babble
Wednesday, July 30, 2003
Ambiguously gay:
I try to avoid getting political in this 'blog because people get really passionate about politics and before you know it, civilized, calm conversations degenerate into mud-slinging and name-calling and sometimes eye-gouging, and I don't really like engaging in too many hyphenated activities, so I keep my opinions to myself. Or, I bore people with them in real life. Right now, though, I'm kinda pissed off, so I figured I'd go ahead and bore you with my views, too.
This morning, the POTUS stated during a press conference that he opposed gay marriage and would seek to have legislation introduced that would explicitly ban it. Now, you might think that the reason this pisses me off is that I want to run off and marry a girl, which is not the case. I've been married before and I want no part of that particular institution. The reason this pisses me off so much is because I am a big believer in the rights of the individual, and I think that by denying a large number of the population (and believe me, there are more of us than you think) the same rights as others, the government has essentially created a second, lower class of citizens, a situation which is expressly forbidden in the U.S. Constitution.
Gay people who want to get married are not asking for special rights, they are asking for the same rights that the married, heterosexual couple next door has: civil benefits that are only available to married couples, such as tax incentives, the right to visit a spouse in the hospital, inheritance and property rights, etc. Nobody is asking the government to force religious institutions to recognize gay marriage - we're supposed to have a separation between church and state, and nobody wants to change that. Gay people simply want to have the same legal rights as straight people. I don't think that's too much to ask. Neither do several Canadian courts. Think our Supreme Court will be far behind? Even if a law is passed that outlaws gay marriage, it may inadvertently set into motion the legal proceedings that will lead to gay marriage becoming legal in the U.S., because such a law would give gay people the opportunity to bring suit against the government for violation of the equal protection rights afforded every U.S. citizen under the 5th & 14th amendments of the constitution.
And who knows - if you give gay people the right to get married, maybe they'll actually treat the institution of marriage better than straight people have. I'll bet my 13th spinal vertebra that the overall divorce rate would go down if "them damn queers" were finally allowed to get married.
Update: Take action.
babbled by Kat @ 11:47:00 AM |
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