nothing to do with, let’s make sure government isn’t overstepping its bounds.
[/quote]

But that was never the argument used. The argument used was a constitutional right to marry whoever you want which of course opens the door up to all kinds of crazy stuff.

[SexMachine]

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:
Gay marriage has, in my estimation, been great for Maine. This is purely anecdotal, but these are my observations.

I’ll go out on a limb and say that Maine is considered “attractive” to homosexuals, not just because of our laws (first state to legalize gay marriage by referendum) but also because of the “mind your own damn business” attitude that is prevalent here. I don’t recall any stories of random assaults or any of the truly horrible stuff you hear about elsewhere. Just as I can go about my atheist life with no slack-jawed yokels judging me for not believing their made-up stuff, they can go about theirs without some slack-jawed yokel judging them for their lifestyle choices.

So let’s go out on a limb and suggest that gay people are moving to Maine. An influx of fabulous, if you will.

GREAT!

Every, and I mean EVERY gay person with whom I am acquainted…

1. Works (and pays taxes)
2. Is generally successful (pays even more taxes)
3. Is healthy (not a social burden spending tax dollars on public health benefits)
4. Contributes positively to the community by virtue of the above points.

So, in other words, a bunch of healthy and successful people with no children to weigh them down see Maine as an attractive place to live.

GREAT! Keep 'em coming.

Pun intended.[/quote]

Well that sure is progressive. Who needs children or families when you can have some wealthy queers from San Francisco move in? Besides, children don’t pay any taxes at all. They’re just parasites.[/quote]

You are presenting a logical fallacy of a false dilemma. There is plenty of room in Maine for both gays and heterosexuals. Allowing gays to marry has not, to my knowledge, prevented a single heterosexual couple from starting a family.
[/quote]

It’s a question of value. Traditional marriage is more valuable as it is geared towards reproduction and child rearing. It is the children and the family that creates and nurtures them that creates the value. You actually realise this - even if only subconsciously - because you are trying to add value to gay unions by saying how they have benefited your state. You are trying to raise the social value of gay unions to the level of traditional families - unsuccessfully I might add.[/quote]

And now we get to your next logical fallacy, the straw man.

Nowhere did I claim that gay unions present the same social value of a heterosexual union. The reasons for this are self-evident for a species intent on long-term survival.

I simply claimed that they can be a positive social force, which is absolutely true. Raising children is not the only way to contribute positively.

I’d gladly trade a heterosexual who moved to Maine because his Massachusetts state benefits expired for a homosexual engineer who moved here to live his life without being hassled by backwards rednecks in Alabama.
[/quote]

No one is “hassling” gay people. Sure there’s a handful of loons like Westboro Baptist that do but 99.99% of “rednecks” have never and would never harass gay people.

[twojarslave]

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:
Gay marriage has, in my estimation, been great for Maine. This is purely anecdotal, but these are my observations.

I’ll go out on a limb and say that Maine is considered “attractive” to homosexuals, not just because of our laws (first state to legalize gay marriage by referendum) but also because of the “mind your own damn business” attitude that is prevalent here. I don’t recall any stories of random assaults or any of the truly horrible stuff you hear about elsewhere. Just as I can go about my atheist life with no slack-jawed yokels judging me for not believing their made-up stuff, they can go about theirs without some slack-jawed yokel judging them for their lifestyle choices.

So let’s go out on a limb and suggest that gay people are moving to Maine. An influx of fabulous, if you will.

GREAT!

Every, and I mean EVERY gay person with whom I am acquainted…

1. Works (and pays taxes)
2. Is generally successful (pays even more taxes)
3. Is healthy (not a social burden spending tax dollars on public health benefits)
4. Contributes positively to the community by virtue of the above points.

So, in other words, a bunch of healthy and successful people with no children to weigh them down see Maine as an attractive place to live.

GREAT! Keep 'em coming.

Pun intended.[/quote]

Well that sure is progressive. Who needs children or families when you can have some wealthy queers from San Francisco move in? Besides, children don’t pay any taxes at all. They’re just parasites.[/quote]

You are presenting a logical fallacy of a false dilemma. There is plenty of room in Maine for both gays and heterosexuals. Allowing gays to marry has not, to my knowledge, prevented a single heterosexual couple from starting a family.
[/quote]

It’s a question of value. Traditional marriage is more valuable as it is geared towards reproduction and child rearing. It is the children and the family that creates and nurtures them that creates the value. You actually realise this - even if only subconsciously - because you are trying to add value to gay unions by saying how they have benefited your state. You are trying to raise the social value of gay unions to the level of traditional families - unsuccessfully I might add.[/quote]

And now we get to your next logical fallacy, the straw man.

Nowhere did I claim that gay unions present the same social value of a heterosexual union. The reasons for this are self-evident for a species intent on long-term survival.

I simply claimed that they can be a positive social force, which is absolutely true. Raising children is not the only way to contribute positively.

I’d gladly trade a heterosexual who moved to Maine because his Massachusetts state benefits expired for a homosexual engineer who moved here to live his life without being hassled by backwards rednecks in Alabama.
[/quote]

No one is “hassling” gay people. Sure there’s a handful of loons like Westboro Baptist that do but 99.99% of “rednecks” have never and would never harass gay people.
[/quote]

Well, the 0.01 % sure do a good job of making themselves heard on the matter. I’m quite sure that harassment of gays is alive and well in the US, and there are many parts of the world where being gay is grounds for execution.

It also defies common sense to think that a gay person could expect similar treatment in a place like Alabama compared to a place like Maine.

But gay people’s subjective experiences in different locations is neither here nor there. We were discussing your logical fallacies, no?

[angry_chicken]

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
Feel free to post any responses here. I don’t want to keep derailing push’s thread on the presidential elections.

This was my last post:

[quote]angry chicken wrote:

Marriage IS NOT based around reproduction and child rearing.

[/quote]

No? [/quote] No [quote]

This is obvious because not all marriages result in reproduction and child rearing.

I missed the part where an exception to the rule voids the rule itself. Perhaps you will explain…
[/quote]People get married for all kinds of reasons that are NOT “child centric” yet are perfectly legal.[quote]

If that were the case, sterile men and woman would not be allowed to marry.

This would best be put as a question to a supporter of traditional marriage - eg, would you prevent sterile couples from marrying? Answer: no, because for one thing they are upholding the tradition of marriage despite their inability to fully realise the biological praxis of marriage. [/quote]So if we took CHILDREN out of the equation, please tell me how two homosexuals getting married doesn’t uphold a tradition of creating a stronger family? In fact, there are PLENTY of homosexuals who DO have children that they have born/fathered. Some of them have been able to ADOPT children. Why would you deny those children a stable family unit? [quote]

Therefore, we can conclude that marriage is about OTHER things.

Can we? Do tell…[/quote]I just did[quote]

Things such as “love”, “merging existing families for political gain/prosperity”, “green cards”, “inheritance”, “tax advantage”.

All subordinate(even love) to the primary function - procreation, child rearing and the formation of the building blocks of the civil society(families).[/quote]Gay couples certainly can and do provide building blocks of stable, civil families. [quote]

If marriage were just a CHURCH institution, then any church could make whatever rules it wanted to.

As I said it’s a manifestation of a biological imperative and existed long before the church.
[/quote]There weren’t RULES about it like there are with the church and the state. Sure people found a mate and tended to stay with that mate. In SOME tribes. In OTHER tribes, a woman was not considered “mate material” until she had demonstrated that she COULD bear children (as in she got knocked up out of “wedlock” so she could “find a husband”). Lots of different strokes for different folks.[quote]

They COULD tell us that marriage is only between and man and a woman and that WE WON’T MARRY FAGS HERE!!! An alternative GAY church could be established to marry all the fags who want to get married with multi colored cakes baked by businesses that catered to that sort of thing.

You mean the Episcopalians?[/quote]LMAO good one![quote]

HOWEVER, the STATE decided to get into regulating the marriage business.

You don’t know how wrong you are. As I commented earlier the state sanction of marriage came about as a Protestant attempt to take away the authority of the Catholic Church. King Henry VIII actually kicked it off when he took away the authority of the church to decree divorces; Martin Luther and John Calvin similarly transferred the Papal authority over marriage to the state. Little did they realise how this strategy would blow up in their faces in the second half of the 20th Century.

[/quote]So just because it originated from some folks who decided the Catholic Church needed to slow it’s role, how does that take away from my statement? The “State” DID in fact decide to get into the marriage business. Here in America that is a game changer. I DO love debating with you because I always learn something, but despite your overwhelming knowledge of history, it doesn’t change what I said. The State got involved. Period. [quote]

And that changes the game AND, by default, the definition.

Well, it certainly places it(marriage) into the hands of a new sovereign. Today, the people vote time and time again AGAINST gay marriage then a handful of masterminds on the Supreme Court overrule them. The wishes of the people can’t stand in the way of progress aka nihilism.
[/quote]When something is under state control, it becomes subject to the Constitution and people are to be treated equally under the law. Not allowing gay people to marry discriminates against them and is a violation of their civil rights BECAUSE of the advantaged granted to heterosexuals who ARE permitted to marry. Take away the state incentives and the fags would have no leg to stand on, but as long as you give ONE group an advantage over ANOTHER group, you have effectively disenfranchised the OTHER group. Why is that such a hard concept to understand? It’s no longer about a “definition” Like it or not, we are WAY beyond that now.[quote]

Especially when they decided to give married people distinct advantages over unmarried people.

Maybe those right-wing fundamentalist loons like Bill Clinton think that society has a profound stake in maintaining traditional marriage?
[/quote]Bill Clinton made his decisions with ONE thing in mind: VOTES/POLLS[quote]

And by doing so, they have effectively disenfranchised and entire VOCAL and, whether you like it or not, POWERFUL segment of our population.

How have they disenfranchised them when they never had any such “right” to begin with?
[/quote]Blacks never had the right to be considered people until the Government decided that, “wait a minute, they ARE people!”. I’d say they were pretty fucking disenfranchised…[quote]

They wanted to control it, and they have destroyed it (or at least the concept that YOU subscribe to).

If you want to preserve “traditional marriage”, get the state out of it and respect the marriages performed by YOUR religion.

My religion has no power or authority. Neither does anyone else’s religion in the western world. By opposing gay marriage I am in a sense asserting the supremacy of the church over the state. I am opposing statism in opposing the deconstruction of marriage.
[/quote]

But you are holding EVERYONE to the standard of what is essentially a CHURCH inspired religious value. We have Constitutional protections against things like that. Your position is simply UNCONSTITUTIONAL… IMHO, of course

EDIT: I have a response up there that isn’t showing up in yellow, buried after the history lesson - not sure how to fix the quotes.

[SexMachine]

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:
Gay marriage has, in my estimation, been great for Maine. This is purely anecdotal, but these are my observations.

I’ll go out on a limb and say that Maine is considered “attractive” to homosexuals, not just because of our laws (first state to legalize gay marriage by referendum) but also because of the “mind your own damn business” attitude that is prevalent here. I don’t recall any stories of random assaults or any of the truly horrible stuff you hear about elsewhere. Just as I can go about my atheist life with no slack-jawed yokels judging me for not believing their made-up stuff, they can go about theirs without some slack-jawed yokel judging them for their lifestyle choices.

So let’s go out on a limb and suggest that gay people are moving to Maine. An influx of fabulous, if you will.

GREAT!

Every, and I mean EVERY gay person with whom I am acquainted…

1. Works (and pays taxes)
2. Is generally successful (pays even more taxes)
3. Is healthy (not a social burden spending tax dollars on public health benefits)
4. Contributes positively to the community by virtue of the above points.

So, in other words, a bunch of healthy and successful people with no children to weigh them down see Maine as an attractive place to live.

GREAT! Keep 'em coming.

Pun intended.[/quote]

Well that sure is progressive. Who needs children or families when you can have some wealthy queers from San Francisco move in? Besides, children don’t pay any taxes at all. They’re just parasites.[/quote]

You are presenting a logical fallacy of a false dilemma. There is plenty of room in Maine for both gays and heterosexuals. Allowing gays to marry has not, to my knowledge, prevented a single heterosexual couple from starting a family.
[/quote]

It’s a question of value. Traditional marriage is more valuable as it is geared towards reproduction and child rearing. It is the children and the family that creates and nurtures them that creates the value. You actually realise this - even if only subconsciously - because you are trying to add value to gay unions by saying how they have benefited your state. You are trying to raise the social value of gay unions to the level of traditional families - unsuccessfully I might add.[/quote]

And now we get to your next logical fallacy, the straw man.

Nowhere did I claim that gay unions present the same social value of a heterosexual union. The reasons for this are self-evident for a species intent on long-term survival.

I simply claimed that they can be a positive social force, which is absolutely true. Raising children is not the only way to contribute positively.

I’d gladly trade a heterosexual who moved to Maine because his Massachusetts state benefits expired for a homosexual engineer who moved here to live his life without being hassled by backwards rednecks in Alabama.
[/quote]

No one is “hassling” gay people. Sure there’s a handful of loons like Westboro Baptist that do but 99.99% of “rednecks” have never and would never harass gay people.
[/quote]

Well, the 0.01 % sure do a good job of making themselves heard on the matter. I’m quite sure that harassment of gays is alive and well in the US, and there are many parts of the world where being gay is grounds for execution.

It also defies common sense to think that a gay person could expect similar treatment in a place like Alabama compared to a place like Maine.

But gay people’s subjective experiences in different locations is neither here nor there. We were discussing your logical fallacies, no?[/quote]

Well, you cried logical fallacy but that’s not the case. Possibly I misinterpreted what you were initially saying. After clarification it appears you are saying that traditional marriage has more intrinsic value but that doesn’t mean gay marriage doesn’t have some value too. But that is missing the point. It is not being married that is of value to society. It is marriage itself that is valuable to society. It is the institution of marriage that has the value. Now if you diminish the institution of marriage to a contractual arrangement between two people then the actual value of marriage itself is annihilated. Marriage no longer has any value to society.

[twojarslave]

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:

[quote]twojarslave wrote:
Gay marriage has, in my estimation, been great for Maine. This is purely anecdotal, but these are my observations.

I’ll go out on a limb and say that Maine is considered “attractive” to homosexuals, not just because of our laws (first state to legalize gay marriage by referendum) but also because of the “mind your own damn business” attitude that is prevalent here. I don’t recall any stories of random assaults or any of the truly horrible stuff you hear about elsewhere. Just as I can go about my atheist life with no slack-jawed yokels judging me for not believing their made-up stuff, they can go about theirs without some slack-jawed yokel judging them for their lifestyle choices.

So let’s go out on a limb and suggest that gay people are moving to Maine. An influx of fabulous, if you will.

GREAT!

Every, and I mean EVERY gay person with whom I am acquainted…

1. Works (and pays taxes)
2. Is generally successful (pays even more taxes)
3. Is healthy (not a social burden spending tax dollars on public health benefits)
4. Contributes positively to the community by virtue of the above points.

So, in other words, a bunch of healthy and successful people with no children to weigh them down see Maine as an attractive place to live.

GREAT! Keep 'em coming.

Pun intended.[/quote]

Well that sure is progressive. Who needs children or families when you can have some wealthy queers from San Francisco move in? Besides, children don’t pay any taxes at all. They’re just parasites.[/quote]

You are presenting a logical fallacy of a false dilemma. There is plenty of room in Maine for both gays and heterosexuals. Allowing gays to marry has not, to my knowledge, prevented a single heterosexual couple from starting a family.
[/quote]

It’s a question of value. Traditional marriage is more valuable as it is geared towards reproduction and child rearing. It is the children and the family that creates and nurtures them that creates the value. You actually realise this - even if only subconsciously - because you are trying to add value to gay unions by saying how they have benefited your state. You are trying to raise the social value of gay unions to the level of traditional families - unsuccessfully I might add.[/quote]

And now we get to your next logical fallacy, the straw man.

Nowhere did I claim that gay unions present the same social value of a heterosexual union. The reasons for this are self-evident for a species intent on long-term survival.

I simply claimed that they can be a positive social force, which is absolutely true. Raising children is not the only way to contribute positively.

I’d gladly trade a heterosexual who moved to Maine because his Massachusetts state benefits expired for a homosexual engineer who moved here to live his life without being hassled by backwards rednecks in Alabama.
[/quote]

No one is “hassling” gay people. Sure there’s a handful of loons like Westboro Baptist that do but 99.99% of “rednecks” have never and would never harass gay people.
[/quote]

Well, the 0.01 % sure do a good job of making themselves heard on the matter. I’m quite sure that harassment of gays is alive and well in the US, and there are many parts of the world where being gay is grounds for execution.

It also defies common sense to think that a gay person could expect similar treatment in a place like Alabama compared to a place like Maine.

But gay people’s subjective experiences in different locations is neither here nor there. We were discussing your logical fallacies, no?[/quote]

Well, you cried logical fallacy but that’s not the case. Possibly I misinterpreted what you were initially saying. After clarification it appears you are saying that traditional marriage has more intrinsic value but that doesn’t mean gay marriage doesn’t have some value too. But that is missing the point. It is not being married that is of value to society. It is marriage itself that is valuable to society. It is the institution of marriage that has the value. Now if you diminish the institution of marriage to a contractual arrangement between two people then the actual value of marriage itself is annihilated. Marriage no longer has any value to society.[/quote]

Looks like you followed that up with another straw man.

Nowhere did I say that gay marriage, or marriage in general, is nothing more than a contract. Indeed the feelings and commitment that two gay people have towards each other are not inherently less genuine than those shared by a man and a woman.

You seem to be stuck on this idea that broadening the definition of marriage reduces the intrinsic value of traditional man/woman marriages that produce babies. I do not see the cause/effect relationship here.

Explain how this mechanism works.

[angry_chicken]

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

[quote]ActivitiesGuy wrote:

But RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE American family RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE traditional values RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE my kids will catch it RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE this sets a bad example RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE.
[/quote]

Come the fuck on with this…

I will argue until I’m blue in the face that government has no legal standing to not recognize a same sex marriage, but this post adds absolutely zero to any sort of discussion. [/quote]

Come on, that was pretty fucking funny! That’s EXACTLY what they sound like!

[magick]

[quote]NorCal916 wrote:
Curious, are supporters of gay marriage for or against family members marrying? Because if it’s a “rights” and a “choice” issue not a moral/religious one… There cannot be any judgement on whom you marry, correct?

Example: adult first cousins[/quote]

First cousins have been marrying one another since fucking forever.

If anything the ban, and general dislike of, first cousin marriage occurred in recent history, and largely because of better understanding what it may cause.

[magick]

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
Look America was founded on principles, some of whom took decades and a Civil War to see through. But the framework was in place since day one for those appropriate improvements to take place without revolution or destruction of the State. (Even though the Civil War was pretty damn close to those things.)

I think you might want to take a look at the conditions billions of people live in outside of America (and Europe). I’m still not following what point you’re trying to make, but that perspective might help.
[/quote]

I’m starting to seriously believe that only immigrants or those who lived in foreign countries for any serious length of time understand just how fucking amazing the U.S. is.

Generally, Americans have no appreciation for their own country, and I find that really really sad.

[countingbeans]

[quote]magick wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
Look America was founded on principles, some of whom took decades and a Civil War to see through. But the framework was in place since day one for those appropriate improvements to take place without revolution or destruction of the State. (Even though the Civil War was pretty damn close to those things.)

I think you might want to take a look at the conditions billions of people live in outside of America (and Europe). I’m still not following what point you’re trying to make, but that perspective might help.
[/quote]

I’m starting to seriously believe that only immigrants or those who lived in foreign countries for any serious length of time understand just how fucking amazing the U.S. is.

Generally, Americans have no appreciation for their own country, and I find that really really sad.[/quote]

lol, without question.

We’re having serious arguments over the finer points of contract law and how it relates to marriage and the social view of it.

Meanwhile there are a billion people who’s drinking water isn’t as clean as the water we shit into, after we shit in it.

[anon50325502]

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
Unless you’re making the claim that they are all falsely imprisoned due to government corruption, it is irrelevant to this topic.

Equal under the law doesn’t mean free from consequence for your actions.
[/quote]

I assume he means the law isn’t equally applied, which in all fairness is probably true. [/quote]

How is the number of people in prison any sort of measure of this?

I’d say we likely could get away with a swift reduction of pure volume of people in prison, and that non-violent crimes might be better punished in other ways, however, unless you guys have some statistic that shows how people are being falsely incarcerated, you’re still limp here. [/quote]

Well I think the demographics pretty clearly show certain people, black people for example, are over represented in the prison population. Now you have to try and figure out why that it. There are probably 100 reasons, I’m not saying the evil police are targeting blacks. I do however thing the disparity warrants further analysis.

I’m reading a book about the topic now and it’s pretty interesting; although, I’m not sure of the authors reputation or how legitimate his claims are. One point he makes is to show how few people went to jail over the financial crisis. He talks about what happened at Enron, Citi Group, Arthur Anderson, etc… and the reality is not many if any people went to jail. Now the question to me becomes is that because of money (possibly), race (possibly), ineptitude at the DOJ under Holder (probably), etc… Point being, if the law was applied equally a lot more people should of gone to prison over the various frauds that occurred.

[anon50325502]

FTR I’m not saying people are falsely accused.

[magick]

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
We’re having serious arguments over the finer points of contract law and how it relates to marriage and the social view of it.

Meanwhile there are a billion people who’s drinking water isn’t as clean as the water we shit into, after we shit in it.
[/quote]

Have to learn to enjoy the simple things in life.

Honestly, I’m just happy with having a proper toilet and a proper shower that is actually isolated from the rest of the bathroom.

I’m dead serious.

[SexMachine]

[quote] angrychicken wrote:

So if we took CHILDREN out of the equation, please tell me how two homosexuals getting married doesn’t uphold a tradition of creating a stronger family?

[/quote]

How could it? A family is a mother, a father and their children. This structure is necessary for productive and healthy children. Even a modification of this structure that places the mother as family head - ie, matriarchy - has a profound detrimental effect on the well being of the children and the civil society as a whole. This is actually part of the reason for the dysfunctional nature of black communities in the US today. And you want people to start experimenting with same sex parents? Seriously, think it over. The family structure evolved the way it did for a reason. Don’t mess with it.

In fact, there are PLENTY of homosexuals who DO have children that they have born/fathered. Some of them have been able to ADOPT children. Why would you deny those children a stable family unit?

I’d ask you the same question. Two gay men do NOT make a healthy, stable family for children. If you’re interested I can actually dig up some information from children who were brought up by same sex parents who are strongly against the idea because it fucked them up. There’s a French politician who was brought up by a same sex couple and wrote a book about it. He’s vehemently against gay couples raising children.

There weren’t RULES about it like there are with the church and the state. Sure people found a mate and tended to stay with that mate. In SOME tribes. In OTHER tribes, a woman was not considered “mate material” until she had demonstrated that she COULD bear children (as in she got knocked up out of “wedlock” so she could “find a husband”). Lots of different strokes for different folks.

But there was never “gay” marriage and marriage was always a child producing/rearing proposition.

When something is under state control, it becomes subject to the Constitution and people are to be treated equally under the law. Not allowing gay people to marry discriminates against them and is a violation of their civil rights BECAUSE of the advantaged granted to heterosexuals who ARE permitted to marry.

Again, gay people ARE permitted to marry. The fact that they can’t “marry” other men is NOT discrimination. We didn’t invent marriage to spite gay people. In fact, before recent years “gay” was not an identity. You couldn’t “discriminate” against gay people because “homosexuality” was a behaviour as opposed to who you are. Are we going to say in the future that “drug taker” is an identity and making drugs illegal discriminates against “drug takers” and that “drug takers” are protected under the constitution?

But you are holding EVERYONE to the standard of what is essentially a CHURCH inspired religious value.

This is true and I make no apology for it. “Values” don’t come from the state. Values come from cultural institutions such as the church.

[countingbeans]

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:
Well I think the demographics pretty clearly show certain people, black people for example, are over represented in the prison population.[/quote]

The also are over represented in poor urban environments. (IE: they are poor, live in shit neighborhoods, and have a lot of people around whom to commit crimes with/against).

However… Even if the police “targeted” them… Does that mean they were innocent or just got caught. Because if it is the latter, I don’t give a fuck what color you are, you fucked up, you pay the price.

I do however thing the disparity warrants further analysis.

Fine… Still not following how this says anything about whether people are equal under the law or not.

[quote] One point he makes is to show how few people went to jail over the financial crisis. He talks about what happened at Enron, Citi Group, Arthur Anderson, etc… and the reality is not many if any people went to jail. Now the question to me becomes is that because of money (possibly), race (possibly), ineptitude at the DOJ under Holder (probably), etc… Point being, if the law was applied equally a lot more people should of gone to prison over the various frauds that occurred.

[/quote]
I’m not going to entertain comparing the financial crisis and systematic sickness brought on through decades of intervention and general lack of math skills to street crime, and you shouldn’t either. You’re much smarter than that.