Thank you for your thoughtful post, Water. In the United States, though, there are certain factors in play that help define the subject.
To reiterate, but largely for continuity:
• The Constitution and its standing Amendments are the Supreme Law of the Land in the United States. (
Article VI, Section 2)
• Included in that Supreme Law of the Land is what is called the Equal Protection Clause. (
Amendment XIV, Section 1)
Water said:
There is plenty of people who would answer "yes" to this question.
Strangely, those people are in many cases Christians. Let us be clear about this, though: the sanctity of marriage argument is purely a religious creation.
The assertion that one's Constitutional rights are only fulfilled when another's are violated is familiar to the political aspect of Christianity in the United States. For instance, about ten years ago, a mother protested before the school board in Salem, Oregon, complaining about a book called
Demon Walk, by Robert McCammon. In addition to the title, the mother protested a character named "Demon". A point that needs to be clarified, however, is that a character named "Demon" appears in more than one McCammon story, and the name is often an assignation reflecting prejudice. In
Boy's Life, it was a red-haired girl reviled by her classmates. The woman's complaint relied on the sinister implications of a fearful, Christian interpretation of what the word means. The sum of her protest was that
her First Amendment rights were violated by the presence of that book in school libraries. In other words, because the book was present in the library at her child's school, her rights were somehow violated. The solution she demanded was to remove the book from the library. Thus, unless someone else was censored, she felt her rights were offended.
The same issue kicked off Oregon's gay fray, which has gone on for over a decade. The 2004 election marks the first statewide win for the anti-gay crowd; they passed a marriage measure. However, in 1992, a group called the Oregon Citizens' Alliance sponsored a ballot measure that would have compelled the state to essentially disenfranchise homosexuals. The measure was so broad that a District Attorney would have been unable to prosecute the murder of a homosexual. The medical schools would have given bad information to students. Gay police officers, and even the typing pool down at the capitol, would have been fired. And it all started over a library book. The same argument as the Christian mother:
If this book, Heather Has Two Mommies
, is allowed on library shelves, our First Amendment rights are violated.
The argument turns the First Amendment on its ear. The First clearly states that Congress shall make no law abridging freedom of speech or press. Yet the argument goes that unless freedom of speech and press is revoked, freedom of religion (also included in the First) is violated. To simply not read the book is apparently an unacceptable solution.
And the OCA kept trying, scoring the occasional municipal victory. Over and over, narrowly losing each time. The OCA is down right now, and possibly for the count, but a new group has stepped up to pass a measure against gay marriage in Oregon.
To give the answer, "Yes, rights are only fulfilled when someone else's are denied," is incompatible with the Supreme Law of the Land. Hence, though plenty would, they're out of luck.
The point being that democracy, freedom of speech, human rights etc. are myths. They are there, as ideals, but they are not really obligatory. And they end as soon as someone comes into your house trying to rob you.
I prefer calling rights a "convention", or conventional agreement. Nonetheless, you are correct that they are artificial concepts. In the United States, though, certain rights
are obligatory. That's the way it works.
Additionally, rights end when someone attempts to rob you because the robber forfeits those rights by violating yours so directly.
Really? Bush made his belief of America being superior to a law, and went to war.
Yeah, that's a source of contention. But that same law of the land outlines the presidency, as well. (
Article II, Section 2) With congressional support, he can do what he did. That he did it dishonestly defames the presidency in general, but that's beside the point at present.
Secondly, people have the right to vote. When they vote, they vote in accordance with their values and preferences. And if someone doesn't like the outcome of the vote, this does not mean that the vote should be repeated for so long until a favourable outcome is achieved.
Interestingly enough, 1992 saw Colorado pass a measure similar to the one defeated in Oregon. The measure was taken to court to review its position as regards the U.S. Constitution, and was promptly eviscerated. Subsequent measures in Oregon were adjusted each time in response to the last failure, and tinkered with to avoid similar judgments against them, but none of them passed until this marriage one.
Traditionalists in Congress recently tried to push through a law that would prevent the Supreme Court from reviewing laws like the Defense of Marriage Act, or marital definitions. This is because they know the laws won't pass muster. They trample all over the Fourteenth Amendment.
Essentially, eleven states have voted to ignore the Constitution. This will not stand forever. As we consider these issues, there are lawyers hard at work sharpening the legal knives. These laws will be sliced and diced as soon as they get around to the gender argument.
The Constitutional problem facing these definition of marriage laws is that they target gender and are intended to discriminate. Those two conditions alone sit very poorly with the Fourteenth Amendment. The gender issue arises because while the churches are welcome to call marriage whatever they want, it is for the purposes of government merely a contract with certain rules attached, as well as certain recognitions.
Imagine a spouse of thirty years undergoing chemotherapy. Imagine not being allowed to visit your spouse in the hospital. Or imagine your spouse dies in a car wreck, without having signed a Will. Now imagine losing everything you two built together to her parents, who disowned her before you met her.
These things don't happen in the United States. But they
do if you're not married. In Tacoma, Washington, a few years ago, a judge apologized to a gay man upon handing over his late partner's estate to the family that disowned him when he came out of the closet. You can even lose what was yours to begin with in addition to the things you and your partner built together. The judge had no choice under the law. If they were allowed to be married, this would not have happened; your spouse, being part-owner of what's yours, gets first dibs after you die unless you sign a Will or prenuptual that indicates otherwise.
When my daughter was born, the hospital screwed up and for the first year she had no birth certificate. As her mother and I are not married, I had no legal rights pertaining to the child. I could not authorize medical treatment, I could not recover her from the police if she was ever taken. Gay couples do adopt children. Some of them have children from marriages they entered with heterosexual spouses while trying to suppress their own sexuality. Without being married, these families must take many extraneous measures to cover all those issues.
Shortly after the Defense of Marriage Act was signed by President Clinton, Congress passed a tax bill that gave a deduction of up to $250,000 for home sales under certain conditions. Married people filing jointly could see that deduction double. Gay partners, not married, could not.
There are numerous legal benefits that come with the marital contract. These laws that define marriage on the basis of gender specifically discriminate in order to refuse those benefits to someone who is the wrong gender.
The result is that any homosexual seeking to attain those rights must marry someone of the opposite gender in order to get them. Things get messy at that point. Very, very messy. Suffice to say that this is not a solution, as no other place in American law requires you to participate in sexual conduct you don't like in order to attain rights.
I suppose that to many people, homosexuals are an eyesore, and they feel offended by the mere presence of a homosexual. So they don't like them around. So when a vote comes, they will vote thus as to get them out of their sight.
True. I will mention--especially since I failed to do so--that the "injury" aspect arises in the case of Massachusetts, wherein people suing to overturn the law
allowing gay marriage will have a difficult time showing injury.
If you, for example, tell those whites they have to be tolerant to blacks, those whites will feel that they are not allowed to be what they are, that they have to be someone else. Similar when it comes to homosexuals.
Which is why they're voting for a law that won't hold under the Constitution.
The same as it has become something most normal for a woman to have an abortion. I personally know girls where the boyfriend demanded her to have an abortion -- because it is normal.
Now, I can imagine that the same would one day be expected and demanded of *me*. Would I like that? No.
Um ... I just don't see the parallel.
These "minorities" have more privileges than the majority, this is what bothers me.
To the other, though, all the minority is asking for in the case of gay marriage is to be treated equally.
I never said it is a disease.
My argument is that just because something is regarded as "natural" does not mean that all should consider it desireable and alright.
Fair enough; my bad. But you
did, in making your argument, compare homosexuality to diseases.
In the past, gays have been compared to all sorts of things. The 1992 Oregon measure sought to bundle homosexuality with pedophilia, bestiality, and necrophilia. The problem with this comparison is that neither pedophilia, bestiality, nor necrophilia involve what the law regards as informed consent. A child, according to the law, is not capable of consenting to sexual contact until a certain age. It varies from state to state, but at one point, around 1875, or so, while religious sentiments incorporated into the law prohibited the consumption of alcohol on Sunday, well, the law set the age of consent for a girl at ten years old, and essentially allowed a man to bribe her--e.g. prostitution.
A poster recently compared gays to dogs. Another compared them to household appliances. Gay marriage, to those posters, makes as much sense as marrying a dog or an appliance. Of course, these comparisons overlooks things like species, or in the case of appliances, life, brain, &c.
Comparing gays to a disease in order to make the point that natural isn't always good is presumptuous at the outset, and demeaning to boot. Being gay, in and of itself, makes nobody sick, kills nobody, and requires no cure.
Why is it unacceptable to the "modern people" that people, no matter what race, gender, religion, nationality etc. etc. simply have their values and preferences, and that these values and preferences make up who they are?
As long as they're not hurting anybody, there's no reason to challenge them.
Secondly, why is it unacceptable to the "modern people" that humans simply don't like foreigners and all those that are different, in one way or another?
History suggests this is wisest. Traditionally, the reasons for both prejudices you've inquired about arise from ignorance.
The tolerance people are expected, if not demanded, to display today is artificial.
The conventions empowering human society are artificial. We agree on that point.
One cannot like, not even tolerate everyone and everything.
Obviously not.
Advocating both choice and tolerance is nonsensical. Choice and tolerance are mutually exclusive.
I disagree. One chooses for their own life, and tolerates another's choices. As you point out with your point about robbery, those conventions break down when one person forfeits their part by attempting or causing injury to another.
One can simply choose that no, it's not worth finding out if they like gay sex. In the meantime, are you violated if you cannot choose to not tolerate another's choice to enjoy gay sex? The toleration that is expected is that people should be allowed to participate in society. Choice and tolerance are only mutually exclusive if you have the right to choose for another, and they have no choice.
Step it out, Mary,
My fine daughter.
Mary, if you can--
Step it out, Mary,
My fine daughter,
Show your legs to the wealthy man.
I heard that song from a band called Boiled in Lead; the album notes merely tell us that it is an Irish song about arranged marriages. It is most likely a modern song, as they tend to mark traditional songs as "traditional". Nonetheless, Equal Protection in the United States would also prevent anyone from calling on that tradition to return women to general servitude in the marital arrangement.
All that and we're back to gender in this country.
____________________
Thanks as always to the Legal Information Institute at Cornell University for their excellent online copy of the U.S. Constitution. See http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/index.html