Submitted By: Mike Spindell, Guest Blogger
As you know part of my contribution as a guest blogger has been the fact that I write much from personal experience. This particular blog is one that I’ve thought about for awhile and have had some trepidation in writing because as you will see it touches on a very sensitive topic for most males. As a boy coming of age in the 1950’s one of the unvoiced, but omnipresent topics was male homosexuality. For a male growing up in that period, among the most upsetting epithets you could be called was queer. This was especially disturbing for those entering puberty, which in the 50’s context was coming into the macho essence of your own self worth. If you were queer you were deemed to be less of a male, a wimp, a fag and most essentially a loathsome pervert who did disgusting things with other males. People were bullied and beaten at school while being called degrading names. Even though I was always big for my age, I was a gentle and sensitive boy and while when attacked I would always fight back, I would be throwing punches through tears of frustration and rage at the injustice of it all. As I cried and fought, all those demeaning epithets would be hurled at me by the jeering bystanders. If I had the temerity to be winning, then other boys would attack me from behind. Finally, a teacher or Administrator would break it up, many times though my rescuer would sneer at the fact that my crying was “unmanly”.
At the same time in the 50’s, stories would occasionally appear in the papers and TV, of police raiding homosexual nightclubs and arresting the participants for engaging in lewd acts. These stories were always couched in vague terminology since homosexuality was such a sensitive topic, indeed most discussions of sexuality in general were not considered decent topics for open discussion in the media. Even though my parents were very open about sexuality for the time and I was told the “facts of life” at a young age, they never discussed homosexuality with me. To be honest I never asked because my father was what you would call a “Man’s Man”, or “hale fellow well met”. He was large and had a history as a brawler in his youth. I wanted to be like him have his respect, so although I could ask him anything about sex, I never asked him about homosexuality. Taboo subjects interested me. The mystique surrounding homosexuality perked my interest. Through reading and from Freud, I tried to get a handle on what this strange “perversion” was and why it was considered so bad that it needed the intervention of law enforcement. My attraction was always towards women, but I wanted to understand why some men (and some women) were attracted to the same sex. There simply wasn’t enough information at the time to give me any sort of understanding and Freud’s position was among the least helpful. What I did know is that having been called queer and fag, knowing how it hurt, my empathy for those who were homosexual and how they were treated increased. It is the question of do you side with the oppressors, or the oppressed? What moved me to finally write this piece was a story out of Louisiana in the Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/29/louisiana-police-sting-gay-men-anti-sodomy-law_n_3668116.html It is about the Sheriff’s Office in Baton Rouge, Louisiana that has arrested at least a dozen men since 2011 for agreeing to have consensual sex with undercover police officers. What makes this case so bizarre for these times, yet so familiar when its law enforcement dealing with homosexuality, is that they were arrested under a law that had been declared unconstitutional?
“In all of the cases, the men were arrested under the state’s anti-sodomy law, which was struck down as unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2003 ruling in Lawrence v. Texas.
“Technically invalid yet still on the books, the state’s “Crime Against Nature” law prohibits “unnatural carnal copulation by a human being with another of the same-sex or opposite-sex or with an animal” along with “solicitation by a human being of another with the intent to engage in any unnatural carnal copulation for compensation,” according to Louisiana legislature.
“This is a law that is currently on the Louisiana books, and the sheriff is charged with enforcing the laws passed by our Louisiana Legislature,” Casey Rayborn Hicks, a Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman, told the Baton Rouge Advocate. “Whether the law is valid is something for the courts to determine, but the sheriff will enforce the laws that are enacted.”
However, the Advocate also revealed that none of these cases had been prosecuted by District Attorney Hillar Moore III, whose office could find no evidence of any crime being committed by any of the arrested men.”
Obviously, District Attorney Moore had more common sense than the Sheriff’s Office that formulated the “sting”. The statement by Mr. Hicks is thoroughly disingenuous to say the least. Knowing the “law on the books” was unconstitutional they did it anyway as their way of harassing gay men and most probably because of their own distaste for homosexuality. Before SCOTUS rulings such as Lawrence v. Texas http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas , all over this country the police were harassing members of the LGBT community. Some of this harassment was done because of the predominant religious mores of the particular community and some was done because by nature many police officers and District Attorneys in the U.S. see themselves as macho defenders of justice and more importantly public morals.
Even today when being Gay has been favorably portrayed in the media, when there are beloved Gay celebrities and when SCOTUS has ruled in favor of Gay Marriage, there are many who are horrified by the notion of homosexuality and consider it evil. Many of these people are in positions of power today and the vileness, to me at least; of their statements railing against the notion of Gay Rights proliferate even though those rights are now being recognized as Constitutional guarantees. Below are some links that will give you an idea of the amount of anti-gay bigotry that is hysterically increasing in the face of this country becoming far more accepting of people’s inherent right to their sexual preference.
http://www.policymic.com/articles/41549/10-craziest-michele-bachmann-anti-gay-quotes
There are many more quotations available, but let me point out that two of those links refer to people who were contenders for the GOP Presidential nomination and other was from a sitting Supreme Court Justice. Clearly the battle for the human rights of the LBGT community is far from over, even though much progress has been made. The fact is there are many in the United States that for religious reasons, personal prejudice and preference will keep battling against what seems to be a rising tide. I write this to emphasize that it is not time to rest in this issue which to me has an importance far beyond just the issue of who consenting adults have sex with. I have written before about the threat that religion of the extreme fundamentalist stripe creates towards the idea of democracy. http://jonathanturley.org/2013/07/05/morsi-democracy-and-problem-with-fundamentalist-politics/ . This blowback by religionists is taking place in many regions of the world.
“MOSCOW — A new law banning “homosexual propaganda” in Russia is raising concerns about the state of human rights in a country already notorious for silencing dissent.
The legislation is vague but its intent is clear: It is now “illegal to spread information about non-traditional sexual behavior” to minors (under 18), and there are hefty fines for those who disobey. Foreigners are also subject to fines and can be deported.” http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/07/27/19699629-homosexual-propaganda-law-signals-latest-russian-crackdown?lite
This crackdown in Russia is now being pushed to further extremes and affects visitors there:
“In an even wider crackdown in Russia over expressions of homosexuality, gay athletes and fans will be prohibited from displays of affection and the wearing of pro-homosexual rainbow pins and badges during the 2014 Olympics. Violators face steep fines and jail time, foreigners will face similar penalties plus deportation.” http://www.catholic.org/sports/story.php?id=51935
Much of this Russian zeal to crackdown on homosexuals stems from pressure coming from the Russian Orthodox Church upon Putin and other Russian officialdom. In post Communist Russia the Orthodox Church has been a major player and has undergone a tremendous resurgence. It has definitely been an important political player and Putin et. al. have courted their support. The Russian Orthodox Church probably outdoes the Catholic Church in its opposition to homosexuality. However, homophobia in Russia has a long history and in 1933 Stalin also came down hard on homosexuals and led one of his characteristic purges.
“In 1933, Joseph Stalin added Article 121 to the entire Soviet Union criminal code, which made male homosexuality a crime punishable by up to five years in prison with hard labor. The precise reason for Article 121 is in some dispute among historians. The few official government statements made about the law tended to confuse homosexuality with pedophilia and was tied up with a belief that homosexuality was only practiced among fascists or the aristocracy. The law remained intact until after the dissolution of the Soviet Union; it was repealed in 1993.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism_and_homosexuality
On Friday Professor Turley even posted a blog about the situation in Russia. http://jonathanturley.org/2013/08/02/russian-gays-forced-to-drink-urine-and-beaten-as-part-of-cure-by-nationalist-thugs/
Another example of “legal” homophobia around the world are the attacks on homosexuals by various African Governments and the draconian penalties for being homosexual that are being imposed:
“More than two-thirds of African countries have laws criminalizing homosexual acts, and despite accounting for a significant percentage of new infections in many countries, men who have sex with men tend to be left out of the HIV response.” http://www.irinnews.org/report/87793
As we can see there is still significant oppression of homosexuals around the world and I haven’t even gotten into the dangerous situations in many other countries for those who don’t meet the standard heterosexual criteria. In the U.S. Russia’s anti-homosexual laws have drawn praise from a source that seems a surprise, but then again maybe not a surprise at all:
“As the hub of the Soviet Union, Russia was reviled for rights abuses by many U.S. conservatives during the Cold War. Now some are voicing support and admiration as Russian authorities crack down on gay-rights activism. The latest step drawing praise from social conservatives is a bill signed into law Sunday by President Vladimir Putin that would impose hefty fines for holding gay pride rallies or providing information about the gay community to minors.
“You admire some of the things they’re doing in Russia against propaganda,” said Austin Ruse, president of the U.S.-based Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute. “On the other hand, you know it would be impossible to do that here.” Ruse, whose institute is seeking accreditation at the United Nations, plans to travel to Russia this summer to meet with government officials and civic leaders. “We want to let them know they do in fact have support among American NGOs (non-governmental organizations) on social issues,” he said.
Among others commending Russia’s anti-gay efforts was Peter LaBarbera of Americans for Truth About Homosexuality.”Russians do not want to follow America’s reckless and decadent promotion of gender confusion, sexual perversion, and anti-biblical ideologies to youth,” LaBarbera said on his website.
In a sign of Russia’s evolving stature among some U.S. social conservatives, the Illinois-based World Congress of Families plans to hold its eighth international conference at the Kremlin’s Palace of Congresses in Moscow next year. Past conferences in Europe, Mexico and Australia have brought together opponents of abortion and same-sex marriage from dozens of countries.” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/01/russia-anti-gay-bill_n_3530050.html
My premise is that the battle for the right to be of different sexual orientation is a subset of the battle to impose a religious based morality on people under the color of law. The issue of Gay rights is just one aspect of this threat. It has assumed almost a center stage in the battle to theocratize governments because for males all over the world, the idea of not being “man enough” hits at the core of their being. I reject the whole concept that a male’s self worth should be tied up in his sexual preferences and experiences. Many who have known me view me in macho terms. As the son of a “man’s man” I learned how to interact with other males and can talk sports, cars and women with the best of them. There is a swagger to my walk and with my height and large head many friends called and call me “Big Mike”. I played many sports and while never a good athlete I was competent as a player. Those who really know me best though see my more sensitive, feminine and in many ways better side. I’m a bit of a gossip; I love Broadway Musicals; loved Judy Garland and Peter Allen and I cry copiously in both joy and sorrow. Yes those are clichés used regarding Gay men, but these clichés apply to me as well.
I believe that for the human race finally to learn to live together peacefully and harmoniously we need to learn to stop making these distinctions about what is the natural state for perhaps ten percent of all of humans and indeed animals. Our sexual drives are complex and the need to satisfy our sexual urges is what drives us to interact with others. Sexuality needs to be viewed in its true sense as a spectrum of responses humans make in the search for pleasure and fulfillment. A good part of sexuality is curiosity and indeed one of the reasons humans have progressed so far is that we have an insatiable curiosity. This leads me to my own confession which I alluded to in the title and in my opening of this blog. In the 60’s and in the early 70’s I was an active participant in what was known as the sexual revolution. For the homosexual community the opening battle for their rights could be said to have occurred in the Stonewall Riots. I had many gay friends and acquaintances when those protests began on June 28th 1969. I even knew some who directly participated. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_riots
When news of the protests reached the media I cried in joy at the unity in fighting back against police repression and the corruption it engendered. In the following days I shared the sense of triumph coming from those protests with my Gay friends. To me looking back this was the opening shot of the fight for Gay freedom. Since I was so openly a supporter of freedom from oppression for the Gay community it was inevitable that a few years later one of my Gay male friends would proposition me. That this occurred was well known in my social group and there was good natured pressure on me to at least give it a try. This pressure arose partly because at the time I was involved in a ménage with two women and they playfully taunted me that what was good for the goose, was good for the gander. It was with much fear and trepidation that I took my male friend up on his offer. My experience was a good one and there was pleasure to be had, but it also confirmed for me that my sexual preference was for the female body. So it goes and it matters not if it had led me on a different relationship path. It was said back in the day that one could be a married man for years, but if a man had even one homosexual experience he was a queer. That is frankly nonsense and is believed by ignorant people. Admittedly I gave into peer pressure and in a sense I can’t claim that my experiment was one of courage, but I would also be lying if I denied that I was curious about the difference between gay and straight sex. The truth is that there is really very little difference except body structure and the limits that imposes. The underlying reality though is that normal human interaction between individuals doesn’t differ to any great degree and depends primarily on the personality of the participants. I look back upon my experiments in sexuality with warmth and a certain amount of pride that I was able to satisfy my curiosity along with the pleasure it brought.
However, that is not my point. What one does with their sexuality, provided it is consensual and among peers, is nobody’s business but that of the participants. One’s sexuality neither defines ones character, nor does it define one’s self worth. Those “paragons” of morality, who would call those whose sexual practices don’t conform to their own “evil,” are to my mind somewhat crazy. Why should any of us care how people get their pleasure as long as it harms no one?
In many places of the world, in many eras of civilization’s long history, religion has made sexuality a target of hatred. Some, but certainly not all religions target sexuality as a means of gaining political power. In many eras through history religion and government have had a symbiotic relationship, with religious belief being used to assist the powers that be in retaining their power and their positions atop a society’s hierarchy. We see in the Gospels of Christianity for instance a Jesus who disdains wealth, abjures the rich and would even break bread with those looked down upon by society. Jesus never once deals with homosexuality. Yet the Roman Catholic Church began under the control of the Roman Emperor and so the emphasis of Jesus strictures to “turn the other cheek” or the difficulties of a rich man getting into Heaven were downplayed and the Pentateuch’s sexual rigidity was brought to the forefront. I don’t mean to single out Christianity in this respect, because we see the same pattern existing in all great religions. Economic disparity and oppression are hard to justify morally and certainly would put any religion on a collision course with the elite’s power that they seek to share, so sexuality becomes an easy focus. Those with political power and wealth don’t mind sexual repression since it never interferes with their own pleasures and it certainly helps to keep the common folk down. Since most places throughout human history have been dominated by Alpha Males repression of homosexuality has found approval, but no more so than repression of women’s rights. The irony is that some of the most “Alpha” of males like the Spartan Army and Alexander The Great were probably gay, or at the least “Bi”. Then of course they were pagans and in many of those religions sexuality was of little import.
The prejudice against the LBGT community is a real evil that we face simply because it is a prejudice against the reality of human nature. To demonize people for their sexuality, their sex, the color of their skin or for their ethnicity is the real evil in this world. I support, nay demand, full citizenship rights for the LBGT community and if in your opposition to that natural state you want to call me queer, go right ahead, I’ll wear the mantle proudly.
Submitted By: Mike Spindell, Guest Blogger
Gene,
I guess equal means different things to different folks.
Elaine M.
Elder Correspondent
Still not grasping what the word “equal” means, are you, Squeek?
That was a rhetorical question.
@ElaineM
Hmmm. I thought they had equal rights. If Gay Gregory, wants to get married, and if he can find a woman to agree and he can get married in any state of the Union! Just like any other man! In 13 states, he can even marry another dude if he so desires.
What you really advocate for, is Gregory to be able to marry anybody he wants, which right is not given to any of us. In some states, for example, I can not marry my first cousin. Or my uncle. Or my father. I can not marry Little Bobby who is 15 years old. I can not marry Bob and Ted at the same time. Much less Carol and Alice at the same time, even in Massachusetts.
It behooves those of you who push to change things, which have been the cultural tradition for thousands of year, to at least set forth the limits of those changes. And your bases for those limits. If any. Out of politeness, if nothing else. Because the whole “Nobody should be able to tell nobody else what to do!” thingy is a little broad, if you know what I mean. You could actually drive a Mack truck through it.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Gay marriage isn’t a problem for millions of Americans. It’s a problem for those who want to deny gays and lesbians equal rights.
Elaine M wrote: ” It’s a problem for those who want to deny gays and lesbians equal rights.”
Ugh! Too much repetition. I don’t know anybody who wants to deny gays and lesbians equal rights.
If someone applies for a driver’s license, they have to pass the driving test.
If someone applies for a job on a football team, they have to pass certain athletic abilities.
Marriage requires a pen*s and vag*na.
@VestalVirgin:
You make some very good points. I am not sure that I agree that gay misbehavior is a result of being locked out of conservative institutions. At some point, if someone is found in the bushes, in the dark, at at city park, looking for love, then you gotta kind of figure that’s where where they want to be. But rather than get into a chicken vs. egg discussion, wouldn’t you agree that it is way past time for the excessive Gay Libertinage to stop. Period. No more excuses. The Straights’ behavior is nothing to write home about, but at least they are not flirting with that 1 in 5 chance of HIV thingy.
I don’t find it a matter of politics in the narrow sense of whom gays may or may not vote for. They need to stop because they are killing themselves and others in large numbers. But, I am not holding my breath. Plus, it’s not like gays, as a collective, can even decide whether they truly want marriage qua marriage rights. Take this philosophical example. A gay guy wants to join the Army, so he prisses down to the local Recruitment Center to sign up, and he tells the sergeant:
“Now, I have a fundamental right to join the Army, but I also want this side agreement, that:
1. Nobody will scream at me during Basic Training;
2, That whole wake up at 5:00 in the morning routine is just not going to happen, let me tell you, because that is usually about the time I get in;
3. Those tres tacky uniforms have got to go, because I have designed one based on those dreamy dragoon outfits I saw in G&S’s “Patience.”
4. No Dirt!!! I mean it, no crawling around on the ground with bugs and icky worms!
Now, here’s some of the questions. Does the gay guy truly want to join the Army??? Should the Army changes it’s rules either fully to comply, or partially, in compromise? Is the Army homophobic and bigoted if it says no? Are there some gays who would find it homonormative for the gay guy to even seek to join the Army? Should people who are not flaming pro-gay advocates be allowed to express an opinion? If they do express an opinion, and it is unfavorable, are they bigots and homophobes?
Like I said way earlier, I don’t think gay marriage would be a problem, or as big a problem, if those opposed knew the nature and limits of what was being sought, and if gays, as a group, would do some major growing up.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
DavidM: The problem with your generalized “social harm” is something I was taught by my father at an early age, it “proves too much.”
To be more specific what that means is if we allow such a non-specific “social harm” to be a valid reason to block one action, then it is a valid reason to block just about any action. Perhaps even itself!
That is basically why something being “insulting” or “hurting somebody’s feelings” cannot be in itself illegal; it proves too much: Everything can be claimed as insulting by somebody, or hurting their feelings, thus making everything illegal.
That is basically why, as you seem to claim, harming somebody’s perception of what marriage means is not enough, just about anything could be prevented by people claiming a perception is altered for the worse. I could outlaw religion on those grounds, I could outlaw marriage on the grounds it hurts the feelings of those without romantic partners.
As Gene keeps saying, You need a specific, plausible harm to others, or potential harm to others, and all you have ever provided thus far is the claim it will change what people will think the state of marriage means.
Changing how people feel about something (and that is all that is really changed, since marriage for heterosexuals need not change at all in any particular) is not a valid “harm,” it proves too much; by rational extension it probably prevents all change forever. That is just irrational.
One of the secrets of comedy is repetition, Elaine.
It’s also one of the methods of propagandists called “The Big Lie”. The tactic, one perfected by the Nazis, was summarized in an OSS profile of Hitler as:
“His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.”
It’s a tactic we’ve seen here more than once from both “culture warriors” and professional paid propagandists.
Too bad when an audience has been educated to the tactics, strategy and psychology of propaganda, such as the audience of this blog, they are far less susceptible to being swayed by those methods.
But it is funny when people try them.
davidm,
Didn’t you already post that video on this thread? Do you suppose repetition of the same stuff is going to help your argument?
And your position is wrong.
The case law clearly indicates that marriage is a fundamental right. The law clearly indicates that they have a right to free association by the terms of the Constitution. That the right is reserved is simply a function of the 9th Amendment and the fact that rights are inherent to the individual and not a grant by the state. The insistence that this right be constrained to heterosexuals only is a religious definition of marriage and that very insistence that homosexuals rights be infringed based on their sexual orientation is a violation of the the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the 14th Amendment in addition to being abhorrent to the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses of the 1st Amendment.
You’re full of crap, David.
Your position is bigoted and simple minded and some nebulous non-existent generalized “social harm” is not sufficient to overcome the legal thresholds required to restrict the fundamental rights of others. You raised that flag and no one saluted. Quite a few rightfully gave it the finger though. You can whine and stomp your feet all you like about marriage not being a fundamental right or how society is somehow obligated to cater to your religious definition of marriage as a heterosexual only endeavor but you are simply wrong both as a matter of fact and a matter of law.
That Masha Gessen is as ignorant of the legal principles and science involved here as you are changes nothing.
And the solution for her is just as the solution for you. If you don’t like homosexual marriage? Don’t have one. Learn to mind your own business.
No. I want you to go read the cases cite above, David. Not that you’ll understand them any better than you understood Maynard. Your ignorance is a fine example of why laypeople should never ever represent themselves.
However, it’s not a fallacious appeal to authority when one is actually an authority. You admit you are not a lawyer and have no legal training. I can’t say that. I am actually an expert on the law.
You also have no idea how contracts work, do you? The reason a court is required for a divorce is because of those aforementioned attendant rights, duties and obligations vis a vis the contracting parties and third parties. Terminating any other form of contract may also require going to court depending on the terms of the contract and the conditions surrounding the dissolution.
The one out of touch with the law and reality is you, David. I don’t expect you to understand this given your predilection to cherry pick data and argue from ignorance in every single argument we’ve had from science to statistics to law, but you simply don’t know what you are talking about. About pretty much everything. This has been illustrated by your exchanges both with me and other posters. You may be a self-made man, but the quality of workmanship is poor.
You’re trying to justify your bigotry by any means possible and failing miserably.
That’s the simple fact of the matter.
Can you show some specific harm that merits restricting the fundamental rights of homosexuals under a strict scrutiny analysis? That is what is required to justify limiting a fundamental right and marriage is a fundamental right.
No. You can’t. You’ve already tried . . . and failed miserably. More than once.
Absent that specific harm, you don’t have a legal leg to stand on in arguing against equal rights for homosexuals.
Gene H wrote: “Can you show some specific harm that merits restricting the fundamental rights of homosexuals under a strict scrutiny analysis?”
My position is that you assume a fundamental right that does not exist. They have a right of association, and by contract law may form a legal civil partnership, but nobody has established through logic that they have a FUNDAMENTAL right to marry someone of the same sex. The harm caused to society is changing the definition of marriage, a foundation of civilized society. As Masha Gessen has explained, the result will be to destroy marriage for everyone. That is a harm to society.
http://youtu.be/n9M0xcs2Vw4?t=16s
You aren’t insulting me, David. You’re free to be as ignorant and wrong as you like. You’re insulting logic, legal reasoning and jurisprudence.
Also, in case you missed it, I consider the whole continuum of case law and as much as you dislike it, Loving is a key part of that jurisprudence. There is also no false equivalence in the simple substitution test to see is if the legal logic behind Loving applies to homosexuals. Gender is as meaningless as race in how a person chooses to define their interpersonal relationships and homosexuals have every right to pursue the recognition and protection of their fundamental rights.
Your understanding of marriage comes from religion no matter how much you protest. The government has no legitimate interest in procreation, the race of your mate or the gender of your mate. It has been explained to you time and again what marriage is at law. It is a specialty contract. Nothing more, nothing less. Yet you reject that reality and try to substitute your own. Making up your own definitions is no way to win an argument, David. And neither is cherry picking Maynard, taking it out of context of the continuum of jurisprudence and misrepresenting the matters of the case. I’ll say it again real slow so you can maybe get a clue: The right to reproduce and the right to marry are NOT the same thing. Maynard is one old case in a long line of cases that define legitimate governmental interests in marriage. It is not the end all be all final word in the jurisprudence no matter how much you think your cherry picking of it will help your “case”.
It doesn’t.
It makes you look foolish and desperate in your attempts to portray your bigoted stance as being somehow principled instead of simply bigoted and it shows your ignorance of how precedent shapes law.
Sorry!
No sale.
Gene H wrote: “It has been explained to you time and again what marriage is at law. It is a specialty contract. Nothing more, nothing less.”
I hear you saying that, but I see no basis in law for your assertions. The law explains that the reason one must go to the law to end a marriage is because the relationship is a matter of law and not just a contract. Specialty contracts must be signed by all parties (something not done in marriage) and they do not require going to law to terminate if both parties agree to terminate it. Basically, everything you assert seems not to be based in either law or reality.
You just want me to take your word for it, to just trust your authority.
“True bigotry is when you can’t see the facts because your own beliefs are blocking the way.”
~Lawrence D. Elliott
Shoot. I can see that I didn’t do complete justice to the support for gay civil rights by sexual libertarians. I will forever love and respect them for that.
On that one, they’ve really done the work of God.
Squeeky Fromm, Girl Reporter,
Imagine you were a sexual minority kid from a traditional family, entering adult consciousness so to speak, as a growing teen-ager. Now imagine that you looked around you and you saw two kinds of adult people. One type advocated personal conservatism–caution & reserve in the use of one’s body in sexual relationships, monogamy as ideal, self-restraint, kindness to others, thrift as means of responsibility towards one’s family and one’s society, in the sense of not having to ask for charity from them, good manners as means of smoothing the natural friction that comes with interacting with people and as a means of conflict reduction. And so on! But now imagine that this first type of adult also questioned the idea you should be able to get married to someone who isn’t repulsive to you, wondered whether you were sexually attracted to children, barred you (if you made your orientation known) from their religious places of worship, believed that you simply being you was a rebellion against the supernatural being they believed in, advocated for your second class citizenship under the law in employment, housing, and public accommodations, and even looked the other way when people of your sexual orientation were physically attacked. Imagine that because of this, you were cheated out of a normal upbringing because you spent the whole time in deception and muted terror of being discovered for who you really are.
Now imagine the second type of adult. This second type of adult was much less concerned with personal conservatism. In fact, this person often had glib justifications always at the ready as to why one shouldn’t be cautious with your body, why you deserved to have that extra drink, why it was okay not to do your work, etc. This set off red flags in your sub-conscious–you having come from a traditional-minded family–it gave you an uncomfortable feeling, or, if your lucky, consciously bothered you. But nonetheless, you had spent your whole life play-acting, had spent your whole life being the person your friends, family, teachers, and coworkers wanted you to be, instead of being your authentic self; when occasionally discovered, had been treated with the worst kind of ridicule & derision, and had spent your whole life with an inferiority complex created by other people’s prejudice. Maybe it was even you who was physically attacked, and maybe you even still have the scars to show for it. .
So, in those circumstances, who would you look up to?
My answer: First to one. Then to the other. Then back to one. Then back to the other. Then finally profound disappointment that both kinds of people could be so right and so flawed at the same time.
But my point in saying this is to set up the background for four points: (1) Sexual minorities have always been shut out of conservative institutions.They shouldn’t then be blamed for the libertine-izing detrimental effect this has had. (2) Sexual minorities have had to make an alliance with sexual libertarians in order to gain civil rights. Again, this has also had a libertine-izing detrimental effect, for which they shouldn’t then be further blamed. (3) Conservatives, sadly, have undermined the persuasiveness of their own (very) reasonable points (e.g., having multiple partners increases the risk of contracting a fatal illness) by adopting bigoted positions and by not narrowly tailoring their criticism. (4) Conservatives have alienated natural allies in the LGBT community by having adopted bigoted positions.
Now, I realize that “bigoted” is a conclusion that is not a stand-in for analysis, but to reconstruct how that conclusion was reached would require reciting the long sordid history of–to give one prominent example–the Family Research Council’s lies, and so forth, for which there’s really no time. (If you’re interested I’ll do it, but it can’t be today or tomorrow.)
Somewhere on Slate.com, there’s a very good article about gay parents in San Francisco upset at people’s public behavior they found potentially harmful to their children. It’s quite the read.
Sincerely,
Vestal Virgin
@MikeS:
Sure it does. Is this guy inherently a bigot??? You probably recognize the speaker:
“You and I know how true this is in the African-American community. We know that more than half of all black children live in single-parent households, a number that has doubled – doubled – since we were children. We know the statistics – that children who grow up without a father are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime; nine times more likely to drop out of schools and twenty times more likely to end up in prison. They are more likely to have behavioral problems, or run away from home, or become teenage parents themselves. And the foundations of our community are weaker because of it.
But we also need families to raise our children. We need fathers to realize that responsibility does not end at conception. We need them to realize that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child – it’s the courage to raise one. ”
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
@MikeS:
Hmmm. Do you work for NBC??? Because I noticed some of that selective editing stuff going on, to wit:
I said: “just go to your local poor black neighborhood”
which YOU characterized as:
“Go to your average Black neighborhood”
Hmmm. See any differences??? If you don’t work for NBC, they may have an opening for you!
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Squeeky,,
You did say poor but that wouldn’t change the bigotry inherent in your statement.
There are a great many horndog straight males prancing around this world, just watch TV if you want proof.
Those guys in the movie Porky’s, pretty much says it all.
“Which would tend to mean for this thread, that all of you with so-called rational excuses for your beliefs, are really just trying to justify your emotional predilections. Which facts kind of pokes around out in all the name calling.”
Someone said that people tend to do that. So all of us on this thread are doing it?
I this how you form all of your opinions? That would explain a lot.
@lottakatz:
I think it was in his Outrage book. As far as the personal stuff, no. No gay person ever did anything to me. I don’t even have any particular animus against them, although I do think that gay males, as a group, are a very skeezy bunch that collectively ought to be ashamed of themselves. There is no excuse for all the rampant promiscuity, particularly when there is the spectre of death hanging over them the way it is. That foolishness is not about “love”, just “sex.” Which behavior I see society having an important interest in reducing. People are supposed to be human beings, not just the means to an org*smic end. If you doubt the impact on society, just go to your local poor black neighborhood and look what happens when the grown men are pretty much all about a good time for themselves, and could care less about their women or children.
When gay men screw up, true, you don’t get the babies, but that still isn’t a good lifestyle for them, and significant to society for the same reasons we have laws against prostitution. I think people who just open-endedly encourage gay men, without expecting them to start acting responsibly, or calling them out on their horrible conduct, are doing them a gross disservice. Outside of their reprehensible behavior with others, I could care less what they do in their own bedrooms.
As far as religion, I see the attacks on it as more of a childish pout ala “I ought to be able to do whatever I want, so there!” thingie. FWIW, I also am a virulent anti-Libertarian person, whether it is the financial libertarianism of the right, or the social libertarianism of the left. A very smart person said, about libertarianism, “people don’t need any encouragement to be selfish. They need to be taught not to be selfish for society to work.” Or something like that.
I think the same is true about religion and a normative level of public morality. People don’t need to be taught how to take advantage of their neighbors, they need to be taught how not to. To presume that some very intelligent people here and there can create a “virtual construct” of morality, and stay within it, is to ignore the clear history of the human race particularly when they associate in large groups. Sooo, I don’t think it is a great idea to just chunk out “religion” and all the built in attitudes and traditions it entails.
Because really, how reasonable are people, and how many of their beliefs are really based on logic and reason? Take me for example. I have major issues with gay men’s behavior and conduct, and very reasonable people here presume that I am a “bigot” of one sort or another.
I mean, if you told me you can’t stand Christians, because they go around burning witches at the stake, I wouldn’t call you a “bigot.” Heck, they did! I would just try to reassure you that they no longer go around burning witches at the stake. Now, they just pretty much spend a lot of time trying to convince people the world is but 6,000 old. Or at least the less sophisticated among them. Which same kind of foolishness I also see among more sophisticated non-Christians.
For all humans, much of what we believe and much of what we do is based on emotions. I pulled this little 2 paragraph blurb just to state the case:
“In our society it is generally not considered justifiable to make a decision purely on an emotional response,” he said. “We want to be considered scientific and rational, so we come up with reasons after the fact to justify our choice.”
“This process seems to be happening somewhat unconsciously, people are not really aware they’re coming up with these justifications. What is even more interesting is that people who claim that emotions are not that important, who consider themselves to be really rational, are actually more prone to fall into this trap.”
Which would tend to mean for this thread, that all of you with so-called rational excuses for your beliefs, are really just trying to justify your emotional predilections. Which facts kind of pokes around out in all the name calling.
That’s also why I overuse sarcasm and ridicule, to directly attack the emotional centers. It would be nice if we all could just argue this rationally. But who knows.
Does this answer any of your concerns???
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
“Go to your average Black neighborhood……..”
Squeeky,
So your bigotry isn’t just about Gay people is it. It’s also about all those irresponsible Black males as well. The hallmark of bigotry is stereotype, which pontificates on the failings of a subset of humanity based on ignorant, uninformed generalizations. Notice my big hooked nose in my avatar, or my Jew nose as you might put it. What a prig of a person you are and I use that term because your prejudice seems intertwined with your disgust for sexuality. Sad, pathetic child, pontificating on subjects she knows little about except that which bigotry has informed her.
That you have problems understanding what you read is evidenced by your totally missing the point of what Jefferson was saying, David.
And you’re not fooling anyone. “Reductionist” is not what you are trying to be in the slightest. The bottom line is this: the valid state interests in the marital relationship are all in the contract and the attendant rights, duties and obligations vis a vis the contracting parties and third parties. Marriage is a fundamental right. Homosexuals have the right to seek equal protection and autonomy for these purposes just as heterosexual persons do. This is what the case law in context says, not some cherry picked self-serving cite taken out of context from a 127 year old case to rationalize that procreation is a legitimate state interest when it is not nor is it a rational basis for infringing upon the basic rights of others under a strict scrutiny analysis as is required to infringe upon a fundamental right.
You don’t get to pick and choose out of jurisprudence what fits your desires willy nilly, David. The totality of case law is considered in understanding how law is interpreted, not just one that happens to have language you like (even if you were to use it in context, which you didn’t). You not only have a problem reading Maynard, you have a problem understanding that in the century and a quarter since then, the issues about what constitutes a valid state interest in marriage have been refined many times to take the shape they have today – the shape I have been telling you they have all along.
You’re wrong as a matter of law.
That you are wrong as a matter of fact is just gravy.
Deal with it.
Or don’t.
But if you persist in endorsing treating homosexuals like second class citizens based on a religious definition of marriage that has squat to do with the legalities of the relationship, then be prepared for people to think your position is bigoted and rooted in a desire to apply religious standards to governmental action – a big no-no Constitutionally speaking.
You don’t like homosexual marriage? Don’t marry one. Problem solved.
And while you’re at it, learn that unless it harms someone?
What other people do in their lives and relationships is none of your damn business. They don’t need your approval. They don’t need to adhere to your imaginary standard of “purity”. They don’t need (or appreciate) your attempts to meddle with their lives like some busybody Churchlady. It’s not “special”. It’s authoritarian, theocratic, bigoted and oppressive. It’s against the ideals of liberty and egalitarianism this country was founded upon.
If you don’t like people thinking that’s how you roll?
Adapt or fail.
The choice is yours.
Your culture war against homosexual rights is failing right before your eyes.
Gene H – Again, I am not meaning to insult you, but it truly looks like you are dodging my inquiry rather than answering it. I am really trying to focus on the logic that the courts use to define marriage as a fundamental right. If gay marriage is a fundamental right, I want to be able to see that. If it is not a fundamental right, I want you to be able to see that.
As you know from past posts, I came to Maynard v. Hill through Loving v. Virginia. In Loving, Chief Justice Warren wrote:
—–
The freedom to marry has long been recognized as one of the vital personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.
Marriage is one of the “basic civil rights of man,” fundamental to our very existence and survival. Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535, 541 (1942). See also Maynard v. Hill, 125 U.S. 190 (1888). To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State’s citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discriminations. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual, and cannot be infringed by the State.
—–
The two cases mentioned follow a logic of marriage that involves procreation. In Skinner, it concerned the issue of sterilizing prisoners. Remember that this case is the case the Warren court uses to create the statement, “Marriage is one of the ‘basic civil rights of man.'”
Here is a quote from Skinner:
—–
We are dealing here with legislation which involves one of the basic civil rights of man. Marriage and procreation are fundamental to the very existence and survival of the race. The power to sterilize, if exercised, may have subtle, far-reaching and devastating effects. In evil or reckless hands it can cause races or types which are inimical to the dominant group to wither and disappear. There is no redemption for the individual whom the law touches. Any experiment which the State conducts is to his irreparable injury. He is forever deprived of a basic liberty. We mention these matters not to reexamine the scope of the police power of the States. We advert to them merely in emphasis of our view that strict scrutiny of the classification which a State makes in a sterilization law is essential, lest unwittingly, or otherwise, invidious discriminations are made against groups or types of individuals in violation of the constitutional guaranty of just and equal laws. The guaranty of “equal protection of the laws is a pledge of the protection of equal laws.” Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 U.S. 356, 369. When the law lays an unequal hand on those who have committed intrinsically the same quality of offense and sterilizes one and not the other, it has made as invidious a discrimination as if it had selected a particular race or nationality for oppressive treatment. Yick Wo v. Hopkins, supra; Gaines v. Canada, 305 U.S. 337. Sterilization of those who have thrice committed grand larceny, with immunity for those who are embezzlers, is a clear, pointed, unmistakable discrimination.
—–
The quote from Maynard we just discussed, focuses upon the government’s interest in the maintenance of marriage in its purity because it is the foundation of the family and society. Maynard also says marriage is “the first step from barbarism to incipient civilization, the purest tie of social life and the true basis of human progress.”
So, the courts declare marriage to be a great institution that moves us toward being a civilized society; therefore, we should carefully consider the logic of how they arrive at this understanding before we change marriage into something substantially different.
The rationale in these cases clearly point to the role in reproduction that marriage serves. Again, I am NOT getting this line of thinking from religion or whatever other source you want to blame. Loving only cites two cases to support the idea of marriage as a fundamental right, and both cases focus upon the inherent right of individuals to reproduce and create families through the institution of marriage. Their argument for using strict scrutiny and for stopping the States from infringing upon the rights of individuals is based upon the right of marriage, but a type of marriage that is used for responsible reproduction. Am I the only person on earth to see it this way?
Somehow I think not, because the recent Windsor case seemed to make gay marriage a State issue. Although the majority of Justices are apparently on board with the whole gay rights issue, they still make it a State’s right issue. Why is that? If the discrimination issue in Loving applied, they would step in and stop the discrimination just like the Warren court did in Loving. They did not do that. Why? Could it be that they fully understand the logic used in Loving was based upon marriage being a vehicle for responsible reproduction? Is it because they have the simplistic view that marriage is simply a contract and therefore not a fundamental right requiring strict scrutiny?
If the connection between marriage and reproduction is what makes marriage a fundamental right, then gay marriage does not qualify as a fundamental right because it does not have that quality of reproductive purpose. If this is true, then same sex unions and opposite sex unions have inherently different qualities, and they should be treated differently.
Is anyone able to show me where my logic is amiss here? I sincerely ask to be corrected here. I am not trying to win an argument. I want to know the truth.
Gene, I realize that you take Loving as a decisive case in regards to gay marriage. You have instructed us to do a word substitution, sexual orientation for race, in order to make your case. However, I see this as an illogical approach. It is a syntactic trick that causes a person to presume that the two words are equivalent when they are not. Words have meaning, and one cannot simply do word substitution to prove a case. We need to have understanding and draw logical connections for exactly why marriage is considered a fundamental right.
The cases of Loving v. Virginia, Skinner v. Oklahoma, and Maynard v. Hill identify marriage as a fundamental right based upon its role in being the responsible way for human individuals to procreate. How can you not see this? At the very least, you should acknowledge that my definition and understanding of marriage comes from law and not religion. Can you acknowledge this?