Line between bigotry and traditional values.

[Jon Miller]

It's like me saying MikeH is a bigot about religion since he doesn't believe in God.

JM

[MikeH]

It's like me saying MikeH is a bigot about religion since he doesn't believe in God.

JM

If I say that I don't think marriage between religious people should be called marriage, that name should be reserved for legal partnerships and religious people can find their own term, then you can call me a bigot.

[MikeH]

By wanting marriage to be treated differently between a Father and Son, or an Employee and Boss, is wanting people to be treated differently because of XXX, which is bigotry in your book.

Bull****.

For some traditional people it is just a different definition, one which does not include two men/two women/etc pairings which would be called something else.

JM

WTF?! Marriage between a father and son? Is that what you meant? Was anyone else saying that? That's a ridiculous strawman.

Why is it different Jon? It's two people, in love, wanting to make a life commitment together, either legally or in front of their God/Gods. Why should it be called a different name when it's exactly the same thing?

[MikeH]

Mike,
The difference that has to keep being told to you folks is that we don't hate gays. Bigotry is hate. Not hate, not bigotry.

We don't hate gays, we just think their relationships are inferior and need to be given a name that discriminates them from our 'proper' relationships? Even if we can't agree with the term bigotry, I think we can agree on prejudice.

[Jon Miller]

But for a traditional person marriage is not defined as being between two people in love/etc/etc/etc.

Marriage is between a man and a woman /etc/etc/etc.

As such, for them, gay marriage is such a "WTF?!" as saying marriage is between a father and son/employee and boss/etc.

And yet you and MrFun demonize them as bigots or say that they must be prejudiced.

It doesn't have to have anything to do with prejudice (although it often does, perhaps for other reasons), it is inherently an issue of definition/meaning/etc.

JM

[MikeH]

But for a traditional person marriage is not defined as being between two people in love/etc/etc/etc.

Marriage is between a man and a woman /etc/etc/etc.

As such, for them, gay marriage is such a "WTF?!" as saying marriage is between a father and son/employee and boss/etc.

And yet you and MrFun demonize them as bigots or say that they must be prejudiced.

It doesn't have to have anything to do with prejudice (although it often does, perhaps for other reasons), it is inherently an issue of definition/meaning/etc.

JM

We've moved on, we now know for sure that homosexuality is not some strange abnormality, or wrongness. It's completely normal and natural. Not just in humans but across the animal kingdom. We live in free societies that champion equality across boundaries. Language evolves with culture. Words that were once completely normal words for describing the colour of someones skin or sexuality are now seen as extremely offensive, because attitudes have changed.

If we live in a country where we consider that same sex couples have the same right to share their lives, and it is both legally and socially accepted, I think we've moved on to a place where we can and should evolve the word to be inclusive. Resistance to accepting that change I think is resistance to accepting that social change. And then I question why the resistance other than to highlight that it's different, when I don't see any difference between marriage between a man and a woman or two men or two women.

And in my county they call it Civil Partnership rather than marriage, in official circles, and I think that's wrong but everyone else refers to it as marriage. Couples invite you to their marriage and that's it.

I also think there might be some people who are against the term, but don't hate gays, but by far the greater or louder number of people anti calling it marriage are against gay marriage in general, and a very loud proportion of them think that homosexuality is wrong, and generally are bigots.

[MikeH]

Fundamentally I disagree with the notion that marriage between two men is different to between a man and a woman, and believe that anyone who does think it is different is wrong and prejudiced.

[Jon Miller]

You are wrong, it is no different than me saying that I fundamentally disagree with the notion that marriage between a son and father is different from between two men, and think that anyone who thinks differently is wrong and prejudiced.

Or me saying that I fundamentally disagree with the notion that there is no God, and that I believe that anyone who thinks differently is wrong and prejudiced.

You are displaying an inability to see things from a different point of view. Note that you can still see things from their point of view and disagree with them (I do with Randians + Agnostics + others). But you still need to see things from their point of view. And if you saw it from their point of view, you would realize that they are not prejudiced (note that I didn't say that you would realize that they were not wrong).

Prejudice does not mean believes which are held that I think are wrong and disagree with.

JM

[MikeH]

It is completely different. You are suggesting incest, which is still universally unacceptable within heterosexuals. Marriage between a father and daughter is completely unacceptable, so why would we consider that a homosexual version of that would be acceptable? Now you could well hold that view, but society would view you as a crank. I can't imagine that changing, but I guess it might in a suitably large amount of time. It certainly happens now, but is usually seen as an abuse of a position of responsibility.

Predjudice means treating someone differently for reasons that society has deemed unacceptable. In modern western societies these include race, sex, sexuality and disability. It's not my view, it's the legally enshrined views of the societies in which we live.

[MikeH]

It boils down to this:

Is treating homosexuals differently purely because they are gay acceptable?

If you say yes, you are prejudiced.
If you say no, you aren't.

The marriage question is then a trivial outcome of that answer.

[Jon Miller]

I agree with your statement "Is treating homosexuals differently purely because they are gay acceptable? If you say yes, you are prejudiced."

I don't see how it has to do with the marriage statement. The traditional person would say that a gay man could marry a woman if they wanted to, as such they are not being treated differently.

The issue is 'do you stick with the traditional european definition of marriage, or are you willing to change it'.

Just because many who are not willing to change it are bigots doesn't mean that if you are not willing to change it you are a bigot.

JM

[Jon Miller]

It is completely different. You are suggesting incest, which is still universally unacceptable within heterosexuals. Marriage between a father and daughter is completely unacceptable, so why would we consider that a homosexual version of that would be acceptable? Now you could well hold that view, but society would view you as a crank. I can't imagine that changing, but I guess it might in a suitably large amount of time. It certainly happens now, but is usually seen as an abuse of a position of responsibility.

Predjudice means treating someone differently for reasons that society has deemed unacceptable. In modern western societies these include race, sex, sexuality and disability. It's not my view, it's the legally enshrined views of the societies in which we live.

I didn't suggest incest. You could replace son + father with employee + employer or employee + employee if you want.

I was changing the definition of marriage, just like you and I support doing to include romantic two men relationships as part of the definition of marriage.

The reason why you thought I suggested incest is because you have connotations/etc with the word marriage. You understand it to mean a certain thing.

Which is the same thing that traditional people do.

Not wanting to change the definition of a thing/etc does not make one a bigot.

JM

[MikeH]

I don't see how it has to do with the marriage statement. The traditional person would say that a gay man could marry a woman if they wanted to, as such they are not being treated differently.

One of the most ridiculous arguments out there. That could only be "not being treated differently" if you said straight men were allowed to marry a man but not a woman.

[MikeH]

Jon to suggest the term marriage doesn't imply a sexual relationship is utterly ridiculous.

[Jon Miller]

To some traditional people, it is just at utterly ridiculous as saying that the term marriage doesn't imply a man and a woman.

JM