What is the primary reason behind your support for same-sex marriage? [W:539/549]

RabidAlpaca said:

So basing your faith off the old testament, do you follow the parts where it says to kill non-believers?

If your daughter is raped will you force her to marry the rapist?

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Well, considering my mention that I do not proactively impose my faith on others should answer that question for you and not withstanding that it has nothing to do with gay marriage, I suppose I might occasionally since I do not know what is in the mind and hearts of the spiders my wife screams at me to smush.

It's in the best interest of this nation.

Ikari said:

It's equal rights, right to contract is being denied to same sex couples; it's pretty cut and dry. Bigots and hatemongers deny it; but measurably that is what the system comes down to.

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equating marriage to the right to contract is kind of a silly argument IMHO. Contracts have terms--marriages do not.

Fisher said:

equating marriage to the right to contract is kind of a silly argument IMHO. Contracts have terms--marriages do not.

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Marriage does have terms, which is why the contract can be dissolved. Also....it's a contract. So there's that.

It's an equal rights issue that really bother anyone considering it's none of your business.

Dooble said:

Being true to how you think God made you does not exonerate you from His Justice.

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Nope, this is how God made me, and He loves me just the way I am. You can believe whatever you want, that God is this ultra-strict taskmaster who cares more about how closely people live to what PEOPLE wrote 2,000 years ago(which 99% of Christians ignore the parts about bacon, clothing etc BTW), but I'm going to believe in the God that has showed Himself to me, and make sure that for my whole life that love, peace, forgiveness, and good will towards men are the principles that guide me.

Ikari said:

Marriage does have terms, which is why the contract can be dissolved. Also....it's a contract. So there's that.

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It is not a contract. It does not have terms. You don't even have to have a ceremony or say vows to be married. It is a legal status, not a contract. There is very little that cannot be done by default in a marriage that could not be done by Wills or Powers of Attorney or beneficiary designations completely outside the marriage. The only difference are the default ruls that come with the legal status over which the parties agreeing to the alleged contract have ZERO control. Calling marriage a contract undermines the argument for SS marriage. It is silly and that is that.

Fisher said:

It is not a contract. It does not have terms. You don't even have to have a ceremony or say vows to be married. It is a legal status, not a contract. There is very little that cannot be done by default in a marriage that could not be done by Wills or Powers of Attorney or beneficiary designations completely outside the marriage. The only difference are the default ruls that come with the legal status over which the parties agreeing to the alleged contract have ZERO control. Calling marriage a contract undermines the argument for SS marriage. It is silly and that is that.

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It is contract, it comes with all sorts of legal privilege contained in other contract which is unacceptable through any other contract such as visitation and financial contracts. The legal status is contract which is why you go through the courts to dissolve marriage and not a church or just by saying "we're no longer married". Duh!

It's only silly for those who wish to pretend marriage is something that its not in order to push their religious indoctrination on the rest of us. As I said, bigots and hatemongers will disagree; but reality is as it is.

I support S.S.M. because I have a well developed sense of right and wrong based upon upper level Moral reasoning.

Why else, eh?

It's an equal rights issue. Homosexuals are the only segment of society that can be legally discriminated against. That's unconstitutional, it's immoral, and it's got to stop.

DiAnna said:

It's an equal rights issue. Homosexuals are the only segment of society that can be legally discriminated against. That's unconstitutional, it's immoral, and it's got to stop.

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Please. Ugly people will always be discriminated against and it is 100% legal.

Other
True, is is indeed a civil rights issue (fairness), but I do not support it...Our government could have all "marriages" as civil unions and allow the churches to do their thing without interference.
Of course, my "support" or lack thereof means nothing.

Fisher said:

Please. Ugly people will always be discriminated against and it is 100% legal.

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Ugly people have always been able to legally marry and serve in the military while openly ugly. Few people are denied the ability to rent an apt or house of their choice because of their ugliness, nor have they been routinely beaten and murdered for being openly ugly.

Got any other ridiculous analogies you care to share?

DaveFagan said:

Marriage is a religious term. Same sex contracts is a fine description and marriage should also be labelled the same. CONTRACT! We're talking about a legal contract, not in any way related to love.

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SSM isnt perfect but I feel its as close as we are going to get. Personally I would like to see the term "marriage" removed from government completely and instead have contracts allowed between any agreeing adults and not be limited by number or sex.

Dooble said:

Not sure if a poll like this has already been posted, but these are questions that I've been mulling over for sometime. Would appreciate some honest input.

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I am personally against it, but do not actively oppose it politically.

On a personal level, I have religious reasons I cannot actively support it or put my stamp of approval on it.

Politically, however, I can see the arguments about equal access to a legal institution and so on... not to mention that after considerable investigation into it I just don't see it having a lot of impact on society in and of itself.

So, color me rather indifferent. I think we've got far more important fish to fry.

I used to be against it, however, after reevaluating my stance I reason that you can't stand for liberty while opposing gay marriage without being a hypocrite. So equal rights for all regardless of my personal feelings on the matter!

Baralis said:

SSM isnt perfect but I feel its as close as we are going to get. Personally I would like to see the term "marriage" removed from government completely and instead have contracts allowed between any agreeing adults and not be limited by number or sex.

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I disagree. Removing the term marriage from government falsely concedes that marriage is somehow the property of religion. (rather, the property of one particular religion). It isn't. It's ok with me if the religious want to use the same word as me to refer to their bonds of love, but they don't get to take that word away from me.

RabidAlpaca said:

Outside of the OT, which you don't listen to anymore,

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Prove it. Show me how I don't listen to the OT anymore. The quickest way to freezing a debate with me, is to tell me what I believe. Now that you've committed yourself, you get to produce your evidence. This should be a breeze for a steel trap, scientific mind, like you have.

Dooble said:

Prove it. Show me how I don't listen to the OT anymore. The quickest way to freezing a debate with me, is to tell me what I believe. Now that you've committed yourself, you get to produce your evidence. This should be a breeze for a steel trap, scientific mind, like you have.

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Oh sh*t.. We must be dealing with a psychopath then. You're saying you murder non-believers? Or if your daughter was raped you would make her marry her rapist? You absolutely refuse to eat anything kosher? When you come across a homosexual you stone him to death?

I assumed you didn't follow the old testament out of hopeful respect for you, but apparently that was mistaken.

I think gays should be allowed to marry as in, sign that piece of paper that makes them married in the eyes of the government, because that is a right you get for being a citizen of a country, not for being a religious citizen of a country. And if a country offers benefits to married couples, they should get the same state benefits. The one exception there may be there is about children because you know, they have to adopt them if they are male homo couple or use in-vitro fertilization for women gay couples. But since most of the tests that came out about children who were raised by homosexual couples were positive, in that the children weren't "wrong" in any way, then they should be allowed to adopt. But the tests were on small scale... and hence, there is room to doubt. I would like to see large scale tests performed to have a better, more definitive answer.

I am against any intrusion of the government to tell religions that they should allow the homosexuals to marry in a Church and I don't think that they should be allowed to marry in a Church/synangogue if the religion (any religion, from the abrahamic religions to the asian ones) doesn't allow it. If the gays want to marry in a church and have a ceremony, they should make the Holy Church of Homosexuals, copy whatever religion they want to have, scrap the no-marriage-for-gays part and replace with something favorable and then they can marry in a Church, have a ceremony and all that good stuff. If the numbers are correct, and 10% of the world is homosexual, then the Holy Church of Homosexuals will have 700bil people as their constituents and it will be the 4th largest religion on the planet after Islam, Christianity and Hinduism.

But politically, I don't care and I see the whole discussion about gay marriage as being a stupid one, used mostly as a distraction and a means by impotent politicians to gain the votes of the terminally tolerant and economically inept.

RabidAlpaca said:

Outside of the OT, which you don't listen to anymore, it doesn't say they shouldn't either. And no, it is NOT a commandment.


It actually doesn't mention the man-woman relationship at all.

You simply hate gays and you want to twist your religion to support that. Perhaps you can give me a new testament quote saying how gays are wrong and will be going to hell.

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Who says Christians don't listen to the Old Testament? Matthew 5:17-20

Smeagol said:

Who says Christians don't listen to the Old Testament? Matthew 5:17-20

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I don't know any christians who kill non-believers, stone gays, refuse to eat pork, or will force their daughters to marry their rapists. That was always "part of the old covenant that we don't follow anymore".

Dooble said:

Not sure if a poll like this has already been posted, but these are questions that I've been mulling over for sometime. Would appreciate some honest input.

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For exactly all of the same reasons that I think that Straight couples should be allowed to marry.

My only reservation is that the term "marriage" has religious connotations to some and this might be offensive to apply it to gay civil unions. As a religious term, applying it even to straight marriages in a legal sense would not be appropriate in today's PC climate, so the term Civil Union should probably be expanded to included Straight as well as Gay marriage.

RabidAlpaca said:

Oh sh*t.. We must be dealing with a psychopath then. You're saying you murder non-believers? Or if your daughter was raped you would make her marry her rapist? You absolutely refuse to eat anything kosher? When you come across a homosexual you stone him to death?

I assumed you didn't follow the old testament out of hopeful respect for you, but apparently that was mistaken.

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A HUGE misunderstanding of the Old Testament. The section of the OT to which I think you're referring served two purposes:

1. It was the civil code of ancient Israel similar to our laws and constitution. That particular aspect of the OT, or "The Law", applied only to how the government of ancient Israel was to enforce its laws from the time of Moses to the reign of King Josiah when Israel lost is national sovereignty. In America we also have laws and penalties that if the United States were to be dissolved would no longer apply. Hypothetically, if someone reading our laws outside of the US or at some point in the distant future saw where certain crimes call for the death penalty, that would not apply to them because they would be outside of the jurisdiction of the government of the United States or that state where a capital crime was described.

2. The above all said, the Old Testament is also the word of God expressed to the human race. Another important aspect of the OT was to define sin (things that offend God), show mankind who otherwise think they are doing nothing wrong in the eyes of the Creator what displeases him and to give mankind a sense of just how serious God considers those offenses by the penalties He calls for if he were writing the laws of a society, yet retrains Himself because of his love and mercy toward people. People are real good at cherry picking verses out of the Bible without taking the entire Bible into context as it should be read, but even under ancient Israeli law you can read about numerous accounts where people violated capital crimes and the death penalty was rarely imposed usually in cases where the offending party was truly sorry for what they did because God loves us. Just because we are not living under ancient Israeli law, it doesn't make the things God defines as sinful okay. He still considers them just as wrong and simply used ancient Israel as an example to communicate his will it all societies throughout history. And being true to his word, he still required the death penalty for sin but because of his love and mercy applied it to Himself instead of us in the person of His Son so the the requirements of justice would be fulfilled and we could be legally forgiven on the basis of faith in and surrender to Him. This does not mean however that any sin is henceforth no longer offensive to God unless God later declared it to be fulfilled as in the case of kosher dietary laws, seemingly (and I might be wrong) put there to allow Jesus to be a perfect sin sacrifice undefiled by unclean meats himself or in his earthly lineage as the kosher dietary laws were lifted only after his crucifixion. Acts 10:9-:15

RabidAlpaca said:

I don't know any christians who kill non-believers, stone gays, refuse to eat pork, or will force their daughters to marry their rapists. That was always "part of the old covenant that we don't follow anymore".

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You forgot about sacrificing lambs and calves. :lol: