Gay marriage

[tif]

If this occurs, it is because people have abused others in the name of belief. If you misuse a tool to harm those around you, we will take it away from you. This is one of the great things about living in a civilized society.

I don't mind terribly much when random preachers call what I do immoral. I do mind, however, when they stir up their congregations and spend millions of dollars trying to make it illegal. I mind when hate-speech incites people to violence against minorities. That's the sort of thing I would like to curtail. That's hardly unreasonable.

If you don't want that sort of thing to occur, perhaps you should, as a group, try to speak up a little more loudly than those among you who want us dead. If you continue to let them represent you and make laws on your behalf, don't act surprised when we take away their ability to continue interfering in our lives.

In other words, if you don't want to be treated like bigoted, law-mongering zealots whose idea of sharing the gospel is playing marriage-keep-away from the gays, make sure you're louder than those folks.

Wait, so you're saying that you're upset about a certain group trying to take away certain rights, and your solution is to "take away" the rights of that group? Or am I misunderstanding the underlined section right there?

You know, I can't personally control what some people say or what laws they want to pass. That'd be like controlling the NRA. I'm not overtly political. And I'm NOT "louder than those folks." I am who I am, and that's a person who will never back down from what I believe. But not on a large scale, screaming it in the streets or in front of law makers.

I don't personally believe in withholding rights from gays. I wish that both sides would back down just a little here: One one side, give people who want to commit their lives to another of the same sex the same rights (end of life, financial filings, etc). On the other side, call it a union or something and allow laws to be enacted protecting ministers who feel it would violate their beliefs to perform a same-sex ceremony.

I believe homosexuality is not God's plan for people, but in America we don't have anti-fornication laws, anti-adultery laws, etc... And I don't see why this one is so big for so many people. It feels sometimes like a kid who's been caught with his hand in the cookie jar and says in response, "Well, Janie broke your lamp!"

To the nonChristians posting in this thread: I hope that you can see that, if you take away the rights of another group in retribution, you're doing just what you hate, only justifying it by saying "Well, they started it!" And really, is that any better?

 

[contemplative]

Wait, so you're saying that you're upset about a certain group trying to take away certain rights, and your solution is to "take away" the rights of that group? Or am I misunderstanding the underlined section right there?

I think you're misunderstanding. In the quote, I allude to situations in which I'd be willing to take away rights from a group. For instance:

I do mind, however, when they stir up their congregations and spend millions of dollars trying to make it illegal.

To give a specific example, I think it should have been illegal for the Mormon church to spend the amount of money they did on Prop 8 yet maintain tax-exempt status. Keep in mind that the Mormon leadership threatened with excommunication (their version of it, anyway) those who didn't support the proposition. This really shouldn't have happened. Let's continue:

I mind when hate-speech incites people to violence against minorities. That's the sort of thing I would like to curtail.

So no, it's not about me being "upset." So, what am I saying here? That if it does happen that Christians have their rights taken away (as they concern what they can do with homosexuals) then it's because those rights have been misused. Misused. The rest of what I write concerns how to prevent that from happening.

If you're unwilling or unable to step up and clarify the message when necessary, if you're willing or unable to prevent to let the loudest voices from your faith be the bigots, then they will stand as your representatives. If you have an actual gospel to be preached to gays, it's really not being heard.

From what I'm hearing, though, there's nothing you can do about that. Oh well. There will be consequences. Surely that doesn't surprise you.

On the other side, call it a union or something and allow laws to be enacted protecting ministers who feel it would violate their beliefs to perform a same-sex ceremony.

Under current law, no minister can be forced to perform a marriage. Plenty of ministers will refuse to marry heterosexual couples because they don't attend pre-marriage counseling, etc. Even if it were called marriage, no one would have to violate his beliefs. Essentially, you're reaching for separate-but-equal here and using the scare tactic that people will be forced to perform ceremonies.

That's so 2007.

To the nonChristians posting in this thread: I hope that you can see that, if you take away the rights of another group in retribution, you're doing just what you hate, only justifying it by saying "Well, they started it!" And really, is that any better?

You're not listening if all you're hearing is "they started it first." It's not in retribution. I want my husband on my health insurance - it's just icing on the cake if it peeves the person who put the law into place in the first place.

 

[contemplative]

I should add - it doesn't bother me particularly much if I'm no better than these folks. At the end of the day, I wanted legal recognition and protection, not some trophy for moral superiority.

 

[ASK]

I don't see a "scare tactic" being used. I understand the seperate but equal argument,but does that not suffice? Perhaps that just depends on whether or not you believe marriage is a union from God or a union of two people in love?

 

[contemplative]

I don't see a "scare tactic" being used.

Here we go:

On the other side, call it a union or something and allow laws to be enacted protecting ministers who feel it would violate their beliefs to perform a same-sex ceremony.

This phrase presumes that ministers need additional laws to be passed so that they cannot be forced to perform same-sex ceremonies. In fact, they're already covered. (As an aside: I don't personally know anyone who wants his wedding presided over by someone who takes issue with its validity. I suspect someone might do it to make a court case out of it, but the minister again is already covered.)

 

[ASK]

Fair enough. I just saw it as a precautionary statement, not used to incite fear.

 

[contemplative]

Ah, well, if it hadn't been used for the last decade to scare people into voting for certain propositions, I might be a little less cynical. However, that's precisely how it's been used and, while I don't think Tif was particularly nefarious in using it, I don't think she was completely ignorant of its history. NOM's "gathering storm" ad is a fantastic example.

Here's a useful thought experiment, though: if a minister refuses to baptize someone, do his reasons need to be legally valid and, if so, to whom does the minister need to report his reasons?

 

[ASK]

Point well made
And sorry, I wasn't familiar with the scare tactics. Although it does not surprise me.

 

[contemplative]

I understand the seperate but equal argument, but does that not suffice?

To get to this question (and sorry for passing it over, because it's important), usually no. If they're called different things in law, they can be treated differently and, in practice, usually are. According to my understanding of US law, even the intangibles must be considered in questions of equality - in other words, the very fact that we'd be using two names to create two categories in law that the law is supposed to treat as equal is itself an inequality.

Is it necessarily a bad inequality? No, but we have learned through experience that when we mean for two things to be treated equally, we must proactively remove any basis on which inequality might arise.

I do think it's a bad inequality, though. If the distinction were to persist in law, it would persist in everyday language. For instance, when you asked someone when they got married, they would have to clarify, even if just internally. They weren't "married," they got "unioned." This is just a small example of the psychological pressures that build up over time, reinforcing the idea that civil unions are for second-class citizens.

If all the laws were rewritten so that only civil unions were recognized and marriage or commitment ceremonies, etc. became the business solely of non-governmental organizations, then that might work. A lot of people, including Christians, have called for that - why, after all, is government recognizing the validity of a religious sacrament? We see little reason for government to have any say whatsoever in religious practice. If we allow it to keep dabbling in religious rites, what happens when it does it in a way we don't like?

 

[ASK]

That was actually the one I was hoping you would hit on.

"If all the laws were rewritten so that only civil unions were recognized and marriage or commitment ceremonies, etc. became the business solely of non-governmental organizations, then that might work. A lot of people, including Christians, have called for that - why, after all, is government recognizing the validity of a religious sacrament? We see little reason for government to have any say whatsoever in religious practice. If we allow it to keep dabbling in religious rites, what happens when it does it in a way we don't like?"

This is by far the best sollution I've heard.

 

[contemplative]

I believe homosexuality is not God's plan for people, but in America we don't have anti-fornication laws, anti-adultery laws, etc...

To follow up on this, I'd like to remind folks that the US Supreme Court struck down the state sodomy laws in 2003. If we don't have them, it's because we've been scrubbing them from the books. It's not because the US is remotely enlightened as it concerns sexuality.

On the contrary, though, I think we do have those etc. laws. The Michigan State House approved a penalty of 5% off the operating budget for public schools that gave benefits to same-sex or unmarried partners. That's right - 5% of the school's budget goes away if they put two men on a dental plan.

A bill just passed in May in Tennessee, preventing any mention of homosexuality in public schools, even (or especially) during sex ed courses. Louisiana law allows sexually explicit materials to be used in sex education, but only if they're heterosexual.

I could go on but I hope this makes the point. This isn't about being "upset." Am I upset? Certainly. But if that's all people are hearing, they're deaf.

 

[jonathanbchristian]

There really are verses for man and woman that define marriage in the Bible. It is between a man and woman. I still believe it's Sodom and Gommorah (among other things). Those people are wicked!

 

[contemplative]

There really are verses for man and woman that define marriage in the Bible. It is between a man and woman. I still believe it's Sodom and Gommorah (among other things). Those people are wicked!

Jonathan, we have observed that you like to drop what you believe are controversial one-liners and see what happens. Flipping through the last few threads you've started, I can't help but wonder if you have a list tacked to the side of your monitor for when you get bored and want a thrill.

Here's the deal - LGBT people tend to know those verses, know the Christian's stance on homosexuality and gay marriage, and know what you think will happen to us if we don't comply. In fact, some of us know more about the Bible, Christian history, and doctrine than practicing Christians.

Of course, this doesn't make us saved, but it does mean that we don't need to be reminded of the basics of your stance. We've come here to discuss because we're unconvinced. We didn't come here because we're ignorant of what you believe - you're not the first by any means to toss out a one-liner and hope for the best.

 

[contemplative]

It has been brought to my attention that that is technically a two-liner on most screens. Sincerest apologies for the confusion.

 

[jonathanbchristian]

Jonathan, we have observed that you like to drop what you believe are controversial one-liners and see what happens. Flipping through the last few threads you've started, I can't help but wonder if you have a list tacked to the side of your monitor for when you get bored and want a thrill.

Here's the deal - LGBT people tend to know those verses, know the Christian's stance on homosexuality and gay marriage, and know what you think will happen to us if we don't comply. In fact, some of us know more about the Bible, Christian history, and doctrine than practicing Christians.

Of course, this doesn't make us saved, but it does mean that we don't need to be reminded of the basics of your stance. We've come here to discuss because we're unconvinced. We didn't come here because we're ignorant of what you believe - you're not the first by any means to toss out a one-liner and hope for the best.

I'll do what ever I want, thanks alot, but you must have missed a few threads where people were definding homosexuality. It fact, not many threads ago someone confessed they were a homosexual. I'm glad you are a Christian but not everyone here is.

 

[contemplative]

I'll do what ever I want, thanks alot, but you must have missed a few threads where people were definding homosexuality. It fact, not many threads ago someone confessed they were a homosexual. I'm glad you are a Christian but not everyone here is.

You did not read what I wrote.

 

[jonathanbchristian]

You did not read what I wrote.

I like one liners, so the hell with your thoughts! ONE LINERS! Praise God for one liners. OKNATOKNA!

 

[Chelseajade]

Who are we to say if its right or wrong. Its two people that love each other, who are we to judge? God created us to build a relationships of love doesn't matter if its between friends, partnership, relationships, he created us to love. And that what marriage is all about right, two people coming together before god to become one. so how can that be wrong. We cant help who we love.

just thought i would say this i know where it comes from in the bible it says it wrong but it also says we shouldn't be judgmental and love to love others like we love ourselves. So in away its not for us to Judge only god....

 

[jimmydiggs]

The difficulty here is that you're choosing to be inflexible in your thinking. Their "right and wrong" is not the same thing a person means when discussing right and wrong in the light of an objective standard. Their rejection of such a standard makes that clear enough.

Right, because their right and wrong is subjective. It's more of a "that goes against my personal desires." So what? Desire doesn't matter squat if there isn't intrinsic values, if there isn't intrinsic rights and wrongs when it comes to matters of morality...

They're using familiar shorthand for something a whole lot more complicated than "I looked it up in a moral standard." I would apologize for the vagueness if I thought that it weren't your fault for intentionally misunderstanding.

There could never be an ontological need to apologize if morality is just subjective, and ultimately nihilistic.

But you can, and in fact must, and even do.

Even the new atheist Sam Harris points out this inconsistency in his book "The Moral Landscape."

"They [atheists] think we can combat human evil all the while knowing that our notions of 'good' and 'evil' are completely unwarranted" (27).

"...the whole crop of ‘New Atheists’ are softies of this kind [of atheists who believe in objective morality]. So was I, until I experienced my shocking epiphany that the religious fundamentalists are correct: without God, there is no morality.... I was struck by salient parallels between religion and morality, especially that both avail themselves of imperatives or commands, which are intended to apply universally. In the case of religion, and most obviously theism, these commands emanate from a Commander; 'and this all people call God,' as Aquinas might have put it. The problem with theism is of course the shaky grounds for believing in God. But the problem with morality, I now maintain, is that it is in even worse shape than religion in this regard; for if there were a God, His issuing commands would make some kind of sense. But if there is no God, as of course atheists assert, then what sense could be made of there being commands of this sort? In sum, while theists take the obvious existence of moral commands to be a kind of proof of the existence of a Commander, i.e., God, I now take the non-existence of a Commander as a kind of proof that there are no Commands, i.e., morality." (An Amoral Manifesto. Philosophy NOW. Issue 84)

I've chosen to take issue with the form (and frequency) of your argument against their forms of morality, but you should keep in mind that the same arguments will eventually be turned against what you portray as an objective system.

I wouldn't say that there is any "potrayal" if even Joel Marks and other atheist philosophers agree with me...

Truly, you need to explore the etc., etc. At this point I'll go ahead and ask, since you won't stop swinging this particular hammer - would you please demonstrate that your choice of system and the system itself are not subjective and relative?

These would be rough definitions of how the two are generally used..

Objective morality- Morality that has truth outside of ones own perception.

Subjective morality- Morality in which truth is not dependent upon anything outside of ones own perception.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rmg720wO6tY[/video]


I don't know that I can demonstrate, in the same manner that I could demonstrate something in a scientific sense. There are certainly parts of the biblical morality that are subjective and relative on the surface, but are at their root objective. For example, what I like to call the Romans 13 Clause. We as Christians are to obey the law so long as it does not go against divine imperative. This on the surface is subjective, and relative, as the laws of nations are ultimately subjective and relative. The root of it though is the issueing of a "command", if you will...



Since, you're probably going to bring up Euthypro, I'll just go ahead and provide this.
Stand to Reason: Euthyphro's Dilemma <--- click

 

[contemplative]

So what?

Yes! Good! You've entered philosophy proper. Unfortunately:

Desire doesn't matter squat if there isn't intrinsic values

That's not true, though, and I'm certain you don't actually live like that. Desires matter more on a daily basis than your supposedly objective morality. Interestingly, I find that a lot of Christian morality corresponds directly to what a lot of people desire and I don't think this is coincidental. There's nothing in it that couldn't be derived from human preference (and in fact I think it was).

I don't know that I can demonstrate, in the same manner that I could demonstrate something in a scientific sense. There are certainly parts of the biblical morality that are subjective and relative on the surface, but are at their root objective. For example, what I like to call the Romans 13 Clause. We as Christians are to obey the law so long as it does not go against divine imperative. This on the surface is subjective, and relative, as the laws of nations are ultimately subjective and relative. The root of it though is the issueing of a "command", if you will...

Since you're unable to demonstrate that your morality is objective, I'll go ahead and conclude that your frequent criticism of other forms of morality as subjective is just you having some fun and hoping nobody carries the argument further. Honestly, you should have had this answer ready long before leveling that charge against other systems. You had to know the challenge was coming.

At this point, a third party observer would probably conclude that you're actually arguing for the insufficiency of all moral systems. You've been very careless with this particular argument.

Since, you're probably going to bring up Euthypro, I'll just go ahead and provide this.
Stand to Reason: Euthyphro's Dilemma <--- click

Not really, but let's have fun.

Concerning the first part of the solution, it's not a solution. All they've done is shift god's arbitrary preference to an inherent quality. It's not an essential part of the Euthyphro argument that the preference be an arbitrary exercise of power. We don't care why god expressed a particular morality. It either comes from the god or it comes from above him - we don't care the process the god used to derive it, if it's the former.

If we did care, the page provides no argument there that god's character was necessarily that character. You would need to argue that that manifestation of god is the only possible manifestation of god and that this morality, which is welded into his nature, is not accidental. The argument says that this morality is "fixed and absolute." Why? Essentially, all that page did was put the external law into god. He is still a slave of an object beyond his control. It doesn't matter that we've attached it to his character directly.

You're balking at the most important points in this conversation. Please understand that this lack of effort and preparation is why you're going to be ignored.