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What’s Wrong with the World is dedicated to the defense of what remains of Christendom, the civilization made by the men of the Cross of Christ. Athwart two hostile Powers we stand: the Jihad and Liberalism...read more

What Will You Say? - rationally, that is

Paul recently steered me to a post at Red State in which the author, Dan McLaughlin, seems to think he's found the "winning statistic in the same-sex marriage debate," the statistics coming by way of the New York Times via the Census Bureau. The statistic is important because

...even treated purely as a matter of quantifiable empirical social science, the legal debate comes down to whether there exists any rational basis for distinguishing the two relationships.
(It does? If I recall, the judge in the California case summarily dismissed all rational defense of Prop 8 as irrational. Why? Because he said so, that's why.) Further,
The burden of establishing the complete absence of such a rational basis is on the proponents of court-mandated “marriage equality.” And new Census data makes that burden harder to carry.
(Again, I'd point out that proponents of said equality didn't seem to be carrying much of a burden in California.)

So, what is that datum, that winning statistic that establishes the rational basis we're so desperately in need of? It is "that they [opposite-sex relationships] are vastly more likely to produce children, for reasons so biologically obvious they should not have to be repeated."

Are we to understand, then, that the judge in the California case did not know this biologically obvious fact? Of course he did. Would he have thought it "irrational" if such a statistic had been pointed out to him? Only in the sense that he'd have thought it irrelevant. As it is true that opposite sex couples are, and always will be, "more likely to produce children," so will it always be, to the entire marriage equality juggernaut, irrelevant. That every homosexual on the planet owes his existence to a heterosexual liaison is, likewise, a fact so obvious that it must be irrelevant. The union called 'marriage' is founded not on its possible fecundity, but on its depth of feeling. When a boy tells you that he loves his boyfriend as much as you love your wife, and dares you to prove him wrong, what will you say? When he says, "I am what I am, just as you are what you are, and you should not discriminate against me for being what I cannot help but be," what will you say? And when he claims that the foundation of marriage is love, not children, what will you say? You know in your bones that all his challenges are exemplars of irrationality but, really, what will you say? Judge Walker awaits your response because, contra Mr. McLaughlin, the burden is on you. The judge considers those challenges rational, and your instincts about the obvious irrational. Should you venture the conviction that homosexual relationships are somehow, well, unnatural, he will accuse you of being a bigot for thinking heterosexual relationships "superior." There may be a requirement in law for a "rational basis," but of what avail is that to you when the presumption of favor lies in its opposite?

The difficulty some people have in answering these challenges without seeming mean-spirited or intolerant may account for another flaw in Mr. McLauglin's post, a touching inclination toward compromise. He's in favor of legal status for same-sex civil unions. In posts at his personal blog, I think I detected (as I did with Charles Krauthammer back in 2006) a good deal of ambivalence about the propriety of the Federal Marriage Amendment. (You can judge for yourself by reading this and this.) Both he and Krauthammer seem enamored of the necessity of leaving this question to the states if at all possible. Krauthammer's opinion was that "Gay marriage is a legitimate social issue, to be decided democratically," to which my response was: No it's not.

. It’s a narcissistic social construct masquerading as an issue. Yes, we can legalize “it” so that homosexuals can live under the same roof, collect all the financial benefits of a real marriage, and do whatever else it is they do, but it still won’t be a marriage. I guess these days if enough members of a tiny minority start screaming that the rest of us owe them something because we have it and they don’t, even though the thing they want in the form they want it doesn’t exist, you’ve got yourself a legitimate issue....We tend to trust the people more than the judges because we think them less likely to impose intellectual atrocities on their neighbors. If the issue of abortion were left up to them, it seems likely that the currently allowed nine month period for unobstructed butchery would suffer serious restriction. (In my own state last election, the people amended the constitution to require parental notification prior to a minor’s abortion. It was struck down by the Florida Supreme Court as unconstitutional, even though we went about it constitutionally.) So, too, with gay marriage we’d expect the people to be more reserved in the rush to legality. But what if they did legalize it? Would they?
The concept of civil unions (and the approval thereof) seems to me a sort of liberal parasite in the conservative constitution, eating us from the inside out. It is an attempt to stave off ultimate loss of our propietary right to the word 'marriage.' It amounts to saying, "Look, see how reasonable and tolerant we are. What you do in private is really not my concern. In a show of good will, we'll grant you this title of legitimacy if you'll just leave ours alone." Once upon a time, I asked what a civil union was, because I was having difficulty distinguishing it from marriage and, in time (in 2004 to be precise), was compelled to a conclusion:
...some conservatives are willing not merely to put up with civil unions as a matter of strategic compromise, but actually approve of them. This notion that we can feast on the Marriage Amendment while throwing homosexual couples the bone of civil union bespeaks a guilty conscience, as though we owe them something – a sign of tolerance and compassion, perhaps, a semblance of normalcy. "We're married but, hey, don't feel bad: you're almost married." But a bone is exactly what they’ll see it as, a scrap thrown from the table at which the rest of us sit...they will not stand for second-class citizenship or second-class “unions.” Marriage is the mainstream, and marriage is the goal. They do not want your tolerance or compassion; they want your approval and they will have it however they must get it. The essence of compromise is mutual assent, but there will be no compromise save that which is forced upon them.

Even though passage of the Amendment and the proliferation of civil unions would deny to the latter usage of a word, an official moral legitimacy will have been bestowed upon homosexual relationships - a condition precisely contrary to the Amendment’s purpose - but not legitimate enough for the activists, who will be happy to point out that the distinction we have been striving to discover here is in fact no distinction at all. What’s in a name? they will ask, and I fear for our answer.

I don’t think it’s quite dawned on us yet what’s been happening in Vermont, in Lawrence vs. Texas, in Massachusetts, and now in San Francisco. These are not the actions of judges and public servants engaged in a zealous but well-intentioned and polite disagreement over a matter of social policy. These are the actions of people who bear utter and absolute contempt for the moral and spiritual inheritance bequeathed us by the men and women, the mothers and fathers, who came before, whose love labored in this vineyard, and whose labor was fruitful, not barren. We ought to consider the nature of that contempt before showing ourselves willing to compromise not merely a word, but the most fundamental and life-giving state of being known to man. Although our divorce laws, and the living arrangements of many of our citizens, make it appear that the promise to become “one-flesh, ‘till death do us part” exchanged between man and woman is a concept highly malleable, it is only an appearance. The substance remains to prick our collective conscience. Acceptance of civil unions will be tantamount to a public announcement that legally, and therefore morally, the substance is of no consequence. It is no more possible to compromise the meaning of that sublime union known as marriage, than it is possible to be almost pregnant.

All of which is to say that of course the ability to bear children is important. But before there were children there was a man and woman. There are certain realities about human beings that don't need a "rational basis." They are rational because they're real. That you are a human being with a right to life endowed by your creator is not a fact to be validated by rational discourse or by the tortured cerebrations of judges, legislatures, or constitutions. It is a fact which precedes any positivist construct. The word 'marriage' is not defined in our constitution (that I know of) for the simple fact that the people who wrote it already knew what it was. That your marriage is real, and the one between John and Fred is not, is a truth built by God into the way the world works. It is this sort of truth, the only kind that counts, that has been cast out by our courts, who cannot be rational if they are hardly sane. Returning that truth to the public square from which it has fled ought to be Mr. McLaughlin's quest, not trying to satisfy some legal construct that is already stacked against him. How it is to be accomplished I have no idea, but that he might not succeed is...irrelevant.

Comments (78)

I was recently thrown out of Ricochet.com because I dared to express facts regarding homosexuality (that it is not good, natural, or healthy). They didn't like my tone (which was plain and simple) nor that I attacked a specific group. Homosexuals are a protected group to them and can't be delineated or criticized for what they do or believe. I am forbidden to express the same facts and arguments when I write for American Thinker, and many have noticed when the Congress approved the end Don't Ask Don't Tell that Republicans made nary a peep and a number betrayed the cause and voted to repeal the policy.

The mainstream Right has abandoned nearly all our basic moral principles. Ted Olsen, for God's sake, brought the suit against California. His 9/11 murdered wife must be rolling in her grave. She was a staunch conservative as far as I know.

I am often beside myself with grief over the demise of my nation and liberty, the end of our civil rights (God given), and the ascendancy of Evil over good.

I am often beside myself with grief...

If it makes you feel any better, you're not alone.

What McLaughlin needs to internalize fully is that the infertility of homosexual pairings is not a statistic (how could it be a statistic?) but a fact of nature. He also needs to get a grip on the implications for child and family law of civil unions. Perhaps the name "Lisa Miller" would help him. That's the woman currently a fugitive with her own biological daughter because the court mandated full custody of the child to her former lesbian civil union partner.

"So, what is that datum, that winning statistic that establishes the rational basis we're so desperately in need of? It is "that they [opposite-sex relationships] are vastly more likely to produce children, for reasons so biologically obvious they should not have to be repeated."

Bill, you have two problems here.

1. If one goes to the NYT article we discover that a significant number of gays do have children. That they are a minority doesn't change the fact that those gay couples that do have children will benefit from the same access to the body of law that married couples have.

2. Rational basis is a term of art that isn't about just being able to discern differences but involves a law or regulation having a rational relationship to achieving a legitimate state end.

What the courts in Iowa, Massachusetts, and California have ruled is that there is no such basis. Try these experiments.

1. Come up with a legitimate state purpose in the state recognizing marriage. Describe how allowing gay folk to marry will realistically harm that purpose.

2. Party A and Party B have been in a committed affectional relationship for 25 years. They live in a residence that Party B inherited. Party A has maintained the house as well as taking care of day to day matters. Party B has a well paying job and has $1,500,000 in retirement savings as well as being vested in Social Security and Medicare. Party B has siblings but wanted Party A to be the beneficiary of the house and the bulk of the estate. Party B had been planning to write a will for years but had yet to get around to it. Party B dies in an freak accident.

If A and B are married, A automatically inherits. If they aren't
A is likely out of luck. Note that gender is irrelevant here. A and B could be named Tom and Linda, Tom and Joe, or Linda and Mary. One can come up with all sorts of similar situations.

If accurate descriptions of real life situations in which access to marriage conveys material benefits fail to have relevant gender components then perhaps we lack a rational basis for restricting marriage on the basis of gender.

1. If one goes to the NYT article we discover that a significant number of gays do have children. That they are a minority doesn't change the fact that those gay couples that do have children will benefit from the same access to the body of law that married couples have.

And that's what's wrong with McLaughlin's approach. That he treats it as a matter of _statistics_ rather than _biological nature_ that homosexual couples, qua couples, do not have children. Liberals like Al will just play dumb about what it means for a couple to "have children" and will assert that "gays have children." And McLaughlin has already given away the game, because the statistics he cites imply that, indeed, homosexual couples do "have children," but just less often than heterosexual couples.

Al's example:

"2. Party A and Party B have been in a committed affectional relationship for 25 years. They live in a residence that Party B inherited. Party A has maintained the house as well as taking care of day to day matters. Party B has a well paying job and has $1,500,000 in retirement savings as well as being vested in Social Security and Medicare. Party B has siblings but wanted Party A to be the beneficiary of the house and the bulk of the estate. Party B had been planning to write a will for years but had yet to get around to it. Party B dies in an freak accident.

If A and B are married, A automatically inherits. If they aren't
A is likely out of luck. Note that gender is irrelevant here. A and B could be named Tom and Linda, Tom and Joe, or Linda and Mary. One can come up with all sorts of similar situations."

What does this have to do with marriage? A and B could be mother and son, Tom and Linda, who have never had intercourse with each other. Is that a marriage?

You are confusing the accidents of marriage with its properties.

A human being is a rational animal; a triangle is a three angled plane figure. What is a marriage? Yes, human beings can wear polyester shirts and go fishing, and yes triangles can make nice precussion instruments. But in each case, these are accidents, not essential. So, until you tell us what marriage is, all the accoutraments of shacking up or having roommate don't equal marriage.

McLaughlin is wrong. Healthy and fertile male and females can have children with each other, just as they can use their minds for thinking and their lungs for breathing. Sexual orientation is not relevant to engaging in a marital act, gender is.

Al, my reaction to your point #2 is a big, fat shrug. Party B should have written a will. Interestingly, you're imagining a situation where A & B are going to get real on-the-ball about going out and getting that "marriage" license, apparently because they want the benefit of not having to write a will (?), but they aren't similarly able to get on the ball and write a will.

It is a sign that you have no concept of human nature that you think you can just trot out a case like that and say that this somehow means that we have to call A & B "married" regardless of gender.

We can make cases up all day. Here's one: A & B are brother and sister and have no sexual relationship. They've lived together for decades, ever since B's abusive husband walked out on her (but for some reason there was never a divorce). B is rich and always meant to leave her money and house to her loving brother instead of her nasty husband. She never got around to it. She dies. Husband gets the lot.

You can run the same scenario with dear, roommate Platonic friend (whom the deceased would never, ever, ever have wanted to say he was "married" to) and nasty siblings.

You can do it with loving mother and grown, successful child who lives with her and who wanted to leave loving mother everything but dies intestate so that loving mother has to share in equal parts with unloved and uninvolved siblings.

Rinse, repeat.

Thing is, life is tough, and just setting up situations where people want to leave money to somebody and it gets left to somebody else because they don't get around to writing a will tells us zilch about what marriage law should be. Among other reasons, this should be obvious because such situations can readily arise when the person whom we wish could have inherited the money has no relationship to the deceased that _anyone_ wants to call "marriage" or would ever think of calling "marriage" or ever has suggested calling "marriage."

Al, your objections might be applied to any two people who live together for a long time; two sisters, for instance, or a brother and a sister. If "gender components" have nothing to do with it, then why should whether the pair is sexually involved or not enter into it? Could not any two people who "love each other" decide to get "married"? What difference does it make if they're having sex or not?

Furthermore, if such is the case, on what basis do we limit the quantity to two? Why can't three people decide to marry?

No, the goal here is not to allow homosexuals to marry because of their "rights." That's a smokescreen. The goal is to reduce the term "marriage" to a meaningless one, which then makes the word "family" to be so broad that it becomes meaningless as well. The state redefines "marriage" and "family" to its pleasure, which means it redefines them in a way in which they can no longer serve as bulwarks against state power. One is left with the naked, isolated individual and the omnicompetent state, with no "natural" estate standing between them.


Al, why do you quote McLaughlin and then tell me I have a problem? I don't think you read the post.

The rest of your comment is just your usual tactic of (as Lydia puts it) playing dumb about the moral content of human sexual relations and the state's obligatory lack of interest in such things. Until you're able to engage the actual content of the post, I have other things to do. By the way, if the state has no legitimate purpose in recognizing marriage, then it shouldn't recognize the gay facsimile either. It should just say, with a Pilate-like shrug, "What is marriage?", wash its hands, and let the chaos commence.

Listing other scenarios is besides the point. I gave an example of a group of problems that access to marriage resolves. i maintain that resolution to be of great benefit to a class of folks currently denied access to marriage with no material harms resulting to those who are currently allowed to marry. My point isn't defeated by scenarios that involve other problems.

I notice that no one has tackled #1. That is because there are no harms. I listened to the oral arguments on Prop. 8 and read the briefs. You all haven't got a case so you content yourselves with red herrings..

"There are certain realities about human beings that don't need a "rational basis." They are rational because they're real. "

William, I believe you wrote that. You and McLaughlin equivocate "rational". As for reading you might actually read mine as I didn't get into the legitimacy of the state's involvement in marriage.

"That your marriage is real, and the one between John and Fred is not, is a truth built by God into the way the world works."

You are entitled to your theological opinions. Your dispensation is entitled to refuse to internally recognize any arrangement that is in conflict with its precepts. You are not entitled to use your theological beliefs to deny a class of folks the equal protection of the laws.

I again note that we have yet to see a rational basis asserted for measures like Prop. 8.

I again note that we have yet to see a rational basis asserted for measures like Prop. 8.

No, you have yet to see something _you_ would recognize as a rational basis asserted for measures like Prop. 8. Because we know that we'll just be wasting our time if we assert the obvious, because you think you can define "rational" to mean "things Al thinks are important." Why the dickens should we play that game? Honestly, I have better things to do with my time. There is something truly intellectually and rationally cockeyed about a person who literally thinks there is a big, fat blank as far as a rational basis for recognizing marriage as being between a man and a woman rather than between two men. That our judges are thus intellectually and rationally cockeyed is a great reason for a free people to deny judicial supremacy, but pigs will fly before our states or other entities start taking that idea seriously.

1. Come up with a legitimate state purpose in the state recognizing marriage. Describe how allowing gay folk to marry will realistically harm that purpose.

It's a legitimate state purpose to reward virtue and to punish vice, to incentivize moral behavior and disincentivize immoral behavior. Marriage is morally good, whereas sexual expression apart from marriage is morally wrong. Deceiving homosexuals into thinking they are married is to reward and incentivize promiscuity and extra-marital sexual behavior.

It's a legitimate state purpose to protect children from physical and moral harm. The best means of thus protecting children is marriage. Creating a false category of homosexual "marriage" is to purposely deprive children of the protection of married parents, to which they have a natural right.

Homosexual "marriage" = criminal child abuse. Period.

You are not entitled to use your theological beliefs to deny a class of folks the equal protection of the laws.

Wait - you get to use your theological beliefs to deny children the protection of married parents, and to deny decent people everywhere the right to a government that is not at war with reality, but Christians must never let their theological beliefs influence public policy? That's a sweet deal.

And don't pretend you don't have any theological beliefs. You have them, even if they are entirely negative, and you want your personal theological beliefs to dominate public life.

"The day will come when the mad will look at the sane and say, 'You are mad, you are not like us.'"
~~~~St. Anthony of Egypt

"A liberal stands on his head and tells everyone else they're upside-down."
~~~~Jim Quinn

(a) It's a legitimate state purpose to reward virtue and to punish vice, to incentivize moral behavior and disincentivize immoral behavior. Marriage is morally good, whereas sexual expression apart from marriage is morally wrong. Deceiving homosexuals into thinking they are married is to reward and incentivize promiscuity and extra-marital sexual behavior.

(b) It's a legitimate state purpose to protect children from physical and moral harm. The best means of thus protecting children is marriage. Creating a false category of homosexual "marriage" is to purposely deprive children of the protection of married parents, to which they have a natural right.

Well, there are two rational reasons. But who wants to take wagers on whether Al will just go ahead and do the convenient thing, assuming against all fact that these are not rational reasons but rather theological ones?

Just because a reason is theological does not mean it isn't rational.

You are not entitled to use your theological beliefs to deny a class of folks the equal protection of the laws.

Even assuming that your exclusion of "theological beliefs" is legitimate, which it isn't, no one is proposing that homosexuals be denied the equal protection of the laws. Homosexuals do have, and ought to have, the right to marry just like everyone else.

Al, your side is not arguing for equal protection. Your side is making a total mockery of equal protection. If this line of non-reasoning triumphs, there will be no end to new categories of deviants and miscreants whose depravities must be sanctioned by the state in the name of "equal protection".

Al, again, What is marriage? You can't very well claim someone is denied something unfairly if you can't tell us what it is?

If I believe in "human quality," I can tell you what a human is: rational animal. But if you claim the mantle of "marriage equality" and can't tell us what it is that we should think is equal, I'm suspicious that you really don't know.

Here's how same-sex marriage harms all of us: it implies that no one is entitled to one mother and one father by nature. This robs children of a claim upon their ancestors that all prior generations of children have had. But if they are entitled to one mother and one father, then a gay couple that adopts a child that could have been adopted by a married couple, harms that child. But it also puts in place a way of thinking that is false: human beings are not procreated beings, requiring the wedding of male and female. It is wrong to tell people falsehoods about who they really are; it is an affront to their dignity.

A child who could have had adopted male and female parents but is forced by faux "equality" to live with two women instead has in fact been harmed. Boys and girls need their real Daddies. When that is not possible, we should do our best to provide an adequate substitute. When we bypass an adequate substitute to advance a social experiment in the self-esteem of disordered adults, we hurt that child.

Only a liberal could think that a child deserves a federal payed-for school lunch but not a father and a mother.

c) It's a legitimate state interest to protect children from moral and psychological harm. Creating a false category of homosexual "marriage" normalizes homosexual acts and thereby encourages children to believe that homosexuality is normal, to experiment with homosexual acts, which are both morally and psychologically (and not infrequently physically) harmful, and to decide during periods of sexual confusion that they "are" homosexual, thus leading them into a life of sexual confusion and moral degradation.

d) It's a legitimate state interest to prevent the pollution of the moral atmosphere with repeated allusions to perverted sex acts. The creation of a false category of homosexual "marriage" will result in a higher frequency of allusion in education and popular culture to unnatural sexual acts.

e) It's a legitimate state interest for the state not to lie about reality. Because marriage, even civil marriage, is not _merely_ a state construct but is, to the extent that it is not null, void and meaningless, rooted in the nature of reality, including the biological reality of the complementarity of the sexes, to create a false category of homosexual "marriage" is to create a formal, legal lie about reality and to require others in their various public, legally relevant activities where the category of civil marriage is involved to treat this lie as the truth.

f) It is a legitimate state interest not to encourage the redefinition and devaluing of such notions as "sexual faithfulnes," "sexual commitment" and "monogamy," which are relevant for the strength and permanence of marriage generally. The recognition of homosexual unions as "marriages" will result in redefinitions of these terms and the devaluing of the concepts they represent. See here:

http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/open_monogamy/

g) It is a legitimate state interest not to degrade the concepts and distinctive roles of fatherhood and motherhood by replacing them with ungendered "Parent 1" and "Parent 2." Calling homosexual couples "married" leads directly to the degradation of such roles, as can already be seen in the degendered replacement on some U.S. passport forms.

Jeff, Al does not believe in equal protection. If he did, he would not say exclude theological beliefs from the public square while allowing people's sexual orientation to be part of the conversation. People with theological beliefs often believe they have and encounter with God that is in some cases as incorrigible as the gay person's claim that their gayness is immutable. Of course, God may not exist. But in that case, gayness may not be immutable. So, if the gayness of some citizens is rational enough to change the very nature of marriage, theological beliefs can be used to change other laws.

Any arguments for the rationality of one's gayness is at least as rational as one's belief that one has had an encounter with the Divine (through either mystical experience or special revelation). After all, people identify themselves with communities faith just as people identify themselves with communities of sexual orientation. Why should the latter trump the former?

Al, again, What is marriage? You can't very well claim someone is denied something unfairly if you can't tell us what it is?

I'll answer for Al: marriage is whatever the state says it is.

Which is a useful precedent. If the state says that liberty is incarceration, then liberty is incarceration and no one is denied liberty due to incarceration. Voila, ain't equal protection grand?

Rob, I hope you don't mind if I borrow those quotes!

Lydia, I have a feeling you could keep that up for a while if you thought it would do any good. :-)

Yeah, I just thought I'd let rip a bit. But there's not much point, is there? Because of what Rob said.

e) It's a legitimate state interest for the state not to lie about reality. Because marriage, even civil marriage, is not _merely_ a state construct but is, to the extent that it is not null, void and meaningless, rooted in the nature of reality, including the biological reality of the complementarity of the sexes, to create a false category of homosexual "marriage" is to create a formal, legal lie about reality and to require others in their various public, legally relevant activities where the category of civil marriage is involved to treat this lie as the truth.

I think this is where same-sex "marriage" is likely to do the most damage, to have a ripple effect far beyond its origin. When people adopt an idea they adopt its philosophical underpinnings, and if these are false they corrupt everything. Beneath the lie of same-sex "marriage" is the notion that man is self-created, that reality can be forced to conform to our own whims and desires, that the state determines moral truth by decree.

rooted in the nature of reality, including the biological reality of the complementarity of the sexes,

To which I agree: even if 2 lesbians use IVT to get a test-tube baby, they are still using the natural capacity of male and female reproduction as instantiated in sperm and egg cells - natural (God-designed) sexual reproductive powers of 2 distinct sexes that complement. (If we ever have true, completely a-sexual reproduction like true cloning that does not involve egg and sperm material, where the entirety of the offspring has only one parent's cells to thank, that in itself is an injustice to the child because sexual reproduction has inherent natural (genetic) benefits.)

But no gay is going to accept this argument. My departure point is this: the word "marriage" means something only because society developed and crafted it to mean something. What it means is a kind of union between a man and a women. Whatever gays want to be true of their unions, (just as love-filled as heterosexual marriage, etc), these qualities do not constitute "marriage" because those qualities are not congruent to the socially developed meaning of the word. Many marriages are without love. But each one is still marriage, if a man and a woman committed to a life-long union of that nature. Marriage MEANS a union of man and woman, so it does not encompass a union of man and man, or man and beast, or paper and ink, or cola to paper towel. Gays can come up with another word that MEANS what kind of union they want, but they cannot expect us to treat that kind of union identically to marriages. Words mean more than "what I want them to mean and nothing else."

Although I don't want to jettison state-sanctioned privileges for marriage, I would be willing (and prefer) to have the public argument all over again, for each specific state benefit that is conferred on marriage, and justify each one separately (or not) than to simply assume that if gays can be "united" then they should get state-sanctioned benefits of marriage. If we took each benefit out and shook it out individually, we would probably find that of the 50 (or whatever) benefits, there are rock solid arguments for some of these to apply to marriages and not to other unions, and that there are not sufficient arguments to apply others of them to marriages without allowing them for other arrangements. I would find that a much better result that stupidly allowing gays to co-opt the entire heritage of marriage merely for the sake of trying to protect a few state-sponsored benefits. (I take it as assumed that my truly preferred option - treating homosexual acts as the heinous offenses against God that they are - is not practically speaking within the realm of the achievable in this polity at this time.)

In Michigan at this time, it is contrary to the state constitution for the state to treat anything other than the union of one man and one woman as marriage "or similar union for any purpose."

My understanding is that this has so far been interpreted to mean that "partner" benefits can be offered to non-related state employees but only if there is no requirement or implication that these "partner" benefits have anything to do with a sexual relationship and therefore are not being treated by the state as unions "similar to marriage." The remaining legal question, which I gather has not been decided in the courts, is whether a putative sexual aspect of the relationship is really being fully left out of account since the "partners" must be unrelated. After all, if these "partnerships" are not being treated as in any way similar to marriage, why should not the benefited partner be able to be a family member in need of health benefits, etc.?

The truth is that there will _always_ be a problem with conferring any legal benefits whatsoever on what are assumed or taken to be sexual partners because they have formed a sexual partnership. This simply should not happen at all, not even for some benefits.

And I'm pretty certain that in our present social environment there is no possible way to get the implicit sexual aspect out of this, which means that any granting of any legal benefits to "partners" is going to be, as a matter of sociological influence, a stepping stone on the way to the full homosexual agenda.

A perverted sexual "union" should have no special state legal benefits, period. If there were some way for purely platonic or individual other familial relationships without any possible sexual connotations to be thought of as "unions," there might be something to talk about there. But that is never, ever going to happen. And as Jennifer Roback Morse recently pointed out, now it has even happened that in places where there are "civil unions" some _heterosexual_ couples have opted to have a "civil union," which is a really chaotic thing as far as down-grading the entire notion of marriage. Like "marriage lite."

These are some very fine comments. It was good of you all to play al's game and give him what he asked for. You will not be disappointed, I'm sure, if he doesn't return the courtesy. By taking you seriously, I mean.

"I hope you don't mind if I borrow those quotes"

Certainly, Jeff! I'd check on the exact wording of the one from Anthony though. I was working from memory there.

Al is right - "rational basis" is a legal term of art and, traditionally, it is a rather low threshhold to meet. It doesn't mean good, strong or particularly enlightened - it means that it has some relation to reality. The bases mentioned above, in a sane world, would more than meet the standard.

Exactly, C Matt, and anyone who is a lawyer should know this. This is a point that Antonin Scalia has made--For ideological reasons, the courts have begun treating "rational basis" as if it meant "strict scrutiny" and "strict scrutiny" as if it meant "rational basis," wherever they find it convenient to do so. It's a Looking-Glass world out there, where judges rule by whim.

"Jeff, Al does not believe in equal protection. If he did, he would not say exclude theological beliefs from the public square while allowing people's sexual orientation to be part of the conversation."

Thomas, you torture the meaning of Equal Protection. Asserting your theological beliefs is your First Amendment right. Discounting them is my First Amendment right. The logic of your position would make the Nation the Senate and that would be our sure undoing.

Equal Protection means that, in general, folks confronting identical circumstances are treated the same before the law. That the legal situations that same-sex and opposite-sex couples confront are identical was clearly demonstrated in my thought experiment.

It also doesn't mean that you would be treated equally if only you weren't you.

"(b) It's a legitimate state purpose to protect children from physical and moral harm."

Agreed.

"The best means of thus protecting children is marriage."

Agreed, all other things being equal.

"Creating a false category of homosexual "marriage" is to purposely deprive children of the protection of married parents, to which they have a natural right."

This is where things fall apart.

1. Something called "homosexual marriage" isn't being created. What is happening is that "marriage" is being made available to couples of the same sex. Nothing else changes in the relevant codes.

2. How are the children of gay folk being deprived of "married parents" by allowing their parents to marry? Are you saying that it would be better if the children of gays had never been born? Are you saying that gays should fake it and enter into relationships that make everyone miserable?

"g) It is a legitimate state interest not to degrade the concepts and distinctive roles of fatherhood and motherhood by replacing them with ungendered "Parent 1" and "Parent 2." Calling homosexual couples "married" leads directly to the degradation of such roles, as can already be seen in the degendered replacement on some U.S. passport forms."

This journal article should properly horrify you,

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1554927

(Lydia and Jeff c., thanks for responding. I find the examples unpersuasive, of course :), but there are many others who read this and it's good that they have the best cases that can be made available for their analysis. More later but California is enjoying a break in the weather which has me able to get some outside things done.)

"I'll answer for Al: marriage is whatever the state says it is."

Bingo! It's also more than that but that is for those who freely attach themselves to the various dispensations. Marriage is a cultural creation that is highly malleable.
ALABAMA

"(c) Marriage is a sacred covenant, solemnized between a man and a woman, which, when the legal capacity and consent of both parties is present, establishes their relationship as husband and wife, and which is recognized by the state as a civil contract."

CALIFORNIA

"300. (a) Marriage is a personal relation arising out of a civil
contract between a man and a woman, to which the consent of the parties capable of making that contract is necessary..."

MICHIGAN

"Sec. 2."

"So far as its validity in law is concerned, marriage is a civil contract between a man and a woman, to which the consent of parties capable in law of contracting is essential."

WYOMING

"20-1-101. Marriage a civil contract."

"Marriage is a civil contract between a male and a female person to which the consent of the parties capable of contracting is essential."

An example of the socially induced changes; coverature bites the dust:

INDIANA

"IC 31-11-7-1
Abolition of legal disabilities of married women to make contracts
Sec. 1. All legal disabilities of a married woman to make contracts are abolished.
As added by P.L.1-1997, SEC.3.

IC 31-11-7-2
Married women's property rights
Sec. 2. A married woman has the same rights concerning real and personal property that an unmarried woman has.
As added by P.L.1-1997, SEC.3."

"Marriage is a cultural creation that is highly malleable."

Still waiting for an answer, Al, on why, if the institution cannot be limited to a man and a woman, it must be limited to two people.

What prevents its "malleability" from extending to more than two persons? Why can't a homosexual threesome marry when a homosexual couple can? Is it only because the state says so?

Do you honestly not see where this logic leads, or are you just being a goof?

Al, the examples of the state laws you cite do absolutely nothing towards proving that Marriage is a cultural creation that is highly malleable."

First of all, almost all of the states posit very similar, almost identical substance even though they use different word constructions. Achieving this kind of uniformity, if the action they are engaging in is molding and creating the social entity, is unrealistic. What they are doing is, rather, describing something that exists in society independently of law.

That's because society exists before the law also. The law can modify, constrain, limit social interaction, but it does not CREATE society. Society is a pre-existing suppositum upon which law can present a change.

Given society, free individuals have an innate right to contract between themselves, without law creating that right. Marriage is just one type of those contracts. The above cited laws about what marriage is are laws that describe what the state finds true in society, they do not posit marriage as a construct of law.

Property rights do not (and never have) constituted the substance or essence of the contract of marriage, and so it is a peripheral - an accident that attaches to the marriage contract. As such, of course, it is much more subject to variation and modification, it is much more malleable. And so the laws that change the rights of property surrounding marriage do nothing at all to suggest that marriage itself is a creature of the law.

Thanks, Al, for making the case for us: marriage is a pre-law reality that the law can attest to but cannot pretend to create.

But further: marriage is a contract that exists in the context of society. That does not imply that marriage is a creation of society. It could be that logically, but alternatively it could be something that is more fundamental than an instance of society creating a particular form of interaction. The fact that essentially every society on the planet has a form of marriage suggests that marriage is not a creation of any individual society, but is more fundamental, that it springs out of the very same roots from which springs society itself as a universal human phenomenon. This would mean, then, that marriage is not a creature of any social order as such, that its roots are found in human nature. And, therefore, no society has the freedom to "design" it differently according to sheer will.

Al, I looked at your references and saw within their text, numbers. Numbers too must be a social construction. But wait, I also found the word "human being." So perhaps that too is subject to our whims and desires.

Whenever you think you can create reality and call it freedom, you've repeated Eve's mistake in believing the Serpent's promise.

Marriage is not a cultural creation. Marriage comes before a culture can be created. More to the point, states are stewards of marriage, not its definer and not its creator. It can hold that stewardship badly as in the case when it attempts to define homosexual marriage. When a civil contract of marriage is granted it is not permission from the state to unite a man and a women, but rather, a recognition that such a union has already taken place, for marriage comes before the state. It is not within the proper power of a state to define marriage. A man and a women on a desert island can be married even if there is no state to see it and that same couple can be married even if the state denies it.

I'll be blunt - marriage is from God and defined by God. What God joins together, let no man or state dare put assunder. Is that clear enough for you, Al? I don't give a damn what politics or the state chooses to define as marriage. Their rulings, to the extent they deviate from God and the Natural Law, are the products of fools and can bind no one - not in conscience and certainly not in a sham and arbitrary definition of marriage.

One must choose to serve God or men. Choose. An immoral law does not bind conscience. Rather than reform one's conscience, redefine morality, is that it? Is that what law and politics have come to - spitting in God's face? You may call me merely sentimental and emotional, but you and many politicians will one day have to plead your case before a higher court than flesh and blood. The issues are clear. They have been for two thousand years, so I say it, again - choose.

The Chicken

Is that what law and politics have come to - spitting in God's face?

Not to put too fine a point on it...

Yup.

Still waiting for an answer, Al, on why, if the institution cannot be limited to a man and a woman, it must be limited to two people.

What prevents its "malleability" from extending to more than two persons? Why can't a homosexual threesome marry when a homosexual couple can? Is it only because the state says so?

Answer: nothing prevents it from extending to polyamory. Stanley Kurtz has done some good writing on this.

2. How are the children of gay folk being deprived of "married parents" by allowing their parents to marry? Are you saying that it would be better if the children of gays had never been born? Are you saying that gays should fake it and enter into relationships that make everyone miserable
?

Yeah, families are all about pleasing parents, and not what is best for children. Heaven forbid that the parents or guardians of children should set aside their own gratification for the sake of the children. We can't have people being miserable now can we? We all know that what is best for children is for a parents or guardian to seeks his own inner desires, whatever they may be, and the children will simply be better off because of it. Well that is the lie the entire culture told itself for a few decades at least. Of course it is horrifying self-serving and false. Hope springs eternal though.

You have to love Justice Scalia. From his comments on "rational basis" in Lawrence (emphasis added):

That review is readily satisfied here by the same rational basis that satisfied it in Bowers–society’s belief that certain forms of sexual behavior are “immoral and unacceptable,” 478 U.S., at 196. This is the same justification that supports many other laws regulating sexual behavior that make a distinction based upon the identity of the partner–for example, laws against adultery, fornication, and adult incest, and laws refusing to recognize homosexual marriage.

Justice O’Connor argues that the discrimination in this law which must be justified is not its discrimination with regard to the sex of the partner but its discrimination with regard to the sexual proclivity of the principal actor.

“While it is true that the law applies only to conduct, the conduct targeted by this law is conduct that is closely correlated with being homosexual. Under such circumstances, Texas’ sodomy law is targeted at more than conduct. It is instead directed toward gay persons as a class.” Ante, at 5.

Of course the same could be said of any law. A law against public nudity targets “the conduct that is closely correlated with being a nudist,” and hence “is targeted at more than conduct”; it is “directed toward nudists as a class.” But be that as it may. Even if the Texas law does deny equal protection to “homosexuals as a class,” that denial still does not need to be justified by anything more than a rational basis, which our cases show is satisfied by the enforcement of traditional notions of sexual morality.

Justice O’Connor simply decrees application of “a more searching form of rational basis review” to the Texas statute. Ante, at 2. ... Nor does Justice O’Connor explain precisely what her “more searching form” of rational-basis review consists of. It must at least mean, however, that laws exhibiting “ ‘a … desire to harm a politically unpopular group,’ ” ante, at 2, are invalid even though there may be a conceivable rational basis to support them.

So in other words, before Justice O'Connor looked into her crystal ball and invented out of nowhere a new and "more searching form of rational basis review," the rational basis test was so minimal that it could be satisfied merely by reference to traditional sexual morality and to society's view (you know, like the society of people who voted for Prop. 8) that certain kinds of sexual behavior are immoral and unacceptable!

Anybody who didn't know that, or who pretends not to have known that, deserves to be reminded of it.

al says,

"2. How are the children of gay folk being deprived of "married parents" by allowing their parents to marry? Are you saying that it would be better if the children of gays had never been born? Are you saying that gays should fake it and enter into relationships that make everyone miserable?"

This is, of course, a lie. There is no such thing as "children of gay folk". Every child has a mother and a father. What "gay marriage" wants to do is deny this reality and lie to children that they don't have mothers or fathers and being raised by two men or two women is just as good as being raised by an alternative. Not to put too fine a point on it, but this idea is insane. And to be fair to "gay marriage" advocates, this same problem drives a lot of modern welfare policy that encourages single mothers to raise their children without the father around. Bad for the mother, bad for the kids.

There is no such thing as "children of gay folk

Indeed. Crucial point Jeff. This is exactly what gays want to adopt children for. To prove their normalcy and coequal status. I realize fully that many gays honestly do not see it that way. Being self-deceived that it is normal they simply wish to a have a the benefits of familial intimacy. This is the most hideous part of it all. We're supposed to do the PC thing and offer up children as instruments on the altar of the liberal homosexual agenda.

""There is no such thing as "children of gay folk". Every child has a mother and a father."

Sometimes I still cannot believe I live in a world where this actually has to be said. How do you argue with people that have to be reminded of such things? "Oh, by the way, the thing you're missing is that you're a human being. If you don't recall, that means you have a mind and are capable of reason, and also a body with physical characteristics that need to be taken into account. You're not an angel! Also, you are somewhat different from a beetle. Oh, and the one crucial thing you're missing is that you ought to eat food, not poison. Hey, did you ever realize that the words you're using have meanings, and that the opposites of those meanings have different words, and that you should use those when you mean to say the opposites of things? That would help our discussion a lot." I'm not sure one can have a reasonable discussion with people to whom such things need to be said.

I'll be blunt - marriage is from God and defined by God.

You might want to look at some of the moral arraignments that God permitted: multiple wives, female prisoners of war as wives or consorts, buying a female slave to be wife for a man or his sons. There is also an interesting standard of justice in terms of punishment: 1) Seducing a virgin who is not engaged could be forgiven - so long as the man offers to marry her and pays a dowry 2) Rape of a virgin who isn't engaged could be forgiven - so long as the man marries her and pays a large fine to her father.

One must choose to serve God or men. Choose.

Much of Leviticus is a list of unclean people and things, defiling acts and abominations that offend God, some of which are nearly incomprehensible like food and garment choices. Other Old Testament prohibitions that are slightly more sensible, like working on the Sabbath, required the death penalty. Do you favor killing those who work on the Sabbath? Do you think you could ever justify such a punishment, perhaps by accusing them of spitting on the sacredness of God's holy day? You have to choose between serving God's divine commands or man's foolish laws.

You might want to look at some of the moral arraignments that God permitted: multiple wives...

You might want to recall Jesus's correction of little defects like that in society: "Moses allowed it because of the hardness of your hearts, but in the beginning it was not so." The fact that God allowed something doesn't mean He endorsed it. Jesus also clarified that "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" to correct other errors.

1) Seducing a virgin who is not engaged could be forgiven - so long as the man offers to marry her and pays a dowry 2) Rape of a virgin who isn't engaged could be forgiven - so long as the man marries her and pays a large fine to her father.

You are shocked at shotgun marriages? Do you know how long these survived after the Old Testament? Can you speculate why? I actually know people who were in this circumstance and it worked out pretty well. I'll bet many of us do. Can you refer us to an anecdote from any culture before recently where a man divorces his wife and moves in with another man to be happy and how that worked out?

Step2, you need to get your hermeneutics straight. Christians read the Old Testament through the New. The "if-you-are-against-homosexuality-then-why-do-you-eat-shellfish?" argument is lame and puerile, and shows a serious lack in understanding about how Christianity reads the Scriptures.

"This is, of course, a lie. There is no such thing as "children of gay folk". Every child has a mother and a father."

In Qzzie and Harriot Land, maybe; in this universe we do it differently - folks do die and divorce. Lesbians give birth and fathers wind up with custody from previous marriages. Adoptions are legal for singles and gays and studies show the kids do just fine. Contra Lydia, drug addiction and sexual orientation are two different categories, the former being dysfunctional, the latter merely another possibility.

"Indeed. Crucial point Jeff. This is exactly what gays want to adopt children for. To prove their normalcy and coequal status."

Or they have the same desire to parent that straight folk have; I would think, at this point, they have nothing to prove.

Evidently some of the people who regularly comment here are psychic!

For example:

The goal is to reduce the term "marriage" to a meaningless one, which then makes the word "family" to be so broad that it becomes meaningless as well.

and

This is, of course, a lie.

Al writes:

"Lesbians give birth and fathers wind up with custody from previous marriages."

You're missing the point. Of course, lesbians give birth, but even that lesbian is a being that requires a mother and father by nature. Lesbians don't come from lesbian unions, since lesbian unions are not conjugal. Even two fertile lesbians can't produce a child, just as two sticks of ice cannot produce a spark.

The child borne by the lesbian has a father, a real father. It may be a sperm donor, but it's a real father. The woman who lives with the lesbian is not the child's father. It is the woman who lives with the birth mother and has sex with her. (If you think that is what lesbians do. Since neither one has male organs they technically cannot have "sex" with each other. They can bring each other to orgasm, but that's not sex. If it were, then masturbation or feeling good while riding a pony would be sex).

We can rename Daddy "Mommy" but that doesn't make Daddy a Mommy anymore than renaming poison manna makes poison manna.

Adoption is an attempt to remedy a harm. What is that harm? The child does not have his or her real parents to care for her. We try our best to compensate the child. But to try our best we need to come close to what the child would have had, and that would be a mother and a father. That child is entitled to both. Thus, to deny a child, on purpose, a mother and a father is to harm that child, just as it would be wrong to deny that child nourishment or shelter.

People have known all this to be true for millenia prior to the fame of Ozzie & Harriet and their troubled son Ricky.

Thomas, the point is that we have significant numbers of folks that are in a legal limbo created by their being in relationships that are legal and viewed or coming to be viewed as fundamental rights while theyn are excluded, in large part, from the body of law that gas evolved to deal with situations arising from those relationships.

Since you admit that your mother/father "entitlement" is no guarantee of anything, perhaps we should deal the beat we can with what we have.

"Or they have the same desire to parent that straight folk have..."

Liberalism in a nutshell -- as long as someone, somewhere has a desire to do something, the state needs to step in a make it so.

Baloney, Al. They aren't in a legal limbo. They are in the very same legal situation they have always been in. They just want to change that legal situation, because they aren't happy with it.

And who cares whether their sexual relationships are "coming to be viewed as a fundamental right"? "Viewed" by whom? Evidently it really doesn't matter that there are a lot of people, even people who vote, even people who make it *absolutely clear* in their laws that they don't have that view. It's only the view of the people who agree with Al that counts.

Thomas, the point is...

No, that's not the point. You dodged his point.

Or they have the same desire to parent that straight folk have; I would think, at this point, they have nothing to prove.

I suppose so if you believe that gays have as stable relationships as heteros, or that they have roughly the same rate of mental health and substance abuse. None of this is true however. They actually have a lot to prove, or they would if people like you didn't assume the normalcy of their lives in spite of all the evidence.

Still waiting, Al, on why the number of people in a marriage matters but their sex doesn't.

BTW, I refuse to use the word 'gender' w/r/t a person's sex. People don't have 'gender' -- words do.

The use of 'gender' is just another way for sexual modernists to undermine the historic understanding of things, and I won't play that game.

Tony,
Thank you for admitting those were errors and defects in Jewish society. I think the difference between "allowed" and "endorsed" is much less clear, especially when combined with the narrative voice of being directly communicated by God.

Mark,
I'm not shocked by shotgun marriages, although a customary leniency regarding rape is very troubling. One of the reasons it was an interesting standard is because it only applied to virgins who were not engaged. The law was far more lethal when applied to virgins who were engaged, presumably because a blood feud was a likely consequence.

Rob G,
As far as I can tell, many Christians simply cherry pick the parts they like and ignore the rest. My point was directed mainly against MC's sanctimonious sermon about divine commands being an ultimate trump over culture. So here's the dilemma: If the Old Testament is a true account of the commands and prohibitions of God, those commands and prohibitions include some morally problematic, some morally trivial, and apparently culturally influenced offenses. If the Old Testament isn't a true account, why does it deserve greater legal or moral authority than other sources?

If the Old Testament is a true account of the commands and prohibitions of God, those commands and prohibitions include some morally problematic, some morally trivial, and apparently culturally influenced offenses.

The OT is, among other things, an absolutely true account of commands and prohibitions that have been superceded by the New Law. They are not morally problematic unless they are applied without regard to what God has since revealed in Christ. None are morally trivial in their context. All laws are "culturally influenced", but not all cultures are equally authoritative morally.

My comments were not sanctimonious. They hold true if Christianity is true. What do you think Christ meant when he presided at the marriage celebration recorded in Scripture? Everything God holds about marriage is there, at least in outline. Your argument is not with me. This is not my private interpretation, but the Church's teaching from the beginning. It speaks as Christ speaks. One redefines marrige at their peril. I remember when societies actually were Christian. Culture is like the paint job on a car. The car will drive regardless of the paint, but change the definition of the motor and all bets are off.

The Chicken

I'm not shocked by shotgun marriages, although a customary leniency regarding rape is very troubling. One of the reasons it was an interesting standard is because it only applied to virgins who were not engaged. The law was far more lethal when applied to virgins who were engaged, presumably because a blood feud was a likely consequence.

Also because the idea "engaged" may not be translating very well. As translated, Mary was "betrothed" Joseph. But in the cultural tradition, they were formally recognized as a unit. If Mary was found to be with child, and If Joseph accepted the child, then they were not charged with fornication. Consequently, the state of being that is often translated as "betrothed" is more like "married" than "promised to get married in the future".

"As far as I can tell, many Christians simply cherry pick the parts they like and ignore the rest."

This no doubt happens at times among some Christians and it may thus appear to be the norm to an outside observer. But the great majority of Christian ethical and moral thought takes the issue of the relationship between OT and NT morality quite seriously. And it's been this way since the beginning of the Church, as evidenced by the book of Acts.

Al writes:

"Thomas, the point is that we have significant numbers of folks that are in a legal limbo created by their being in relationships that are legal and viewed or coming to be viewed as fundamental rights while theyn are excluded, in large part, from the body of law that gas evolved to deal with situations arising from those relationships."

Interesting. But how does that justify pretending a woman who sleeps with mommy is a daddy?

Look, I thought liberals were into reason and truth. How is putting into law a falsehood reasonable and true? Mommies are not Daddies because girls cannot be boys. Now, you can pretend that it is so, just as you can cut off a dog's leg and claim that you have discovered a three-legged dog. But all you've done is harmed a dog, since a dog is by nature four-legged even when he has only three.

Daddies sire, Mommies bear. Children result. If Daddy and Mommy can't care for children, then we try to remedy the harm as best we can. That means Daddies replace Daddies and Mommies Mommies. But Mommies can't replace Daddies since Mommies are not Daddies. This also means, by the way, that it is far worse for a man to sire children from five different women who are not his wife than that he uses the word "crosshairs" on TV or employs sexist speech if he is a sportscaster. (I mention these examples to show how perverse liberalism has become; I suspect that well over 50% of the players in the Super Bowl have fathered children outside of wedlock by multiple women, and yet they keep their jobs. But if one of them says he thinks homosexuality is immoral, he is fined or perhaps fired. Brett Favre sent a text message with a photo of his penis to a woman who is not his wife. If he had sent a text that said, "I think homosexual acts are immoral," he would have been issuing public apologies and genuflecting to the liberal gods for another decade.)

"Still waiting, Al, on why the number of people in a marriage matters but their sex doesn't."

Fair question. The law meets needs as they arise and history is also a factor. Opening marriage to same-sex couples doesn't seem to involve radical changes beyond the novelity of the partners.

On the other hand, polygyny (polyandry isn't a factor) has a history and an adverse decision by the Supremes that needs to be dealt with. Polyamory is new and doesn't have a political voice. It would be interesting to see the briefs on both.

Polygyny is still practiced in certain parts of Deseret and so we have a track record of sorts - one that includes the abuse of underage girls and teenage boys. The cult status hasn't helped with the image and the argument that legal recognition would help curb the abuses has a point.

Anyway, the way things work in our system is that folks who feel that rights have been denied usually have to make their case and the majority agrees or not. As with some aspects of Jim Crow it might mean a majority of the SC and the Congress or, in the case of DADT, a majority of the people and the Congress.

Anyway, the way things work in our system is that folks who feel that rights have been denied usually have to make their case and the majority agrees or not. As with some aspects of Jim Crow it might mean a majority of the SC and the Congress or, in the case of DADT, a majority of the people and the Congress.

In other words: "whatever". A shrug. It's the latest thing so it must be right.

The law meets needs as they arise and history is also a factor.
There you go, all the ontological density a civilization requires for organizing itself and sustaining its members.

Should the "need" for multiple "spouses" arise, our legal system will, helped along by the zeitgeist, or history's benign hand, affect the desired outcome.

Awesome.

DC

"Should the "need" for multiple "spouses" arise, our legal system will, helped along by the zeitgeist, or history's benign hand, affect the desired outcome."

JC
"In other words: "whatever". A shrug. It's the latest thing so it must be right."

EC
"It's an Afghanistan goat, so it can't stay here, or else it'll choke on the sweet air of freedom."

Perhaps traditionalists should consider emigration to climes more friendly to traditionalists.

Al writes: "The law meets needs as they arise and history is also a factor."

But then...

Al writes: "As with some aspects of Jim Crow it might mean a majority of the SC and the Congress or, in the case of DADT, a majority of the people and the Congress."

If the first is true, then the latter can't be wrong, since Jim Crow laws would be a case of the law meeting "needs as they arise and history is also a factor."

So, we are now back to liberal superstition. The belief that history is moving in an inexorably moral direction except when it's not moving in an inexorably moral direction. The Tea Partiers, for example, are not "speaking truth to power," while the cross-dressing high school kids are steps on the path toward the Hegelian nirvana of the androgynous ideal. I get it. You want what you want when you want it, and principles are nice fictions to dupe the suckers. I get it. Just confess and we can have a real conversation.

Liberalism is homeless emotivism in a rationalist's tuxedo.

"So, we are now back to liberal superstition. The belief that history is moving in an inexorably moral direction except when it's not moving in an inexorably moral direction."

Yep. Weaver had this pegged way back in the 40s:

"In considering the world to which [this book is] addressed, I have been chiefly impressed by the difficulty of getting certain initial facts admitted. This difficulty is due in part to the widely prevailing Whig theory of history, with its belief that the most advanced point in time represents the point of highest development, aided no doubt by theories of evolution which suggest to the uncritical a kind of necessary passage from simple to complex. Yet the real trouble is found to lie deeper than this. It is the appalling problem, when one comes to actual cases, of getting men to distinguish between better and worse. Are people today provided with a sufficiently rational scale of values to attach these predicates with intelligence? There is ground for declaring that modern man has become a moral idiot..."

The answer to the rhetorical question in his penultimate sentence is no and he goes on to describe how modern man finds confusion when he meets moral and ethical questions with merely ad hoc policies, which of course are the only policies available if you're a materialist. "[Modern man] struggles with the paradox that total immersion in matter unfits him to deal with the problems of matter."

(From Ideas Have Consequences, 1948)


Just confess and we can have a real conversation.

How does that occur with someone whose moral reasoning begins and ends with the The Whig Theory of History?

"Today is better than yesterday and tomorrow will be better than today" is not only a guaranteed conversation-stopper and protective barrier of entry to original thought, but also the best means for silencing one's inner voice.

The OT is, among other things, an absolutely true account of commands and prohibitions that have been superceded by the New Law.

Not exactly. If you are positing an eternal perfect definition about what marriage is, and God allowed or endorsed other kinds of marriages, it isn't sufficient to say that the New Law came around and fixed the Old. Under a traditionalist view, the Old Law doesn't need reforming.

They are not morally problematic unless they are applied without regard to what God has since revealed in Christ.

A few of them are morally problematic if you believe that they could be justified, ever. It was about 1300 years from the time of Moses to the time of Christ, so even accepting that God wanted to revise or reform the covenant with his people, He took the scenic route to get there.

None are morally trivial in their context.

I'll grant that some can be read euphemistically for those who didn't have our modern understanding of disease. A swine flue epidemic could have wiped out an entire town back then, and they may have concluded it was because swine are cursed. Some of the prohibitions make no sense even under that reading, like forbidding a garment made of both linen and wool. I mean, was it a bad fashion statement or what?

Should be: swine flu epidemic.

"Perhaps traditionalists should consider emigration to climes more friendly to traditionalists."

Why? You lot would only follow us there and continue the imposition.

Some of the prohibitions make no sense even under that reading, like forbidding a garment made of both linen and wool. I mean, was it a bad fashion statement or what?

To materialism, all meaning has meaning only for material purposes.

Of course, reading the Bible not as a materialist, one comes across such things as figurative senses. And foreshadowing. And prophecy. These don't matter to a materialist, though.

...one comes across such things as figurative senses. And foreshadowing. And prophecy.

Like polyester blend? Wow, they predicted the 1970's.

Like polyester blend? Wow, they predicted the 1970's.

Darn tootin right! When Moses came down with the first set of stone tablets, he was so upset with the golden calf (which was clearly a figure for double-knit polyester) that he broke them thar tablets. Double knitters have a lot to answer for. Poly blenders are right up there too.

Hi sorry I'm late to this discussion. If anyone is still reading, please help resolve the marriage debate with the Egg and Sperm Civil Union Compromise. Tell Congress to act right away and replace DOMA with the following three laws:

1) Stop genetic engineering by limiting conception of children to the union of a man and a woman's untampered-with sperm and egg.
2) Federally recognize state civil unions that are defined as "marriage minus conception rights."
3) Affirm in federal law the right of all marriages to conceive children together using their own genes.

See, it gets same-sex couples the security and recognition and benefits they need without too much strife, because it also preserves marriage as a man and a woman. And it also stops genetic modification and designer children, which is unsustainable and would be a huge government entitlement and waste of energy, as well as unsafe and damaging for the children.

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