"Effect of denying equal rights on a gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered person:
Cannot marry who they choose
Cannot utilize their spouse's medical insurance
Cannot adopt children
Cannot visit sick or dying spouse in the hospital"
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As a doctor, I can tell you the visitation argument is pure hyperbole. I've never heard of a gay significant other being denied hospital visitation. Anyone straight, gay, related, or no can be legally designated a health care surrogate/power of attorney for medical decision making and I have had several end-of-life discussions with the partners of gay patients.
When in California, I voted in support of gay marraige. Personally, if I couldn't have biological children with my spouse the pros of being single would've outweighed the cons of marriage, so unsure of the real impetus for all the hub-bub other than a feeling of perceived inequality.
Not a fan of the kids/overall language of the video.
Adoption is a separate issue but it should be mentioned that single, unmarried people certainly can adopt children.
I have friends it's happened to, so it's a bit more than hyperbole. One was in a car crash, and they wouldn't let the partner in, even though they had pages and pages of legal powers of attorney etc. The hosptial ended up getting a police officer to bar them entry, and they had to actually go to court to get an...something. Injunction? I forget. It definitely varies state by state, and region by region. If you're in a city hospital in a blue state I'd be far more shocked if you got denied entry as a gay partner than a rural hosptial in a red state. Just sayin.
Adopting is certainly easier these days, though man it's expensive (for everyone).
There's more than was even listed above. Depending on the state and company you might not be able to get on the same helath insurance. There's also alot more rights and laws that come into play regarding spouses that you don't get from reams of civil agreements. There are lists. Things like the right to not testify against your spouse in court.
In many states there's no right to protection rom harrassement and discrimination based on sexual orientation. IE you can get fired for being gay, or people can harrass you about being gay without recourse.
Most gay couples can't file joint taxes which results in higher taxes for most gay people. Most gay couples also can't pass their estate to a spouse tax-free, which is even more of a tax burden on gay people, which HAS resulted in the loss of homes and buisnesses when a partner has died.
GLBT are denied special consideration during immigration proceedings, so if you come to this country and your gay spouse is in another country, tough shit.
Also can't recieve a spouse's social security pension or tons of other federal benefits.
Can't get domestic violence protection against a partner or former partner, and a bunch of other 'negative' result things, like divorce, alimony, etc. Quit your job for 20 years to raise your kids with a parnter, and they can leave you out of nowhere, and there's nothing you can do about it.
Though I'm fine with gay marriage the adoption thing is something I have an issue with. To me ( and this is soley my opinion formed from personal experience) gay couples should not take priority over heterosexual couples that can not have children of there own. Again let me share my personal experience that brought me to this belief. My wife and I spent 3 years doing every fertility treatment medical science has to offer. It was three year of hell and I am actually surprised in some ways that our marriage survived it. Having to come home every day and look at the purple and black injection sites all over my wifes abdomen and then having to give her shots in the butt with needles the size that we use on cattle (18 gauge by 1.5 inches long) was almost more then I could handle. Anyways, so we give up and look in to adoption. The public adoption waiting list for us was at about 8 years so we went international and if we are lucky we will have our kid paid off about the time he is rdy for college. My point in this rant being..... Gay couples are physically capable of having children in a natural way, they "choose" not to. I know that that choice is there right and I respect that and would never deny them the right to make that union official. However..... that is a choice my wife and I did not have. It was adoption or nothing and the thought that the 8 yr wait may have been do to or extended by gay couples wanting to adopted does in fact bother me.
Two gay men, both had mumps when they were kids, and both are sterile, incapable of fathering children. Would you feel better about them adopting because they also were incapable of having biological children of their own?
What about people on the waiting list who can, and do, have children of their own, but are choosing to adopt rather than have more naturally?
What about two lesbians, one a disabled paraplegic unable to have children of her own, and the other had uterine cancer, and had to have her uterus removed? Let's make it interesting also and have them both be midgets. Who met while working in the circus.
My apologies for not clarifying. I should have mentioned that I also would hold the same feelings twords heterosexual couples that can have children. I would also say that I would be fine with sterile gay couples adopting. To me this is more a matter of who can and who can not have children or there own then it is of who is gay and who is not but seeing as how this thread is about gay rights that was the form my post took. I also would like to point out that although It could be a possibility I am sure the vast majority of gay couples are not sterile and would guess that (only a guess) the majority of hetero couples looking to adopt are.
Why is the message of the video given with so much hate?
When they speak of the high divorce rate among straight people, they are gloating at the failures of others. If they cared for straight marriage, they would mourn the tragedy. When they teach children to yell obscenities, they are teaching them to hate.
Do they love Ann Coulter and Pat Robinson? No? So the message is that you should love your friends and relations, and hate the other. Even monsters do that. If you want to impress me with your ability to love and avoid hate, learn to love your enemies. Of course, you should not love evil actions nor ideas, but the person.
They're not gloating about divorce, they're pointing out the hilarious hypocrisy of the "sanctity of marriage" crowd. They're not teaching kids to hate by saying the word "fuck". If anyone's teaching kids to hate, it's the ones trying to destroy their families in the name of God's "love".
Again, to put this in perspective: these are people who are told they are subhuman, that are ostracized, that are denied basic human rights, that are assaulted, that are murdered simply because of who they are. The people organizing the assault cloak it in the saintliness of religion. You are not going to get much sympathy from me complaining about the language and tone they use to call out the people that are out to destroy them.
If a person claims to be Christian, and then they commit assault and murder in the name of God, then they are a rather poor Christians. A casual reading of the Gospels would make this clear, so whatever the goals of such "Christians" are, they are certainly not following Jesus.
I'm not fishing for sympathy from you. What I am indicating is that the video (and many pro-gay arguments I've seen) is fundamentally hypocritical. If you want people to believe that gay marriage is fundamentally pro-family and love, you have to act like it. All I see here is Us vs. Them tribalism and hate.
You can say that Anger != Hate all that you want, but I will trust my eyes and ears first.
I can't really see the divorce arguement being valid or even a good point, those statistics are taken from hetero couples. The only one's "allowed" to have a mariage license for the moment, correct? What's to say gay couples don't have the same, lower or even higher statistic? Am I trying to stop or hinder the gay right movement? Not at all. I agree people get married for the wrong reasons or simply have a change of heart down the line, things happen. But it's impossible for 100% of the people to stay with 'the one they love' forever, gay or straight.
If anything I'm anti-divorce, people shouldn't take vows that they believe to be sacred "...in sickness and health...till death due us part..." if they don't truly mean them or refuse to work past their problems.
I'm not trying to rile anything up, I'm just saying it seems to be a flawed arguement. But then again, one shouldn't have to argue in the first place to be married to the one they love or any other of the rights gay couples have been denied.
No one here disagrees with you on that point. I'm pretty sure if they did they wouldn't even be in this guild. Some people just don't agree with the tone of the video.
Is there something fundamentally wrong with not liking one particular video?
Just attempting to illustrate why the people in the video - and others like them - are angry about the issue and tend to react badly when a) told to quit whining b) told they need to behave better c) told that the verysame religious folk driving the oppression must be treated with kid gloves and have their feelings considered in the matter.
I doubt going around on it again will help matters, though.
I could have done w/out the kids cursing at me but for the most part I agree with this message. If you don't like it don't do it and don't judge lest ye be judged.
I agree with the whole shock you with kids cursing and people kissing thing being the wrong path.. those that want gay marriage would do better to use reason instead of in your face hate twords those that they claim are the haters. The side that uses tactics like that are seldom seen as the right side by people who are undecided. I sort of have an issue with it when people call others haters for having an oposing opinion, if you want to express your opinion in the right way keep your mouth shut and go vote. If you win more power to you if you lose dont QQ.
...when your "opinion" is that not everyone deserves the same rights as you do, you're the one who's taken reasonable discussion off the table. And human rights should never be up for a goddamn vote. We have this little thing called the Constitution that's supposed to protect people from having their rights abrogated by the majority; you may have heard of it.
Everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but when your opinion is that people should be oppressed, I reserve the right to tell you your opinion's objectively incorrect and morally wrong.
i believe that gay ppl should have the right to get married, they might be able to teach the rest of the stright ppl how to make it work, especially in CA wher 2/3 ppl are getting a divorce in the first year.
and the constitution, good thing..i just hate to see it used as a soapbox, by ppl like Westboro baptist church, although i belive they have the right to freedom of speech, and lawful protest...it's just abused to the breaking pt, when they get away with the one they pulled at that marine's funeral.
You believe gay and lesbian couples should have the right to marry...but you voted yes on Prop 8? Color me confused.
As for the rest of this thread...man there is a lot of combativeness happening in here. Pretty sure we can all have a conversation rationally like adults without all this "you're part of the problem" diatribe that's being espoused.
For my own opinion, I actually agree with Moo. I think there's a right and wrong way to get a point across. The video? For one, it's a propaganda piece. It's polarizing and relies on simplification and perjorative labels. It reduces the battle over gay rights to "good" versus "evil". If it's intended to be directed at the gay population in an attempt to "rally the troops" then sure, it's aimed at the appropriate audience. If it's aimed at opponents of gay marriage, or even those that are apathetic, unknowledgeable, neutral, uncomfortable, then it's failing. It's an attack, and attacks put people on the defensive. People don't like being put on the defensive.
As for the kids cussing...color me unimpressed. Because yeah, teaching kids to swear and display an aggressive attitude is really going to convince the "family values" crowd that gay couples will make great parents, etc. /endsarcasm
To be clear, I'm not saying that the LBGT community shouldn't be angry at being denied the same rights that I enjoy as a straight woman. I am saying that I personally, as someone that passionately supports gay rights and worked against Prop 8 in CA, feel that there's a better way of getting their point across to their opponents than a video like that. If that video is aimed at the LBGT community, then this whole conversation is totally moot. If it's aimed at gay marriage opponents, then sorry, but I think it doesn't help their argument.
But then again, maybe the aggressive, nasty tone is the point, in which case hey, good luck with that.
If anyone feels that a group of people should be denied rights because of who they are, then they deserve to be put on the defensive. Nobody would be worrying about the feelings of the Klan if this were about race. This is a constitutional issue and shouldn't have been put to the electorate in the first place.
If you're in the minority, then attacking the majority and putting them on the defensive using perjorative labels and propaganda techniques isn't the best way to convince them that your position is the right one. In reality, most people in the "majority" would support LBGT couples having the same rights as heterosexual couples. The problem isn't wanting to deny them the same rights, and by focusing on that you're missing the point and hurting your cause.
The problem is in using the term "marriage" to define the legal partnership between two people that grants them legal rights as a couple. That's what most gay marriage "opponents" have an issue with. It's a fine line that ultimately comes down to semantics. I'm not saying it's right - frankly I think it's silly - but that's what it boils down to.
Like I said, the problem is trying to frame this as an issue where we have to convince people to grant the right via ballot. Can you imagine asking the Southern states to hold referendums on what rights to grant slaves after the Civil War? The majority will almost always vote to oppress the minority, which is why this is an issue best handled by the judicial branch.
It was a bad way to go. If human rights become a ballot initiative, they can be repealed at will by the fickle electorate, or forever denied by those who hate the different. There's a reason we wrote that Constitution thing way back when.
Again, courts interpret laws against the backdrop of the Constitution. Sure, there's always some judicial activism concerns with any Court action, but they always get voiced by the unhappy side. The Courts can't act until the people or their representatives make the laws, and then citizens challenge them.
Having 7 year olds curse at me, just doesn't seem very mature when they're trying to drive home a serious issues. Not to mention this is more a funraising video IMO, I think they would get far better results going to openly gay celebs, but that's just my two cents.
We've tried rational discourse. We've tried distinguished speakers. We've tried explaining the logic behind equal rights for everyone. We've tried appealing to compassion. We've tried pointing out the historical parallels between opponents of gay marriage and those who opposed interracial marriage.
And yet there are still people who will deny basic rights to people just because the idea of two men kissing makes them feel icky. All we get is ignorance, intolerance, bigotry, and best case scenario, people who just wish we'd be quiet about the issue because it makes them uncomfortable.
Yeah, if I was gay I'd be pissed. I'm not gay and I'm pissed just because I have friends that don't have access to the same rights I do because of who they are, and the people who defend that double standard piss me the fuck off. Especially because the instant you start making them defend their position logically it tends to collapse like a house of cards.
Here is the thing though.. in the vid they say a lot of vulgar and idiotic things like "fuck you republicans"..... HELLO you just pissed off 50% of the nations voters and not just the hardliners that are devotly against gay marrage but the moderates who "WOULD" have backed you. Then you round up a bunch of kids and have them scream the f bomb over and over until you have now got question marks going threw the heads of moderate democrates about if these are the type of people you want to rally behind. Whoever put this video together did not have there goals best interest in mind.. I mean come on they did everything they could in that vid to offend as many people as they could... even said so in the title.. Sorry but all gay rights aside stuff like this just chaps my ass. The second somone wants to get in my face i just close my ears because they have no message that i want to hear.
Given that your response to a chunk of the population being denied basic human rights was "shut up and quit crying about it", I'm pretty sure there's nothing they could say that you would want to hear anyway.
We're talking about people being denied basic rights the rest of us take for granted, and your complaint is "they're too mad about it".
If you can't see that this is something worth getting pissed over, then frankly, you're part of the problem.
How would the MLK March have gone over if he stood up there smashing the white folk for being demonic hypocrtical honky tonk shit monkeys?
Its a long hard uphill battle for basic human rights and freedoms. It ain't right but that seems to be the way this world is. Stuff like that video makes the supporting side feel good about themselves and is a morale boost, but it further alienates and makes it a more polarizing picture.
In my opinion, gay rights have already won the fight. More and more kids now don't give a crap about whether someone is gay or not. The fight is being won through attrition, just like all the other human rights campaigns that have happened in our history.
Video's like that I feel just delay the inevitable.
If you're quiet and nice and polite, there is a whole slew of people who don't even give you a thought. Yes videos like the above turn off some people, but the point of them is to not be quiet and nice and police. Being nice and quiet and polite empowers people who tell gay jokes, and vote against gay rights, and so on. The video was mostly meant to rally fundraising, not take a message to the masses, but the message is 'we're angry and we're not going to be quiet about it anymore'.
These are people who have very basic rights withheld from them, stuff that if they took them from me or you, I'd flip the fuck out.
"You can't get married."
"She can't be on your health insurance."
"Yes she's in critical condition, but you can't go into her room and see her because you aren't family."
I'd be dropping some fucking f bombs if that happened to me. Hell, i'm dropping f bombs and it isn't even me because I have a number of close friends who this applies to. These people are angry. They HAVE NOT WON, and in most of the country and world they have to hide who they are on a daily basis.
So the makers of the video are standing up and are basically saying what most of the Gay community is thinking. Fuck this shit. Give me my fucking rights now assholes.
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Also I think it's funny how many people get upset when kids swear in things.
The fight is over in my mind but that doesn't mean there are not battles left to be fought. There are battles for human rights going on every day of the year, with all sorts of people all over the world.
The fight to get gays equal marriage rights is an inevitable win in my opinion. Not because of the people out there fighting for it, but for the people that just see nothing wrong with it, myself included.
I still disagree with the premise that this video helps. I think in the short run it will boost morale and be a help, but in the long run it will have a negative impact on this society's view of the gay rights movement. To me, the best example is Ghandi. I think the way he appraoched it was powerful and got the message across.
The whole point, as I see it, is to have gays not just be accepted, but to have sexual orientation be a complete non issue. This video just doesn't seem to do that, it alienates the groups. It makes what was already a sharp divide, even sharper. We should be working together to heal the divide, not drive a stake further into it.
I know that its the harder path. I know that sometimes you want to just put your hands up and scream that we should't have to do it this way, its commen sense! But I think the end result is worth it.
Group 1 - People who support gay marriage and feel that it should be law.
Group 2 - People who personally think it's wrong, but don't feel law should prevent it.
Group 3 - People who have no fucking clue, ie undecideds.
Group 4 - People who personally think it's wrong and think law should prevent it.
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Group 1 people will either like or dislike the video, but it won't change their views that gay marriage should be legal (and if it does then they're a moron).
Group 2 people will most likely dislike the video, but it won't change their views that gay marraige should be legal (and if it does then they're lying to themselves about who they are and what they truly believe).
Group 3 people who the fuck knows. If you don't have an opinion on it by the time seeing the video it could go either way. Even split. Some it might even make them move into group 1 and 2, but it's doubtful that just disliking the video will move them to group 4.
Group 4 people will dislike it, nothing will sway their opinion anyway other than their own death or a radical life experieince, so who gives a shit how they feel about it.
----
Yeah there are going to be people in every group (and most of the people in groups 2 and 4) who will dislike the video, but if it raises money and gets people fired up in Group 1 to do other things like protests in front of a courthouse for instance, then the eventual positive move from the video far outweighs any negatives, which won't radically shift anyone's opinions. In addition if one gay kid in college sees the video, thinks it's funny, and realizes he or she isn't alone and gives them the strength to stand up to the personal persecution they face and not commit suicide, then the video is 100% successfull as well.
Tone Argument: A debate shutdown tactic where it's suggested that if (minority group X) only expressed themselves in a more pleasant manner, they would be more successful. Note that the focus is on the way it's said and the way it makes the majority group feel rather than the substance of the argument itself.
C'mon guys. Yeah, sometimes you'll get somewhere playing nice but you know what? Sometimes at the end of the day making sure the majority is comfortable means they can also be comfortable going "oh you'll get yours someday" and not doing things to help. Sometimes you're trying to make people seriously uncomfortable so they'll actually think about the issues for a change. Alternatively, sometimes you're just really tired of all this bullshit and that was your last straw.
Gay rights didn't get anywhere just playing nice and nothing else. Stonewall riots, anyone?
I think the kids dropping the f-bombs is my favorite part. Even as open-minded as I am, that was jarring the first time I heard it.
But yeah, nailed it on the head. Speaking as the white devil, who's never been discriminated against in any meaningful way, shape or form, if I had to go through what any minority group in this country has had to go through I would have lost my fucking mind. These people aren't too angry, they're just now starting to get close to being angry enough.
This isn't some he-said she-said political issue that's meaningless except for getting out the vote on election day. This shit is destroying lives and killing people. I'm angry at people who aren't angry about it, because if you're not angry about people not being given the same rights as everybody else then what the fuck is America for?
You had MLK advocating peace, and you had Malcolm X and others advocating struggle. Both sides were integral to achieving the goal.
More and more kids don't give a crap about whether someone is gay or not, but there's still way too many people who do. People are being hounded, ostracized, denied fundamental rights, and even killed because of sexual orientation. The fight is very, very far from won.
Never once have I stated my own standpoint on gay marriage wich I do indeed support. My problem is with the attitude and the way the message is being put forth. So you sir in your hurry to feed your own hate twords everyone that you suspect may have a different veiw then you misjudged me. So tell me, who is it that Ian truly part of is problem.
What I took offense to was the statement that people should just shut up and quit crying about being denied civil rights, which is really an odd statement for someone who ostensibly believes in equal treatment for everyone. And the idea that there's really two sides to this issue that are equally defensible, when it's pretty clear-cut.
EXACTLY equal treatment for everyone.. that includes all those that are both for AND against gay marriage. You can't call someone evil just because they see things differently and that goes for both sides. Until you walk a mile in someone shoes to don't have that right. There is no way of knowing what life experiences that person has had that have effected there veiw one way or the other. So I guess the moral of the story is.if.you want to preach about not hating the the first thing you have to do is ... stop hating.
Firstly you CAN call someone evil because they see things differently. Was Hitler evil for wanting to exterminate the jews, or just evil because he went through with it. Was that thought itself evil? Now applying Hitler level evil to say....thinking about buying a McDonald's Happy Meal, is overkill, but the point remains that there is a level of judgement of right and wrong in thought as well as action.
Secondly, we're not really talking about people who see things differently, we're talking about people who are imposing their worldview on others. Honestly, I don't have an iota of a problem with a hardcore christian thinking gay marriage is wrong. That's his or her right. What I, and these people, are opposed to is those people imposing their beliefs on others.
Having a religious view that strips a group of people of human rights is bad enough, not Hitler evil, but not exactly loving and giving everyone flowers either; putting that worldview into law and actually stripping millions of people of basic human rights is pretty bad.
Here is what I mean by not dismissing everyone that is against gay marriage evil. I know several people that have done so much good in there lives... the volunteer at shelters the take in orphans they walk such a straight and narrow and do everything they can for others whenever they can that don't agree with yay marriage. They have been raised all there life with that notion put into there head. You said it yourself tal in another post, it take a rare person to be able to cast off a lifetime of teaching and reinforcement and if they can't achieve.that it does not make them evil. In many ways they are victims themselves. In rural America we don't have the benefit of having a melting pot of ideas anew philosophies that people may have in more metro areas. All people out here see is the amped up news stories where people are screaming about how awful they are for there beliefs wich further alienates them and entrenches there veiw.
You can be against gay marriage all you want, but the instant you act to deny that right to a gay or lesbian person, you've crossed the line from "acceptable if un-PC personal belief" to "oppressor". I don't care how many good works someone does, if they are fine with denying someone else a basic right, then they are wrong and emphatically so on that issue.
If they're upset about people pointing out what awful beliefs they hold, maybe the solution is not to hold such awful beliefs.
Effect of denying equal rights on a gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered person:
Cannot marry who they choose
Cannot utilize their spouse's medical insurance
Cannot adopt children
Cannot visit sick or dying spouse in the hospital
Effect of passing equal rights on a hetero person who's against gay marriage:
Absolutely Fucking Nothing
You're arguing an equivalency here that's completely false. As long as you keep doing that, I'm going to keep judging it as false. That's just the way it is.
The only way to treat both sides equally or even close to equally is to give both sides equal rights. And having the right to deny someone else their rights isn't a right.
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Replying to this
Replying to this part:
"Effect of denying equal rights on a gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered person:
Cannot marry who they choose
Cannot utilize their spouse's medical insurance
Cannot adopt children
Cannot visit sick or dying spouse in the hospital"
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As a doctor, I can tell you the visitation argument is pure hyperbole. I've never heard of a gay significant other being denied hospital visitation. Anyone straight, gay, related, or no can be legally designated a health care surrogate/power of attorney for medical decision making and I have had several end-of-life discussions with the partners of gay patients.
When in California, I voted in support of gay marraige. Personally, if I couldn't have biological children with my spouse the pros of being single would've outweighed the cons of marriage, so unsure of the real impetus for all the hub-bub other than a feeling of perceived inequality.
Not a fan of the kids/overall language of the video.
Adoption is a separate issue but it should be mentioned that single, unmarried people certainly can adopt children.
It happens
I have friends it's happened to, so it's a bit more than hyperbole. One was in a car crash, and they wouldn't let the partner in, even though they had pages and pages of legal powers of attorney etc. The hosptial ended up getting a police officer to bar them entry, and they had to actually go to court to get an...something. Injunction? I forget. It definitely varies state by state, and region by region. If you're in a city hospital in a blue state I'd be far more shocked if you got denied entry as a gay partner than a rural hosptial in a red state. Just sayin.
Adopting is certainly easier these days, though man it's expensive (for everyone).
There's more than was even listed above. Depending on the state and company you might not be able to get on the same helath insurance. There's also alot more rights and laws that come into play regarding spouses that you don't get from reams of civil agreements. There are lists. Things like the right to not testify against your spouse in court.
In many states there's no right to protection rom harrassement and discrimination based on sexual orientation. IE you can get fired for being gay, or people can harrass you about being gay without recourse.
Most gay couples can't file joint taxes which results in higher taxes for most gay people. Most gay couples also can't pass their estate to a spouse tax-free, which is even more of a tax burden on gay people, which HAS resulted in the loss of homes and buisnesses when a partner has died.
GLBT are denied special consideration during immigration proceedings, so if you come to this country and your gay spouse is in another country, tough shit.
Also can't recieve a spouse's social security pension or tons of other federal benefits.
Can't get domestic violence protection against a partner or former partner, and a bunch of other 'negative' result things, like divorce, alimony, etc. Quit your job for 20 years to raise your kids with a parnter, and they can leave you out of nowhere, and there's nothing you can do about it.
etc etc etc.
If you're hospitalized in a
If you're hospitalized in a red state rural hospital, you're generally fucked.
The estate tax repeal is gone for all of us on Jan1 regardless.
Though I'm fine with gay
Though I'm fine with gay marriage the adoption thing is something I have an issue with. To me ( and this is soley my opinion formed from personal experience) gay couples should not take priority over heterosexual couples that can not have children of there own. Again let me share my personal experience that brought me to this belief. My wife and I spent 3 years doing every fertility treatment medical science has to offer. It was three year of hell and I am actually surprised in some ways that our marriage survived it. Having to come home every day and look at the purple and black injection sites all over my wifes abdomen and then having to give her shots in the butt with needles the size that we use on cattle (18 gauge by 1.5 inches long) was almost more then I could handle. Anyways, so we give up and look in to adoption. The public adoption waiting list for us was at about 8 years so we went international and if we are lucky we will have our kid paid off about the time he is rdy for college. My point in this rant being..... Gay couples are physically capable of having children in a natural way, they "choose" not to. I know that that choice is there right and I respect that and would never deny them the right to make that union official. However..... that is a choice my wife and I did not have. It was adoption or nothing and the thought that the 8 yr wait may have been do to or extended by gay couples wanting to adopted does in fact bother me.
theoretical question
Two gay men, both had mumps when they were kids, and both are sterile, incapable of fathering children. Would you feel better about them adopting because they also were incapable of having biological children of their own?
What about people on the waiting list who can, and do, have children of their own, but are choosing to adopt rather than have more naturally?
What about two lesbians, one a disabled paraplegic unable to have children of her own, and the other had uterine cancer, and had to have her uterus removed? Let's make it interesting also and have them both be midgets. Who met while working in the circus.
My apologies for not
My apologies for not clarifying. I should have mentioned that I also would hold the same feelings twords heterosexual couples that can have children. I would also say that I would be fine with sterile gay couples adopting. To me this is more a matter of who can and who can not have children or there own then it is of who is gay and who is not but seeing as how this thread is about gay rights that was the form my post took. I also would like to point out that although It could be a possibility I am sure the vast majority of gay couples are not sterile and would guess that (only a guess) the majority of hetero couples looking to adopt are.
If they against hate,
Why is the message of the video given with so much hate?
When they speak of the high divorce rate among straight people, they are gloating at the failures of others. If they cared for straight marriage, they would mourn the tragedy. When they teach children to yell obscenities, they are teaching them to hate.
Do they love Ann Coulter and Pat Robinson? No? So the message is that you should love your friends and relations, and hate the other. Even monsters do that. If you want to impress me with your ability to love and avoid hate, learn to love your enemies. Of course, you should not love evil actions nor ideas, but the person.
Anger != Hate.
They're not gloating about divorce, they're pointing out the hilarious hypocrisy of the "sanctity of marriage" crowd. They're not teaching kids to hate by saying the word "fuck". If anyone's teaching kids to hate, it's the ones trying to destroy their families in the name of God's "love".
Again, to put this in perspective: these are people who are told they are subhuman, that are ostracized, that are denied basic human rights, that are assaulted, that are murdered simply because of who they are. The people organizing the assault cloak it in the saintliness of religion. You are not going to get much sympathy from me complaining about the language and tone they use to call out the people that are out to destroy them.
Christians
If a person claims to be Christian, and then they commit assault and murder in the name of God, then they are a rather poor Christians. A casual reading of the Gospels would make this clear, so whatever the goals of such "Christians" are, they are certainly not following Jesus.
I'm not fishing for sympathy from you. What I am indicating is that the video (and many pro-gay arguments I've seen) is fundamentally hypocritical. If you want people to believe that gay marriage is fundamentally pro-family and love, you have to act like it. All I see here is Us vs. Them tribalism and hate.
You can say that Anger != Hate all that you want, but I will trust my eyes and ears first.
Divorce Arguement...
I can't really see the divorce arguement being valid or even a good point, those statistics are taken from hetero couples. The only one's "allowed" to have a mariage license for the moment, correct? What's to say gay couples don't have the same, lower or even higher statistic? Am I trying to stop or hinder the gay right movement? Not at all. I agree people get married for the wrong reasons or simply have a change of heart down the line, things happen. But it's impossible for 100% of the people to stay with 'the one they love' forever, gay or straight.
If anything I'm anti-divorce, people shouldn't take vows that they believe to be sacred "...in sickness and health...till death due us part..." if they don't truly mean them or refuse to work past their problems.
I'm not trying to rile anything up, I'm just saying it seems to be a flawed arguement. But then again, one shouldn't have to argue in the first place to be married to the one they love or any other of the rights gay couples have been denied.
How about this argument?
Denying rights to a subset of the population based on their identity is wrong.
Honestly...
No one here disagrees with you on that point. I'm pretty sure if they did they wouldn't even be in this guild. Some people just don't agree with the tone of the video.
Is there something fundamentally wrong with not liking one particular video?
No, nothing wrong with it.
Just attempting to illustrate why the people in the video - and others like them - are angry about the issue and tend to react badly when a) told to quit whining b) told they need to behave better c) told that the verysame religious folk driving the oppression must be treated with kid gloves and have their feelings considered in the matter.
I doubt going around on it again will help matters, though.
Normally I don't care what
Normally I don't care what other people do, but this commercial is so annoying it makes me want to vote for prop 8 out of spite.
I could have done w/out the
I could have done w/out the kids cursing at me but for the most part I agree with this message. If you don't like it don't do it and don't judge lest ye be judged.
I agree with the whole shock
I agree with the whole shock you with kids cursing and people kissing thing being the wrong path.. those that want gay marriage would do better to use reason instead of in your face hate twords those that they claim are the haters. The side that uses tactics like that are seldom seen as the right side by people who are undecided. I sort of have an issue with it when people call others haters for having an oposing opinion, if you want to express your opinion in the right way keep your mouth shut and go vote. If you win more power to you if you lose dont QQ.
Well...
...when your "opinion" is that not everyone deserves the same rights as you do, you're the one who's taken reasonable discussion off the table. And human rights should never be up for a goddamn vote. We have this little thing called the Constitution that's supposed to protect people from having their rights abrogated by the majority; you may have heard of it.
Everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but when your opinion is that people should be oppressed, I reserve the right to tell you your opinion's objectively incorrect and morally wrong.
i actually voted yes on prop 8
i believe that gay ppl should have the right to get married, they might be able to teach the rest of the stright ppl how to make it work, especially in CA wher 2/3 ppl are getting a divorce in the first year.
and the constitution, good thing..i just hate to see it used as a soapbox, by ppl like Westboro baptist church, although i belive they have the right to freedom of speech, and lawful protest...it's just abused to the breaking pt, when they get away with the one they pulled at that marine's funeral.
Wait
You believe gay and lesbian couples should have the right to marry...but you voted yes on Prop 8? Color me confused.
As for the rest of this thread...man there is a lot of combativeness happening in here. Pretty sure we can all have a conversation rationally like adults without all this "you're part of the problem" diatribe that's being espoused.
For my own opinion, I actually agree with Moo. I think there's a right and wrong way to get a point across. The video? For one, it's a propaganda piece. It's polarizing and relies on simplification and perjorative labels. It reduces the battle over gay rights to "good" versus "evil". If it's intended to be directed at the gay population in an attempt to "rally the troops" then sure, it's aimed at the appropriate audience. If it's aimed at opponents of gay marriage, or even those that are apathetic, unknowledgeable, neutral, uncomfortable, then it's failing. It's an attack, and attacks put people on the defensive. People don't like being put on the defensive.
As for the kids cussing...color me unimpressed. Because yeah, teaching kids to swear and display an aggressive attitude is really going to convince the "family values" crowd that gay couples will make great parents, etc. /endsarcasm
To be clear, I'm not saying that the LBGT community shouldn't be angry at being denied the same rights that I enjoy as a straight woman. I am saying that I personally, as someone that passionately supports gay rights and worked against Prop 8 in CA, feel that there's a better way of getting their point across to their opponents than a video like that. If that video is aimed at the LBGT community, then this whole conversation is totally moot. If it's aimed at gay marriage opponents, then sorry, but I think it doesn't help their argument.
But then again, maybe the aggressive, nasty tone is the point, in which case hey, good luck with that.
oops
i'm sorry, i supported gay marrage, and voted for it the first time, forgot that prop 8 was a repeal.
I'm sorry.
If anyone feels that a group of people should be denied rights because of who they are, then they deserve to be put on the defensive. Nobody would be worrying about the feelings of the Klan if this were about race. This is a constitutional issue and shouldn't have been put to the electorate in the first place.
Minority vs. Majority
If you're in the minority, then attacking the majority and putting them on the defensive using perjorative labels and propaganda techniques isn't the best way to convince them that your position is the right one. In reality, most people in the "majority" would support LBGT couples having the same rights as heterosexual couples. The problem isn't wanting to deny them the same rights, and by focusing on that you're missing the point and hurting your cause.
The problem is in using the term "marriage" to define the legal partnership between two people that grants them legal rights as a couple. That's what most gay marriage "opponents" have an issue with. It's a fine line that ultimately comes down to semantics. I'm not saying it's right - frankly I think it's silly - but that's what it boils down to.
"Separate but Equal"...
...enough said on that count.
Like I said, the problem is trying to frame this as an issue where we have to convince people to grant the right via ballot. Can you imagine asking the Southern states to hold referendums on what rights to grant slaves after the Civil War? The majority will almost always vote to oppress the minority, which is why this is an issue best handled by the judicial branch.
True
I don't disagree with you there. It's sad that it went to ballot in CA before it went to the courts.
Aye.
It was a bad way to go. If human rights become a ballot initiative, they can be repealed at will by the fickle electorate, or forever denied by those who hate the different. There's a reason we wrote that Constitution thing way back when.
It's not a Constitutional argument in that respect.
Again, courts interpret laws against the backdrop of the Constitution. Sure, there's always some judicial activism concerns with any Court action, but they always get voiced by the unhappy side. The Courts can't act until the people or their representatives make the laws, and then citizens challenge them.
Had to...
Courts interpret laws, Prop 8 made a law, Courts enjoined enforcement of the law.
My point is there are other
My point is there are other ways to push an agenda other then with an in your face attitude.
Not to mention
Having 7 year olds curse at me, just doesn't seem very mature when they're trying to drive home a serious issues. Not to mention this is more a funraising video IMO, I think they would get far better results going to openly gay celebs, but that's just my two cents.
Tried it.
We've tried rational discourse. We've tried distinguished speakers. We've tried explaining the logic behind equal rights for everyone. We've tried appealing to compassion. We've tried pointing out the historical parallels between opponents of gay marriage and those who opposed interracial marriage.
And yet there are still people who will deny basic rights to people just because the idea of two men kissing makes them feel icky. All we get is ignorance, intolerance, bigotry, and best case scenario, people who just wish we'd be quiet about the issue because it makes them uncomfortable.
Yeah, if I was gay I'd be pissed. I'm not gay and I'm pissed just because I have friends that don't have access to the same rights I do because of who they are, and the people who defend that double standard piss me the fuck off. Especially because the instant you start making them defend their position logically it tends to collapse like a house of cards.
Here is the thing though.. in
Here is the thing though.. in the vid they say a lot of vulgar and idiotic things like "fuck you republicans"..... HELLO you just pissed off 50% of the nations voters and not just the hardliners that are devotly against gay marrage but the moderates who "WOULD" have backed you. Then you round up a bunch of kids and have them scream the f bomb over and over until you have now got question marks going threw the heads of moderate democrates about if these are the type of people you want to rally behind. Whoever put this video together did not have there goals best interest in mind.. I mean come on they did everything they could in that vid to offend as many people as they could... even said so in the title.. Sorry but all gay rights aside stuff like this just chaps my ass. The second somone wants to get in my face i just close my ears because they have no message that i want to hear.
...
Given that your response to a chunk of the population being denied basic human rights was "shut up and quit crying about it", I'm pretty sure there's nothing they could say that you would want to hear anyway.
We're talking about people being denied basic rights the rest of us take for granted, and your complaint is "they're too mad about it".
If you can't see that this is something worth getting pissed over, then frankly, you're part of the problem.
Just a thought
How would the MLK March have gone over if he stood up there smashing the white folk for being demonic hypocrtical honky tonk shit monkeys?
Its a long hard uphill battle for basic human rights and freedoms. It ain't right but that seems to be the way this world is. Stuff like that video makes the supporting side feel good about themselves and is a morale boost, but it further alienates and makes it a more polarizing picture.
In my opinion, gay rights have already won the fight. More and more kids now don't give a crap about whether someone is gay or not. The fight is being won through attrition, just like all the other human rights campaigns that have happened in our history.
Video's like that I feel just delay the inevitable.
Speaking as someone who has been discriminated against
If you're quiet and nice and polite, there is a whole slew of people who don't even give you a thought. Yes videos like the above turn off some people, but the point of them is to not be quiet and nice and police. Being nice and quiet and polite empowers people who tell gay jokes, and vote against gay rights, and so on. The video was mostly meant to rally fundraising, not take a message to the masses, but the message is 'we're angry and we're not going to be quiet about it anymore'.
These are people who have very basic rights withheld from them, stuff that if they took them from me or you, I'd flip the fuck out.
"You can't get married."
"She can't be on your health insurance."
"Yes she's in critical condition, but you can't go into her room and see her because you aren't family."
I'd be dropping some fucking f bombs if that happened to me. Hell, i'm dropping f bombs and it isn't even me because I have a number of close friends who this applies to. These people are angry. They HAVE NOT WON, and in most of the country and world they have to hide who they are on a daily basis.
So the makers of the video are standing up and are basically saying what most of the Gay community is thinking. Fuck this shit. Give me my fucking rights now assholes.
---
Also I think it's funny how many people get upset when kids swear in things.
Clarification
The fight is over in my mind but that doesn't mean there are not battles left to be fought. There are battles for human rights going on every day of the year, with all sorts of people all over the world.
The fight to get gays equal marriage rights is an inevitable win in my opinion. Not because of the people out there fighting for it, but for the people that just see nothing wrong with it, myself included.
I still disagree with the premise that this video helps. I think in the short run it will boost morale and be a help, but in the long run it will have a negative impact on this society's view of the gay rights movement. To me, the best example is Ghandi. I think the way he appraoched it was powerful and got the message across.
The whole point, as I see it, is to have gays not just be accepted, but to have sexual orientation be a complete non issue. This video just doesn't seem to do that, it alienates the groups. It makes what was already a sharp divide, even sharper. We should be working together to heal the divide, not drive a stake further into it.
I know that its the harder path. I know that sometimes you want to just put your hands up and scream that we should't have to do it this way, its commen sense! But I think the end result is worth it.
Here's the Thing
How would we segment the population?
Group 1 - People who support gay marriage and feel that it should be law.
Group 2 - People who personally think it's wrong, but don't feel law should prevent it.
Group 3 - People who have no fucking clue, ie undecideds.
Group 4 - People who personally think it's wrong and think law should prevent it.
----
Group 1 people will either like or dislike the video, but it won't change their views that gay marriage should be legal (and if it does then they're a moron).
Group 2 people will most likely dislike the video, but it won't change their views that gay marraige should be legal (and if it does then they're lying to themselves about who they are and what they truly believe).
Group 3 people who the fuck knows. If you don't have an opinion on it by the time seeing the video it could go either way. Even split. Some it might even make them move into group 1 and 2, but it's doubtful that just disliking the video will move them to group 4.
Group 4 people will dislike it, nothing will sway their opinion anyway other than their own death or a radical life experieince, so who gives a shit how they feel about it.
----
Yeah there are going to be people in every group (and most of the people in groups 2 and 4) who will dislike the video, but if it raises money and gets people fired up in Group 1 to do other things like protests in front of a courthouse for instance, then the eventual positive move from the video far outweighs any negatives, which won't radically shift anyone's opinions. In addition if one gay kid in college sees the video, thinks it's funny, and realizes he or she isn't alone and gives them the strength to stand up to the personal persecution they face and not commit suicide, then the video is 100% successfull as well.
There's a whole lot of tone argument going on in here
Tone Argument: A debate shutdown tactic where it's suggested that if (minority group X) only expressed themselves in a more pleasant manner, they would be more successful. Note that the focus is on the way it's said and the way it makes the majority group feel rather than the substance of the argument itself.
C'mon guys. Yeah, sometimes you'll get somewhere playing nice but you know what? Sometimes at the end of the day making sure the majority is comfortable means they can also be comfortable going "oh you'll get yours someday" and not doing things to help. Sometimes you're trying to make people seriously uncomfortable so they'll actually think about the issues for a change. Alternatively, sometimes you're just really tired of all this bullshit and that was your last straw.
Gay rights didn't get anywhere just playing nice and nothing else. Stonewall riots, anyone?
Seriously.
I think the kids dropping the f-bombs is my favorite part. Even as open-minded as I am, that was jarring the first time I heard it.
But yeah, nailed it on the head. Speaking as the white devil, who's never been discriminated against in any meaningful way, shape or form, if I had to go through what any minority group in this country has had to go through I would have lost my fucking mind. These people aren't too angry, they're just now starting to get close to being angry enough.
This isn't some he-said she-said political issue that's meaningless except for getting out the vote on election day. This shit is destroying lives and killing people. I'm angry at people who aren't angry about it, because if you're not angry about people not being given the same rights as everybody else then what the fuck is America for?
The Civil Rights struggle had two sides.
You had MLK advocating peace, and you had Malcolm X and others advocating struggle. Both sides were integral to achieving the goal.
More and more kids don't give a crap about whether someone is gay or not, but there's still way too many people who do. People are being hounded, ostracized, denied fundamental rights, and even killed because of sexual orientation. The fight is very, very far from won.
I said my piece
I think you are getting angry at the choir but whatever man. XD
I am out, work time for me.
Never once have I stated my
Never once have I stated my own standpoint on gay marriage wich I do indeed support. My problem is with the attitude and the way the message is being put forth. So you sir in your hurry to feed your own hate twords everyone that you suspect may have a different veiw then you misjudged me. So tell me, who is it that Ian truly part of is problem.
Congratulations.
You're a human being.
What I took offense to was the statement that people should just shut up and quit crying about being denied civil rights, which is really an odd statement for someone who ostensibly believes in equal treatment for everyone. And the idea that there's really two sides to this issue that are equally defensible, when it's pretty clear-cut.
EXACTLY equal treatment for
EXACTLY equal treatment for everyone.. that includes all those that are both for AND against gay marriage. You can't call someone evil just because they see things differently and that goes for both sides. Until you walk a mile in someone shoes to don't have that right. There is no way of knowing what life experiences that person has had that have effected there veiw one way or the other. So I guess the moral of the story is.if.you want to preach about not hating the the first thing you have to do is ... stop hating.
Well
couple flaws in your argument...
Firstly you CAN call someone evil because they see things differently. Was Hitler evil for wanting to exterminate the jews, or just evil because he went through with it. Was that thought itself evil? Now applying Hitler level evil to say....thinking about buying a McDonald's Happy Meal, is overkill, but the point remains that there is a level of judgement of right and wrong in thought as well as action.
Secondly, we're not really talking about people who see things differently, we're talking about people who are imposing their worldview on others. Honestly, I don't have an iota of a problem with a hardcore christian thinking gay marriage is wrong. That's his or her right. What I, and these people, are opposed to is those people imposing their beliefs on others.
Having a religious view that strips a group of people of human rights is bad enough, not Hitler evil, but not exactly loving and giving everyone flowers either; putting that worldview into law and actually stripping millions of people of basic human rights is pretty bad.
Here is what I mean by not
Here is what I mean by not dismissing everyone that is against gay marriage evil. I know several people that have done so much good in there lives... the volunteer at shelters the take in orphans they walk such a straight and narrow and do everything they can for others whenever they can that don't agree with yay marriage. They have been raised all there life with that notion put into there head. You said it yourself tal in another post, it take a rare person to be able to cast off a lifetime of teaching and reinforcement and if they can't achieve.that it does not make them evil. In many ways they are victims themselves. In rural America we don't have the benefit of having a melting pot of ideas anew philosophies that people may have in more metro areas. All people out here see is the amped up news stories where people are screaming about how awful they are for there beliefs wich further alienates them and entrenches there veiw.
You stop being a victim the moment you victimize someone.
You can be against gay marriage all you want, but the instant you act to deny that right to a gay or lesbian person, you've crossed the line from "acceptable if un-PC personal belief" to "oppressor". I don't care how many good works someone does, if they are fine with denying someone else a basic right, then they are wrong and emphatically so on that issue.
If they're upset about people pointing out what awful beliefs they hold, maybe the solution is not to hold such awful beliefs.
Like I said... walk a mile...
Like I said... walk a mile... there is only one person on this thread making judgements... I'm done..
Okay, I'll walk that mile.
Effect of denying equal rights on a gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered person:
Cannot marry who they choose
Cannot utilize their spouse's medical insurance
Cannot adopt children
Cannot visit sick or dying spouse in the hospital
Effect of passing equal rights on a hetero person who's against gay marriage:
Absolutely Fucking Nothing
You're arguing an equivalency here that's completely false. As long as you keep doing that, I'm going to keep judging it as false. That's just the way it is.
The only way to treat both sides equally or even close to equally is to give both sides equal rights. And having the right to deny someone else their rights isn't a right.
Please by all means continue
Please by all means continue to make an ass of yourself.. I enjoy it.