Prop 8 ruling disappointing, infuriating
Wendy's new least-favorite number.
When I heard the disappointing news regarding the controversial Proposition 8 ruling, my heart sunk all the way down to my toes. At that moment I thought of all my gay friends, some single and hopeful, others waiting and yearning for the chance to get married to their long-time partner. I thought of family members whose faces must have stung from the figurative slap in the face they received when their basic rights were, yet again, denied. But all that heart sinking, face stinging and yearning meant little to those who rejoiced as loudly as they possibly could.
And that's when people got ultra-pissed. Again. So I'm commenting on the situation. Again.
You see, the homosexual debate is one that has sparked putrid words and a venomous hatred (on both sides) for thousands of years. Bring it up and you're guaranteed a heated conversation chock-full of "Oh no you didn't"s and "Jesus says WHAT?" lines.
The gays and gay supporters always throw up their best arguments while the anti-gays puff up their chests and spew Biblical words that either deeply hurt or mean little to those who cannot help their attraction to the same sex. It's a circular conversation, my friends. And while the LGBTQ community has made some progress, it's a slow time coming.
Because I have this medium to speak through, and because I feel like it, I'm going to offer you my uninterrupted thoughts on the matter. My goal is to not infuriate. My goal is to not offend. My goal is to not slander religion and my goal is not to babble through my fingers or self-aggrandize (though it's one of my favorite past times). I encourage only healthy dialogues, m'dear.
Marriage is not religious
This is not a religious argument. Church is separate from state. You can argue all you want that marriage is a religious institution, but it's not. Sure, marriage happens in the Bible (it also happens in other religions) and a lot of people get married in churches, but that doesn't make it a religious issue. When it comes right down to it, the state (a.k.a. government) is the one that issues your marriage license, the state is the one that gets your marriage license money and when you're ready to call your marriage quits you go to the court, not your pastor.
Unconstitutional
The United States Constitution is a brilliant thing when it's upheld. It states that all people have the right to be treated equally. A ban on gay marriage is unconstitutional because it strips 10% (yes, 10%) of the population a basic, fundamental right. FYI: Marriage equals more than just a statement of your love on a piece of paper and married couples receive a lot of benefits that unmarried couples aren't privy to. Perhaps that's why activists who normally fight against each other are standing up together for this cause. To deny the right of marriage to any gay couple is simply unconstitutional.
Minority verses Majority
In 1967, when interracial marriage became legal (yes, less than 50 years ago), it wasn't the people who voted in favor of it. In fact, at that time only 30% of the voting population supported interracial marriage, the exact same number that supports gay marriage today. Interracial marriage became legal because the government decided to step up and protect the minority from the majority. Because that was the constitutional thing to do.
So when Pastor Jim Garlow made this statement on Larry King the night of the Prop 8 ruling, I vomited in my mouth a little bit: "Thirty states have voted on [gay marriage bans] and all 30 states, where people have been allowed to have vote, have all voted for traditional marriage. Every single time. We have three states who have brought it about because the Supreme Court required it and a couple of states because of legislative action. But where the people get to express themselves, the average pass rate has been 68%."
The response from San Francisco's Mayor Gavin summed up my thoughts perfectly: "Thank God, maybe literally, not just figuratively, that in 1967 we didn't let the people decide on interracial marriage because 70% of American's opposed that." Nice.
Wendy Gould is a freelance journalist for Glamour Magazine, NUVO Newsweekly, Kiwanis International and various publications. She is also a photographer who specializes in portraiture, business, fine arts, and photojournalism. For more about Wendy, visit wendygould.com.
I had originally type a long post responding to many of the argumetns I felt were lacking in your article but now I believe there are two basic issues here:
First, the assumption that sexuality is not a choice.
Second, that marriage is a right.
Regarding sexuality being a choice or not, I have this to say:
I have yet to see evidence proving it isn't a choice. In fact I have yet to see any evidence proving that any behaviour is totally determined, whether it be alcoholism, getting up at the right time, eating, or drinking. (We may have what you call a predisposition to some of these things but this is by no means determinative) You think out of the fundamental needs for survival eating and drinking would not be a choice, yet people still can go on hunger strikes. And regarding sex many people (nuns, priests, eunichs, and others) choose to abstain from what might be considered an evolutionary requirement of survival. If we were evolutionarily programmed to do anything it would be to have sex to produce children wouldn't it? Yet not even this is determined. Exclusively homosexual behavior in nature is an argument against, not for a determined nature of sexuality since evolutionarly this is disadvantageous. In addition to this behavioural determinism is extremely difficult to prove in the human organism. Our behaviour is not as simple as that of the fruit fly, or some of the other behavioural genetics test organisms.
if sexuality is not a choice then pedophilia, polygamy, and zoophillia are justifyable too. It's not their fault, they didn't choose.
Second, marriage in my opinion is not a right. Marriage is a pre-existing condition that the governemnt wisely decided to protect because the consequences of marriage (children) have an impact on society which the government must account for. The government is not protecting rights in this case, but simply protecting the conditions under which things happen that it has a vested interest in. In my opinion, it has never been the governments jurisdiction to define marraige. It simply recognizes it. The government can just as easily recognize same sex unions, without the need for suggesting this is the same as marriage. I am unclear as to why it is so important for it to be called marriage.
Oh and please notice I did not quote the Bible once. I firmly believe the arguments agains same sex marriage outside of Biblical ones are sufficient to prove that this is not something socieity is required to protect or promote.
Thanks for your comments, Nathan. I appreciate any and all feedback.
Looking forward to hearing others' responses to this and yours,
Wendy
Wendy, you made some good points. I agree that marriage is not necessarily religious. If certain religions choose to ban or refuse same-sex couples, that is their prerogative, but the government is supposedly separate from the church in the USA. It should allow both heterosexual and homosexual couples the same benefits under law. At this point, a conservative reader gets their panties in a twist and argues, “If two men or two women can get married, that opens the door for anyone to marry anything – an adult and a child, a woman to a dog, a man and a couch!” Untwist your panties and remember that marriage is between consenting adults.
Nathan, I agree that it doesn’t necessarily have to be called “marriage.” Maybe the government should issue “civil union licenses” for all couples and only religious ceremonies are “marriages.” The name is not important, the rights provided by the union are. Otherwise, Nathan, your reasoning is incomplete. I could line by line discuss the holes and errors in your argument, but I’ll try to keep it concise. As with any impulse, whether is it biological or not, we choose whether to act on it. Sexuality is not a choice, but acting on your sexual urges is a choice. (Nuns, priests and many other people CHOOSE to be celibate whether they are attracted to men or women. Eunuchs are men with their sexual organs removed; they can’t have intercourse, though I’ve read that they didn’t necessarily abstain from sexual behavior.)
It is an evolutionary disadvantage for a majority of a species to be homosexual which is why it is a minority of people.
Why do conservatives always equate homosexuality with pedophilia and bestiality? I guess the Bible lumps them all together under “abomination, though I’m unsure if the Bible deals at all with the abuse of children. Eating pork is abomination in that same book of the Bible.
I’m praying that this makes it to the Supreme Court and they rule as they ruled on interracial marriage.
Marriage: An Unholy Alliance of Church and State
Get government out of the marriage and special civil union businesses
“By the power vested in me, by the state of California, I now pronounce you Husband and Wife.” declared the minister in front of the altar of God.
We have heard it so many times at weddings, movies and television that we forget
the significance of this pronouncement and how it blurs the vast difference between the government meaning of marriage and the popular meaning of marriage.
The word “marriage” conjures in our minds and emotion the promise of love, caring, committed relationship, living together, making babies, families, and continuity. A government marriage license does not require or address any of those things. The couple does not even have to declare that they intend to like each other or live together. In this respect it is a hollow document, only a voucher for a bundle for exclusive government benefits and privileges. These subsidies have grown with little thought, challenge or debate during the 20th century.
There is a popular misconception that marriage in the eyes of the government is a contract between the bride and the groom. This is not quite true, “Though mutual assent is necessary to enter into a marriage, the marriage itself is a status or relationship rather than a contract, the rights and obligations of the parties thereto being fixed by the law instead of by the parties themselves” There are three parties: The bride, the groom and the government. The bride and groom merely agree (assent) to be governed by the government’s rules. The government reserves the exclusive right to itself to change the rules at anytime. No one reads the unsuspecting couple their “Miranda rights” or informs them about what they are agreeing to.
Our minister conducting the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony is a government official, an “agent” of the State of California. There is a conspiracy of Church and State. If a couple wishes to have the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony in their own local church they will be forced, as a practical matter, to get a government marriage license in which they assent to this contract with government which binds them to whatever marriage laws the government wishes to enact or change.
The controversy over same-sex marriage should cause us to ask: Why is the government involved in marriage? Equality? Fairness? Why is the government giving exclusive financial benefits to people with marriage licenses and not to people without marriage licenses? I submit that people will fall in love, live together, make babies and perpetuate families with or without the government. Why do we want the ministers of our faith to be government agents?
I recommend that churches stop being agents of the government; that the state governments stop issuing marriage licenses or special civil unions; and that the federal government stop giving exclusive subsidies to people with marriage licenses. Benefits for all or benefits for none.
The elements of “government marriage” are the exclusive financial benefits, the exclusive privileges, and the legal responsibilities of the husband and wife. We can imagine that the financial benefits were originally motivated by concern over the “little woman” staying at home raising the children with no career, and not having any Social Security. That concern is not so applicable in recent years and makes even less sense for same-sex marriage. The exclusive privileges such as hospital visitation and exemption for testifying against a spouse could be made available in some form to all people, single or married. The legal responsibilities, in any case married or not, are better managed by explicit documents such as wills, durable power of attorney, living wills and partnership agreements.
The arguments against getting government out of the marriage and special civil union business break down into convenience; singles can get married if they want government benefits; and that single people don’t need the benefits. Pretty weak arguments compared to the passion generated in the recent marriage debates.
Since it should be the government's job to "protect" marriage, why isn't there more of an uproar from all these prop-8 peeps about making divorce illegal? I bet divorce hurts kids more than having two mommies or daddies.
I'm really confused as to why who someone decides to have sex is the business of the government, barring the violationg of a law.
I have yet to hear someone make the argument against same-sex marriages or civil unions that who doesn't eventually bring up religion. Doesn't mean someone hasn't done it, but really, let's be honest when it's religion driving this, not some fear the world population is going to die out.
Marriage may not necessarily be a "right", but when the government allows some consenting adults to get married, but not others, that's when it becomes a legal issue. Why not prevent convicted rapists from getting married? Child molesters shouldn't be allowed to get married, because getting married means you'll have children and if they have children, they may harm the child. The government should step in to protect the sanctity of marriage and the children! Who knows, we may get a crazy court that decides it doesn't want interreligious marriages because if a Jewish person and a Catholic got married, why their children would be so confused! It would harm them. We must protect the children!
Really, why do people care so much if two gay people want to get married? Besides making you uncomfortable, is it really going to affect your day-to-day life at all?
No kudos for Iowa?
kudos for Iowa!
And thanks for your comments, everyone!
Leave your response!
Most Viewed
Most Commented
Recent Comments
Popular Topics