I think the question should rather be why so many devout white protestants are republicans and why so many catholics and jews have been democrats instead of why the american right is both religious and free-market-liberalist-ish. Witch means the issue is more about wich demograpichs have traditionally been dems or repubs and why, than a religous vs atheist issue. IMO.
Disclaimer: After reading this forum for years I have understood that the jewish and republican demographic is traditionally democrats. If this is wrong, please feel free to correct me.
If you are trying to bait my into giving you an outlet to spew atheist biogtry, it isn’t going to happen.
Government is representative or it fails. If that government starts with the indvidual, and is founded on personal responsibility, the individuals involved need clear consistant morals in order for government to be representative.
Small shifts in moral standing are added into the fold and absorbed. But if the moral code is weak, lacking, unclear or whole heartedly fractioned among small groups, the government fails because it can’t encompass every whim of the weak.
[quote]
It doesn’t help.[/quote]
How do you figure?
Again, simply following the law, or making a law doesn’t, hasn’t, nor will it ever be the sole measure of someone and if they are moral or not.
Breaking a law doesn’t make someone any less moral than not breaking the law.
The law is not the focus here, even though you will continue to cling to it so you can justify to yourself your hatred of religious people.
Something else that we have in US politics sometimes these days is unhinged hatred against religion. One example I ran across this afternoon ~
“Top Dem donor and kooky religious bigot J.Z. Knight rants on video: ?F**k you, Catholics?”
excerpt:
“…As of Tuesday, Democrats are deciding to take Knight?s money and run, an equivocation that could produce significant controversy among swing voters just as many are marking their ballots to decide a very close election.
The video evidence of Knight?s tirades are difficult to watch.
?F? you, you Catholics!? Knight bellows over cheers from her audience.
?We will come on you in a terror,? Knight growls in another cut. ?We will bring? St. Peter?s temple down and we will swallow it in the sea.? (?St. Peter?s temple? is a reference to the Catholic church itself.)
The entirety of hateful language used by Knight defied redaction to meet our standards for publication. For the full context, you will have to brace yourself and view the videos. We warn you use discretion when viewing these where the general public and especially small children may be present. It?s very rough stuff…”
[quote]florelius wrote:
I think the question should rather be why so many devout white protestants are republicans and why so many catholics and jews have been democrats instead of why the american right is both religious and free-market-liberalist-ish. Witch means the issue is more about wich demograpichs have traditionally been dems or repubs and why, than a religous vs atheist issue. IMO.
Disclaimer: After reading this forum for years I have understood that the jewish and republican demographic is traditionally democrats. If this is wrong, please feel free to correct me.
[quote]florelius wrote:
I think the question should rather be why so many devout white protestants are republicans and why so many catholics and jews have been democrats instead of why the american right is both religious and free-market-liberalist-ish. Witch means the issue is more about wich demograpichs have traditionally been dems or repubs and why, than a religous vs atheist issue. IMO.
Disclaimer: After reading this forum for years I have understood that the jewish and republican demographic is traditionally democrats. If this is wrong, please feel free to correct me.
[/quote]
Lol at dog whistle in your post.[/quote]
Sorry I dont know what dog whistle is alluding to?
Because actions widely agreed upon as immoral are committed equally by people of all religious affiliations/no affiliation. Illegal or legal.
[quote]countingbeans wrote:
Again, simply following the law, or making a law doesn’t, hasn’t, nor will it ever be the sole measure of someone and if they are moral or not. [/quote]
The fact that it’s against the law is irrelevant to the point. The law is just a means to measure how often certain immoral acts occur through convinction rates etc.
[quote]countingbeans wrote:
The law is not the focus here, even though you will continue to cling to it so you can justify to yourself your hatred of religious people.[/quote]
LOL
I don’t hate religious people, I just think they’re wrong. That’s considered hatred nowadays?
Because actions widely agreed upon as immoral are committed equally by people of all religious affiliations/no affiliation. Illegal or legal.[/quote]
This still have zero to do with what I said.
Still has nothing to do with my OP in this thread.
[quote]
LOL
I don’t hate religious people, I just think they’re wrong. That’s considered bigotry nowadays?[/quote]
The way your ears perk up and you lunge to passive attack mode when the topic is brought up is much more telling of how you feel than what you are saying here.
[quote]therajraj wrote:
How about a two-tier system?
gays/childless marriages recognized with certain benefits.
When kids enter the picture contract obligations increase and more benefits doled out.
Pedestal maintained.
[/quote]
Why? In what way do I want competing alternatives? I want the norm to be that the reproductive sexes grow up, and at least in some point of their biologically reproductive life, pair up in marriage. No law saying you have to. I want that model for the reproductive sexes experienced over and over in daily life. That’s reinforcing a norm. Regardless of will, or medical condition, the reproductive sexes don’t change. The model is still served, and reinforced.
It’s my view that there is no good secular reason that marriage should be defined as a union between a man and a woman rather than a union between two consenting adults. The procreation argument is a pale stand-in for a much more passionate religious argument, and it is predicated on a NOT universally-recognized definition of marriage as an institution predicated on child-bearing coupled with an unproved assertion that gay marriage will somehow negatively impact this child-bearing institution. As if gays getting married will have any–and I mean any–impact on heterosexual newlyweds’ desire to become pregnant.
To encourage the model of two committed people in a monogamous relationship.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
In what way do I want competing alternatives? [/quote]
They’re not, one does not preclude you from the other. In fact, it could be argued that the two-tiered model would ADD incentives for childless couples to pro-create
[quote]Sloth wrote:
I want the norm to be that the reproductive sexes grow up, and at least in some point of their biologically reproductive life, pair up in marriage. [/quote]
That would still happen.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
No law saying you have to. [/quote]
That’s not what I’m suggesting.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
I want that model for the reproductive sexes experienced over and over in daily life. That’s reinforcing a norm. Regardless of will, or medical condition, the reproductive sexes don’t change. The model is still served, and reinforced.[/quote]
Norms are still being enforced, one does not preclude the other from happening.
Abortion; an argument over the protection of human life. This isn’t about you masturbating.
State recognized Homosexual marriage. A POSITIVE action/position of the state. Which is why we’re arguing about STATE RECOGNIZED homosexual marriage. If some, any kind of human relationship is privileged, given a title, and recognized as some sort of model to emulate (which is sort of the point), then there better be a critical function. An irreplaceable function. Otherwise, you’re elevating (through positive state action) one whopping (my, how inclusive…) other human arrangement above all other imaginative human arrangements still left out in the cold, because it’s simply your pet activist project. It’s either all or none. Or, just maybe, a rational recognition of how the orderly pairing of the reproductive sexes justifies it’s position through it’s critical irreplaceable function.
It’s my view that there is no good secular reason that marriage should be defined as a union between a man and a woman rather than a union between two consenting adults.[[/quote]
Well, that is incorrect, but in any event, whatever your basis for this statement, then you must also agree on teh same principle that there is no reason marriage should defined as a union between “two” consenting adults. If sex-specific marriage is “irrational”, so is recognition of coupling.
No, it isn’t, and this is really a bit of a cop-out, I am afraid to say. I’ve heard it a thousand times, and every time, it’s a red herring.
I think there would be an impact, but I still haven’t heard an answer from you - if marriage really doesn’t have any logical tie to procreation, then why bother having a public institution for a thing called “marriage” at all? What does it “tie” to? What is the point? What purpose does it serve?
The way your ears perk up and you lunge to passive attack mode when the topic is brought up is much more telling of how you feel than what you are saying here.[/quote]
I really have no idea what you’re trying to say in your previous post but I’ll comment on this.
First off, I doubt even the religious people here would agree I hate them or people like them. I hate religion and in some cases I consider religious people victims - Muslims are victims of Islam etc.
Secondly, your perception is one sided, during the relatively short time I’ve posted in PWI when my participation was at it’s peak, some posters jumped to attack every post I made. It’s only natural for people on a politics forum to attack those with diametrically opposing views. If you consider this hatred, you’re on the wrong forum.
It’s my view that there is no good secular reason that marriage should be defined as a union between a man and a woman rather than a union between two consenting adults.[[/quote]
Well, that is incorrect, but in any event, whatever your basis for this statement, then you must also agree on teh same principle that there is no reason marriage should defined as a union between “two” consenting adults. If sex-specific marriage is “irrational”, so is recognition of coupling.
No, it isn’t, and this is really a bit of a cop-out, I am afraid to say. I’ve heard it a thousand times, and every time, it’s a red herring.
I think there would be an impact, but I still haven’t heard an answer from you - if marriage really doesn’t have any logical tie to procreation, then why bother having a public institution for a thing called “marriage” at all? What does it “tie” to? What is the point? What purpose does it serve?[/quote]
Almost every state’s family code ties property and custody rights to something called “marriage.” Once this something called marriage is tied to a system of property rights, equal protection requires granting gay couples access to the system. The alternative is de-coupling property rights from a system called “marriage.” Thus, the state should either recognize marriage for gay couples or it should not recognize marriage for straight couples and recognize only “civil unions” for all and decouple the concept of marriage from property rights. The state doesn’t have any legitimate business “approving” or “disapproving” of straight or gay coupling aside from the regulation of property rights and custody issues.
[quote]smh23 wrote:
It’s my view that there is no good secular reason that marriage should be defined as a union between a man and a woman rather than a union between two consenting adults.[/quote]
There is no secular argument for defining marriage as between two consenting adults. Who the hell are you to define marriage? Why are you trying to define it for anyone? Two? But there is a secular argument for defining it, specifically, as being between the smallest reproductive unit.
[quote] The procreation argument is a pale stand-in for a much more passionate religious argument, and it is predicated on a NOT universally-recognized definition of marriage as an institution predicated on child-bearing coupled with an unproved assertion that gay marriage will somehow negatively impact this child-bearing institution. As if gays getting married will have any–and I mean any–impact on heterosexual newlyweds’ desire to become pregnant.
[/quote]
So you want the government to tell me homosexual relationships are special enough to be elevated above my friendships? You want it put on a pedestal through positive government action, without my consent, why? What inarguable justification do you have to discriminate against all other imaginative human arrangements, by allowing homosexuals to marry? Because you have an emotional attachment? You better have some kind of critical and irreplaceable function to discriminate like that.
Marriage isn’t about individual expression. What kind of nonsense is this. I’m not concerned simply because Jack loves Jill. So what? Who cares? They don’t need a state pat on the back for that. I’m concerned that the reproductive sexes continue/recommit to pairing in committed relationships, because of what those pairings, by their very nature, bring to society for better or worse.
I really have no idea what you’re trying to say in your previous post [/quote]
I noticed.
This is all you had to say.
I find it sad, but whatever, you can feel however you want to about the situation. Just don’t pretend your “fighting the good fight” can’t be seen as a bigot responce. And this is coming from a fairly non-religious person.
Almost every state’s family code ties property and custody rights to something called “marriage.”[/quote]
Irrelevant - you are merely stating that states have existing marriage laws. You aren’t explaining why states that existing marriage laws.
Well, completely false, equal protection does not require this, because you are basically saying that if some adults construct an arrangement they call a “marriage” or “family” (any way they want), equal protection as a constitutional matter requires that the arrangement be afforded the same legal status as other arrangements.
This is, in a word, false. Equal protection does not and has never required that the public recognize whatever private citizens come up with on their own as a “right”.
And, more besides, the tie to property rights can be governed by private contract.
Well, if you are correct, it doesn’t stop at “coupling” - they’d be no rational reason to - and so, under your argument, “the state doesn’t have any legitimate business “approving” or “disapproving” of any consenting adult relationships aside from the regulation of property rights and custody issues.”
That’s the point of this logic - you make the case for no public institution of marriage at all. “No business” means “no business” - and so the state can’t pick favorites, and that goes for gay or straight, number of partners, and so forth.
And regulation of property rights doesn’t help you either - setting aside that thay can be handled by private contract, the ordering of property rights would still be at issue in the consenting adult arrangements outside of gay and straight “coupling”, and you’d be discriminating against them as well. You cannot, logically, under the principle you’ve invoked.
Marriage isn’t about individual expression. What kind of nonsense is this. I’m not concerned simply because Jack loves Jill. So what? Who cares? They don’t need a state pat on the back for that.
[/quote]
Again, this is your opinion and I disagree. Your view of marriage is pretty uncomfortably close to the one in Orwell’s 1984.