nakedemperor said:
There are laws concerning marriage. Tax laws, inheritance laws, etc. These laws protect specific rights of heterosexuals; the "right" to marry whenever and whoever they want, specific "rights" on how they can be jointly taxed, etc. Homosexuals do not have the right to to civil unions, a secular establishment. Its not 'marriage' in disguise. I don't want to have anything to do with 'marriage' as the Christian Church defines it, but I want the right to have my union recognized just as heterosexual couples' marriages are recognized by the government.
My short-term memory may not be as good as it once was, but as I recall, I was making the case that there is no
Constitutional basis for your support of homosexual unions. You are attempting to support your view by shifting the basis of the argument. Yes, there are laws concerning marriage -but that has NOTHING to do with rights spelled out in the Constitution. Civil law may not violate the constitution and no one has yet made a case that a ban on homosexual marriage rises to that level.
First, let's deal with the current homosexual lie - that being that a "civil union" is somehow different than a marriage. To support your argument, you cited a marriage based on religious beliefs. In taking this approach, you are simply attempting to cheat your way around the issue. Let's compare apples to apples. You well know that there is secular marriage, licensed by the state, which has NOTHING to do with the religious ceremony. Secular marriage and your so-called "civil unions" are in fact one and the same. Through the establishment of civil unions, homosexuals seek to gain the same legal status and privelige currently reserved for heterosexual couples only. The assertion that civil unions and secular marriage are somehow different is nothing but a dishonest shell game promoted by homosexuals in a transparent attempt to worm their way around the issue. Homosexual groups seem to think that the rest of society is too stupid to see what is happening. They apparently think that by calling marriage civil unions that we won't know what is really happening here.
Yes, homosexuals are denied the tax benefit of joint returns. Tough. That's a tax code issue. Take it up with the IRS. Exemptions are placed in the tax code to encourage certain things like home ownership and investments.
Your claim that heterosexuals have the right "to marry whenever and whoever they want" is demonstrably false. You can't marry your sister, you can't marry more than one spouse, you can't marry below a certain age etc etc. I'm not sure what point you intended to make with this, but this one's a no-go.
When you seek to justify your view by citing civil law, you tread on very shaky ground. Secular marriage or, if you prefer "civil union", is simply a license granted by the state. Like any other license, it is regulated. Twelve year old children are not allowed to marry or drive on the public roads. Blind people are not allowed to have a pilot's license. A high school dropout is not allowed to practice medicine as an MD. There are many restrictive licensing requirements in our society and the concept that secular marriage or civil unions should be between one man and one woman is simply one of many such restrictions.
nakedemperor said:
Plus, just because the majority of Americans don't want homosexual to be able to marry each other doesn't mean its not right. The majority wanted to have slavery at one point. The majority wanted to stay out of WWII. The majority wanted antimiscygenation laws. Etc. etc. etc. Sometimes the majority is wrong.
A childish argument which typifies leftist views. Not only does your desperation to seek support for your argument takes you all the way back to days of slavery but you seek to throw out democracy in the same sentence. Anytime leftists don't get their way they resort to the "majority is not alway right" whine. That may be. But the majority is always the majority and so long as we have a representative democracy, the will of the majority should be the law of the land. But leftists don't see it that way. They seek instead to impose the tyranny of the minority. They seek to use the courts as the agent of their desire. A tiny minority of militant atheists have imposed their will on the majority through the courts. They have perverted the intent of the Constitution and denied the will of the people. Homosexuals are attempting to follow in atheist footsteps and do the same.
nakedemperor said:
No, people who are not sufficiently obsequious with my views are entitled to their opinions.
Ah but you know that's not true. Tolerance for disagreement is certainly not a hallmark of liberalism. Matter of fact, just the opposite is true. Liberals accuse conservatives of fascist tendencies, yet it is liberals who seek to stifle religious expression. It is liberals who seek to impose politically correct speech. It is liberals who go into towering rages whenever confronted with a differing view. It is liberals who, having failed to win by referendum, now seek to impose their agenda through the courts.
nakedemperor said:
People who think gays want "special" rights are intentionally trying to make them out to be bad people who are asking too much, and generally these people who intentionally distort the sitation hate or strongly dislike gays, and try to restrict what they can or can't do in the privacy of their own homes that doesn't hurt them at all. This intentionally misleading language is hateful.
Finally, you shoot yourself in BOTH feet with this argument. The fact is that homosexuals DO demand special rights. Throughout our history, marriage - secular or otherwise - has been a union between a man and a woman. Now homosexuals want to change that. I don't know about you, but I consider that to be a "special" demand.
Your claim that some "distort the situation hate or strongly dislike gays" proves that you remain incapable of objective argument on this topic. Distortion depends on one's view. I could accuse you of distortion when you attempted to shift the argument from constitutional principle to civil law. But that's not distortion, that is simply choosing your reference. Furthermore, you are incapable of separating the concept of homosexual marriage from the individuals. I can loathe a homosexual lifestyle without hating the people involved. I can argue against homosexual marriage without promoting violence or hatred toward homosexuals. I can separate my opposition to homosexual "civil unions" from my dealings with homosexuals as individuals. Apparently you are incapable of doing the same or you think that I am.
nakedemperor said:
and try to restrict what they can or can't do in the privacy of their own homes that doesn't hurt them at all. This intentionally misleading language is hateful.
Nothing could be further from the truth. I am not the bedroom police, nor do I think we should have such an entity. What homosexuals do in the privacy of their homes is no business of mine and frankly, Scarlet, I don't give a rat's ass. But now homosexuals demand that the state legitimize their relationships by granting them the status of marriage. Call it civil unions till you're blue in the face, it's a secular marriage until you can prove there's a difference. By making this demand, homosexuals have placed their argument into the public domain. By insisting that they have the same rights as heterosexual couples, homosexuals have taken their private conduct and made it public. They have taken that which was none of my business and have forced me to take sides - and I have every right to do so. And so long as I present a rational argument, I should have the right not to be villified and painted as a hate-monger and a bigot simply because I present an argument which homosexuals cannot successfully refute.
