165 Replies to “Gay activists: marry us, or else”

  1. I hear you, Ron. But law and religion don’t work on the same plane.
    I wish I could agree with your “live and let live” idea, but I can’t. It’s great in theory. But I’ve seen too many lives blighted by the idea of let’s “just concentrat[e] on doing what we c[an]”. This SO doesn’t work for kids. A much higher standard FOR THE ADULTS IN THEIR LIVES is needed.
    With charity, I hope, re public policy, we’ll have to agree to disagree.

  4. Chairm,
    I just read your extremely lengthy rebuttal to the facts that I stated.
    It sounds like you’ve spent a lot of time trying to justify why those facts arent’ valid. But the reality is what I stated is correct.
    If you want to analyze every societal change and the corresponding parliamentary process and laws – from military development to energy production to tax law to labor law or any other change that has ever occured in Canada or any other society by meticulously proving why the laws that were passed “dont’ really count” than you’ll have your work cut out for you.
    It also sounds like you have exerted a tremendous amont of energy trying to measure and weigh and justify that marriage between and a man and a woman holds a special value that same-sex marriage will never hold, regardless of what is or becomes the custom in society, in some churches, in various communities.
    Good for you – Go for it!
    You’ve also set up a tremendously complex weave of inquiries for me to “justify” same-sex marriage, while ensuring that any argument you’d rather not deal with is immediately and arbitrarily disqualified or as some type of “hocus pocus” meaningless equivalency (or whatever terms you’ve created).
    That’s great – I’m impressed!
    Humans have value – in the eyes of God and to each other. Their relationships have value as well. Imperfect as they are, our laws should strive to provide support to the relationships that nurture the best in us. That in itself is the reason why husbands and wives – whether they have children or not – should be recognized and supported by society. And for those that have children, society should do more to ensure those children are rasied as lovingly and as supported as they can be. LIkewise, same-sex couples provide support to each other and they do individually and together contribute value to their communities. That is true whether or not they raise children, as well.
    I will not be roped into a conversation of trying to justify which couples or which families deserve greater value. Perhaps God does that – I don’t know. But I know it is not my role. And, furthermore, I know it isn’t your role either.
    As the law stands today, through the imperfect processes of flawed beings in a less-than-perfect society, has granted marriage to homosexuals. You many not like it. I’m quite sure you will never agree with it, from what you’ve written. But I personally do not believe that recognizing and supporting healthy and nurturing relationships for same-sex couples will harm society. On the contrary, I believe it can be a bridge in creating a better society.
    And with that, I think we’ll have to just disagree. But I won’t be spending time “proving” anything to you.
    I wish you and your loved ones well.

  5. If society truly favours traditional marriage then, regardless of the laws, traditional marriage will survive.
    Forget the qualifier “traditional”. SSM is not marriage. Conflating nonmarriage with marriage directly contradicts the societal preference for the social institution.
    The rush and push for SSM was accomplished against the wishes of society. Now the considerable powers of the state will be used not to protect marriage but to continue to undermine it.
    The question is not whether the social institution will merely survive but whether society will thrive without the preferential treatment of marriage by the state, on behalf of the society which favors it.
    If society truly favors marriage, as Canadians currently do, then a system of self-government would vigorously protect AND strengthen marriage recognition. That’s how a society will thrive.

  6. If this were a multi-state discussion I might agree with you.
    It is a pluralistic state. I think we agree that marriage has special significance within almost every religion. It is a univeral social institution in which men and women are integrated, not segregated as per SSM, and where this is combined with the contingency for responsible procreation. There are variables in the protocls, and in how that core of marriage is protected, but across time and cultures the man-woman criterion stands as tried and proven. I think this is due in no small part to the nature of humankind — two-sexed — and the nature of human generativity — both-sexed — and the nature of human community — both-sexed and very, very, very social. Social norms are informed by religious beliefs, inescapably. Thus, as you pointed out, there is a Judeo-Christian background to the social institution in Canada. The state merely recognized marriage, rather than presumed to create marriage.
    I think we also agree that in Canada, with the enactment of SSM especially, the state’s intervention has replaced marriage recognition with some other thing that is so vague and arbitrary that the utility of “marital status” has been greatly diminished. But it is too early to retreat into a sort of religious ghetto, I think. Time to push back and correct the errors of the lower federal courts in the SSM cases.

  7. meticulously proving why the laws that were passed “dont’ really count” than you’ll have your work cut out for you
    It was easy in the case of SSM in Canada. Not hard work, actually. I did not challenge each and every point you made but I did point out how the process was profoundly undemocratic and how the Liberal government, especially, lulled people into a false comfort that the Liberal party would defend the constitutionality of the man-woman criterion. Instead the abolished it. SSM could not been enacted with open debate in which the purpose of the proposed reform was made to stand on its merits and demerits.
    The SSM campaign, and folks like yourself provide comments to show this, sound like Janet Brady whining about her older and more competent sister, “Marcia, Marcia, Marcia.”

  8. meticulously proving why the laws that were passed “dont’ really count” than you’ll have your work cut out for you
    It was easy in the case of SSM in Canada. Not hard work, actually. I did not challenge each and every point you made but I did point out how the process was profoundly undemocratic and how the Liberal government, especially, lulled people into a false comfort that the Liberal party would defend the constitutionality of the man-woman criterion. Instead they abolished it. SSM could not been enacted with open debate in which the purpose of the proposed reform was made to stand on its merits and demerits.
    The SSM campaign, and folks like yourself provide comments to show this, sound like Janet Brady whining about her older and more competent sister, “Marcia, Marcia, Marcia.”

  9. regardless of what is or becomes the custom in society, in some churches, in various communities
    You mentioned churches. Why is it that these churches have imposed their religious views on all of society? And you say, various communities, as if some tiny fringe on the edges of the homosexual population get to dictate to all of society.
    SSM is not marriage. But you might have good reason to merge it with marriage. Afterall, it is the newly crafted custom in Canada, according to you. What is the grand purpose for demoting marital status and elevating your idealization of the homosexual relaitonship? And if you say it is about mutually caring and supportive couples, then, why would you go along with the prohibitions on other such people who want the same protections? Maybe you are not in favor of those prohibitions and would flatten marital status even further. But you evidently have covered this and have ready-made answers … or do you?
    Maybe further open debate in Parliament and in committees and in public hearings would be useful in your helping society craft this new custom.

  10. Chaim: Your statement “SSM is not marriage” is just an exclusionary assertion.
    Merriam-Webster, for one, disagrees with you.

  11. Well, if this: “The question is not whether the social institution will merely survive but whether society will thrive without the preferential treatment of marriage by the state, on behalf of the society which favors it” really is the question, then relax–society will do fine.

  12. You’ve also set up a tremendously complex weave of inquiries for me to “justify” same-sex marriage, while ensuring that any argument you’d rather not deal with is immediately and arbitrarily disqualified or as some type of “hocus pocus” meaningless equivalency (or whatever terms you’ve created).
    The SSM campaign shutdown discussion by making a claim of a right that does not exist. They depended on hocus pocus such as calling equal participation of the sexes “unequal marriage”.
    The core of marriage is not arbitrary. See the nature of humankind.
    I will not be roped into a conversation of trying to justify which couples or which families deserve greater value. Perhaps God does that – I don’t know. But I know it is not my role. And, furthermore, I know it isn’t your role either.
    That is so condenscending of you.
    Besides, I did not disparage human relationships. I am referring to the conjugal relaitonship which ought to be preferred for the reasons I have given.
    Now, you give some mamby pamby claptrap about valuing all kinds of relaitonships. Do you favor abolishing the prohibitions on other relationships which could also qualify on the same basis as the one-sex arrangement you favor?
    You do favor the homosexual relaitionship because you are in favor of replacing marriage recognition with something that is extrinsic to the conjugal relationship and which is taylored for the homosexual relationship. Problem is, even that is excludes other human relationships.
    It is not unreasonable to ask why you want to make the replacement and why the conjugal relationship should be treated as if it was one-sexed. And why other relationships, you say are valuable, are not included in this “marriage equality”.
    I won’t be spending time “proving” anything to you.
    That’s perfectly in keeping with the SSM campaign. Just assert axiomatic beliefs and slip the burden that comes with seeking to reform, in this case replace, a bedrock social institution.
    Marriage rates in Canada, for both-sexed couples, continues to decline while participation rates, including conversion from shacking up to SSM, remain very low among the homosexual population in Canada.
    The harm is not necessarily in your idealization of the homosexual relationship, but in mucking up a social institution and claiming it is a wonderful achievement.
    Social policy in Canada will now be restricted by this merger of nonmarriage with marriage. That, too, will do harm to society. And it was unncessary since the protections you may have wanted for the homosexual relationship, at least your idealized version of it, was available through designated beneficiaries. You did not need to lay one finger on marriage recognition.
    The notion of a false equivalency is not hocus pocus, by the way, but if you routinely evade the substance of the social policy issue, then, the resort to blatangly undemocratic means will become a routine course. And once that becomes the standard operating procedure, forget about expecting the government to value human relationships.

  13. To lookout, thanks for the kind words. The SSM debate in Canada was cut short prematurely.
    The clash with other liberties is now inevitable because Parliament did not do its job. Respecting, and protecting, the homosexual relationship is not really the root issue but, as evident above, it became so because for the SSM campaign the issue was not marriage but homosexuality. They poisoned the well with their central presumption that disagreement is bigotry.
    And that will continue with these increasingly frequent clashes over other liberties.
    SSM is the wrong solution to the problems that were alluded to throughout the SSM campaign. What Joe and others may have wanted for the homosexual relationship could have been achieved in other ways with more appropriate solutions.
    I’ll step off.

  14. Ron Good, that statement was a brief paraphrase of the rest of what I had said about the nature of humankind. So, no, the dictionary’s variation you may have in mind does not prove what you claimed.
    But as you said earlier, marital status discriminates against the nonmarital arrangements. But the question is not whether all discrimination must be done away with — that’s ludicrous — but whether discriminating on the basis of the nature of humankind is unjust. It is not.

  15. relax–society will do fine
    Okay. Never mind. I think that is said by those who start with that assumption and then accomodate whatever comes down the pipe. I was around when assurances like that were dished out to lull people about no-fault divorce trends and nonmarital birth trends. Seen enough. Not satisfied with the reassurance. On principle, I see it is an empty gesture, I’m afraid, but I do appreciate the sentiment.
    Cheers.
    Yeh, I’ll step off now. Thanks for the exchanges.

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