Marriage is a civil right in the US

then what do you call it? Tradition seems to be an appropriate word because you include , and tradition is that which is rooted in the yesteryear or that which is done or has been done for a long time. It is a tradition to go to church on sunday. It is tradition to start the primaries in Ohio. It is tradtion to say that marriage is between man and woman. But marriage has also been traditionally about property arrangments and forutne consolidations, and this was done as late as 19th century Britain, and is done by a good chunk of the world. Which tradtional defintion of marriage do you subscribe to, becuase if you wnat the tradtional defintion left alone, you accept that the defintion is for property arrangments, and has nothing to do with love or commitment, which are new ideas in Western civilization. And if marriage is defined with love and commitment, then how can you deny the right to marry to gays?

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All a man's knowledge comes from his experiences

So if the definition of marriage doesn't require a religious backing, are you trying to protect the definition because you are resistant to change? And why shouldn't homosexuals be allowed to be Why can you not change it do include homosexuals? What is your basis for the argument besides destroying a traditional definition of marriage (for that matter, your's quietly recognizes a property element with "belong to each other and are not available to anybody else").

I do believe Orwell presented an oh so wonderful depiction of that sort of world in his book 1984.

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All a man's knowledge comes from his experiences

All mankind is a single group. Which means that it is tradition that marriage is the permanent bond between man and woman. Hmm, and you say you aren't talking about traditions. Oh well. really? i'd say that marriage is practiced because of and with these "traditions". They are intimately linked, not objectively removed. You marry for a reason, and these different "traditions" are those reasons.

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All a man's knowledge comes from his experiences

So is a sexless species unatural? Like the lizard species that is competely female? And if it is genetics that determine sexuality, then their disposition is natural. Which makes it natural that they should be together (homosexuals, that is). And why can't they aspire to that greatest of commitments, the tradition of marriage, especially since it would just be a natural extension of their feelings toward each other?

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All a man's knowledge comes from his experiences

I welcome American imperialism, make no mistake about that. And I'm no marxist. I am by the very definition a dirty capitalist. When it comes to money matters, I'm abohorred by how our gov't can send us 8.2 trillion dollars into debt (and a good chunk of that is owned to China), and at the same time I'm abhorred by how intolerant our gov't can be (and our nation). And I'm not about to hope that my gov't can (or will) completely care for me, but I do believe that it should help those who have hit the worst of luck. Keep in mind, once they are on their feet again, they need to be kicked out. But this is off topic.What you argue with is pure Kant : "implies that 'it is the right thing'". However, how can this be an absolute? What is right changes. Just a couple of generations ago it wasn't right that a black should have civil liberties. It is the right thing that they have liberties, and if our nation feels that all men are garunteed their rights, and marriage is one of those rights (as defended by the courts in the example in the OP of this thread), then how can we logically deny those other people from this right? Are they not human? If they aren't, then are they open to all the discrimination that we put on the blacks on the basis that they aren't human. We realized that they were human, like we always should have, but it wasn't until the 1960s that we passed laws fully protecting their rights as humans.I say they are human, and as such are garunteed the same rights I am and the same rights you are. To deny them a right is equivalent to saying they aren't human (at least in this nation). It may be a charged question, but do you (and Iano and Faith) recognize homosexuals as human? If so, like I asked before, how can you logically deny them their rights?

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All a man's knowledge comes from his experiences

the rights garunteed to all humans, including, but not limited to: free speech, press, assembly, religion, petition, freedom from being tried twice for the same crime, freedom from sefl-incrimination, a right to enter into a social/legal contract with another (for lack of a better word: marriage)That's a very intersting definition of sexuality you have there, one I'm sure is to be contested here. As far as I know, sexuality deals with how inclined how is to commit acts of sex, i.e. someone is more sexual than another (another i.e. how "horny" a person is). When applied to the prefixes of hetero and homo, it means having a desire for the opposite (hetero) or the same (homo) sex. So far, it has nothing to do with reproduction, except that in a heterosexual act of sex there is the possibility of the union of sperm and egg. This act of fertilization is the first step in reproduction. But that's another story for another thread and another night.

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All a man's knowledge comes from his experiences