How big of an issue is same sex marriage to you?

What does it mean for you as a person if it is legalized or rejected?

When the matter is finally closed and you realized you wasted a lot of time on it, will you regret debating it so passionately?

I'd like to know.

 

Same sex marriage is an oxymoron.

 

Because if I were part of an unpopular demographic subjected to mistreatment by certain members of the mentally immature majority, I would hope that people from outside my demographic would have the intelligence to see past the bigotry and champion my cause.

Basically, people who stand in the way of gay rights are either open bigots, are closed bigots in complete denial of their bigotry so they look for excuses to hate gays (Bible, aids, etc).

 

Why?


It won't matter to me at all, wish them well.

 

Thats a good point, and that is why I defend it.

 

Same sex marriage means very little to me other than it is an incremental step toward something I oppose--granting gays special victim status so that they get a private cause of action to sue people based solely on something happening to them that they do not like under a claim of discrimination.

 

Same-sex marriage legalization wouldn't affect me personally, but I have a strong urge to defend vulnerable, disenfranchised or oppressed groups. Fully-legalizing "gay marriage" would make me very happy.

 

Same here!

 

and I don't consider gays more vulnerable, disenfranchised or oppressed, so I couldn't care less about marriage just so long as they do not get the benefit of special class protection under discrimination law.

 

I don't think that gay people are intrinsically weak, but I think that society weakens them with oppressive laws that deny them significant privileges that straight people have. Once these laws are eliminated, I am hopeful that anti-discrimination laws for gay people would be unnecessary.

 

Whatever the Republicans think of it, I'm on the opposite side.

 

Well I applaud you for calling them privileges instead of "natural rights", but to me, that argument by many misses the mark.

 

I do not support marriage full stop. The main issue for me is that in most countries partners under civil unions do not get all of the guaranteed benefits of marriage. I could care less about the state extending a religious institution to yet more people but partners under civil unions should get the full legally guaranteed rights granted to married couples.

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That is not a very good way to form objective political opinions.

 

And I would like to point out that there is a long and twisted history of men marrying women.. And goats, and slaves. But to my knowledge there is no European history of men marrying men, only men going into marriage-like but usually less religious relationships. For example the history of 'blood brothers', although the Catholic Church is happy to engage in historical revisionism by claiming there was absolutely no homoerotic element in that institution

 

So if the sports stadium was having your favorite team and tickets were waved for the day, but when you reached the turnstyle after waiting in line for hours, you were turned away because of your clothes, we shouldn't see that as discrimination, like you say, we couldn't care less about you not getting in, as long as we did. Gottcha point just fine.

 

Well they are no matter how you would like to deny it. Homosexuals are deeply disenfranchised, our very language is homophobic as we have even children using homophobic slurs as insults. That homosexuals have to 'come out' and it is a big deal to everyone is evidence enough. There was no 'coming out' in our original societies, your sexual preferences are just something that would become known as they became apparent to you, like your food or fashion preferences. Answer us why don't heterosexuals have to come out?

 

Ask women when they won the rights to vote if they realized the time they wasted on it was worth it.

Ask African Americans when they won the rights to not be slaves if they realized the time they wasted on it was worth it.

Ask homosexuals who won the rights to be openly gay while fighting and dying for the United States if they realized the time they wasted on it was worth it.

Ask any American who wants the same rights as any other American if the time they wasted on it was worth it.

One wonders why anyone should be treated equally when it is such a waste of time.... doesn't one? Things that make you go hmmm. Those pesky inalienable rights endowed by our creator could be shrugged off so easily and much less wasted time spent if everyone who wasn't treated equally just lived and died on their knees, huh?

Shucks. I just can't figure why all the fuss. I guess you got me there.

 

I don't think "granted by our creator" is a good argument, it just turns the issue into a theological debate. Which is exactly what he wants.

All people have 'rights' because we are social empathetic beings. We see ourselves in others thus to hurt them is to hurt us.

 

You say po-tay-to and I say po-tah-to and maybe exactly what he wants is for us to "stop wasting time on it" and just call them all "spuds".

Nevertheless, if our eyes are as blind to the injustice of others as the eyes of a potato are to everything and anything in this world then we are bereft of the vision afforded us by creator or evolution and should just close our eyes, fall to our knees, flop down and belly crawl back into the primordial abyss from whence we came.

Whether by God or Darwin; if we don't treat each other equally - then we will all die in vain, and thus far not be so nobly advanced as Lincoln would remark in such a beautiful manner once upon a time.

 

On a personal basis probably a 1 as I am not gay nor do I intend to get married anytime soon. I will defend my position when the topic comes up but I don't go out of my way to look for information for it like I do with subjects that are more important to me like international relations, history, lesbian porn, astronomy, guns, video games and italian food/recipes.

 

while it doesn't affect me personally, defending the rights of my fellow man is something worth making a fuss about IMO


"He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty, he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself"

 

Your support you gay rights is admirable. But it does effect you personally. The same heteronormative roles which encourage homophobia restrict heterosexual men to only public acts that could not be misinterpreted as 'gay'. Most heterosexual men are less affectionate towards their friends than they should be. We should all love our friends.

 

It is if you can't think for yourself.

 

Exactly correct.

 

I can think for myself, and nobody will ever be completely objective. He is the one saying he bases his opinions on the opposite of others. We all have biases, my goal is to reduce mine.