And yet, Western society found slavery to be morally undesirable and cast it off.
Wait… is that… experimentation… and adaptation?
[quote]Makavali wrote:
And yet, Western society found slavery to be morally undesirable and cast it off.
Wait… is that… experimentation… and adaptation?[/quote]
And was it worth the costs?
[quote]Makavali wrote:
Adverse effects?[/quote]
And not to be a pest, but have you read any of those links I posted to you? Or the articles?
Your argument boils down to: Irrespective of any possible problems, the simple goal of “equality”, which in this case means redefining marriage to include same-sex couples in a legal status to which they were previously “excluded” because gays have no desire to enter into a marriage as it is currently defined - to achieve the effect of governmental “recognition” and avoid hurting the feelings of gay people - should be pursued. And , if “experimentation” were suggested, no alternatives should be tried, such as providing a separate and unavailable-to-heterosexuals legal status - such as civil unions - because that might still hurt their feelings and not “legitimize” their relationships sufficiently.
[quote]Makavali wrote:
Aside from the right to equality.[/quote]
Absolutely incorrect.
The Constitution does not command a legislative invention for every predilection on the basis that some preferences are privileged over others. It is not that way for polygamy, and it is not that way for gay marriage. The issue is a democratic one, one that requires good old fashioned changing of minds on the naked merits of the issue, and the votes that follow.
Based on the puppet show we see in this thread, I am not so sure you are making much progress in that endeavor.
But it’s pointless to pursue - if pressed on the questions, you will you “get bored”, dodge the issue, and respond with “oh, look…a squirrel”.
[quote]wirewound wrote:
It doesn’t matter. The majority of a society cannot wish away the rights of the minority in this country. That’s LITERALLY what the courts are here to insure. That’s not legislating from the bench, that’s restricting legislation that never should have been put forth in the first place.[/quote]
Factually wrong. The courts are not here to “insure the majority doesn’t trample the rights of the minority” - the courts are here to adjudicate and follow the law.
If a given law protects the minority from the majority (via codified rights, for example), then the court protects the minority. If the law does not, then the court defers to the majority’s legislative preferences as long as they are rationally based.
Courts interpreting written laws have no general mission to go rescue the minority from majoritarian politics on notions of “fairness”. The general check against overbearing majoritarianism are in the other two branches, and courts are constrained by the written law itself.
I continue to weep for the state of civics education these days.
[quote]Mick28 wrote:
Makavali…how many times must your lunch be eaten before you walk away from the table?
[/quote]
This retard again?
You ever come up with anything useful other than “fags” this and “homos” that, idiot?
Thought not.
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Makavali wrote:
Aside from the right to equality.
Absolutely incorrect.
The Constitution does not command a legislative invention for every predilection on the basis that some preferences are privileged over others. It is not that way for polygamy, and it is not that way for gay marriage. The issue is a democratic one, one that requires good old fashioned changing of minds on the naked merits of the issue, and the votes that follow.[/quote]
Were other civil rights cases decided by majority vote?
[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
Makavali wrote:
Adverse effects?
And not to be a pest, but have you read any of those links I posted to you? Or the articles?
Your argument boils down to: Irrespective of any possible problems, the simple goal of “equality”, which in this case means redefining marriage to include same-sex couples in a legal status to which they were previously “excluded” because gays have no desire to enter into a marriage as it is currently defined - to achieve the effect of governmental “recognition” and avoid hurting the feelings of gay people - should be pursued. And , if “experimentation” were suggested, no alternatives should be tried, such as providing a separate and unavailable-to-heterosexuals legal status - such as civil unions - because that might still hurt their feelings and not “legitimize” their relationships sufficiently.[/quote]
If a civil union is the same thing as a marriage, what would the point of giving it a different name be (other than to placate a homophobic society)?
Or, what would the legal differences between a marriage and a civil union be?
You could easily answer this for yourself (admittedly, this requires the large assumption that you’d comprehend and apply the material) if you put together information from articles you are refusing to read.
A good post for this topic, from USD law professor Gail Heriot:
http://therightcoast.blogspot.com/2005/01/marriage-schmarriage-by-gail-heriot-at.html
[i]January 16, 2005
Marriage, Schmarriage
By Gail Heriot
At USD’s Conference on the Meaning of Marriage this past weekend, my friend and colleague Larry Alexander asked why so many people are willing to tolerate or even endorse civil unions between same-sex couples and yet strongly oppose same-sex marriage. Here in California (and I suspect in some other places too), the legal rights and obligations that arise out the two institutions are precisely the same. The fight is thus essentially over the use of the word “marriage” Or, as Larry put it, what if we were to call same-sex unions “schmarriage,” but otherwise treat opposite-sex and same-sex unions the same? Would that be fine with a significant number of those who oppose same-sex marriage?
Well, maybe it would be. But I don’t think that’s evidence those people are acting irrationally. Symbols matter, especially in a debate that is about symbols. And I see the gay marriage debate as primarily about symbols–and only secondarily about marriage.
First of all, it’s important to remember that the debate over same-sex marriage is not about same-sex marriage at all. It’s about the legal recognition of same-sex marriage. There’s nothing to prevent a same-sex couple from simply declaring themselves married right now, this minute, anywhere in the United States of America. Indeed, there’s nothing to prevent the couple from having, as Shania Twain would put it, “the white dress, the guests, the cake, the car, the whole darn thing.” If they want to, they can start their own church to sanctify the union. After all, this is America. The only problem is that the law won’t recognize the marriage. But that doesn’t mean the couple and their friends and family won’t.
Strangely, however, not that many same-sex couples engage in this sort of “self-help.” (Though some do, and I’ll give them some respect for that.) When the City of San Francisco started granting marriage licenses to same-sex couples a little while ago, surprisingly few of the couples who lined up for blocks said that they already considered themselves married and they were just seeking to have the marriage legalized. They just weren’t married.
Why? There are two possible answers that would make sense to me. First is that it’s not the marriage itself that they are interested in, but rather the legal benefits that flow from the marriage. If so, legal recognition is crucial. But if that’s the case, one would expect that civil unions that provide identical benefits would be just as good. Somehow, however, for large numbers of same-sex couples, they wouldn’t be. Why not?
I think the answer is that for many same-sex couples, a legally-recognized marriage is desired precisely because they regard legal recognition as an endorsement by the community of their relationship. It says, “The State regards this relationship as a worthy one that should receive support.” The same is true of the push to have mainline churches recognize same-sex marriages. It’s not the bare fact of a religious marriage ceremony that is central, since some church, somewhere could easily be found (or created) to endorse same-sex marriage. The desire is to have a major church endorse same-sex marriage as a way of endorsing same-sex relationships generally. It’s just plain better to be able to say that the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Methodist Church or (perhaps even better) a very large church like the Roman Catholic Church, with millions of members, endorses your “life style” than it is to say that the “Tiny Church of the Castro District” endorses it. And, for many, having the church in which they were reared in is important. What being asked for is approval. It’s an undertandable thing; we all crave approval.
The problem is that other people’s approval is the one thing they’re just not entitled to. Nobody is. Approval comes voluntarily or not at all. And rightly or wrongly (and I’ll write on that later), most Americans do not wholly approve of same-sex relationships–at least not at this time and quite possibly never. That doesn’t mean that they don’t like gays or lesbians or that they want to ban same-sex relationships. And it certainly doesn’t mean that they want to turn gays and lesbians into lamp shades (One friend of mine recently suggested–with what I hope and believe was a certain degree of hyperbole–that that significant numbers of people do). But it does mean that they have reservations about public declarations that same-sex relationships are just as desirable as opposite-sex relationships. And recent elections suggest that they are not willing to be corraled into such a declaration.
That doesn’t mean that some of them, perhaps many of them, might not be willing to compromise with … uh … schmarriage … I mean civil unions, which do not put same-sex relationships on the same symbolic footing with opposite-sex relationships and hence do not call upon them to endorse same-sex and opposite-sex unions as equally desirable.
But I’ll have to get back to this later …[/i]
ADDENDUM: Turns out that was the first of a series of very good posts. The rest of the links follow:
http://therightcoast.blogspot.com/2005/01/marriage-schmarriage-part-ii-by-gail.html
http://therightcoast.blogspot.com/2005/01/marriage-schmarriage-part-iii.html
http://therightcoast.blogspot.com/2005/01/marriage-schmarriage-part-iv-edmund.html
http://therightcoast.blogspot.com/2005/01/marriage-schmarriage-part-v-same-sex.html
http://therightcoast.blogspot.com/2005/01/marriage-schmarriage-part-vi-will-same.html
http://therightcoast.blogspot.com/2005/01/marriage-schmarriage-part-vii-partial.html
Another good thing about civil unions: they are likely to be obtainable without a judicial fiat.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2004-01-14-gay-civil-union_x.htm
The link is a few years old (2004), but I’m fairly certain support is about the same.
[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
Makavali wrote:
Adverse effects?
Refer to my previous posts on the illegitimacy rates and marriage rates in the U.S. and northern Europe, and the articles I posted by Stanley Kurtz.
[/quote]
Why is illegitimacy an adverse effect? If the importance of marriage is downplayed, so is the importance of ‘legitimacy’.
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
wirewound wrote:
It doesn’t matter. The majority of a society cannot wish away the rights of the minority in this country. That’s LITERALLY what the courts are here to insure. That’s not legislating from the bench, that’s restricting legislation that never should have been put forth in the first place.
Factually wrong. The courts are not here to “insure the majority doesn’t trample the rights of the minority” - the courts are here to adjudicate and follow the law.
If a given law protects the minority from the majority (via codified rights, for example), then the court protects the minority. If the law does not, then the court defers to the majority’s legislative preferences as long as they are rationally based.[/quote]
I believe the word is not ‘rational’ but ‘constitutional’. The courts are designed to ensure that laws are constitutional - and the constitution holds forth the Bill of Rights and the constitutional amendments which increasingly protect the rights of the minority from the tyranny of the majority. To the extent that the job of the courts is to ensure adherence to the constitution and the spirit thereof, it is also the job of the courts to protect the civil rights of the minority from the tyranny of the majority.
It’s not legitimacy as a legal concept w/r/t inheritance that gets at the importance of the illegitimacy numbers; it’s illegitimacy as a proxy for single-parent households created by choice to procreate outside of a stable two-parent relationship (as opposed to death; and even as opposed to divorce).
[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
wirewound wrote:
Ending slavery was a change for the worse? Ending segregation was a change for the worse? Greater religious freedom was a change for the worse? The enlightenment was a change for the worse?
That’s not what I said, and you know that’s not what I said. The New Deal and the Great Society were largely changes for the worse. The re-introduction of racial quotas into the law was largely a change for the worse. No-fault divorce was largely negative.[/quote]
How were the New Deal and the Great Society changes for the worse? This is only true if you believe that moves toward socialism are inherently bad. If you categorically assign all moves toward collectivism of any kind as ‘bad’ regardless of the outcomes, then yes, it is bad. On the whole, though, it is not necessarily bad just because it goes against your stated ideals. It solves many of the ‘remaindered’ problems of capitalism.
No-fault divorce is only negative if you feel that easy divorces are bad. It’s affected the divorce rate. How it’s affected individual happiness is not so easy to determine. On the whole though, I agree with you here - I’m just pointing out that you must have a bias to believe that strong marriages are more conducive to the greater good than is increased liberty.
[quote]You’ve broadly painted “conservative” as being against any sort of change, thus allowing you to define any change with positive effect as a conservative loss - with positive effect.
ADDENDUM: Here are some interesting posts that attempt to get at the essence of Burkean conservatism, which is appropriate for this topic, given his eventual thinking on the French Revolution:
http://vox-nova.com/2008/06/18/edmund-burkes-anti-ideology/[/quote]
Conservative: �??adjective
- disposed to preserve existing conditions, institutions, etc., or to restore traditional ones, and to limit change.
Argue with the dictionary - not me.
That’s only if you believe, a priori, that socialism is a force that SHOULD be opposed. Possibly, you mean that by resisting socialism, individual rights are preserved. Unfortunately, at the same time conservatism has aligned itself with groups determined to limit one’s rights (to abortion, to freedom from religion in school, from religious dominance of science education, to name a few).
[quote]
Wirewound wrote:
It does often take a bit of investigation to see when a conservative victory had a consequential effect on the growth of a nation. Here’s one though: Britain’s reliance on coal. It was an old energy economy that fueled Britain’s greatness, but holding on to it well past it’s prime caused Britain to lose out as petroleum and other energy economies and their attendant technologies rose to prominence. This was very much a ‘victory’ for conservatism, as the economic power structure at the time was the force responsible for clinging to coal.
Boston Barrister wrote:
See, again, this just goes with your definition of conservative as someone resisting any change. A “conservative” position in this case would also have been promoting capitalistic competition. All you’ve pointed out is a case of rent seeking by entrenched economic interest - a major problem when the government gets into the business of economic planning.[/quote]
Conservative: �??adjective
- disposed to preserve existing conditions, institutions, etc., or to restore traditional ones, and to limit change.
Fair, and well noted. Conservatism is a valuable force for preventing foolish attempts at progress. Nonetheless, it always eventually loses because, as defender of the status quo, it also opposes healthy progress. It is not discriminate prudence, it is reactive resistance to progress.
You have my total agreement here.
I was thinking of the greater wins for humanity in general, not Roman society. Jesus, although he’s not my ‘guy’, proposed radical changes in the nature of religion that caused religion to be something that transcended tribal or national bounds. In this, his movement was very much progressive for the time.
Conservative: �??adjective
- disposed to preserve existing conditions, institutions, etc., or to restore traditional ones, and to limit change.
And yet the effect of the north was to extend rights to slaves that had not previously had those rights. In essence, a progressive move.
And yet I cannot see how extending the rights of marriage to same-sex couples in and of itself endangers marriage.
wirewound:
Oh come on now - are we going to have one, one-line dictionary definition attempt to define a political philosophy? And then argue about the philosophy’s positions based on that dictionary definition?
[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
wirewound:
Oh come on now - are we going to have one, one-line dictionary definition attempt to define a political philosophy? And then argue about the philosophy’s positions based on that dictionary definition? [/quote]
We can look for more dictionary definitions if you want. My point is that you alone do not get to define ‘conservative’. The word has associated meanings, one of which is the one I’ve posted. As relates to the word as used in this discussion, I believe it is the appropriate definition.
You cannot argue that conservatism is something other than what it actually is. That’s my point.
[quote]
BostonBarrister wrote:
wirewound:
Oh come on now - are we going to have one, one-line dictionary definition attempt to define a political philosophy? And then argue about the philosophy’s positions based on that dictionary definition?
wirewound wrote:
We can look for more dictionary definitions if you want. My point is that you alone do not get to define ‘conservative’. The word has associated meanings, one of which is the one I’ve posted. As relates to the word as used in this discussion, I believe it is the appropriate definition.
You cannot argue that conservatism is something other than what it actually is. That’s my point.[/quote]
Appeal to the dictionary to squish a broad concept into a one-line definition is weak sauce. And I don’t really think several one-line definitions would improve things. Again, you’re trying to make a point about a political philosophy generally, right? Or is your point simply that “preserv[ing] existing conditions, institutions, etc., or restor[ing] traditional ones, and limit[ing] change” is doomed to fail, which warms the cockles of your heart?
[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
BostonBarrister wrote:
wirewound:
Oh come on now - are we going to have one, one-line dictionary definition attempt to define a political philosophy? And then argue about the philosophy’s positions based on that dictionary definition?
wirewound wrote:
We can look for more dictionary definitions if you want. My point is that you alone do not get to define ‘conservative’. The word has associated meanings, one of which is the one I’ve posted. As relates to the word as used in this discussion, I believe it is the appropriate definition.
You cannot argue that conservatism is something other than what it actually is. That’s my point.
Appeal to the dictionary to squish a broad concept into a one-line definition is weak sauce.[/quote]
That’s your argument? Concision is now a sin? If we are not talking about conservatism as defined by the fucking dictionary, what the fuck are we talking about? We have to have SOME common agreement about what conservatism is, and consistently saying that ‘that isn’t conservatism’ when the prevailing definition states otherwise is ‘weak sauce’. I’ve seen you formulate good arguments and I respect your skill. Stop being lazy!