The future of marriage

They don't. They want to be married according to the government, because there's thousands of rights and legal protections for couples and their families that the government offers to those it considers "married."Aren't you paying attention, here? The question is - if you admit that "tradition" can be used to justify all kinds of things that decent people would recoil from, why did you offer it as a justification for your bigoted views?

Please do. What's it to me, or my marriage?

Including the right to suspend the legal construct of meaningful consent?How is that equal protection under the law? Why would pedophiles get to suspend other people's withholding consent, but other people can't?What I keep asking you to explain, and what you seem completely unable to do, is explain how you get the right to rape a child out of "equal protection under law." I'm tired of getting a new driver's license every time I move; having to buy new insurance every time; having to deal with 50 different encyclopedia's worth of relevant tax law.I think we should cancel the states and turn nearly everything over to the federal government. What on Earth could be the purpose of so many different regulations about the same thing? What possible relevance could your geographic location have on whether or not you can marry someone? The glibertarian message just doesn't make any sense. It was the science that turned that around, not the lobbying. It was established that there was no scientific evidence that homosexuality was either a disorder or the result of abuse - that people were just gay. And you think those people were lying? You're a bigot, NJ. This is just bigoted nonsense. Let pedophiles parade and try to argue for the legitimacy of abuse and rape. We'll array their victims' testimonys and hoist them on the own petards.Like I said, the only people trying to legitimize rape are conservatives. Covered on every major news network, week after week, and dwarfed by the number of heterosexuals who abuse and murder children. And, of course, those who oppose gay rights throw this one out at every turn to somehow substantiate media complicity in "gay rights."It's nonsense. You've just offered the second-most well-known gay crime as evidence that gay crimes are under-reported?How about Mark Foley? (That would be the first I was referring to.) Ever heard of that guy? Not if you turned on a TV or opened a newspaper in the last six months.Gay crimes underreported? You're speaking nonsense.

Let them, for all I care. Honestly, is incest even that big a deal in a world of readily-available contraception? Insofar as it's genuine adult consent and not simply the result of childhood sexual abuse, who cares? We have considerable evidence that it isn't lobing behavior, it's abuse.There's no evidence that two homosexual people are "abusing" each other when they have sex. Homosexual people have completely normal relationships with each other. The degree to which they tend to mirror their heterosexual counterparts in that degree is quite uncanny, in fact.This is not true of adult-child sexual relationships, which are almost always abusive. (I certainly think it's possible for an adult and a mature minor to have a legitimate sexual relationship, though I haven't figured out any way for the law to accurately discern the difference between that and an abusive relationship, so I don't see any reason yet to change our laws in that regard.) They're already trying. As of yet there are literally no public examples of positive adult-child sexual intercourse. They don't, and won't, have a realistic "model" example to publicize.Whereas, hundreds of thousands of homosexuals have completely positive, loving, real relationships every day. Almost every American knows someone involved in such a relationship, which is why we're seeing the drastic, sudden swing in favor of civil rights for gay people. Why you're losing the culture war, in other words.Pedophilia simply won't ever be as normal as homosexuality - because it isn't as normal. It's the abuse and rape of children. Irrelevant. The rapist doesn't get to decide whether or not it's rape. All rapists say it wasn't rape. Why would we suddenly start believing them? (Any more than conservatives usually do, I mean.) Both. (We rent.) We have to cancel our old policies and start new ones - even though we're with the same company. Insurance policies (as far as I'm aware) seem to be bound to the state in which they're purchased. Auto insurance, renters, health insurance - we always have to cancel our old policies and get new ones when we move interstate. Liking it just fine (and thank you for asking.) Lincoln's plenty fun for us, so we've only been up to Omaha twice so far. A few of our college friends live up there.My wife and I are homebodies mostly, though. Going out and stuff isn't really our style. Playing video games online is our style. "There's no cause so noble you can't find a fool following it." The people in completely legitimate, completely loving, completely supportive homosexual relationships. Do you think they were lying about being happy, about having as meaningful a relationship as any heterosexual?(In a pedophilic relationship, you'll only hear one person freely describe it that way. That would be a crucial difference.) Well, so what? If you hate cancer, am I supposed to love it? That's a common and bigoted myth. In fact, heterosexual males are far more likely to abuse children. Actually, they account for less of a percentage of offenses than percentage among the population as a whole. (Hence the phenomenon stated above.) Isn't 17 the age of consent in Washington DC? I remember this coming up during the Foley thing, and I thought that was the crucial difference.Honestly I don't see how these apples-and-oranges comparisons are supposed to prove any kind of trend. Homosexual abuse of children is underrepresented in the media because it's underrepresented in occurance. Of course, male abuse of female children is so common it's hardly reported. Pretty much the only abuse that really makes the news is when female teachers abuse male students.At any rate, it doesn't change the fact that you ludicrously offered one of the most well-known, widely-reported examples as proof of media underreporting, which is just a false charge not supported by any evidence. If you want to talk about stuff the media doesn't report in this country, let's start with the election "irregularities" from 2000 and 2004...

What's a "homophile"?

How much higher? Gay men, you mean. What about gay women? Less, much less of a risk for blood-borne illness.Does that mean that no one should ever get a transfusion from a straight man, either?Moreover - only in the US is this true, and it's rapidly shifting the other way. HIV is growing far more quickly among straights than among gays in the US, and in every other country in the world, HIV is largely a straight disease.But Jar is quite correct - Your question doesn't make any sense. Blood transfusions are typically done out of medical immediacy - so between being HIV positive and dying, I'll take the former every time. Moreover - transfusions are almost always anonymous, so you'd have no idea who the blood came from. Moreover - HIV blood screening is ridiculously cheap and easy, so an HIV-positive man wouldn't even be considered for donation.So on what planet do you live where blood from a gay man has a greater chance of being HIV positive than blood from a straight man? And why don't you insist on blood from lesbians?Because this isn't about HIV - this is about the fact that the idea of having "OMG teh HOMOZ!" right there in your blood gives you the heebee-jeebees.Because you're a bigot. This whole argument is a fucking ridiculous waste of time.Edited by crashfrog, : No reason given.

I disagree, and I'm waiting for your comment on Dan Carrol's proposal, posted directly to you, twice now.

They already do that, no thanks to the efforts of your side to oppose them.Honestly don't you know anything about this debate? Same-sex marriage's opponents are trying to prevent gay adoption. How could it possibly be a draw for them?

I didn't. "Marriage" is a noun.They don't have dictionaries in Washington? Or you just don't know how to read one? LOL! C'mon. Don't argue grammar with an English major. Why not? "Legalize same-sex marriage." Sounds completely like a proposal to me. You have yet to respond to it. Why is that?

No, actually, you basically do. Or a fundamentalist Muslim. (I guess you could call them your allies on this.)That's why the objections to same-sex marriage stem almost completely from religious conservatism. I guess you didn't notice that - you were too busy fantasizing about ways to keep OMG TEH H0M0Z!!!11! out of your bloodstream.

Yeah yeah yeah, but there you are, blabbling on about filthy gay sex and blood-borne disease and HIV transmission between gay men, apparently ignorant of the fact that thanks to widespread condom use, education, and the emerging phenomenon of "sero-sorting", HIV transmission among gay men in America is at the lowest it's ever been since the disease was discovered - but HIV transmission among straights is on the rise.When I see someone who's substituted strongly held beliefs and prejudices for factual evidence, religion is almost always to blame. And it's bigotry when belief and prejudice is used to justify second-class citizenship for a group of people. No shit, HM! We can all see you're scared to fucking death of the idea that you'll get some OMG TEH HOMO cooties in your bloodstream.We get that you're terrified. You need to lighten the fuck up - not oppress an entire class of American citizens to assuage your fear. It's a bigoted smokescreen to bring it up in this debate, and you know it. It's bigoted because it's counterfactual and you don't apply the same reasoning to straight marriage. Originally it was a harsh precaution; at the time, male homosexual activity was a risk activity for HIV. Giving blood isn't a right.The ban, now, persists because of bigotry. The conditions that were believed to neccessitate it no longer are present. No, it hasn't, tragically.But it's irrelevant. The elegibility to donate blood to the Red Cross is not a requirement for entering into a marriage. It's irrelevant; a smokescreen based on bigotry. (A good thing, too, or else I wouldn't have been able to get married - I lived in the UK too long.) You look at the facts. Can you substantiate your assertion that being able to donate blood to the Red Cross is a requirement for entry into marriage?

I suggest you move to a country that reacts to homosexuals a little more to your liking. Might I suggest Iran?

I don't understand this. Are you under the impression that you have the right/ability to force a church to recognize your marriage?You don't. So why would homosexuals suddenly be able to? Having a marriage license from the government doesn't mean that churches have to recognize it. For interracial or interreligious marriages, a lot of churches don't. The only thing that "forces" them to is the fact that they look like asshats to a lot of people when they say "I don't care what the government says; you're not married in the eyes of God" like they have the authority to speak for him or something.So I don't understand your point. The government doesn't regulate what marriages churches have to accept now. Why would they suddenly be able to?

You, in message 286, which I quoted:

quote:

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Nosy's proposal is brilliant for letting the churches decide who they want to sanction as being "married."

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Since that's already the case, what are you afraid of? Didn't I tell you that I didn't understand your point? Your reply makes even less sense.

Who gives a fuck? You don't compromise with bigotry; you eradicate it.