So this means that a couple of the opposite sex that do not have the biological capability to procreate cannot ever be called married. Good to know.
And I propose legal civil unions nationwide.
jsfox, you raise a legitimate question, and I had thought about that, because I know people in that situation. "Biological capability" would designate, in my opinion, the equipment, not it's effectiveness.
LisB, thanks for stopping by. Perhaps your proposal could lead to a peaceful compromise, if we can get our terminology straightened out.
My point is that marriage and civil union are not the same. Let's write law to reflect that reality. Don't try to put a round peg in square hole.
In other words, you admit that your definition is solely based on the narrow views of the particular interpretations of some classical myths to which you subscribe. And that there is no good legal or moral reason for believing as you do.
Explain to me why a gay couple calling themselves married or being recognized as so by state and federal government is a problem for you? Is their love and commitment to each some how less because they are gay or cannot procreate? Last time I checked most marriage vows don't mention procreation.
OK, so maybe my proposed definition is unworkable from a legal perspective. It's a suggestion, perhaps a way to establish communication, a talking point, if you will.
Your point is well-taken. When my wife and I spoke marriage vows 29 years ago, we did not mention procreation.
Nevertheless, childbirth did occur three times. That is significant to me and her, and to those three humans who now exist because of our coming together. Apparently we live a society now where that regenerative capacity has no significance. We do not value procreative potential as we once did.
If such fertility holds little meaning to you, that's ok. I would not expect it to. But, hey, thanks for considering my pov.
Having considered your "pov", as you refer to it, I find it severely lacking in several ways.
Since marriage was originally meant to ensure passage of family assets (and only incidentally establish the heritage of children - its failure there was that most non-Judaic cultures do not make such heritage matrilineal) how does marriage between two people of any description, providing all the legal benefits thereby, not somehow belong if those involved wish it so? It's a contract, after all.
And how is it that you and your like-thinking crowd alone get to define marriage for others who may very well not agree with you? Would you grant the same power to me to say your marriage is invalid for an arbitrary reason of my own?
Disclosure: I'm a straight guy, with two gay nephews. They are wonderful people, and one of them has left the country in order to marry. He and his chosen partner are far happier than many hetero couples I know. And far better human beings, in that they would not preclude anyone else's right to happiness in a pairing of their choice. The other is in a state where the transition is taking shape, and may well marry at some point once that occurs, If he does, bravo! If not, well, that's their choice, his and his partner's. N o t y o u r s.
You are attempting to define out of existence, for no good reason, the very real love between people whose expression of that love makes you uncomfortable. Why don't you simply admit that? And then ignore them and go about your business, because it truly is no legitimate concern of yours whatsoever.
Right on.
So once a woman reaches menopause she's no longer eligible to marry?
Look. If you're going to propose a definition for a word, you have to explain why it's not arbitrary. You can say anything you want, but you have to say why it has to be A and cannot be B. If you cannot do that, your claim is essentially meaningless.
If you want to define 'marriage' on how it traditionally has been conceived, then of course there are a number of oddities that would result from that, but more importantly you would have to support the notion that the traditional concept is the socially optimal definition of 'marriage'. My guess is that you could not.
Or, you could take a more commonsense approach. You could define marriage as a legal partnership between two adults who wish to be so close as to have a number of shared legal rights, etc. etc. etc.
If we are in search of the most socially optimal definition of marriage, we wouldn't arbitrarily restrict gender, when we are perfectly aware that healthy, loving, non-exploitative relationships can take place between two members of the same sex.
Think of all the 'slippery slope' extensions peddled by conservative demagogues (human-animal marriage, adult-child marriage, etc.) I would say these do not constitute marriage, not just because I say so, but because they are either inherently exploitative, or somehow harmful to the functioning of society in general.
Well, this is just the outline of an argument. But see what I'm doing here? I'm defining marriage based on the extent to which various definitions of marriage would help society. That, in my opinion, is the only rational way to go.
Carey - the characterization of marriage you propose has been its implicit definition for centuries, particularly as a means for royalty to perpetuate its lineage through the transfer of property and authority from one generation to another.
More recently, in this country, it has been seen as an important means to protect the welfare of children - by providing a stable family structure for their upbringing. I expect you had this in mind, and it is indeed a legitimate justification for marriage. But must it be the only justification?
My question to you and others of like mind is - why do you find it important to make marriage so exclusionary? Of course, those exclusions affect the infertile or the elderly, but isn't their underlying rationale the desire to exclude homosexuals? I can't read your mind, but the debates on this issue clearly demonstrate that motive to be a driving force for many who wish the Constitution altered to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman.
I would suggest the question deserves some soul searching on the part of those who feel as you do. No statistics I have seen from abroad indicate that gay marriage or its legal equivalents have in any way destabilized heterosexual marriage or the family. In fact, the desire of gays for marriage rather than equal legal protections they might gain from civil unions testifies eloquently to the belief they share with the rest of us that marriage has enormous symbolic and emotional value. For them, to be allowed to marry will be a source of great happiness. Why would you deny them that happiness?
Are the rationalizations for excluding gays not a masquerade for an underlying visceral distaste for homosexual sex? Soul searching would help each person answer that for himself or herself. I would simply argue that distaste is a matter of, well, taste, but the happiness of others should not be.
Many have pointed out that a heterosexual couple who feels their marriage threatened by the marriage of a gay couple should consider visiting a marriage counselor to understand why their union is so fragile. I believe the rest of us should rejoice that this nation, through the actions of individual states, is inching toward the kind of marriage equality that should have been our legacy since the day a piece of paper (written in the sexist language of the time) declared that "all... are created equal" and are endowed with inalienable rights that includes the pursuit of happiness.
Beautifully stated, Fred.
Sir Philip Sydney has a better definition:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his,
By just exchange one for another given:
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss,
There never was a better bargain driven:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his.
His heart in me keeps him and me in one,
My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides:
He loves my heart, for once it was own,
I cherish his because in me it bides:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his.
"'Biological capability' would designate, in my opinion, the equipment, not it's effectiveness."
You might want to get your hands on a dictionary and look up the word "capability."
Fred, you have in fact discerned correctly when you posed the question: "Are the rationalizations for excluding gays not a masquerade for an underlying visceral distaste for homosexual sex?"
I would have say that the answer to that question is "yes." So there you have it. You have outed my visceral response to the whole issue. But that is reality for many people, so we'll all just have to deal with it, and forgive each other for our differing worldviews.
Which is, I think, what living in a free society is all about. Thank you for your lucid response.
As long as your views include attempting to preclude others having the same rights as you, it is you that will have to deal with it. You're not the boss of anyone else in the world on this. Get used to it.
Carey - someone once quipped, "sex is dirty and disgusting, and should be reserved for someone you love."
There's a ring of biological truth to that. To some extent, we inherit from our vertebrate ancestors a degree of distaste for bodily functions (many animals cover up their excrement to conceal the odor, which would reveal their presence). In the case of sexual acts, that distaste is overwhelmed by the power of sexual arousal, but when arousal is lacking, the distaste can prevail. For heterosexuals, homosexual sex lacks arousal capacity, and the reverse is true for homosexuals. In other words, the distaste is not entirely cultural, but at least partially natural. As a heterosexual, I'm not immune to it.
My point is simple and blunt. That distaste does not permit me to inflict unhappiness on gays, and depriving them of the right to marry would do just that. If homosexual acts don't appeal to me, I need not engage in them, but we must all, in a spirit of brotherhood, let others do with each other what they consent to do.
I'll go further. That spirit of brotherhood is a sustaining force for most religions. Why invoke religion? Because scriptures have been invoked to demonize homosexuality.
Here, I'll try to avoid arguments that tend to become interminable. One side may argue that the Bible is the word of God, while another proclaims it the words of men - perhaps men who believed God was speaking through them, but who instead were expressing their own beliefs, prejudices, and visceral distastes. The fact that the Bible condones slavery but condemns the charging of interest on loans suggests that whatever words God intended for humans may sometimes have been lost in translation.
Never mind who is right. The best suggestions on this issue as it relates to marriage is simply that as a matter of public expression of the principle of equality, heterosexual and homosexual unions should be given the same legal status - one that will inevitably be termed "marriage" - but that religious institutions should be accorded the right to restrict the marriages they perform to heterosexuals, if they so wish.
I expect that homosexual marriage will ultimately become universal in the U.S, as it will in other civilized nations. Decades from now, our descendants will look back at recent denials of equality to gays, as we look back at the justifications for slavery in past centuries, and ask, "What were they thinking?"
The problem with this is that in the face of the law, UNLESS RE-WRITTEN, a marriage license is the only thing that is dispensed to validate either a "civil union" or a "marriage" , THEREFORE, everyone is entitled to a "marriage license". When you get married in a church, they want a say in whether you can get married in their church, or by their clergy. FINE. They shouldn't have any say in whether you can get married in ANOTHER church, or anywhere else for that matter.
If you want to have civil unions with exactly the same rights and benefits as married people, then all you people (Cary, this is you) who want to shout, "MINE, MINE!" about the word marriage can then be happy and turn off your bigot spigots. OTHERWISE, it's just discrimination, isn't it? All those gay people deserve the same rights as you. PERIOD. Otherwise, you're oppressing them, aren't you?
Well, aren't you?
No, a free society isn't all about you're feeling/not feeling uncomfortable about what some other people are doing in the privacy of their own home, and so get to regulate what they get to do in life. Or what they do walking down the street, so long as it isn't lewd. Your ick factor doesn't get to decide anything about anybody's life, except your own.
You don't get to decide for other people, that's what a free society is all about. Apparently you're willing to make exceptions to the freedom other people are allowed to have, when it bothers you. Tough. Man up, get over it.
I can't imagine a time when I am going to be overjoyed at any visceral level to see a man kissing a man, or a woman kissing a woman, but I'm honest enough with myself to know it's none of my business, whatever they want to do, unless one of the two people in question were with me, and we had we had a monogamous understanding. And at the very least I can be intellectually happy for them.
Well, at least you're being honest now. You posed the question in order to build a dialogue, but this discussion has taken place thousands of times before. What is new about what you propose? Not a thing. It's you or someone like you wanting to impose your idea of "marriage" on someone else. You figure if you get enough people behind you, and the next guy gets enough people behind him, and so on and so on and so on. . .
There is nothing so sacred about marriage that it should be defined so rigidly that others are left out. I say that as someone who is about to celebrate my 53rd Anniversary. I love being married, but not everybody does. I know lovely people who are on their 4th and 5th marriages, and others who have finally realized that marriage is best left to those who actually LIKE it. Whatever works for them.
Are you going to limit the number of times any one person can marry? Of course you aren't. So why would you feel the need to make a fuss about the gender of those who want to try that marriage thing? It makes no sense unless you just feel the need to butt in where you're not wanted.
I am with LisB on this one.
Civil Unions for all, a legal contract between two consenting adults to live together with all the attendent responsiblities and rights. Leave the word "marriage" to the churches and their desk-top publishing software for "marriage certificates" to go along with the legal Civil Union license we get from the government.
Kids, or lack thereof, should have nothing to do with the conversation.
Thank you, Fred for your reasoned, polite rebuttal. Your points about slavery and charging interest are well-taken. Also included in that list would be some controversial scriptures about women.
As far as these issues go, they are suitable talking points. The bottom line for me is that I believe that Christ rose from the dead. That's the deciding factor of where my life goes from here, including after I pass through death's door.
And speaking of life, I suppose it will go on just as it was before I proposed a definition for the word "marriage." Thanks, jsfox, jason, Old Grouch, Orlando, moat, LisB, and CarlBentham, for you well-constructed comments.
I withdraw the proposal.
One or two sentences, if you can, on why your belief "...that Christ rose from the dead..." has any bearing at all on how two people choose to express their love for each other.
And while you're at it, please cite the Gospel*, chapter, and verse on where Joshua bar-Joseph (Jesus to some) said anything - anything - on same-sex marriage. Be specific.
* Accepted by most if not all scholars as the words of the man called Jesus. As opposed to the rest, which are regarded as commentary.
Old Grouch, the only reason I mention Jeshua is that his teaching, his life and resurrection, are the only message of any significance that I can offer to you or to anyone. The rest of what I say is simply my opinion, because i am not God. But he was.
You are correct in stating that he made no pronouncements about same-sex unions. Those prohibitions are found in the books written by Moses and Paul.
So you admit that there is no real theological or moral foundation for you to advocate discrimination against two members of my family?
What I say has nothing to do with what is real or not real.
I cannot prove to you what is "real," because faith, in my opinion, transcends reasoned discourse. As far as a "theological" foundation, that would be found in Leviticus 18:22 and Romans 1:25-28., which are books historically acknowledged by many as a source of theological principles.
I'm assuming you don't receive those references as legitimate sources for belief or morality. That's your choice.
And while we are here in disagreement, I must say, Old Grouch, that I do not advocate discrimination against your family members. That's because there is another document the authority of which I am a subject. It's the US Constitution, which states Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...
Since you and your nephews do not subscribe to the same creed as I, we differ in that practice of what the Constitution calls religion. I have, therefore, no basis for discrimination against them or against you.
Therefore I acknowledge the futility of my proposed definition. It would be meaningless to pursue it. I hope you'll still have a good day after this encounter. God bless you.
Faith only transcends discourse for those who are either unable or unwilling to engage in it. Faith that is not subject to questioning and analysis is not faith at all, merely blind credulity.
As long as you hold a belief that discriminates against my family members, I will resolutely oppose you. I take that personally, as it affects real, living human beings, while you are in the throes of error, based on faulty abstractions.
It is time for you to face the fact that you may live as you choose, so long as it does not adversely affect the well-being of others. That does not extend to your maliciously false attempts to define away rights of others based on those choices.
Are you aware of the meaning of the term "recant"? Because it is time for you to do so.
So this means that a couple of the opposite sex that do not have the biological capability to procreate cannot ever be called married. Good to know.
June 15, 2009 7:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
And I propose legal civil unions nationwide.
June 15, 2009 8:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
jsfox, you raise a legitimate question, and I had thought about that, because I know people in that situation. "Biological capability" would designate, in my opinion, the equipment, not it's effectiveness.
LisB, thanks for stopping by. Perhaps your proposal could lead to a peaceful compromise, if we can get our terminology straightened out.
My point is that marriage and civil union are not the same. Let's write law to reflect that reality. Don't try to put a round peg in square hole.
June 15, 2009 9:10 AM | Reply | Permalink
In other words, you admit that your definition is solely based on the narrow views of the particular interpretations of some classical myths to which you subscribe. And that there is no good legal or moral reason for believing as you do.
June 15, 2009 11:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
Explain to me why a gay couple calling themselves married or being recognized as so by state and federal government is a problem for you? Is their love and commitment to each some how less because they are gay or cannot procreate? Last time I checked most marriage vows don't mention procreation.
June 15, 2009 9:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
OK, so maybe my proposed definition is unworkable from a legal perspective. It's a suggestion, perhaps a way to establish communication, a talking point, if you will.
Your point is well-taken. When my wife and I spoke marriage vows 29 years ago, we did not mention procreation.
Nevertheless, childbirth did occur three times. That is significant to me and her, and to those three humans who now exist because of our coming together. Apparently we live a society now where that regenerative capacity has no significance. We do not value procreative potential as we once did.
If such fertility holds little meaning to you, that's ok. I would not expect it to. But, hey, thanks for considering my pov.
June 15, 2009 9:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
Having considered your "pov", as you refer to it, I find it severely lacking in several ways.
Since marriage was originally meant to ensure passage of family assets (and only incidentally establish the heritage of children - its failure there was that most non-Judaic cultures do not make such heritage matrilineal) how does marriage between two people of any description, providing all the legal benefits thereby, not somehow belong if those involved wish it so? It's a contract, after all.
And how is it that you and your like-thinking crowd alone get to define marriage for others who may very well not agree with you? Would you grant the same power to me to say your marriage is invalid for an arbitrary reason of my own?
Disclosure: I'm a straight guy, with two gay nephews. They are wonderful people, and one of them has left the country in order to marry. He and his chosen partner are far happier than many hetero couples I know. And far better human beings, in that they would not preclude anyone else's right to happiness in a pairing of their choice. The other is in a state where the transition is taking shape, and may well marry at some point once that occurs, If he does, bravo! If not, well, that's their choice, his and his partner's. N o t y o u r s.
You are attempting to define out of existence, for no good reason, the very real love between people whose expression of that love makes you uncomfortable. Why don't you simply admit that? And then ignore them and go about your business, because it truly is no legitimate concern of yours whatsoever.
June 15, 2009 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Right on.
June 15, 2009 11:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
So once a woman reaches menopause she's no longer eligible to marry?
June 15, 2009 10:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
Look. If you're going to propose a definition for a word, you have to explain why it's not arbitrary. You can say anything you want, but you have to say why it has to be A and cannot be B. If you cannot do that, your claim is essentially meaningless.
If you want to define 'marriage' on how it traditionally has been conceived, then of course there are a number of oddities that would result from that, but more importantly you would have to support the notion that the traditional concept is the socially optimal definition of 'marriage'. My guess is that you could not.
Or, you could take a more commonsense approach. You could define marriage as a legal partnership between two adults who wish to be so close as to have a number of shared legal rights, etc. etc. etc.
If we are in search of the most socially optimal definition of marriage, we wouldn't arbitrarily restrict gender, when we are perfectly aware that healthy, loving, non-exploitative relationships can take place between two members of the same sex.
Think of all the 'slippery slope' extensions peddled by conservative demagogues (human-animal marriage, adult-child marriage, etc.) I would say these do not constitute marriage, not just because I say so, but because they are either inherently exploitative, or somehow harmful to the functioning of society in general.
Well, this is just the outline of an argument. But see what I'm doing here? I'm defining marriage based on the extent to which various definitions of marriage would help society. That, in my opinion, is the only rational way to go.
June 15, 2009 10:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
Carey - the characterization of marriage you propose has been its implicit definition for centuries, particularly as a means for royalty to perpetuate its lineage through the transfer of property and authority from one generation to another.
More recently, in this country, it has been seen as an important means to protect the welfare of children - by providing a stable family structure for their upbringing. I expect you had this in mind, and it is indeed a legitimate justification for marriage. But must it be the only justification?
My question to you and others of like mind is - why do you find it important to make marriage so exclusionary? Of course, those exclusions affect the infertile or the elderly, but isn't their underlying rationale the desire to exclude homosexuals? I can't read your mind, but the debates on this issue clearly demonstrate that motive to be a driving force for many who wish the Constitution altered to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman.
I would suggest the question deserves some soul searching on the part of those who feel as you do. No statistics I have seen from abroad indicate that gay marriage or its legal equivalents have in any way destabilized heterosexual marriage or the family. In fact, the desire of gays for marriage rather than equal legal protections they might gain from civil unions testifies eloquently to the belief they share with the rest of us that marriage has enormous symbolic and emotional value. For them, to be allowed to marry will be a source of great happiness. Why would you deny them that happiness?
Are the rationalizations for excluding gays not a masquerade for an underlying visceral distaste for homosexual sex? Soul searching would help each person answer that for himself or herself. I would simply argue that distaste is a matter of, well, taste, but the happiness of others should not be.
Many have pointed out that a heterosexual couple who feels their marriage threatened by the marriage of a gay couple should consider visiting a marriage counselor to understand why their union is so fragile. I believe the rest of us should rejoice that this nation, through the actions of individual states, is inching toward the kind of marriage equality that should have been our legacy since the day a piece of paper (written in the sexist language of the time) declared that "all... are created equal" and are endowed with inalienable rights that includes the pursuit of happiness.
June 15, 2009 10:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
Beautifully stated, Fred.
June 15, 2009 11:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
Sir Philip Sydney has a better definition:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his,
By just exchange one for another given:
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss,
There never was a better bargain driven:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his.
His heart in me keeps him and me in one,
My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides:
He loves my heart, for once it was own,
I cherish his because in me it bides:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his.
June 15, 2009 11:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
"'Biological capability' would designate, in my opinion, the equipment, not it's effectiveness."
You might want to get your hands on a dictionary and look up the word "capability."
June 15, 2009 11:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Fred, you have in fact discerned correctly when you posed the question: "Are the rationalizations for excluding gays not a masquerade for an underlying visceral distaste for homosexual sex?"
I would have say that the answer to that question is "yes." So there you have it. You have outed my visceral response to the whole issue. But that is reality for many people, so we'll all just have to deal with it, and forgive each other for our differing worldviews.
Which is, I think, what living in a free society is all about. Thank you for your lucid response.
June 15, 2009 11:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
As long as your views include attempting to preclude others having the same rights as you, it is you that will have to deal with it. You're not the boss of anyone else in the world on this. Get used to it.
June 15, 2009 11:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
Carey - someone once quipped, "sex is dirty and disgusting, and should be reserved for someone you love."
There's a ring of biological truth to that. To some extent, we inherit from our vertebrate ancestors a degree of distaste for bodily functions (many animals cover up their excrement to conceal the odor, which would reveal their presence). In the case of sexual acts, that distaste is overwhelmed by the power of sexual arousal, but when arousal is lacking, the distaste can prevail. For heterosexuals, homosexual sex lacks arousal capacity, and the reverse is true for homosexuals. In other words, the distaste is not entirely cultural, but at least partially natural. As a heterosexual, I'm not immune to it.
My point is simple and blunt. That distaste does not permit me to inflict unhappiness on gays, and depriving them of the right to marry would do just that. If homosexual acts don't appeal to me, I need not engage in them, but we must all, in a spirit of brotherhood, let others do with each other what they consent to do.
I'll go further. That spirit of brotherhood is a sustaining force for most religions. Why invoke religion? Because scriptures have been invoked to demonize homosexuality.
Here, I'll try to avoid arguments that tend to become interminable. One side may argue that the Bible is the word of God, while another proclaims it the words of men - perhaps men who believed God was speaking through them, but who instead were expressing their own beliefs, prejudices, and visceral distastes. The fact that the Bible condones slavery but condemns the charging of interest on loans suggests that whatever words God intended for humans may sometimes have been lost in translation.
Never mind who is right. The best suggestions on this issue as it relates to marriage is simply that as a matter of public expression of the principle of equality, heterosexual and homosexual unions should be given the same legal status - one that will inevitably be termed "marriage" - but that religious institutions should be accorded the right to restrict the marriages they perform to heterosexuals, if they so wish.
I expect that homosexual marriage will ultimately become universal in the U.S, as it will in other civilized nations. Decades from now, our descendants will look back at recent denials of equality to gays, as we look back at the justifications for slavery in past centuries, and ask, "What were they thinking?"
June 15, 2009 12:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
The problem with this is that in the face of the law, UNLESS RE-WRITTEN, a marriage license is the only thing that is dispensed to validate either a "civil union" or a "marriage" , THEREFORE, everyone is entitled to a "marriage license". When you get married in a church, they want a say in whether you can get married in their church, or by their clergy. FINE. They shouldn't have any say in whether you can get married in ANOTHER church, or anywhere else for that matter.
If you want to have civil unions with exactly the same rights and benefits as married people, then all you people (Cary, this is you) who want to shout, "MINE, MINE!" about the word marriage can then be happy and turn off your bigot spigots. OTHERWISE, it's just discrimination, isn't it? All those gay people deserve the same rights as you. PERIOD. Otherwise, you're oppressing them, aren't you?
Well, aren't you?
June 15, 2009 3:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
No, a free society isn't all about you're feeling/not feeling uncomfortable about what some other people are doing in the privacy of their own home, and so get to regulate what they get to do in life. Or what they do walking down the street, so long as it isn't lewd. Your ick factor doesn't get to decide anything about anybody's life, except your own.
You don't get to decide for other people, that's what a free society is all about. Apparently you're willing to make exceptions to the freedom other people are allowed to have, when it bothers you. Tough. Man up, get over it.
I can't imagine a time when I am going to be overjoyed at any visceral level to see a man kissing a man, or a woman kissing a woman, but I'm honest enough with myself to know it's none of my business, whatever they want to do, unless one of the two people in question were with me, and we had we had a monogamous understanding. And at the very least I can be intellectually happy for them.
June 15, 2009 3:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, at least you're being honest now. You posed the question in order to build a dialogue, but this discussion has taken place thousands of times before. What is new about what you propose? Not a thing. It's you or someone like you wanting to impose your idea of "marriage" on someone else. You figure if you get enough people behind you, and the next guy gets enough people behind him, and so on and so on and so on. . .
There is nothing so sacred about marriage that it should be defined so rigidly that others are left out. I say that as someone who is about to celebrate my 53rd Anniversary. I love being married, but not everybody does. I know lovely people who are on their 4th and 5th marriages, and others who have finally realized that marriage is best left to those who actually LIKE it. Whatever works for them.
Are you going to limit the number of times any one person can marry? Of course you aren't. So why would you feel the need to make a fuss about the gender of those who want to try that marriage thing? It makes no sense unless you just feel the need to butt in where you're not wanted.
June 15, 2009 6:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
I am with LisB on this one.
Civil Unions for all, a legal contract between two consenting adults to live together with all the attendent responsiblities and rights. Leave the word "marriage" to the churches and their desk-top publishing software for "marriage certificates" to go along with the legal Civil Union license we get from the government.
Kids, or lack thereof, should have nothing to do with the conversation.
June 15, 2009 11:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thank you, Fred for your reasoned, polite rebuttal. Your points about slavery and charging interest are well-taken. Also included in that list would be some controversial scriptures about women.
As far as these issues go, they are suitable talking points. The bottom line for me is that I believe that Christ rose from the dead. That's the deciding factor of where my life goes from here, including after I pass through death's door.
And speaking of life, I suppose it will go on just as it was before I proposed a definition for the word "marriage." Thanks, jsfox, jason, Old Grouch, Orlando, moat, LisB, and CarlBentham, for you well-constructed comments.
I withdraw the proposal.
June 15, 2009 12:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
One or two sentences, if you can, on why your belief "...that Christ rose from the dead..." has any bearing at all on how two people choose to express their love for each other.
And while you're at it, please cite the Gospel*, chapter, and verse on where Joshua bar-Joseph (Jesus to some) said anything - anything - on same-sex marriage. Be specific.
* Accepted by most if not all scholars as the words of the man called Jesus. As opposed to the rest, which are regarded as commentary.
June 15, 2009 1:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
Old Grouch, the only reason I mention Jeshua is that his teaching, his life and resurrection, are the only message of any significance that I can offer to you or to anyone. The rest of what I say is simply my opinion, because i am not God. But he was.
You are correct in stating that he made no pronouncements about same-sex unions. Those prohibitions are found in the books written by Moses and Paul.
June 15, 2009 1:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
So you admit that there is no real theological or moral foundation for you to advocate discrimination against two members of my family?
June 15, 2009 1:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
What I say has nothing to do with what is real or not real.
I cannot prove to you what is "real," because faith, in my opinion, transcends reasoned discourse. As far as a "theological" foundation, that would be found in Leviticus 18:22 and Romans 1:25-28., which are books historically acknowledged by many as a source of theological principles.
I'm assuming you don't receive those references as legitimate sources for belief or morality. That's your choice.
And while we are here in disagreement, I must say, Old Grouch, that I do not advocate discrimination against your family members. That's because there is another document the authority of which I am a subject. It's the US Constitution, which states Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...
Since you and your nephews do not subscribe to the same creed as I, we differ in that practice of what the Constitution calls religion. I have, therefore, no basis for discrimination against them or against you.
Therefore I acknowledge the futility of my proposed definition. It would be meaningless to pursue it. I hope you'll still have a good day after this encounter. God bless you.
June 15, 2009 2:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Faith only transcends discourse for those who are either unable or unwilling to engage in it. Faith that is not subject to questioning and analysis is not faith at all, merely blind credulity.
As long as you hold a belief that discriminates against my family members, I will resolutely oppose you. I take that personally, as it affects real, living human beings, while you are in the throes of error, based on faulty abstractions.
It is time for you to face the fact that you may live as you choose, so long as it does not adversely affect the well-being of others. That does not extend to your maliciously false attempts to define away rights of others based on those choices.
Are you aware of the meaning of the term "recant"? Because it is time for you to do so.
June 15, 2009 3:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
No. Goodbye.
June 15, 2009 4:53 PM | Reply | Permalink