Phatscotty wrote:ooge wrote:Separation of church and state,the government never should have been in the marriage business. Government only should be recognizing the legal agreement between two people.A libertarian position,that you would think those who call themselves libertarians should have.If the "Aqua buda" wants to marry you the government should not care one way or the other.
We can agree on that! I have always held that position. It's apparent you haven't seen the forest for the trees. And that's where my overall argument is, as I understand there is no switch we can hit to get the government out overnight, all we can do is try to move marriage away from the government, or give government more power over marriage.
I am trying to get government more out of it, certainly the federal government. Even though I am repeating this I will just assume you missed it, that my state is a shoe in for gay marriage, and that I will accept that decision and be tolerant of it, and I think letting the states decide for themselves is the best way to respect Liberty and Democracy as well as gays and freedom of religion and association.
If you want to get the government out of marriage, then the consistent position is to say that the government should not be allowed to enforce any restrictions at all on who is allowed to get married. After all, enforcing a ban is the most invasive thing a government can do to any social construct, and currently the government enforces a ban on millions of Americans in enjoying the social construct of marriage.
Phatscotty wrote:Marriage between one man and one woman is the model that we have always had. Either we can prop up and support the basic family structure and the only combination that can naturally produce children and have society encourage family strength and support, or we can trash marriage and the family, say it's just a piece of paper, make it just about money and gov't benefits, or continually point out the exception that a single mother is able to raise a perfectly good child, while continually pointing out that a mother and a father doesn't work 100% of the time, and that having children born out of wedlock can be encouraged because of generous gov't benefits.
Our society reflects our decisions, and I don't think too many people are impressed with the results of decisions from our recent past. If they are impressed, I don't know why they are so full of rage and calling everybody hateful names all the time, or why kids are flipping out and going on shooting sprees or why suicide rates are so high, or why we double the annual amount of spending on education, only to get worse results.
I have a theory on "emptiness", but that's a discussion for another time.
Incorrect. Marriage between one man and one woman is the model all Christian dominated countries have had since St Aquinas. Before his ramblings about what he figured God meant, Christians often partook of the "one man, many women" model. Muslims still do partake of that model (though it's rare for them to do so in westernised countries because the law is set up in such a way as to be discriminatory based on religious beliefs and only allow the Christian model).
If you keep arguing it's about producing children, then why aren't infertile couples banned from marriage, or couples where the woman is over a certain age, or couples who have agreed that they never want kids at all? Continually bringing ths back to child production and raising is flawed and you know it, yet you keep going back round the circle to it. You even acknowledge it in that same paragraph. No pro-gay marriage person is saying "it's just a piece of paper", a good marriage should be built on love and trust and commitment and companionship, and marriage is a strong and powerful cultural and societal construct. This cultural power is exactly why we shouldn't be witholding it from a signifcant minority of the population just because "derp, tradition!".
So gay marriage is causing shooting sprees, suicide and the breakdown of civility and the education system now? Please, do tell us more about how that's true...
And still you haven't answered the one question I keep asking. I'll ask it one more time:
"If you are not allowed to discriminate based on gender, as is established in the principles of law, how do you decide if Person X is legally allowed to marry the woman standing in front of you? Assume person X is deeply in love and totally committed to the woman, is above the age of legal consent, is fully mentally competent, is not related to the woman, and has never been married before."(By the way BBS, there's a big difference between the government trying to encourage equal treatment with extra legislation, and the government sitting with legislation on it's books that enforces discrimination and people asking for it to be changed.)