"Jesus would rather kill, not marry, gay people" - Franklin Graham

[robvalue]

I'd like to also point out that the law is not a statement of what is moral and immoral. It is a statement (roughly speaking) of what will happen to you if you do certain things. The driving force behind changes in any particular law may well be to do with ideas about morality, of course.

For example, in England at least, it's not illegal to cheat on your partner. Does this mean the law, or the country, is saying it's not immoral to cheat on your partner? No. It's not saying it's moral, immoral, or neither. It's making no comment, it's simply allowing it as a legal action. However, the vast majority of people in England would probably say that cheating on your partner is immoral.

---

PS: I suppose a way of looking at the law is asking the question, "Is this something the government should get involved in?"

In any secular(ish) country, no one should be bringing religious beliefs to a discussion about law. Clearly this should be irrelevant, because the law is secular, and because religions can all contradict each other (even people from the same religion).

[Foxaèr]

Let me put it this way.

Suppose someone claimed that inter-racial marriage isn't a real marriage and that real marriage is limited to those of the same race. Suppose that they point to the historical separation of the races as justified both societally and by religion.

Would you not say this person is a bigot?

The situation with gay marriage is *exactly* the same.

So long as the interracial marriage is between a man and a woman, it doesn't change the definition of marriage. Their entire argument centers around the changing of the wording of the definition of marriage being only between a man and a woman.

[Amarok]

Let me put it this way.

Suppose someone claimed that inter-racial marriage isn't a real marriage and that real marriage is limited to those of the same race. Suppose that they point to the historical separation of the races as justified both societally and by religion.

Would you not say this person is a bigot?

The situation with gay marriage is *exactly* the same.

So long as the interracial marriage is between a man and a woman, it doesn't change the definition of marriage.  Their entire argument centers around the changing of the wording of the definition of marriage being only between a man and a woman.

Which is arbitrary and unjustified and i don't by the definition argument it's just a smokescreen .

[RoadRunner79]

There is nothing wrong with criticism, and I never said otherwise.  This is about being able to have an honest and civil discussion.  I’m not going to keep fighting against what is only in your imagination, and whatever polemic you ty an twist to gain rhetorical advantage.

Let me put it this way.

Suppose someone claimed that inter-racial marriage isn't a real marriage and that real marriage is limited to those of the same race. Suppose that they point to the historical separation of the races as justified both societally and by religion.

Would you not say this person is a bigot?

The situation with gay marriage is *exactly* the same.

I seems that you are taking any hatred and/or intolerance out of the equation. In which case, I would say that it doesn’t fit the definition of bigotry then. However, I think that most, who where against interracial marriage; also often had some other views about race which may qualify.

To still call it bigotry, I think is moving away from the original definition, in which you can’t then equivocate, back to the condemnation of the previous definition.

[Amarok]

Smoke screen by Roadkill tried and failed

[robvalue]

How about this:

If marriage is defined by being between a man and a woman, then the only way to assure equal rights is to say no one can be married. Instead, we produce a new term which covers everyone, and does the same thing marriage used to be. Let's say adjoinerage.

Now... is this a preferable solution? In what ways is it better, and in what ways worse? I'd say the ways it is worse vastly outweighs the ways it is better.

Of course, this isn't what definitionists want. They want to keep marriage how it is, even though it's an outdated definition based on ignorance and intolerance, and leave same sex couples out in the dark to fight for scraps.

[polymath257]

Let me put it this way.

Suppose someone claimed that inter-racial marriage isn't a real marriage and that real marriage is limited to those of the same race. Suppose that they point to the historical separation of the races as justified both societally and by religion.

Would you not say this person is a bigot?

The situation with gay marriage is *exactly* the same.

So long as the interracial marriage is between a man and a woman, it doesn't change the definition of marriage.  Their entire argument centers around the changing of the wording of the definition of marriage being only between a man and a woman.

That's not the definition I've used: it is a bond between people who love each other that is recognized by the society.

[robvalue]

I've made this point before, but if people just split in their minds secular, legal marriage from everything else, there is no problem. The former is what has changed. Religious marriage doesn't have to change at all, nor any other kind. And having a religious objection to secular law just doesn't make sense.

Anyhow, this has been the case for a while now. What problems exactly has this caused?

[Angrboda]

....The bible and their church authority says so and that’s that. Abortion and homosexuality are two common moral issues that many Christians are against, but if you ask why they are against it they do not cite scientific facts or any other reasons. Most times they cite scripture or religious dogma. Allowing someone else to make your moral decisions for you is not a wise practice. Your moral choices are some of the most important decisions you can make and often define who we are and most often affect others, sometimes with disastrous results. The murder of abortion doctors is one such result.... [Arizona Atheist]

"That's why those who have an unquestioning faith in the correctness of the moral teachings of their religion are a problem: if they themselves haven't conscientiously considered, on their own, whether their pastors or priests or rabbis or imams are worthy of this delegated authority over their own lives, then they are in fact taking a personally immoral stand." [Daniel Dennett, emphasis in the original]

Dennett goes on to explain how if someone wishes to have a place at the table of a discussion about moral issues one should take the personal responsibility to have rational, well thought out reasons for holding the opinions that one does because if one believes that their stand against homosexuality, let's say, is the word of god then you cannot possibly be argued out of that belief. In that case you've become irrational and having you participate in moral discourse is a waste of time since you cannot and will not change your mind, or make concessions since, after all, you believe it's the word of your god. It would be pointless to have such a person at the table of ideas where reasons, evidence, and rationality are the tools by which people ordinarily make important decisions, especially moral ones, that affect others. That's the point Dennett is trying to get across. [Arizona Atheist]

http://arizonaatheist.blogspot.com/2011/...ation.html

[Cecelia]

I've only recently come to realize the obsession Christians have with Same Sex Marriage. And it's rather quite simple.

Christians, by their own definition, live extremely sinful lives where greed and gluttony are abound. So to ignore their own sins, they project by taking down what they view as other people's 'sins' by the same book, thinking it absolves them of their greediness and hoping God will look kindly upon them for fighting a useless fight rather than doing something hard like facing their own inherent (and rather significant) flaws. If they didn't fight same sex marriage, they might have to actually face the fact that they're not living very well according to their own bible. Especially in the department of being charitable. So they need to compensate, so they do so by using their hatred and bigotry as a sword for their God so they can say they live a biblical life without actually having to do anything remotely challenging by believing in that god.

Of course that's because of one simple fact: Nobody truly worships God. They worship themselves. That's all god really is. When religious people look in the mirror, they see god. They won't admit it. But it's not some imaginary deity's prejudices they're following, but their own. Much like the prejudices in the bible aren't from some magic sky wizard, but are in fact from sheep herders who's system of morality was frankly lacking. Lacking so much that a 3 year old today could come up with a better system of morals. That morality, passed down through society, feeds their bigotry backed up by the idea of "God" who is apparently so loving that he'll punish you forever if you don't love him. That these people don't see that this isn't 'loving' is a disturbing thought. Made worse by the fact there are so many of them.

This is all just more proof that Christianity is not a force for good, but one for--dare I say--evil. Christians are black hearted and will do anything to justify their own actions. they just need to make sure their actions fit a very narrow and strict cherry-picked version of an ancient text written by people who thought Slavery was fine, and that women were property. Who thought it was perfectly okay to stone people.