a question i have for both gay people and homophobes?

[MagunBFP]

I'm sure it was, it seems you're missing the point I was making. The fact is that we've changed and added to marriage repeatedly through it's history, it's barely even symbolically what it used to be. Rather then just keep adding to the patchwork of additions and addemdums that define marriage we should fix the whole damn thing. The problem is when there are people who don't care about anything not being included except for their own personal agendas and they insist that "insert flavour here" gets taken care of immediately and then eventually they'll support someone elses "harder" or "less important" flavour, such as is often the arguement when polygamy is brought into the marriage equality debate.

Hang on, so you're actually arguing that we should extend marriage to polygamous relationships and consensual incestuous ones as well?

In principle, I'm not against that. Those have issues unique to them, of course-- as far as I know, many polygamous relationships are unbalanced, and many incestuous ones are abusive or exploitative. There would have to be in-depth studies into whether allowing marriage for the above could amount to further mechanisms of abuse.

...So, hang on, you're not actually against gay people marrying; you just believe the change should go further?

There are two factors in gay marriage, gays and marriage. I have no problem with homosexuality, my problem is with marriage, I think it's broken. It's been added to, changed, manipulated, co-opted by the state, claimed by religion and when we have as much diversity as we do today it's woefully inadequate.

A secular marriage isn't about love or commitment, we don't need the government to approve who we have a relationship with. Secular marriages are contracts detailing rights, responsibilites and the terms and conditions of contract, it should also include standard terms for the disolution of the contract instead of the "your lawyer is better then their lawyer so you win more"

Fix marriage or scrap it and replace it with something better that is all inclusive, until then all anyone doing is adding "flavour of the month" patches to an already flawed status.

So everyone in your town and county is always honest about their opinions? Then I envy you, we could all do with a little less bullshit and a lot more honesty. To be honest I don't know you from Bob, so telling me you're not being fashionable is relatively meaningless. Just like you could be thinking I'm a bigot because you don't agree with me... doesn't really make any difference.

What? No, I didn't say that. I said the majority is against gay marriage, and vocal about it. I never said "everyone is always honest about their opinions".

But, I severely doubt they're all just hiding pro-gay-marriage sympathies. That's pretty absurd.

I never suggested that all of them would be hiding pro-gay-marriage sympathies, but it's likely that not all of them are as hateful as you might think.

 

[Johnny Impact]

It's the violence and persecution that need to stop. Yeah, I know, one leads to the other. Except 99 times out of 100, it doesn't. For every person who commits violence against gays, there are a hundred who dislike gays but would never actually do anything beyond bitching to their friends.

Anyway, those 99 homophobes not actually physically attacking gay people...do they vote? Do they decide who to hire or fire or promote? Do they have any other power they can abuse?

So you want to, what? Take away the bigots' voting rights? Hatred is not going to go away any time soon. Whether either of us like it or not, people have the right to disagree with gay marriage. It is also their right to vote. How will they vote, if not by the values that are important to them, i.e. "traditional" man-woman marriage? There's a pretty big difference between voting against gay marriage and dragging a gay guy behind your pickup until he dies. I don't agree with either action, but one of them has the advantage of being legal and nonviolent. As for persecution through means such as firing, we have laws against that. A person's right to dislike gays ends where the gay man's employment begins. It's spelled out pretty clearly. I agree that it would be better to eradicate hate. I'm just saying A) it will never completely happen, and B) hate is legal and technically harms no one, it's only acting on it that's harmful and illegal.

 

[Angie7F]

I thnk we just all need to agree to disagree.
People will be different no matter what and we need to let each other be.
If you dont like gays, stay out of the gay areas and vice versa

 

[Silvanus]

There are two factors in gay marriage, gays and marriage. I have no problem with homosexuality, my problem is with marriage, I think it's broken. It's been added to, changed, manipulated, co-opted by the state, claimed by religion and when we have as much diversity as we do today it's woefully inadequate.

A secular marriage isn't about love or commitment, we don't need the government to approve who we have a relationship with. Secular marriages are contracts detailing rights, responsibilites and the terms and conditions of contract, it should also include standard terms for the disolution of the contract instead of the "your lawyer is better then their lawyer so you win more"

Fix marriage or scrap it and replace it with something better that is all inclusive, until then all anyone doing is adding "flavour of the month" patches to an already flawed status.

I can see the benefit in this, admittedly.

That said, I wouldn't tell people what marriage is about; it means different things to different people. Many who grow up to be secular still dreamed of a marriage ceremony when they were little, and for them and others, it is indeed about love.

Scrapping marriage altogether (and replacing it with a more appropriate contract) is something I could get behind. But that's a long way off; in the meantime, I'd rather not deny the services we do have to people who want them.

I never suggested that all of them would be hiding pro-gay-marriage sympathies, but it's likely that not all of them are as hateful as you might think.

Yes, that's likely, I agree.

But they're not the majority.

 

[sageoftruth]

I believe one of the biggest obstacles to achieving Dr. King's dream is our discomfort with not having answers. The thing about the "Content of one's character" is that it's invisible to anyone who doesn't know a person, and we as a society seem to have a need to fill that blank space in with something, so we use algorithms (a.k.a. whatever little we can grasp from the surface).

I never thought I'd find myself saying this, but I think we could actually learn something from Chinese culture, which I hear is much more comfortable with ambiguity. According to a book about Chinese myths, China has very few myths since the ancient people of China were comfortable with not having an explanation for all the mysteries of the world. If we had that same tolerance for ambiguity, I wonder if this would be less of a problem.

 

[MagunBFP]

There are two factors in gay marriage, gays and marriage. I have no problem with homosexuality, my problem is with marriage, I think it's broken. It's been added to, changed, manipulated, co-opted by the state, claimed by religion and when we have as much diversity as we do today it's woefully inadequate.

A secular marriage isn't about love or commitment, we don't need the government to approve who we have a relationship with. Secular marriages are contracts detailing rights, responsibilites and the terms and conditions of contract, it should also include standard terms for the disolution of the contract instead of the "your lawyer is better then their lawyer so you win more"

Fix marriage or scrap it and replace it with something better that is all inclusive, until then all anyone doing is adding "flavour of the month" patches to an already flawed status.

I can see the benefit in this, admittedly.

That said, I wouldn't tell people what marriage is about; it means different things to different people. Many who grow up to be secular still dreamed of a marriage ceremony when they were little, and for them and others, it is indeed about love.

Scrapping marriage altogether (and replacing it with a more appropriate contract) is something I could get behind. But that's a long way off; in the meantime, I'd rather not deny the services we do have to people who want them.

My bad, I wasn't as clear as I'd thought when I was saying what marriage was about. I was only speaking from a legally binding, married in the eyes of the law sense. That secular marriages are intended to symbolise love and commitment and joining to lives into a family is not something I was trying to suggest doesn't happen, but when it comes to marriage as something that is legally binding that part is just a contract.

The problem with fixing marriage for the "flavour of the month" group is that it then reduces the demand to make the changes so the even smaller minorities get to enjoy the same rights being fought for. Which is why my stance is fix it for everyone, not just a select few.