Pages

Photobucket

Monday, March 9, 2009

Responses to Same-Sex Marriage Arguments

Survey of Marriage Neutering Arguments

By The Playful Walrus, Opine Editorials

Here's a survey of some arguments we have heard from marriage neutering advocates, especially in California. I, and others, have dealt with other arguments in more detail in other entries, but I wanted to touch on these this week.

"The Courts Corrected Past Evils."

Assuming courts have only made correct decisions in the past (demonstrably false, but let's assume for the sake of argument) and, in doing so, did not reach beyond their constitutional authority in doing so, this does not automatically mean it was right for the California Supreme Court to strike down Proposition 22. If the court ordered the ACLU to pay me ten million dollars simply because I wanted it, would that automatically mean it was right, because the court has corrected past evils? There is no reason why this should be an issue for the courts instead of the voters.

"We're Being Treated Like Second Class Citizens"

The state, on behalf the people, treats different kinds of voluntary associations differently, and has requirements for various licenses. This is the only example I know of where people are claiming they are being treated as second class citizens because they aren't interested in obtaining a license on the established terms – which neither bar applicants on the basis of sex nor sexual orientation.

We are not telling you that you have to ride in the back of the bus. You are telling all of us bus riders that the wheels must come off of the bus because you get motion sickness. You don't have to ride the bus if you don't want to, but you should not be able to force us to change the very nature of the bus. It is there to move society forward.

**************
Read the rest of the arguments here.