Thursday, May 10, 2012

Insert Angry Rant Here

I normally don’t make posts about things not writing related, but the recent vote in North Carolina to ban gay marriage and civil unions just depressed me.

When an amendment legalizing gay marriage/civil unions is defeated, I feel a little bummed, but hopeful that time will change things. But when I see amendments strengthening the ban on gay marriage/civil unions, it depresses me. Because the rules are there to limit the rights of people. Limit the rights of people in a way that helps no one and harms many.

It just doesn’t make sense to me.

I can understand religious institutions not wanting “gay marriage” because “marriage” is a religious thing, and if civil unions were given the same respect and rights as “marriage” then I’d be fine and happy and whatever. Sadly that’s not the case.

And that’s not really my point, anyway.

I’m a very peaceful, live-and-let-live type. So why must so many people get their noses in the business of others? Why does it matter to YOU if me and someone else want to have all the same rights as YOU?

My brother would say (more eloquently than I will here) that gay rights aren’t limited because everyone has the right to marry someone of the opposite sex and so the law isn’t limiting a specific group from marrying.

Of course, it’s still limiting EVERYONE from entering a partnership/marriage/union with someone of the same sex. (My brother, by the way, says that the government shouldn’t limit marriages to man and woman and that it should only hand out civil unions [or whatever you want to call it], and that it shouldn’t matter what two people want them.)

I guess I can’t understand how we can create boundaries for freedom that do nothing but hurt people. What benefit does the anti-gay marriage group get? Oh, they get the benefit of being “right.” Of protecting the “sanctity” of marriage.

I have a vagina, so that means I can marry a man.

And then fuck him with a strap-on.*

Hate to tell you, but when I get married, it’s going to be a gay marriage no matter what.



* If I wanted to.

2 comments:

  1. Limiting everyone is actually OK under the law, and that is the crux of my argument. You can ban everyone from doing conduct X and not run afoul of the equal protection amendment (because everyone is equally protected), but what you can't do is say Specialgroup A can do X but Specialgroup B can't (because then the law isn't protecting everyone equally). As you know - and noted - I'm no friend of gay marriage opponents, but I do have a problem with contorting this aspect of the law to get what you want. You open up a can of worms that can't be closed. Don't be surprised when 25 years from now someone who can prove or argue that he has a genetic condition expects to reverse laws applying only to his condition. Note that bathrooms can be segregated by sex (much like marriage) because everyone (both sexes) are equally protected.

    If we slice out a new protected group for marriage, how do we not have to slice out a new bathroom policy? Just a hypothetical (and an unlikely one, at that), but its the unintended consequences of which I worry. You may laugh, but during the smoking ban debates they laughed at people who said if we ban smoking the logic will apply next to fast food and fats. The worriers were wrong only in that they didn't see the full spectrum of things that would end up in the cross hairs (the possibly misplaced war on sodium, et al.)

    Make it all a contract - or elevate civil union to "marriage" status without the name so the religious set doesn't get upset - and you get the same result, without torturing the law.

    I fear that in a rush to right a wrong by cloaking it in constitutional protections we may do more damage than good.

    To me, the ends, no matter how honorable, do not justify the means.

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    Replies
    1. This is a very valid and logical argument you make, and it's rational and addresses some legitimate concerns.

      Part of the issue is that the politicians passing these state constitutional amendments aren't thinking rationally or logically. They're too busy freaking out. Anyone who likens a legal civil union between two consenting adults as equivalent with a human and a dog or a human and a bowl of ice cream being similarly joined is quite obviously blinded by religious fallacies and rhetoric.

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