There have been a lot of slippery slope argument used in the debate over gay marriage. One of the slopes - that gay marriage will lead to polygamy - has caught my attention. First off, fuck slippery slope arguments. Lets not debate other laws that might be passed if this one is, lets debate this law. What if the people 100 years ago who argued that allowing women to vote in elections would someday force allowing pets to vote had won? Lets not discuss marrying donkeys or whales or more then one person, lets discuss gay marriage and that alone. Grow up and stop making ridiculous excuses.
All that being said, I don't see any reason why someone should be prevented from marrying another person they love. There are plenty of communal styles of living (kibbutz..tribe) that have proven wonderful environments to raise children, sometimes even better then the so-called “nuclear family.” If you think that polygamy would promote some sort of confusion for children or jealousy between spouses then simply don’t get one. There is no reason to make it illegal. The law in this country is not based on your irrational fears. It is supposed to protect people from harm and especially from facists that want to impose their views on others.
Though I believe that we should have the right to participate in polygamous marriages, you will not find me out marching for my right to marry multiple partners. The reason is simple. Gay people and straight people fundamentally differ on the topic of the gender attraction. Straight-likes prefer the opposite sex while "homosexualists" like their own kind. You've heard it before - just like people are born with blonde hair or a big nose they are also born with sexuality. Any person that has gotten them self off will tell you that they cannot control what turns them on. Some people are attracted to curves and others to dick. Because of this fundamental difference, a marriage between a gay person and a heterosexual is a lie. They cannot participate in "opposite sex" sex the way a husband and wife should, yet they pretend to. A là lie. A marriage based on a lie is no marriage at, its even null in judeo-christian religions. Under today's laws, a gay person cannot participate in marriage. If that is not inequality -- if that is not cause to bring out the old civil rights posters -- then I don't know what is. Prohibiting homosexual marriage is depriving an entire class of citizens of the rights and benefits that another class enjoys.
Polygamy and Monogamy, on the other hand, are both lifestyle choices (though the latter is imposed upon people in our modern culture without many of them even realizing it -- don't get me started). There is nothing in our DNA that tells us we should be lifelong partners with only one person or with multiple people. Some psychiatrists would disagree with that statement and might even point out that human sexuality is prone to wanting multiple sex partners. But I would never suggest outlawing monogamy because I believe people have the right to choose their own lifestyle. Since "ogamy's" are choices that all people equally either have the legal right to make or not, there is no discrimination involved. Polygamy is outlawed for everyone alike instead of isolating a certain group. Is it infringement on our freedom? Absolutely. But it's not a matter of inequality and eliminating inequality is my priority.
One day, after gay marriage is legal, you will find me fighting fights like the polygamy style one. Until then, I wish all you polygamists well. You have my support, if not my picket sign (just yet).
All that being said, I don't see any reason why someone should be prevented from marrying another person they love. There are plenty of communal styles of living (kibbutz..tribe) that have proven wonderful environments to raise children, sometimes even better then the so-called “nuclear family.” If you think that polygamy would promote some sort of confusion for children or jealousy between spouses then simply don’t get one. There is no reason to make it illegal. The law in this country is not based on your irrational fears. It is supposed to protect people from harm and especially from facists that want to impose their views on others.
Though I believe that we should have the right to participate in polygamous marriages, you will not find me out marching for my right to marry multiple partners. The reason is simple. Gay people and straight people fundamentally differ on the topic of the gender attraction. Straight-likes prefer the opposite sex while "homosexualists" like their own kind. You've heard it before - just like people are born with blonde hair or a big nose they are also born with sexuality. Any person that has gotten them self off will tell you that they cannot control what turns them on. Some people are attracted to curves and others to dick. Because of this fundamental difference, a marriage between a gay person and a heterosexual is a lie. They cannot participate in "opposite sex" sex the way a husband and wife should, yet they pretend to. A là lie. A marriage based on a lie is no marriage at, its even null in judeo-christian religions. Under today's laws, a gay person cannot participate in marriage. If that is not inequality -- if that is not cause to bring out the old civil rights posters -- then I don't know what is. Prohibiting homosexual marriage is depriving an entire class of citizens of the rights and benefits that another class enjoys.
Polygamy and Monogamy, on the other hand, are both lifestyle choices (though the latter is imposed upon people in our modern culture without many of them even realizing it -- don't get me started). There is nothing in our DNA that tells us we should be lifelong partners with only one person or with multiple people. Some psychiatrists would disagree with that statement and might even point out that human sexuality is prone to wanting multiple sex partners. But I would never suggest outlawing monogamy because I believe people have the right to choose their own lifestyle. Since "ogamy's" are choices that all people equally either have the legal right to make or not, there is no discrimination involved. Polygamy is outlawed for everyone alike instead of isolating a certain group. Is it infringement on our freedom? Absolutely. But it's not a matter of inequality and eliminating inequality is my priority.
One day, after gay marriage is legal, you will find me fighting fights like the polygamy style one. Until then, I wish all you polygamists well. You have my support, if not my picket sign (just yet).
I'm pretty sure at the time the 19th Amendment was being debated some men did say, "If women are allowed to vote next they'll be allowing dogs to vote." Yes, it sounds ridiculous, but just because an argument's ridiculous doesn't prevent some idiots from using it.
ReplyDeleteThat study you mention that's found children mature better in a multi-parent household sounds interesting. I know it's a cliche, but it really does take a village to raise a child. And if the adults that make up that village want to have relationships with each other that go beyond the platonic, well, why not?
Thanks for the comment Christopher! I completely agree with you, and I'm tired of people refusing to compare the civil rights movement for homosexuals to the other civil rights movements in the country. Inequality is inequality! The bigots against each movement use the exact same prejudice phrases about "children" or slipper slope arguments to deprive people of rights. Glad to see there are other reasonable people out there!
ReplyDeleteI was all excited about having found a new blog that supports marriage equality and isn't afraid to mock religions for being as ridiculous as they are, but then you went and disappointed me with this post. Despite all the media hype over the various studies claiming to have found extremely preliminary evidence that sexual orientation *might* be *partially* genetically influenced, no one has actually proven that people are born gay, bi, or straight, or even born with the slightest predisposition toward one or the other. And there are certainly some people who feel that they've chosen to be gay, bi, or straight. (See queerbychoice.com for many examples.)
ReplyDeleteThere's no reason to be afraid of acknowledging that. Pretty much everyone agrees that all people have the ability choose to change their religions, but that doesn't give Catholics the right to ban states or countries from recognizing the marriages of Protestants, or vice versa. Religious practices cannot be banned on the basis of religion being a choice, but only on the basis of being shown to substantially harm people.
Also, the legal definition of an "immutable characteristic" uses such a broad interpretation of "immutable" that same-sex couples qualify for it just on the basis of the fact that gender is immutable, no matter whether they chose to be gay or not. For example, when the California Supreme Court became the first state in the nation to overturn a ban on interracial marriage, it ruled that being an interracial couple was an immutable characteristic because even though interracial couples technically could choose to break up and go try to find spouses of their own race, the members of the couple were born with different races, and it is unreasonable and racially discriminatory to ask loving couples to break up with each other because of their races. The fact that no "interracialsexual gene" had been discovered was irrelevant. In exactly the same way, the same court overturned the ban on same-sex marriage on the grounds that even though same-sex couples technically could choose to break up and go try to find spouses of the opposite sex, the members of the couple were born with the same sex, and it is unreasonable and gender-discriminatory to ask loving couples to break up with each other because of their genders. The fact that no "gay gene" has been discovered is absolutely irrelevant - and when people in they gay rights movement falsely claim that science has proven that people are born gay, this pretense just fosters the false and harmful impression that we concede that we *only* deserve rights if we *can* prove we were born gay.
Also, there is still a perectly valid argument for fighting for same-sex marriage before fighting for polygamous marriage: polygamous marriage would require a much more thorough reconsideration of economic beneits laws (e.g., can a person marry an essentially infinite number of people and thereby be owed an essentially ininite amount of spousal benefits from employers or Social Security?) than same-sex marriage does.
You are right that gender isn't immutable, but the flaw in your argument comes from the fact that the conservatives would argue that homosexuals have the same right to marry someone of the opposite sex as heterosexuals. That is why we need to place focus on the fact that homosexuals CANNOT participate in heterosexual marriage.
ReplyDeleteYou are also right in that its not officially, necessarily proven that homosexuality is a genetic thing. And there are DEFINITELY straight people that choose to participate in acts of homosexuality (I actually have a much more in-depth theory on this that I will go into on a post one day). For this blog's purposes (and in-line with the title of the blog), I am writing from MY view, which is that people are born with a specific levels/type of sexuality and that you cannot discriminate based on that.
And I ask you this, Anonymous, how can you prove that I am wrong? Remember that little phrase, "innocent until proven guilty." When civil rights are at stake, the government should assume that people are born gay and address the issue accordingly to protect their rights.