Frist Endorses Constitutional Amendment to Ban Gay Marriage

Thanks for the article. While I agree that terminology might change, I don't find that to be a bad thing, or threatening to my heterosexual marriage, I won't argue against it, because that wasn't my motivation for wanting to know. I was just really curious as to the rationale. I am definitely appreciative of your response.

 

Welcome to the wonderful world of JeanHeath's circular reasoning. A few hours from now, you will be right back where you started from. Enjoy your trip!

 

I stand with Timing on this one. Let's open the floodgates -- the teaming masses of horny sisters can finally get married to one another. Yes! And seriously, given that there will be somewhere between 0 and 2 couples formed this way, and given that sisters have been known to successfully raise children together for all of recorded history... no, I have trouble figuring out the harm. Tell me the harm. Mr. C's article clip is interesting, in showing what would happen to divorce law, but I see an easy fix to that even. Just determine a biological priority. If both parents are not genetically related to the child, then the parent who has a parent genetic link to the child has some custody priority. That's what we do anyway, in practice. Then, if two lesbians have a child, but get divorced, the mom who carried the child to term would have a better shot at custody.*

No, just Frist, Cheney, and Wolfowitz. j/k.
Seriously, the "traditional family" never existed, and it's hard to imagine new parental arrangements screwing up any worse than a good number of "traditional" couples do.

* By the way, speaking of screwed up, want to hear some divorce law in traditional couples? Here's a good case for ya. A good friend of mine had her husband beat the **** out of her. My friend filed for divorce, moved to a new state, wanted custody of her children. Old state ruled in favor of the *father* because of home court advantage (don't take the kids away from their school, blah blah; kids had no say in the matter, too young). True story, and my friend is competant and loving in every possible measure. So I don't think highly of current laws; it's all about who has the best lawyer. Cases like that have done more to erode decency in this culture than any of the new scenarios we're discussing here.

 

B-Bob -- are you actually on the 9th Circuit Court? just curious.

 

Sam, once again, you could not possibly be more wrong. Your definitions are way off base.
http://users.ox.ac.uk/~invar/circular.html

 

Why, yes! You are hereby forbidden from practicing law in California, or, er, the ninth circuit of California, or the ninth plane of California... whatever.

 

Ha, I thought you said I never sent you scurrying off to google, I guess I was wrong.

 

did i screw that up?? it is the 9th circuit out in california with the reputation for swinging WAYYY left, right??

left, right...that's funny, too.

 

The Amendment that they are proposing would revoke the Vermont Civil Unions and void those already performed. Don't fool yourself into thinking this is about states' rights to protect themselves from the laws of other states. It is not.

There is no need for this amendment other than to bash gays and to make it an issue in 2004.

 

LOL, that was a first.

Round 67 goes to Sam.

 

What about hermaphrodite marriages? I guess they can't marry anyone...

 

not sure how to take a comment from a D&D legend like yourself, would love to be happy, but part of me knows i should be crying

 

If modern law is going to be based on 'ancient' religious views then surely, the following should also not be allowed

• Divorce
• Re-marriage (a 2nd marriage)
• Abortion
• Contraception (ohhh wait that still happens in Africa, thanks Popey)
• Discrimination of people with different beliefs (that still happens)
• Left Handers

and Witches and Pagans should be burned at a stake

 

Laft handers should be burned at the stake. Pure evil.

 

Are we talking about hot, blonde, blue eyed twins or plump, pale, hairy sisters?

 

Can it get worse? How specifically do you feel gays might weaken the institution of marriage any more so than straights have?

Just turn on the TV: Cheaters, Joe Millionaire, The Bachelor, Who Wants to Marry A Multi-Millionaire, Divorce Court, Married By America, For Love or Money, Temptation Island, Anything For Love

The Divorce rate is 40-50%. I'd bet the adultery rate is 60-70%.

There's pre-arranged marriages, greencard marriages, financial "marriages of convenience", Las Vegas quickie weddings between strangers, Anna Nicole Smith type marriages. Mail order brides.

The state of Texas let murderer Diane Zamora get married to another inmate whom she never met.

The state of California let Death Row inmate Richard Ramirez, (aka The Night Stalker who killed 13 people) get married to some woman who wrote letters to him.

in Utah, 14 year old girls are married off by their parents to men who are often 3 times their age.

 

Manny, I just don't believe that's true. You could have made that argument in '72, when McGovern ran for President. Today's Democratic Party has it's extremists, but they aren't in the leadership positions. The only people who think the Party is run by the "lunatic Liberal fringe" are "lunatic Conservative fringe" Republicans... like Trader and JH seem to delight in being percieved.

Ask your typical Democrat if the party is run by leftist extremists and they will laugh in your face. (if they're not polite ) Today's Democratic Party is so middle of the road that many of its members went to the Green Party or stayed home in the last election... costing them the Presidency.

So many of you seem to get your view from Rush Limbaugh. I brought up Everett Dirksen and Nixon as being 2 famous conservative Republicans who would be run out of the GOP's positions of power by its present leadership and got little response. I've got the sinking suspicion, regarding Dirksen, that many of you don't know who the hell I'm talking about. That's pretty sad. He was a great man and he was a Republican.

As far as two gay people wanting to get married, I could care less. If two people want to make their union legal it's OK with me. My wife and I had our 25th anniversary this past February... I would like to think that gay couples could find the same happiness.

Like I said, there are too many important issues that DO need attention and bringing this up will just waste time, energy and resources. The court ruled on it. Let it go and hope that things get so boring in the country and abroad that there is plenty of time to kill on the Hill for such nonsense.

 

Well, I know who Dirksen was and I'm not a Republican, although probably only cause I lived in Chicago.

But you're right about the differences with conservatives today and of years past. Barry Goldwater, who was basically the godfather of modern conservatism in the american republican party and as hard right, anti communist as they come, spoke out for gay rights and in favor of abortion rights, towards the end of his life and criticized right wing christian conservatives, saying that real conservatism doesn't need to mess withe peoples private lives.

You can actually see a lot of this philosophy in Sandra Day O'Connor, his fellow Arizonan and buddy.

 

It opens the door to polygamy arguments because many of the arguments I hear that support gay marriages also support polygamy. Heterosexual marriage doesn't open the same door because the current law allows it, but not homosexual or polygamic marriages. Your argument here to support gay marriages seems to be that it's not a new thing to have two people joined in marriage. As others have said in this thread, it's not a new thing to have more than two joined in marriage. And as for the huge potential for fraud and harm, is there really a big difference between polygamy and gay marriages? I would think that the number of fraudulent marriages would go up if gay marriages were allowed because people that were roommates could have incentive to say they're married even if they're both straight (for company benefits, etc). However, I don't think that is a sufficient reason to deny gay marriages or polygamy. Likewise, what is the harm of polygamic marriages? If you say "it's not normal", then how can you blame people that say gay marriages aren't normal? I would think that having a larger framework of more people in a family could be a healthy one, just like I think two responsible gay people can make good parents. Plus, like you said, the divorce rate would drop (and wouldn't that be a good thing?) Please don't misconstue this to mean I am comparing gay people to polygamists or some nonsense like that, I am simply trying to see why one should be legal and one not, or if both should or shouldn't be.