Bush Urges Congress to Pass Amendment Banning Same-Sex Marriage

[Ben Kenobi]

How is an individual gay man barred from getting married?

An individual gay man has just as much right to get married as an individual straight man. The bill makes no distinction between the two.

[Flip McWho]

Are you entitled to equal access to veterans benefits Zkribbler, if you did not serve in the war? Not all government benefits are distributed equally, many would make little sense if done in that fashion.

What a bad analogy. This benefit is defined through the use of the word veteran. Marraige has no such official definition, its just traditionally been between a man and a women cause we're still separating the Church from the State.

[SlowwHand]

Majority rules. On anything, the majority rules. 51-49, gets it.

Edit: Yes, I oversimplified for point.

[Flip McWho]

How is an individual gay man barred from getting married?

An individual gay man has just as much right to get marrried as an individual straight man. The bill makes no distinction between the two.

You mean, hes entitled to get married to a woman right?

[Flip McWho]

Majority rules. On anything, the majority rules. 51-49, gets it.

And if the majority decides to kill all Texans then thats fine and dandy no?

[SlowwHand]

Originally posted by Flip McWho


And if the majority decides to kill all Texans then thats fine and dandy no?

I guess you're welcome to try.

[Flip McWho]

You raise a good point. Individual rights and human freedoms do not apply to collectives. No one has the right to get married, because such right would imply an obligation on the other partner. The union must be voluntary.

Makes little sense. Collective rights are easily derived through individual rights (individuals are allowed freedom to gather and freedom of speech and freedom to do anything not illegal, that pretty much covers any collective except ones that like to hurt other people).

Marriage depends on the consent of both partners. Everyone has the right to get married if they wish (you even recognise that gays have this right (as long as it is to a female)). There is no obligation through having the right to marry.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
How is an individual gay man barred from getting married?

An individual gay man has just as much right to get marrried as an individual straight man. The bill makes no distinction between the two.

Yes it does. It tries to tell people who they can marry and who they can't just like the laws which said blacks can't marry whites. I can think of nothing more intrusive then attempting to tell someone who they can marry and who they can't.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by SlowwHand


I wasn't being a smartass. Thank you for telling me.

oh, ok





you're welcome

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


Are you entitled to equal access to veterans benefits Zkribbler, if you did not serve in the war? Not all government benefits are distributed equally, many would make little sense if done in that fashion.

I would argue marriage is the same. The state has a great public interest in preserving marriage between one man and one women for both the sake of the partners, and for their children. Ergo, it makes sense that they would provide benefits for this arrangement in order to encourage more marriages.

It's absurd to claim that access to veterans benefits is absolutely identical in conceptualization as marriage is.

To form a relationship with another person is part of our right to our own conscience. Conscience is the fundamental experience of being human, and one way that we form our identity through our conscience, is to develop a romantic, intimate relationship with another consenting person who expresses the same attraction towards us.

Our individuality certainly does not depend on another person to be in our life; that would be wholly unhealthy. But in the broad sense, our relationships, be they platonic friendships, familial, or romantic, influence our sense of who we are.

To deny that gays are entitled to the same legal protection in their life-long/long-term romantic, committed relationships is to deny that gays are fully human since you also, in turn, refuse to acknowledge that gays are entitled to the very fundamental right to their own conscience.

None of us have formed our own, unique, individual identity in a vacuum; we are all influenced by our various relationships we have with others in our daily lives.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
How is an individual gay man barred from getting married?

An individual gay man has just as much right to get marrried as an individual straight man. The bill makes no distinction between the two.

Ben, you make this same argument in every thread, and its always wrong.

Marriage is a state-sanctioned contract. Period. If you want to imagine that your Sky-God has other ideas, fine -- imagine that. But a state-sanctioned contract is all it is.

And the state has no right specifiying the gender of people who can enter into a contract. It cant't tell you that you can only sell your home to white people; it can't tell you that you can only hire Christians; and it can't tell you that you can only marry women.

It's just that simple.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
Majority rules. On anything, the majority rules. 51-49, gets it.

Edit: Yes, I oversimplified for point.

Which would make tyranny of the majority possible. Which makes a tyrannical majority the power to force unjust laws unto others.

What you say is true in its simplistic form, but I hope you're not arguing that the majority rule is always absolutely right/just.

[SlowwHand]

No. All of the people can be fooled some of the time.
Some can be fooled all of the time.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
No.

So this means if the majority of Apolytoners rule against you wanting to throw Playful's pets over the bridge, you would have to comply.

[SlowwHand]