Gay Marriage: Is It Perhaps Moral to Oppose It Independent of Religion?

[ThrobbingEgo]

But without god, what's moral?!

http://atheism.about.com/od/atheismmyths/p/AtheistsMorals.htm
http://mwillett.org/atheism/moralsource.htm
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/nontheism/atheism/morality-and-atheism.html

Ethics debates are the most fun thing evar. I love asking friends the "damned if you do; damned if you don't" ethics questions just to see them squirm.

I'm a philosophy geek myself. I didn't want to pigeonhole all my fellow atheists in my response to Nimcha, so I spammed a bunch of links.

As far as hypothetical moral questions I generally hold the 'mad philosopher' morally responsible for whatever happens, if I got you right. My action is usually to let the default happen, so I don't put other people in harms way to save victims of circumstance. I'm against volunteering other people to die to save more people.

Have you ever heard of Klosterman's Questions? They're a riot. http://melanism.com/2006/07/chuck-klostermans-23-questions-i-ask.html

 

[EuZic]

oh and this is our own fault you know.. we let every entitled twat in their cerebral spring feed us their brainfarts so that we can vent. not ok.

 

[Ralphfromdk]

Snip snip snip.

Dear OP (and all you other "anti gay" people out there. I'm getting the felling that you are like one of those politicians who are anti gay, but in reality, you're as gay as the people you seem to hate.

It's okay. You can tell us. We won't hate you for it.

Also, stop trying to test the waters with silly things like "do you hate the gays too, because I sure do" just to find out what people think.

It's just.... silly. There's no other word for it. Just be honest with yourself and you will be way more happy about your life.

 

[Nimcha]

Aw crap, you guys. I used sarcasm even though I know it doesn't translate well to text. Shame on me

 

[Woodsey]

We better round up all the infertile heterosexuals and forbid them marriage then.

Anyway, I'm a little confused by you suggesting that what is moral is equal to what is fiscally sound. Gays can also adopt to, which rather throws out the 'lack of children' argument.

 

[ThrobbingEgo]

Snip snip snip.

Dear OP. I'm getting the felling that you are like one of those politicians who are anti gay, but in reality, you're as gay as the people you seem to hate.

It's okay. You can tell us. We won't hate you for it.

Also, stop trying to test the waters with silly things like "do you hate the gays too, because I sure do" just to find out what people think.

It's just.... silly. There's no other word for it. Just be honest with yourself and you will be way more happy about your life.

Fighting homophobia by shaming people through labeling them as gay?

Firefighters don't carry matches for a reason. Fighting fire with fire just results in more homophobic fire.

 

[Vrach]

One word. Overpopulation. You know all those people on without jobs that are taking social? Yeah, that's because of all them lovely kids us heterosexuals throw out into the world. So no, gay marriage is not, even economically, a bad thing.

 

[ThrobbingEgo]

Aw crap, you guys. I used sarcasm even though I know it doesn't translate well to text. Shame on me

Heheh, I was hoping.

You never know what nonsense people think. http://conservapedia.com/Atheism_and_morality

 

[Guardian of Nekops]

So, where should we stand? To support legal gay marriage is to support the following:

1) Happiness for the couple (or rather, more happiness than not legal gay marriage presumably)

2) Less expected income for the state per year

3) Less population (ergo power) for the nation

In 2), I assume you are reffering to the tax breaks that every married couple recieves, and which would be extended to gay couples who were allowed to get married. This leads to a rather obvious question... if we are viewing this as a loss, as something bad for society... why exactly do we give out the tax breaks at all? Why not just force everyone to pay the same amount, whether they are married or not? Presumably, this is because the family serves some social purpose that we are happy to subsidize... a purpose that gay and lesbian couples could also provide if given the chance, and which is not solely limited to popping out more mouths to feed.

Which brings us to 3). What country, what WORLD are you living in? America has how many children in orphanages and foster homes, how many people we don't have jobs for, how many illegal aliens that people are eager to push out for stealing our resources? China has instituted a strict cap on the number of children people are allowed, we have people starving all over the world that we can't figure out how to feed. In this day and age, a single soldier holds more military might than a squad of 20 in ages past. In what UNIVERSE does more people mean more power, as opposed to more cost and more responsibility?

This is not to mention the fact that, presumably, if a person is sure enough about being gay to have found a partner he wants to marry, that he probably isn't gonna have kids. On the other hand, if you let him get married and give him that evil tax break of his, he and his partner might just adopt some of those kids in the orphanage that we don't know what to do with.

So in the long run, legalized gay marriage should lead to more gay persons.

Really? Seriously? You are afraid that people would change their sexual orientation for a tax break? People that aren't already finding someone in whom they have no interest and marrying them for the benefits, I mean? It's not as if this creates an exploit that does not already exist, is what I'm saying.

If you are worried that more gay people will come out of the closet, stop living in loveless or confusing marriages because that's "what they're supposed to do"... if that idea worries you because it might cost us a buck or two, then I seriously have to wonder about your priorities.

The government sees a gay marriage as two persons who will not have children but will take benefits which are meant for those who the government believes WILL have children. This is not good financially for the government, and as such is a problem.

This argument could be applied to any married couple containing at least one sterile individual, any couple using a permanant (ie: surgical) form of birth control, any couple that chooses not to have children and any couple that has already HAD children is finished raising them, and doesn't plan to have any more. Do you really think we give married senior citizens a tax break because we hope that they're still going to have kids, raise them for us, and prepare them for the work force?

I mean seriously, look at that list. Nearly half of current marriages, I'd wager, offer little to no chance at adding further to the population, yet they get tax breaks and, more importantly, visitation rights. Easily shared property. The right to adopt. Legal rights to information on the status of their spouse. The approval that says to people, "What you are doing is good and wholesome. Enjoy your love for each other."

In short, any "financial" argument that discriminates against homosexuals but does not propose that we hunt down all these people and take their benefits from them too... well, it feels like a smoke screen for prejudice. It feels like a flimsy attempt to avoid saying that you don't like gay people, that they scare you, and that you think they will go away if you starve them of attention.

And really? They won't go away. In the oppressive society they grew up in, I guarantee that most of these poor people spent hours, days, maybe even years looking at themselves, wishing these feelings would go away. Wishing that they could be like everyone else, so that they didn't have to face ridicule for being different. But it doesn't go away.

It's time that we, as a society, stopped acting like homosexuals are just kids with imaginary friends and that we stopped ignoring them. What they feel is real, as real as what any straight person feels for another, and it deserves to be treated the same so that we can all, one day, get on with our lives and just live and love as we see fit. Wouldn't that be nice?

 

[Ralphfromdk]

Snip snip snip.

Dear OP. I'm getting the felling that you are like one of those politicians who are anti gay, but in reality, you're as gay as the people you seem to hate.

It's okay. You can tell us. We won't hate you for it.

Also, stop trying to test the waters with silly things like "do you hate the gays too, because I sure do" just to find out what people think.

It's just.... silly. There's no other word for it. Just be honest with yourself and you will be way more happy about your life.

Fighting homophobia by shaming people through labeling them as gay?

Firefighters don't carry matches for a reason. Fighting fire with fire just results in more homophobic fire.

Well, it's just that in my experience, when people whine about something being wrong for what ever reason, they tend to be part of the problem themselves somehow (not that being gay is a problem, but i couldn't find another way to say it)

Also..... flaming homo.... heh... Yes, I'm a very bad person and I will most likely go to hell, thank you for asking.


*edit* You CAN actually fight fire with fire. Put a bigger fire next to the first one, and the bigger one will suck all the oxygen away from the first fire.
So, by seeing all the anti gay people as gays, and accuse them of hiding something, they might just shut up. One can only hope.

 

[Lenin211]

Its been a while since I refuted a post line by line. My arguments will be in bold.

Marriage is the legal act of connecting two people as a unit, and typically leading to them living their lives together. A common byproduct is children, which is the real goal here. For the human race to go on, for the country to grow and become more powerful, people need to procreate. This is where gay marriage comes into play.

First off, if the only reason that people married was to make babies, why do they get married? They could have children when not married.

The government sees a gay marriage as two persons who will not have children but will take benefits which are meant for those who the government believes WILL have children. This is not good financially for the government, and as such is a problem.

So, where should we stand? To support legal gay marriage is to support the following:

1) Happiness for the couple (or rather, more happiness than not legal gay marriage presumably)

2) Less expected income for the state per year

Why? what evidence do you have that would suggest that increases in marriages (or gay marriages in particular) would hurt the economy? If anything it seems like it would stimulate the economy by creating business in the wedding industry.

3) Less population (ergo power) for the nation

There is no reason that gay marriage would cause a decrease in population. All of the people that are currently gay don't have kids, we still are gaining population every day. When gay marriage is legalized all throughout the nation, people won't suddenly decide to be gay and not have kids.

Now, how do we weigh the happiness of a couple versus the losses which our state will suffer per marriage? Before I do that, I want to say that while those who are gay have already supposedly aided toward 3, and perhaps 2, it is encouraging of the gay culture to support gay marriage legally. So in the long run, legalized gay marriage should lead to more gay persons.

How the fuck does that work? When people see that gay marriage is legal they will decide to be gay? Gayness is a genetic trait. One doesn't decide to be gay just like someone doesn't decide to be black. Your statement "it is encouraging of the gay culture to support gay marriage legally." seems to be making the point that people will see gays and their culture and say "Wow that sure sounds neat, I want to be gay to fit in now!" your statement makes no sense under any kind of scrutiny.

Anyway, consider the happiness of two gay people who are informally married but not legally married. Are they sad that they are not married legally to where their happiness is less than neutral overall? I think not, but that is a point which is tough to argue. How much more happiness could 'official' marriage possibly bring?

People obviously have some incentive to marry legally. No one would ever marry were this not the case. The first part of this paragraph seems to be saying that the happiness that they already have balances out the sadness caused by a breech in human rights. It would be like a racist during segregation saying "Consider the happiness of a black person drinking from an inferior water fountain. Are they sad that they are not allowed to drink out of the cleaner whites only water fountain to where their happiness is less than neutral overall? I think not." Now that might have been an extreme example but you see the point that I am illustrating. No matter the quality of life of a person who a human rights violation is being committed against is, their happiness doesn't justify violating their human rights.

The loss in income, population, and power is best measured like this:
A google search tells me that there are 307 million persons in the United States currently.
For every 1 million gay couples, there are 2 million gays, and 2 million people which will not procreate.
I recall hearing that about 5% of the nation was openly gay. So, 15.35 million gays are estimated in America (rough rough estimate). Can you see why the government may have problems, why we as people perhaps should have problems, with this many people (remember, legalized marriage would seem to imply the rate at which gays are open will increase) not procreating? This may be a serious (buzzword I know; if you need a more technical proposition, I'd say large) blow to the United States' power and economy.

Once again, there is no reason that legalizing gay marriage would cause an influx of gay people. You never say why a reduction in babies would be a bad thing. There is no link given from reduction of babies to your impact of loss of U.S. power. No reason is given why a loss of U.S. power would be a bad thing. Your argument also lacks uniqueness. There are many gay people in the united states already, you admitted this. If the number of gay people would not increase (like I have said it wouldn't) then there is no reason that we haven't seen a loss in U.S. power already. If the number of gay people in this country already cannot trigger your impact of U.S. power loss, then why would allowing gay people basic freedoms that we give to every other minority group trigger them? Even if legalizing gay marriage would cause a loss in U.S. power, you haven't given a reason for me to fear the loss of U.S. power. I do fear, however, the loss of human rights. If we lose human rights, then we can say "Yes, deny people rights and freedoms for money and power." THIS IS EXACTLY THE MINDSET THAT YOU ADVOCATE FOR. You think that it is okay to deny people basic freedoms because you are afraid that we might lose some money.

Other factors are things such as expected good a baby will do and how much help they would be in the world in terms of national power etc, but that is difficult to figure when making a decision on the matter. It is also not a variable which would seem to carry much weight in the decision as well, as to assume that there would be enough babies which would cause more problems if those who were gay were straight such that our nation faces even greater and steeper problems, is to assume potential collapse of the United States. To assume that would be pointless, as it is not a conclusion worth considering.

tl'dr human ethics and morals seem to imply that we should allow gay marriage, however on closer inspection, this may not be the case

 

[hecticpicnic]

You know there is away they can marry (here anyway) it's like offical partnership or something,it's the equivalent to marriage with out all the wedding and religious shit.
And while i'm atheist and don't care for that 'family values' bullshit and religion,i didn't mind marriage to be illegal.
I realised that there are gays who are Christian/what ever else, and want to marry their way,
(it kind of annoys me that people who went through enough dealing with their own sexuality would buy into religious bullshit),and they have the right to do what they want, and nobody should(including me) judge them for it or prevent them.

 

[l3awl3ag]

But without god, what's moral?!

I think you're probably being sarcastic here, but better safe than sorry lol



Moral is moral. It's a concept all of it's own.

If a person acts according to moral code purely because God exists and they fear punishment, then they are not a good person. They are a coward, plain and simple. And assuming that their faith turns out to be well founded, they will be punished as cowards.

You don't need to be religious in order to have a sense of morality. There is such a thing as a moral atheist. And there's people like me, I'm agnostic. I believe in God, but I don't believe in religion. I have nothing against it or it's practitioners, I simply don't believe that God is worthy of worship. So with that in mind, when I die I'm either A) Properly dead or B) Going to hell. Yet I still retain a sense of morality, even though I know I'll gain nothing from it. Because that's not what it's about.


Anyway.. On topic. I don't really have anything to add, but I will say I'm pleasantly surprised by the responses here.. I was half expecting to click on this thread and find a bunch of homophobes attacking the sensible minority. But instead I find that the sensible people are the majority? Faith in humanity restored. A little bit lol.

 

[thewaever]

Marriage is the legal act of connecting two people as a unit, and typically leading to them living their lives together. A common byproduct is children, which is the real goal here

This argument pops up from time to time, & it always amazes me when it does.

One word: menopause.

Here's another: infertility

Women go through menopause. They become infertile, unable to produce babies. If you conclude that gays should be denied marriage because they refuse (in the circular logic of the premise) to produce babies, then ALL women of ANY age should NEVER be allowed to marry, because one day they will be unable to produce babies.


Besides, from a legal point of view, which is really the only point of view that matters, marriage is NOT about making babies. The United States Supreme Court has ruled & seconded many times that the right to marry (& it is a RIGHT) is an intrinsic part of the right to the pursuit of happiness.

Frankly, there is no valid logical or legal argument against same-sex marriage. I've been searching for one for a decade. I'm honestly surprised it's taking the Land of the "Free" this long to grant gays the freedom we are supposed to have been born with.

You don't get to vote on my inalienable rights.

 

[Dexiro]

[snipple]
tl'dr human ethics and morals seem to imply that we should allow gay marriage, however on closer inspection, this may not be the case

You indeed have looked closer into these issues, but don't stop so soon because there's an entire extra layer of arguments that you've missed. Almost all of your statements against gay marriage have been wild assumptions.

- The assumption that all married couples have or could have children.
- The assumption that gays getting married somehow means less children being born.
- The assumption that less population is a bad thing in the current state of the world.
- The missing fact that many gays would like to adopt children.
- The assumption that accepting homosexuality makes more people homosexual.
- The missing acknowledgement that marriage provides a lot of legal benefits that extend beyond financial help.
- The idea that gays shouldn't be given equal rights just to save the government money.
- The missing acknowledgement for the sentimental value that marriage holds over a similar alternative.

I'll argue some of these in more detail if I must but you certainly need to think these particular things through

 

[alandavidson]

Operating off the idea that "more people = more power" (we'll shorten the equation to PO=PW) is kind of dumb to begin with.

Let's just say that you are on an island with a finite amount of resources. The more people you have on the island, the faster your resources are used up. You can replenish some of these resources over time, but there must always be a greater supply than there is demand. Once you reach a certain peak of populace, PO=PW stops working, and actually starts to work in the opposite direction.

With that said, 5% of a population not reproducing isn't that big of a deal.

And on a moral note, let gay people fall in love, get married, and live normal lives. To say that they can't do that is saying that they're not human.

 

[bean burrito]

Sorry, I don't have time to read through the whole thread due to an organic chemistry test coming up, but I thought I'd weigh in a few points here. Sorry if I'm just restating other points.

Your argument operates under the assumption that people are here to serve the national interest. It's the opposite: the nation is here to serve the people. In the USA at least, a guiding principle is life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. There's nothing there about being a good citizen and working for the prosperity of the state.

This also has nothing to do with ethics. This is not an argument of ethics which is, according to wikipedia "a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality?that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc." ([link]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethics[/link]) This argument is all about finances and power, which is a far cry from ethics.




Secondly, you also seem to be operating under the assumption that married couples main input to the "loss in income, population, and power" of a nation is procreation. That's an extremely narrow way to view how a person adds to a nations "income, population and power".
Going off that, your point about happiness: " Are they sad that they are not married legally to where their happiness is less than neutral overall? I think not, but that is a point which is tough to argue. How much more happiness could 'official' marriage possibly bring?" I cannot speak for the homosexual community, but I would have to say yes. Yes they are sad. They are being denied a basic tenet of our society because of something that is innate about them. In the USA it used to be illegal for black and white couples to marry. Were they sad about that? Would the United States suffer a "loss in income, population, and power" if Barack Obama's parents were not allowed to marry?

On top of that, the happiness people would gain from marrying would most likely increase the income and power of the nation, as happy people are more likely to be successful [link] http://www.webmd.com/balance/news/20051219/happiness-comes-first-success-follows[/link]

Thirdly, you're point about married gay people would not procreate is for another argument entirely. It really is not relevant here, because gay people aren't procreating anyways, married or no. Admittedly, if gay marriage was allowed, it would lessen the stigma of homosexuality, so more people would come out. But under that assumption, homosexuals would be happier as a general population because they are no longer a stigmatized section of the population. That makes them happier, ergo more successful, ergo increasing the income and power of the nation.

Finally, homosexual couples can procreate. There are plenty of ways for homosexual people to indirectly or indirectly increase the population via artificial insemination, adoption, etc. Hell, men can even get pregnant nowadays. -> [link] http://www.oprah.com/showinfo/First-TV-Interview-The-Pregnant-Man_1 [/link]

tl;dr human ethics and morals seem to imply that we should allow gay marriage, and on closer inspection this belief is upheld.
This argument is not one of ethics, it is one of power and economics.
On the grounds of power and economics, there was no argument presented (from the OP) that proves homosexual marriage should be barred.


Well that was more than I initially intended to write, but I guess that's how procrastination works. Sorry if I didn't make much sense, and sorry if I restated points.

 

[isometry]

Marriage is the legal act of connecting two people as a unit, and typically leading to them living their lives together. A common byproduct is children, which is the real goal here. For the human race to go on, for the country to grow and become more powerful, people need to procreate.

I disagree that children are "the real goal" of marriage. That was the goal throughout most of history, but advances in medicine, farming technology, and warfare have reduced the benefits of population growth, and an increased demand for energy per capita means that overpopulation is a real concern. The birth rate in industrial countries has been decreasing for generations and this is generally seen as a progressive change that we would like to bring to the third world countries as well.

So, where should we stand? To support legal gay marriage is to support the following:

1) Happiness for the couple (or rather, more happiness than not legal gay marriage presumably)

2) Less expected income for the state per year

3) Less population (ergo power) for the nation

Points (2) and (3) don't really follow. As for (2), the Federal government runs a deficit every year, the expenditures exceed the revenue. A smaller population will mean less revenue, but also less expenses, so the overall size of the deficit would be predicted to decrease. The gross domestic product would decrease, but the GDP per capita could potentially increase.

An example of lower population increasing GDP per capita, equivalently standard of living, is in a country like China which took political action to reduce population growth in the form of the one child per household policy. This case demonstrates that (3) is not true for all countries, in modern times population growth is not always associated with more power.

Now, how do we weigh the happiness of a couple versus the losses which our state will suffer per marriage? Before I do that, I want to say that while those who are gay have already supposedly aided toward 3, and perhaps 2, it is encouraging of the gay culture to support gay marriage legally. So in the long run, legalized gay marriage should lead to more gay persons.

Anyway, consider the happiness of two gay people who are informally married but not legally married. Are they sad that they are not married legally to where their happiness is less than neutral overall? I think not, but that is a point which is tough to argue. How much more happiness could 'official' marriage possibly bring?

The loss in income, population, and power is best measured like this:
A google search tells me that there are 307 million persons in the United States currently.
For every 1 million gay couples, there are 2 million gays, and 2 million people which will not procreate.
I recall hearing that about 5% of the nation was openly gay. So, 15.35 million gays are estimated in America (rough rough estimate). Can you see why the government may have problems, why we as people perhaps should have problems, with this many people (remember, legalized marriage would seem to imply the rate at which gays are open will increase) not procreating? This may be a serious (buzzword I know; if you need a more technical proposition, I'd say large) blow to the United States' power and economy.

Other factors are things such as expected good a baby will do and how much help they would be in the world in terms of national power etc, but that is difficult to figure when making a decision on the matter. It is also not a variable which would seem to carry much weight in the decision as well, as to assume that there would be enough babies which would cause more problems if those who were gay were straight such that our nation faces even greater and steeper problems, is to assume potential collapse of the United States. To assume that would be pointless, as it is not a conclusion worth considering.

tl'dr human ethics and morals seem to imply that we should allow gay marriage, however on closer inspection, this may not be the case

I've argued that high birth rates are not always beneficial in industrialized societies, so I disagree that children are "the real goal" of marriage from the state's perspective in modern times, although clearly it was in the past.

Finally, I'd like to point out that your argument favors not allowing sterile heterosexuals to marry, and even stopping heterosexuals with no intention of reproducing from marrying.

See, homosexuals are unlikely to reproduce whether they marry or not. So if kids matter as much as you say, the worse thing would be for a sterile heterosexual to marry a fertile one, since that would be a "waste" of that one's fertility.

My point with showing that your argument applies even more strongly to sterile heterosexuals is to hopefully bring the issue "closer to home", since those advocating against gay marriage are presumably heterosexual it forces them to consider a scenario where they are (a) prevented from marrying the person they want because that person is sterile or (b) prevented from marrying anyone because they themselves are sterile. In this way they are meant to understand that gay marriage is a human rights issue.

 

[BlackWidower]

Simple response to the lower population argument: Who gives a shit?

If the population starts to drop I won't really care. I don't see why I would, unless it drops to zero...and it won't.

The government has less money, good, then it might start spending less.

The country'll be less powerful, good, then maybe it's military'll stop spreading out across the planet like 1940s Germany...yeah, I went there.

Also, you're saying gay people never procreate? Well that's just wrong. Some gays have a kid with a sperm donor or surrogate mother, and then raise them with their "life partner." Others adopt unwanted children and raise them in a loving household.

They never have children accidentally, which is probably what you mean, and if you think that's a bad thing I might have to slap you.

 

[ThrobbingEgo]

The country'll be less powerful, good, then maybe it's military'll stop spreading out across the planet like 1940s Germany...yeah, I went there.

Heheheh, like military spending is the first thing on the chopping block in a recession...