Gay marriage ban passes in NC

[August]

Originally Posted by Bilge_Rat

Do you have your own partisan poll that shows substantially different results?

The polls that I look at are the only ones that count. Election results. Nearly every time the question has been put to the voters in an election referendum it's been defeated. I'd say that's pretty substantial, wouldn't you?

And you ignored my question. What about people (like me) who don't care if gays form a permanent union but just feel it should be called something other than "marriage"? That seems to be the major objection here yet it seems not to have been addressed in your poll.

The big takeaway for me was the correlation between support and age, young people 18-39 show very strong support for same-sex unions, so it is only a matter of time before this issue is resolved once and for all.

Well that's assuming that the poll is accurate. Given that it was run by the Washington Post and ABC it's a pretty safe bet that they had a preferred result already in mind when they conducted it. If a Fox news poll comes up with different results are you going to take it as gospel as well?

You are also assuming that these young peoples opinions will not "evolve" as our Presidents opinion recently did.

Originally Posted by Mookiemookie

That's my thinking on it too. The inexorable march of progress will leave the bigots behind when they die off.

What happens after our generation dies off is not our concern. The way it's going I don't see this country lasting much longer anyways. In any case why not stop with the personal insults? Are they really that necessary to make your point?

[mookiemookie]

Originally Posted by August

In any case why not stop with the personal insults? Are they really that necessary to make your point?

If someone doesn't like being called a bigot, then they shouldn't engage in bigotry.

[August]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

If someone doesn't like being called a bigot, then they shouldn't engage in bigotry.

Then maybe we should start calling you a bigot for your intolerance toward religion, conservatives, Republicans and several other groups that you have taken pains to insult here over the years.

That's the problem with name calling. It eliminates any chance of a peaceful discourse. It certainly does not make your arguments any more valid.

[Ducimus]

My 2 cents worth on the subject of gay marriage in general:

- The argument of violating the sanctity of marriage is a bunch of crap. Straight people have been violating the sanctity of marriage for hundreds of years and continue to do so this day.

- I really don't care what Gay people want to do with their lives. It's their business, not mine. I'm not gonna sit here and pretend to tell them what they can or can't do in their pursuit of happiness, all i ask is they leave me out of their business.

- I'm not sure if its possible to separate marriage from religion. Religion tends to frown on homosexuality, and a marriage ceremony is typically conducted by a priest, pastor, bishop, etc etc. So gays may have to settle for a civil union of some sort by a judge or some legal official to gain the benefits of marriage, without the religious mumbo jumbo.

[mookiemookie]

Originally Posted by August

Then maybe we should start calling you a bigot for your intolerance toward religion, conservatives, Republicans and several other groups that you have taken pains to insult here over the years.

What religion someone subscribes to doesn't bother me in the least, so long as they keep it out of government. Being bigoted against a religion would require me to have an opinion on it, which I don't.

Being opposed to a political ideology makes you a bigot now? I guess you could lump everyone in GT into that one then.

That's the problem with name calling. It eliminates any chance of a peaceful discourse. It certainly does not make your arguments any more valid.

I have no respect for anyone who would deny human rights to another and I don't care to hear their justification for it. I don't need to validate my arguments because our innate nature as human beings and our inalienable rights already have done that.

Originally Posted by CaptainHaplo

Thanks mookie - you just called me (and many others) a bigot. And whats worse - your doing it on merely the basis of your own viewpoint. This is why there can't be a decent discussion - when the left doesn't get its way, when it can't win a factual arguement - it resorts to namecalling. Thats sad - on so many levels.

What's sad on so many levels is that people are still trying to justify denying people equal rights, and then getting offended when someone calls them out on it. Denying someone rights makes you a bigot. Discrimination makes you a bigot. If you don't want to be called one, don't discriminate against other people.

You're acting like I'm baselessly namecalling and telling people they're poopyheads or something. A bigot is a specific label for people who engage in specific behavior.

Originally Posted by AVGWarhawk

Do your accept all comers and situations such as the gay marriage question? Do you unequivocal accept everything?

I accept that if two consenting adults want to enter into a marriage contract with each other, their genders shouldn't matter. Who am I to tell someone that their love isn't as valid as someone else's?

[August]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

Being opposed to a political ideology makes you a bigot now? I guess you could lump everyone in GT into that one then.

According to the definition of bigotry that I read it does. That's the problem with personal insults. They usually can be applied in ways you may not personally agree with.

[Ducimus]

It's my thought that a person who truly possesses zero intolerance to any opinions differing from their own or absolutely not intolerant of anyone with different political views, ethnicity, race, class, religion, profession, sexuality or gender is EXTREMELY RARE.

Hence i'm going to say everyone who has an opinion about something is a bigot to some degree. If you've ever argued about something on a messageboard, its because you possessed some degree of intolerance to what someone said.

edit
Yeah thats right, im painting all of you arguing pansies with a wide freaking brush, the whole bigoted lot of ya!

[August]

Originally Posted by Ducimus

Yeah thats right, im painting all of you arguing pansies with a wide freaking brush, the whole bigoted lot of ya!

We love you too man. Long time.

[Bilge_Rat]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

What's sad on so many levels is that people are still trying to justify denying people equal rights, and then getting offended when someone calls them out on it. Denying someone rights makes you a bigot. Discrimination makes you a bigot. If you don't want to be called one, don't discriminate against other people.

Exactly.

What I find interesting is that if the issue was, say, whether marriages between african-americans should be valid or not (something which was actually discussed pre civil war), everyone would be up in arms, but somehow some people still think it is perfectly acceptable to discriminate against someone based on their sexual orientation.

[AVGWarhawk]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

What religion someone subscribes to doesn't bother me in the least, so long as they keep it out of government. Being bigoted against a religion would require me to have an opinion on it, which I don't.

Being opposed to a political ideology makes you a bigot now? I guess you could lump everyone in GT into that one then.

I have no respect for anyone who would deny human rights to another and I don't care to hear their justification for it. I don't need to validate my arguments because our innate nature as human beings and our inalienable rights already have done that.

What's sad on so many levels is that people are still trying to justify denying people equal rights, and then getting offended when someone calls them out on it. Denying someone rights makes you a bigot. Discrimination makes you a bigot. If you don't want to be called one, don't discriminate against other people.

You're acting like I'm baselessly namecalling and telling people they're poopyheads or something. A bigot is a specific label for people who engage in specific behavior.




I accept that if two consenting adults want to enter into a marriage contract with each other, their genders shouldn't matter. Who am I to tell someone that their love isn't as valid as someone else's?

You did not answer the question. You answered the gay marriage question. Do you accept everything?

[mookiemookie]

Originally Posted by AVGWarhawk

You did not answer the question. You answered the gay marriage question. Do you accept everything?

Ok let's play the game. I say no, I don't accept everything, and then you reply back with "A-HA! Then you're BIGOTED against something, you biggoty biggot!" And then I run away, tail between my legs and cry and say "Curse you AVGWarhawk, and your awesome powers of rhetoric you scurrilous scalawag!"

[AVGWarhawk]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

Ok let's play the game. I say no, I don't accept everything, and then you reply back with "A-HA! Then you're BIGOTED against something, you biggoty biggot!" And then I run away, tail between my legs and cry and say "Curse you AVGWarhawk, and your awesome powers of rhetoric you scurrilous scalawag!"

I'm 46 Mookie. Little time left for games. There will be bigotry long after we are pushing up daisies.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by August

The polls that I look at are the only ones that count. Election results. Nearly every time the question has been put to the voters in an election referendum it's been defeated. I'd say that's pretty substantial, wouldn't you?

I only have one quarrel with that, and it's embodied by this quote from Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn:

Fifty-one percent of a nation can establish a totalitarian regime, suppress minorities and still remain democratic.

[Bilge_Rat]

to further Steve's comments, prior to 1967, all the states of the Deep South (including North Carolina) had laws which prohibited inter-racial marriages.

This was the text of the Virginia Act which was still in place at that time:

Racial Integrity Act of 1924 (1924)

5. It shall hereafter be unlawful for any white person in this State to marry any save a white person, or a person with no other admixture of blood than white and American Indian. For the purpose of this act, the term "white person" shall apply only to the person who has no trace whatsoever of any blood other than Caucasian; but persons who have one-sixteenth or less of the blood of the American Indian and have no other non-Caucasic blood shall be deemed to be white persons. All laws heretofore passed and now in effect regarding the intermarriage of white and colored persons shall apply to marriages prohibited by this act.

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Racial...ty_Act_of_1924

All these laws had been democratically adopted by the states individual legislatures, all of which had been democratically elected by eligible voters, again all in accordance with the constitution of the individual states.

All these laws were declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in the case of Loving v. Virginia. Richard Loving, a white man and Mildred Jeter, a black woman were sentenced to 1 year in jail for marrying in contravention of the Racial Integrety Act.

This is what the Supreme Court said, in part:

Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man," fundamental to our very existence and survival.... 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 discrimination. 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.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia

I can't believe that less than 50 years later we are still having the same argument.

[August]

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

I only have one quarrel with that, and it's embodied by this quote from Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn:

I understand what you're saying Steve but obviously the flip side of that is any government that goes against the wishes of a majority of its own citizens too often is a government that looses it's right to govern. We elect representatives, not rulers.

Besides, my reply was in response to a poster who claimed an unofficial and partisan poll indicates how this issue should be decided. If I have to choose between that and election results, i'll go with the ballot every time.