Wow, I really am disappointed in the response here. After a recent thread here:
California pols overrule citizen vote on gay marriage with a lot of accusations flying immediately after the article was posted because I had used somewhat inflammatory language at the end of my commentary:
| Keep tuned to the news folks, the future of the country is at stake. |
Some people read my comments and immediately seemed that they wanted to call me a homophobe and were demanding to know why gay marriage would rise to the level of life or death for the country.
For the most part, my comment applies to all news. Watch the news, pay attention and stay informed about what is going on. It does matter. The future of the country is at stake. If we let politicians run rampant over our desires, over our own propositions and resolutions (as happened in California) then we are going to destroy this country. We have to make sure that our politicians do our bidding, and not choose to ignore our choices and decide for themselves what is right, and what is wrong.
Regardless, I posted this thread to address the perceptions of my stance on the issue of gay marriage. I really was hoping that some people that seem quick to fly off on accusations about peoples political positions would slow down a bit and see if they really know me, or perhaps find themselves educated somewhat and reminded that many times what others think they know of an individual is a false perception. People are many times far too quick to label someone else with hostile terms. Sometimes the labels are accurate, some times they are not.
But, for as long as we let these labels go unchallenged, and we let these perceptions stand, we are somewhat doomed to continue to have hostilities enter discussions here.
I wish people would leave their own biases behind when they participate here. But there will always be prejudices that enter into play (or so it seems), and because of it, some people will continue to work from a position of ignorance (and possibly bias and hatred).
In anycase, my own take on gay marriage is somewhat as Zoomba describes, but to be clear here goes (or at least to try to be clear):
The government really has no business in this area. The church does (as far as "marriage" goes). No church or religious group should be forced to recognize a union of two samed-sex individuals if they choose not to. They shouldn't be forced to perform the ceremonies, they shouldn't be forced to recognize the unions, and should be free to condemn the same if they choose.
The government may recognize "civil unions" between any consenting adult humans that are not direct siblings and are of "sound mind and body" so they can be confirmed as consenting.
Unfortunately the issue becomes broader because of the rights and responsibilities that go along with the "contract of marriage" that is recognized under the law. Once a couple is united in the eyes of the law, certain rights are recognized -- the right to make medical decisions, the right to receive benefits in case of death (natural or wrongful) and other such issues. In recognizing civil unions, we could in theory be opening up a pandoras box of benefit issues that would create debts or obligations for all of our businesses, the government and our own persons. If we choose to do that, then to me, it is a decision that the citizenry must be involved in, and as such, probably falls back to the individual states to decide.
It may take a long time for all states to reach the same comfort levels with the idea of recognizing civil unions for everyone, and the feds may even come up with some creative ways of spurring such recognition -- similar to what is done with requiring minimum standards of drunk driving laws lest states lose funding from the feds.
There you have it. Dispute it if you want, convince me I'm wrong or argue with others that say I am. Whatever you decide. But do try to keep this stance in mind when trying to determine if I'm a rabid right-winger or a loony liberal.
