I, too, have no problem with someone expressing the opinion that certain arguments are based on homophobia or ignorance. But as I said in the previous post, I try to ignore the motivations behind the claim and just address the claim itself. Otherwise, we have no real discourse at all. That is "why" I'm defending polygamy as an analogy. Despite the potentially disingenuous motivations behind it being brought up, I think the comparison has some validity and should be rebutted honestly. Not for anything I did, but I'm pleased to see that has actually happened in this thread. It has been quite a good discussion with much more reasoned arguments than I'm used to seeing. Of course, the last few pages at least seem to be mostly people who agree with each other playing devil's advocate. I guess that's better than nothing, though.
Are you selectively reading my posts? I stated: If you are asking about whether people should have a right to enter polygamous marriages I am OK with that but have given a very clear argument including examples of why our legal system isn't set up to deal with plural marriages. Again though I've given you several examples of why a plural marriage is much different than a two person marriage which you seem to ignore to just say well its not all that different. There is a huge difference when you go from a system established for two parties to one established for more. Consdering that are law is based on precedent we have no precedents. Do you agree? Yet its not nearly as simple as you are stating nor is it like the dissolution of a business partnership. What if the dissolution only involves one of the members of the plural marriage does that mean that that one still pays alimony/palimony to the rest of the plural marriage? Does each member remaing in the plural marriage pay the person who left equally or is there one payment from the marriage? What are visitacion rights of the member who left? Is it the same to all children of the plural marriage or differnt based upon the parentage of each child? For that matter do plural spouses get visitation rights to the child of a custodial spouse that left the plural marriage? Again there are so many permutations the nature of a plural marriage that we have no model for.
And like bloop you are selectively reading my posts. I've said I would allow polygamy if and when a workable and equitable model could be developed for polygamy that guarenteed the rights of all parties. For that matter if a group of people wanted a polygamous marriage and set it up using contract law I would be OK with that. Its not an equivalent argument though to compare homosexual marriage with plural marriage. The range of issues are very different.
Actually I think you were disagreeing with a claim I made (the main difference between polygamous and monogamous marriage is not much more substantial than the main difference between homosexual and heterosexual marriage). I was talking theoretically about whether each type of marriage should be allowed in principle. Questions of implementation are really irrelevant to that point. That's all I meant. I wasn't saying those questions are completely irrelevant to the overall issue, just that they are in the context of the point you responded to.
Two heterosexual roommates don't usually buy a lot of things jointly. Homosexual couples do, just like heterosexual couples. Not a good analogy.
That's a very strong and very bigoted characterization of polygamy. If you want to see the "consequences" of polygamy look at the historical record that has existed for thousands of years and the regions of the world where it exists today as perfectly happy and fruitful unions. Frankly associating polygamy as an institution with abuses like pedophilia is no better than associating gay priests molesting young boys as being a consequence of the institution of religion or being gay. The larger danger of your argument is that rights are determined by how society views the group in question. If they're "bad" people like polygamists, rights be damned they're denied. If they're "good" people like you see on Queer Eye or Will and Grace, then they deserve the rights. You make a very passionate condemnation of polygamy and find it offensive to even mention it in the same breath as your pet cause but I cant understand how you feel it's moral to discriminate when the question becomes applying those rights for other groups. Your assertion that polygamists (or any other groups) should fend for themselves despite principle, can be easily expanded by non-gays that gays should fend for themselves. And lends itself to reinforcing my earlier worry that this was more about the projection of political and social power by a specific group than the actual moral principle itself. Assuming this is a sincere argument about the protection of those rights, then you would be satisfied with legal redress to these issues, that isn't marriage, is not specific to gays and uniform for anyone who legitimately establishes themselves in any sort of longterm partnership (polygamous common law relationships, longterm agreement among siblings to share resources, etc etc). As an aside, consider the case of a man who might currently be in a relationship with 2 "baby mamas" and by common consent might want to consolidate them all into one household for economic reasons instead of paying state mandated child support for each (each payment making allowances for housing, transportation etc etc). This Spring in SI, there was an article detailing how 78% of NFL players 2 years past their playing date are "bankrupt or are under financial stress because of joblessness or divorce." One of the major contributors to that being child support to different women. Aside from us characterizing him as a child molester and a terrible human being, is it beyond the realm of possibility that there could be some legitimate economic rationale for some crazy b*stard who might want legal polygamy? just as there might be some legitimate legal/economic/social rationale for each leg of the gay marriage argument? This is one case I'm sure you could find hundreds for any new type of marriage, as you could for gay marriage, which dont revolve around them being a pervert or pedo. You dont need to bring words like denigrate when addressing other type of marriage. The fact that you or I dont agree with a particular thing doesn't make it animalistic or repulsive. Rocketsjudoka, I dont think I'm selectively reading your posts. Without going back into it point for point I understand what you're saying. You aren't rejecting the principle out-of-hand like the guy above but you're making the case how implementing one may as a matter of practice provide legitimate difficulties. If I've mischaracterized anything, feel free to correct me.
I think you and bloop, regarding polygamy, are misunderstanding the nature of what constitutes a right under our system of governance. A right isn't something granted in the abstract but there has to be a practical way of granting that. FOr instance if I were to say that it should be a right that everyone has a Porshe that would be a meaningless right as there is no practical way of granting it. In regard to polygamy I agree that in principal I think it should be allowed but to call it a right skirts the practical implications of how such a right would be implemented, especially where it would conflict with other rights. At the moment to say that people have a right to plural message that is a right in the abstract and not really a right. In regard to homosexual marriage that is a very simple matter of removing the gender distinction in who is allowed to marry so there is almost no practical impediment to doing so. If anything the legalistic barrier of defining marriage as only between a man and a woman is an artificial impediment to a right that is very easily implemented from existing laws.
bloop, I appreciate your earlier sincere reply to my post(s). Overall though, I can't believe that once again a discussion of gay marriage has turned into a polygamy discussion again. But the fact that polygamy is the last battlement available to the opposition is probably a strong harbinger of a doomed position. Bringing up polygamy, in this context, is somewhat like arguing the following for habeas corpus. Gay people can be unlawfully detained, while straight people cannot. This makes sense. It makes sense because, once you say that gay people can't be unlawfully detained, what's next? They'll probably say nobody can be detained in multiples of three, and that would be horrible, especially in fighting organized crime! What?
This thread seems to be going in circles so this will probably my last post on this topic for a while but let's tie up some loose ends. rocketsjudoka, I understand what you're saying but consider that the full implementation of the right of suffrage/civil rights for blacks with the concurrent repeal of Jim Crow was in no way mitigated by the difficulties in dismantling the racist apparatus in the South: a byzantine undertaking involving everything from repeals of poll taxes, to busing, to jerrymandering, to the involvement of the United States military which took the greater part of a hundred years to implement. If something is impossible to implement, that is one issue, but considering the lengths this nation has been willing to go to guarantee certain rights, IMO neither polygamy nor gay marriage fall under the category of impossible to implement... it's more a question of it basically not being morally palatable to the majority of the population. yo BBob, I actually think your example of unlawful habeas corpus comes down entirely to definitions. Gay people can be unlawfully detained and polygamous people can be unlawfully detained while straight people cannot. Once you say that gay individuals cannot be unlawfully detained, it makes sense that polygamous individuals cannot be lawfully detained. It really comes down to how you define marriage going in. I understand the gay position that gay couples are in fact married in everything but name and conduct their relationship in a manner which, in their eyes is equivalent to a married male-female couple therefore they're being denied their rights if they're not allowed to be legally married. On the other hand (to the average gay person) polygamists are off doing something else... whatever it is, it isn't marriage (for reasons A, B, C, D) and therefore since what they have is not marriage, and what we have is marriage, the comparison between the two is a red herring, disingenuous political posturing/ nonsensical baiting etc The problem here is that a straight couple might use that exact same rationale: what we have is marriage, what they have is something else. It's absurd to associate the two. I dont agree that "polygamy is the last battlement" of the argument (I think the above argument (rightfully) actually starts and ends for the vast majority of people with the the question "what is marriage?") but polygamy does come up because a lot of impartial people on the fence do honestly see a logical parallel between the extension of marriage rights to gays and the extension of rights to other non-traditional marriages if gay marriage is in fact a matter of principle and not a merely a political tact. This is especially appropriate since polygamous marriage is a legitimate form of marriage that has existed for thousands of years outside the US, perhaps predating 2 person marriage as an institution whose primary original impediment in the US was based on Western European cultural mores and Christian tenets forbidding it (you know the same stuff forbidding gay marriage) props to the people who cared enough to discuss this stuff, see ya all on GARM!
and what is wrong with a civil union that offers all these same rights and protections? no, thats not good enough. They want the term "marriage". That way their lifestyle has been validated and deemed normal. I'm against homosexual marriage, but I have no problem with civil unions/domestic partnerships that have legal protections. guess I'm just an ignorant homophobe... that, or I'm just like majority of Americans... http://people-press.org/report/553/same-sex-marriage
Agreed, although I think the compromise will be for the Country to recognize ALL marriages as civil unions. After all, why do I care what the Gov't calls it? I'll call my relationship what it is.
Bingo. As I have said before, marriage is a creation of religion. Civil unions are creations of the state. Depending on the religion of the spouses, the rules for dissolution can vary wildly between the state and the church.
I think you made the case. They want their lifestyle to be treated as if it is not second-class. And they are right, their lifestyle isn't second-class. I used to think that calling gay unions "civil unions" and straight ones "marriage" was a good compromise. But in reality separate but equal wouldn't really be equal in this case. Not allowing a gay couple to use the term marriage would imply that they are not worthy of it. There's no valid reason to make that implication.
Someone told me that gay divorce lawyers are going to be rich soon in states that legalize gay marriage. I thought that was very profound.
Hmmm. Regular old "straight" divorce lawyers haven't exactly been hurting. Of people my age that I know, if I look at the five longest relationships, including marriages, gay couples have two of those slots. And gay people are probably about 15% of the people I know. (Shrugs.) Anecdotal, yes, but I just don't know if the data supports this "gay people will be getting divorces every six months!1!!" type of thing. And if that's true, and the "someone" YallMean references is correct, maybe we have a new economic engine for the economy: gay divorce law.
Judge refuses to dismiss gay marriage ban suit He asks lawyers to show how gay unions pose threat to traditional ones http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33319490/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/
I find the general consensus should be: civil unions for all, marriage as defined by religious institution. Why it is not there yet, is a muddled mess of greed and hatred.
Excellent question raised by Judge Walker and one that goes to the heart of the issue that Gay marriage is a threat to traditional marriage. [rquoter]‘Naturally procreative relationships’ The question is relevant to the assertion that Proposition 8 is constitutionally valid because it furthers the states goal of fostering "naturally procreative relationships," Walker explained. "What is the harm to the procreation purpose you outlined of allowing same-sex couples to get married?" Walker asked. "My answer is, I don't know. I don't know," Cooper answered. Moment later, after assuring the judge his response did not mean Proposition 8 was doomed to be struck down, Cooper tried to clarify his position. The relevant question was not whether there is proof that same-sex unions jeopardize marriages between men and women, but whether "the state is entitled, when dealing with radical proposals to make changes to bedrock institutions such as this ... to take a wait and see attitude," he said. "There are things we can't know, that's my point," Cooper said. "The people of California are entitled to step back and let the experiment unfold in Massachusetts and other places, to see whether our concerns about the health of marital unions have either been confirmed or perhaps they have been completely assuaged." Walker pressed on, asking again for specific "adverse consequences" that could follow expanding marriage to include same-sex couples. Cooper cited a study from the Netherlands, where gay marriage is legal, showing that straight couples were increasingly opting to become domestic partners instead of getting married. "Has that been harmful to children in the Netherlands? What is the adverse effect?" Walker asked. ‘Proof of no harm?’ Cooper said he did not have the facts at hand. "But it is not self-evident that there is no chance of any harm, and the people of California are entitled not to take the risk," he said. "Since when do Constitutional rights rest on the proof of no harm?" Walker parried, adding the First Amendment right to free speech protects activities that many find offensive, "but we tolerate those in a free society." [/rquoter]
