Utah legalizes gay marriage, December 20, 2013

reply to post by sdcigarpig


Ah, this thread. Thanks. And that was a very good post!

sdcigarpig
reply to post by Inkyfingers

 

That kind of rhetoric is not new, and has been around for years, going back thousands of years to often describe a segment of society that one group desired to get rid of. The Romans used it against the Christians, during the dark ages with the spreading of many plagues, it was used to demonize and justify violence against one group or another. The Nazi, the USSR under Stalin, even Mao, all used this to describe segments of the population that they found undesirable, and sought to justify either imprisoning or killing all in the name of protecting the masses. Even the USA used it against different groups of immigrants, and especially during the civil rights movements, where such terms were used, to describe the African American population, even when it came to biracial marriage and weddings.

Game, set, match!

Inkyfingers

No, I'm not okay with redefining marriage to explicitly accept the unhealthy (and require that we accept it).

If people realised that homosexuality is neither normal nor healthy, there would be no demand to change the definition of marriage to include it.

And if you cannot see the inherent danger of requiring in law that we treat the abnormal and unhealthy as normal and healthy, I'd suggest less time online and more time actually thinking about what you are saying.

So now you're saying that only healthy people should be able to get married?

Perhaps it's time to take your own advice on that highlighted statement...

..Or at least start petitioning against marriage of smokers or marriage of people with contagious diseases.

It's so interesting how every single point that the anti-homosexuals bring up has rules that exclusively apply to homosexuals and no heterosexuals who are doing the exact same things. Then they use this not-specific-to-homosexual argument as "proof" that same-sex marriage is bad. All I can do is laugh at the utter stupidity.

Fail.

sdcigarpig
But back to your statements on homosexuality is neither normal nor healthy. Something about it did not set well with me, as I have heard that kind of rhetoric and statements before. And after a bit of research, looking back in history at such rhetoric and said statements the following can be stated:

That kind of rhetoric is not new, and has been around for years, going back thousands of years to often describe a segment of society that one group desired to get rid of. The Romans used it against the Christians, during the dark ages with the spreading of many plagues, it was used to demonize and justify violence against one group or another. The Nazi, the USSR under Stalin, even Mao, all used this to describe segments of the population that they found undesirable, and sought to justify either imprisoning or killing all in the name of protecting the masses. Even the USA used it against different groups of immigrants, and especially during the civil rights movements, where such terms were used, to describe the African American population, even when it came to biracial marriage and weddings.

Alas this is more logical fallacy along the lines of "Stalin ate bread, you eat bread, therefore you are like Stalin".

In case you had not noticed (perhaps because you do not live in a country where it is yet the case) but socially conservative people are themselves being criminalised for who they are when they speak out against homosexuality. Considering that I am not in any way supportive of criminalising homosexuals, yet liberals here in England have driven this issue to the point where conservatives ARE being criminalised for their values, I'd say that the people who are taking the above mentioned path that you spell out are actually the liberals and not the conservatives.

By liberal I mean in the English and European sense of socially "progressive", as opposed to the American sense which focuses on economics.

Am I to be accused of being like Stalin if I say that blindness or paraplegia are also unhealthy (although neither in a way that invalidates marriage, before some right-on individual accuses me of that as well). Some things are not normal. That doesn't mean that you abuse people for it, but it does mean that you don't call it normal when it is not. That is down to a basic position of honesty.

Gay "marriage" has only come about because people think that homosexuality is normal. It is not, and the demand that we treat it as being normal when it is not is just another case of "emperor's new clothes".

TheRegal

So now you're saying that only healthy people should be able to get married?

No.

I'm saying that we should not say that something is normal and healthy when it is neither.

reply to post by Inkyfingers


In the end does it matter if it's "Normal" or "not Normal" don't we as Humans deserve equal rights? does normality restrict the rights we deserve as Humans?


because this is more of a Humans right than a "Gay Right"

are you saying that you believe we selected to be Gay thus not "Normal" and don't deserve equal rights because it was our "Choice"? how about things Heterosexuals do that are not "Normal" and who dictates normal anyway?

reply to post by Darth_Prime


Normal is in the eye, or the habit patterns, of the beholder. A wise man once said (Robert Anton Wilson? Someone like him if not him) that the best way to expand your own universe is to accept everyone elses.

reply to post by Aleister


werk!

what defines "Normal"?

it seems people refuse to believe that we are born this way so they have a reason to "blame" us.

Aleister

Normal is in the eye, or the habit patterns, of the beholder.

That isn't correct.

There is a statistical aspect (and clearly homosexuality is in no way statistically normal - it is a tiny tiny minority of society).

There is also the behavioural aspect, of not being disordered. In addition to Homosexuality not being statistically normal, neither is it behaviourally normal - given that its very nature stands against the nature of both life itself and the sexes themselves.

Darth_Prime

In the end does it matter if it's "Normal" or "not Normal" don't we as Humans deserve equal rights? does normality restrict the rights we deserve as Humans?

It's not a matter of "rights". It's matter of honesty and reality (see my above repley to Aleister). You don't have the right to force others to treat as normal something which is not.

If Stalin eats bread and I eat bread then we are indeed, both, bread-eaters.

If gays and lesbians are American citizens, and heterosexuals are American citizens, then they are indeed, both, American citizens.

While they are both natural and normal by definition, gays and lesbians don't require either to be treated with equal protection in the United States. They are human citizens of the US first and foremost. Their rights arise from the body politic, from "We the People." No faulty syllogisms take that away, neither do repeated, insipid comments to the contrary.

Study after study after study has demonstrated that homosexual preference is not pathological. Every modern medical and psychological association agrees with that position.

The United States government has on multiple occasions confirmed that gays and lesbians cannot be discriminated against.

Intractable repetition of tired and irrational rhetoric about unnaturalness, abnormality, unhealthiness, etc. in the face of repeated evidence to the contrary is revealed to be merely irrational personal belief.

People can believe whatever they want to. Kids believe in Santa Claus and Superman; that doesn't make jolly elves or superheroes real.

People believe that gays and lesbians are unnatural, abnormal or unhealthy and that they don't have equal rights; that doesn't make that fact.

History offers a word of caution to the bigoted, that those who wish to discriminate against others based on minor differences should be very wary about creating a political or social climate that fosters such discrimination, because all have differences.

What's done to Them today will be done to you tomorrow.

Gryphon66

Study after study after study has demonstrated that homosexual preference is not pathological. Every modern medical and psychological association agrees with that position.

How can something NOT be pathological when it stands against the nature of life and the sexes?

This isn't comparable to discrimination on the grounds of colour, as colour is not a disordered state agains the nature of life and the sexes. It is simply recognising that life is a specific thing (metabolism, growth and reproduction) and that the sexes are a certain thing (the intrinsically complementary roles in sexual reproduction), and that where heterosexuality is in keeping with both, homosexuality is in its nature at odds with both.

How on earth can YOU call something normal and non-pathological when in its very nature it stands at odds with the nature of life itself and the sexes? Seriously, how?

The United States government has on multiple occasions confirmed that gays and lesbians cannot be discriminated against.

The US government used to discriminate against blacks. Just because the US government does something, it does not make it right.

People believe that gays and lesbians are unnatural, abnormal or unhealthy and that they don't have equal rights; that doesn't make that fact.

Indeed. Nor does believing homosexuality to be normal make it normal.

reply to post by Inkyfingers


Can we all please lay off the normal/abnormal/myauntsally stuff for now and get back to topic. As Christian Voice says, topic drift on a thread such as this might dump the whole thing. So I'm asking nicely. I've only used the alert button once since I came here (and that was in a positive way, just yesterday, telling the staff about a possible/likely Mars fossil find) so I don't lean on that, but as thread OP I feel this is moving into some kind of, if not hate speech, "I don't think you are as good as me" speech. Everyone please shake hands (at a minimum) and come out not fighting.

Let's get back on track by looking at pertinent passages from a couple of documents:

The ruling of Judge Shelby striking down Utah's Constitutional Amendment (copy of ruling on Scribd):

Applying the law as it is required to do, the court holds that Utah’s prohibition on same sex marriage conflicts with the United States Constitution’s guarantees of equal protection and due process under the law. The State’s current laws deny its gay and lesbian citizens their fundamental right to marry and, in so doing, demean the dignity of these same-sex couples for no rational reason. Accordingly, the court finds that these laws are unconstitutional.

And Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution:

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

If Utah does eventually pursue the matter all the way to SCOTUS, the resultant decision will likely negate every State constitutional amendment that limits marriage to opposite sexes nationwide. There's just little other way to see it BEFORE THE LAW.

THAT will be the landmark decision of the decade.

The Constitution is clear. A State, even by the action of referendum, may not "make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States." That's it, the end.

If marriage exists for any one couple, it must exist for any couple, regardless of the sexes of that couple.

Sex is not a reasonable determinant of restriction under the Fourteenth as well as the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Given these facts, same-sex marriage will be legal in the United States. The only way it will not be is if by some means the Fourteenth Amendment is repealed.

Now THAT would be an interesting fight ... but for another thread.

reply to post by Gryphon66


You have hit the nail on top of the head, sir, and make all that has come before on this thread mute. Utah and Oklahoma may lead the way to national gay marriage in America. Who would have thunk it.

reply to post by Inkyfingers

No, it is not more logical fallacy. The statements you make about homosexuality are rhetoric that has been used in the past to justify the reasons for discrimination and it starts with statements similar to what you have made. If you do not like gay marriage and think it is wrong, that is fine, and contrary to what you believe, the strongest test to the law, such as the freedom of speech is supporting that which one does not agree with. But to refer to a group, as you have done in your arguments, about it being unhealthy and unnatural falls into another category all together and thus the logic and statement stands and holds truth.

But the statement that you keep making and have made time and time again, those kinds of statements have been used before, and here is the proof on such:

It’s unnatural…
It is incompatible…
It is unhealthy…

Those kinds of statements have been used in the past to justify the outright discrimination against one group or another all on the basis of using them as a scapegoat and fear, and loathing, to deny them the same rights as everyone else, and to justify a criminal system that ultimately would lead to the deaths of millions. When you use terms like that to justify one group of people like that, it starts down a road of hate and violence towards that group that is not right or correct.
Those three statements have been used time and time again through history, but if you want more modern examples, then here you go: The Nazi party used all three in their propaganda against those who were Jewish in an attempt to start to mold the minds of the people and justify either the expulsion from Germany and then later the outright extermination of the Jews during the 1940’s.
Here in the USA, those words, those three words were used in statements over and over again to justify the Jim Crow Laws and the outright legal discrimination of the African American Race, along with denying them the right to wed outside of their race. It was stated that it was unnatural, that the African Americans were unhealthy, and lazy. That such is incompatible with the laws and views of the USA and the south.

And currently in the country of Uganda, such statements are used to describe homosexuals on a regular basis, in an attempt to justify to the population that the anti-gay laws that they are seeking to promote and pass are just, that the punishments and persecution of such are correct.
And as most of history will prove the beginning start to such is always the use of such terms against a group to gather opinion against said group, till society views such as no longer benefiting from having the full rights of being a part of that society and legalizes discrimination and persecution of said target groups. Unless you can produce peer reviewed literature that is nonbiased to the extent as to what is considered to be normal, then to call it not normal is tantamount to the same words of discrimination that have been used before by so many who would deny rights, liberties and ultimately the pursuit of happiness to a target group. On this it can be assured, that the American Medical Association and the American Psychological Association has concluded and reviewed and survived to the conclusion that homosexuality is a natural part of life and it not an illness or something unnatural nor unhealthy.

Furthermore, if you expect a group to do as everyone else does, like pay taxes, be law abiding citizens and a productive members of society, you should at least give them the full rights of being a citizen and the respect of having those rights that every citizen of a country holds dear. Cause be it if you like it or not, in the USA, it is a nation of laws and the ideal of equality under the law still holds weight and once you open a door to deny a right to one group will often come back to affect the whole.

The point i have been trying to make is that Humans have the right to marry, i am a Human. me being Gay doesn't alter that fact, so i should have the same right to marry in any state without it being voted and debated on

the Normal not Normal argument is moot when it comes down to it because as a Human we all deserve equal rights

Christian Voice
reply to post by Aleister

 

I don't think this will change anything. Sooner or later the "Christians" that have been sitting idly by allowing this crap to happen will finally stand up. I have heard several of my friends and family over the past few weeks saying that their Churches are finally speaking out against homosexuality altogether. Finally people are getting their heads out of the sand and are standing up against this mess. Now the government is going to attempt to force it upon a people that clearly do not want it ? I don't think so.

Some say this is the best thing ever. Some say it is the worst thing ever. It had zero impact on my life.

Darth_Prime
The point i have been trying to make is that Humans have the right to marry, i am a Human. me being Gay doesn't alter that fact, so i should have the same right to marry in any state without it being voted and debated on

the Normal not Normal argument is moot when it comes down to it because as a Human we all deserve equal rights

Changing the definition of "marry" in order to make a "human right" apply to you is simple dishonesty.

sdcigarpig
reply to post by Inkyfingers

 

No, it is not more logical fallacy. The statements you make about homosexuality are rhetoric that has been used in the past to justify the reasons for discrimination

Wrong. Hence your repeatedly associating me with the concept that....

It’s unnatural…

Maybe if you took the time to understand what I say enough not to make this very basic repeat error you'd cease making the other ones as well.

reply to post by Inkyfingers


5 G's please...

how many times has the definition of marriage changed over the years before it was taken over by the Church? the reasoning for getting married has changed, everything has changed numerous times.

Darth_Prime
reply to post by Inkyfingers

 

5 G's please...

how many times has the definition of marriage changed over the years before it was taken over by the Church? the reasoning for getting married has changed, everything has changed numerous times.

You cite "human rights" that were scribed by people who never considered marriage to include same-sex.

Does that not strike you as contradictory and opportunistic on your part?