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But we are going to continue to fight for our rights. You just don't get it.
Oh, we get it all right. We just don't believe that "you" (whoever the "we" was in your post) have any such "right" to force the rest of society to pretend that a same-sex couple is a married couple. Consenting adults have the right to live together, to have sex together, and to create legal bonds between themselves. And all members of our society have the right to be treated with decency and respect. And every adult in our society has the right to get married. But if a person wants to forego marriage, for whatever reason, he/she has no "right" to pick another relationship and demand that it be considered a marriage.
THAT is the issue on the table, the one that the majority of voters spoke out on. Picking a random kind of "partner" and calling it a marriage isn't a human right.
The fact is that marriages exist to define, stabilize, and protect male/female bonds that create other humans as part of the larger culture and society. Consenting adults can live together, have sex together, adopt a common name, and legally tie themselves to each other under a variety of contracts. But not all such relationships are "marriages."
Please enlighten us on what a definition of a word can do for a marriage that is more beneficial than allowing them to "live together, have sex together, adopt a common name, and legally tie themselves to each other under a variety of contracts."
And I don't see how you can be so confident that your (current) version of marriage is the right one. Prop 8 denies polygamy as well as same sex marriage, which goes against the LDS opinion. Or, did they change their opinion? I can't keep up. I do remember reading a passage that Joseph Smith wrote, saying something about how his religion is exactly the way it always should be, but that's beside the point.
Marriage was not clearly defined in the early bible, but God's favored people generally had multiple wives, and also had sex out of wedlock with concubines. The definition of marriage changes, even in your religion. So I fail to see the point of being so anal over its 'current' definition (pun intended).
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Originally Posted by PaulMcNabb
Oh, we get it all right. We just don't believe that "you" (whoever the "we" was in your post) have any such "right" to force the rest of society to pretend that a same-sex couple is a married couple. Consenting adults have the right to live together, to have sex together, and to create legal bonds between themselves. And all members of our society have the right to be treated with decency and respect. And every adult in our society has the right to get married. But if a person wants to forego marriage, for whatever reason, he/she has no "right" to pick another relationship and demand that it be considered a marriage.
THAT is the issue on the table, the one that the majority of voters spoke out on. Picking a random kind of "partner" and calling it a marriage isn't a human right.
If it's not about the law, then why do you care what the law says it is? If you don't recognize same sex marriages in your church, why do you care what the state calls it? Here's what you don't get. IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU.
Gay marriage is coming...just not yet. And when it does, I doubt it will be Armageddon as so many predict. Conversely, what so many people don't understand is that marriage is not a "right". Not like voting. If marriage were a "right" then this wouldn't be an issue and we wouldn't be voting on it.
As for the Mormon Church becoming involved, well let me tell you, as Americans, they have the right to vote as they wish and donate money as they wish. Just like PFLAG, ***** Nation, NOW, Act-Up, the Black Caucus, ad infinitum. Just because they're a religious group does not mean that anyone can prevent them from supporting the causes they want. If you don't like it, be prepared to fight to eliminate it--but also be prepared to fight to keep YOUR right to vote as you want. They voted their conscience just as the other side did. Why do they not have this right?
As for the Mormon Church becoming involved, well let me tell you, as Americans, they have the right to vote as they wish and donate money as they wish.
The situation is even worse than that, Arf. The LDS Church did NOT donate any money to the Prop8 issue. The opposition is complaining because individuals supported Prop8 with their own, personal, non-tax-exempt money.
So we have individual Americans donating their own money with no tax benefit to themselves or their church, and then we have people shrieking that the church they belong to should lose its tax exempt status.
The funny thing is that the Mormon Church COULD have donated $20 million or $40 million or more and STILL have been completely in compliance with regulations regarding tax exempt organizations.
So the Mormon Church could have legally donated tens or hundreds of millions of dollars, but did not. Some of its members donated personal money for a cause, but those weren't tax exempt dollars.
But let's not let facts get in the way of a good rant...
Please enlighten us on what a definition of a word can do for a marriage that is more beneficial than allowing them to "live together, have sex together, adopt a common name, and legally tie themselves to each other under a variety of contracts."
A good question. And that brings up why, if there was no benefit to be gained by the definition, the NO side of the argument even bothered to vote.
There clearly is something important about the definition, and it doesn't have to do with legal or personal rights. It has to do with taking a societal institution and redefining what it is. There ARE arguments to be made that our society has a vested interest in promoting and encouraging heterosexual marriage. There ARE arguments to be made that children and society as a whole are benefited when heterosexual marriage is held up as both the ideal and as a special institution within society.
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And I don't see how you can be so confident that your (current) version of marriage is the right one.
I am always open to the idea that I am wrong. It is entirely possible. I suspect it has happened sometime in my past.
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Prop 8 denies polygamy as well as same sex marriage, which goes against the LDS opinion. Or, did they change their opinion? I can't keep up. I do remember reading a passage that Joseph Smith wrote, saying something about how his religion is exactly the way it always should be, but that's beside the point.
But there is a drastic difference here. The 19th century Mormons were NOT asking that their marriages be supported by the government in any way or that they be accepted by society as normal. What they were asking is that the sheriff and his men would stop bursting into homes in the middle of the night to drag men off to prison (yes it happened and was a big problem) for claiming that the person they were sleeping next to was a wife instead of a prostitute or mistress. They were asking that their homes and property not be confiscated for such a claim. I don't know how much you know about the history of polygamy in 19th century Utah, but Mormon men were denied the right to serve on juries and in public offices because they were Mormon. That is, if you were arrested by the sheriff, the only people who were allowed to judge you were people who first professed to be hostile to you. Mormons were NOT asking for polygamy to be accepted as the societal norm, they were asking that they be allowed to come out of hiding to visit their families and earn a living and to be left alone. They were willing to work out among themselves issues of inheritance and other rights. 19th century Mormon plural marriage and Prop 8 are not related.
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Marriage was not clearly defined in the early bible, but God's favored people generally had multiple wives, and also had sex out of wedlock with concubines. The definition of marriage changes, even in your religion. So I fail to see the point of being so anal over its 'current' definition (pun intended).
Yes, historically there have been times when both polygyny and monogamy were accepted as family norms in certain societies. Both were protected by societal rules because both involved heterosexual relationships that created family units for creating and raising new members of the society. There were strong reasons for protecting these relationships, including, in some societies, such drastic measures as death for people who interfered with them. You are now moving into one of the reasons and evidences that a rational, sympathetic, tolerant, intelligent person could see Prop 8 as a good thing for society.
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If it's not about the law, then why do you care what the law says it is? If you don't recognize same sex marriages in your church, why do you care what the state calls it? Here's what you don't get. IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU.
It IS about the law. But it isn't about what two consenting adults can do together. It is about what every member of society would be required to do and say about those relationships. It is about the legal requirements of those who want to discuss families and marriage and to promote the same.
And here's what you don't get. IT HAS SOMETHING TO DO WITH ME.
So the Mormon Church could have legally donated tens or hundreds of millions of dollars, but did not. Some of its members donated personal money for a cause, but those weren't tax exempt dollars.
But let's not let facts get in the way of a good rant...
Yup. Non Profits can legally spend up to 20% of their budget on political activism so long as they dont support a candidate.
In the Church's case as you said, that probably up in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
Why aren't the militant-activist gays protesting black churchs? Latino churchs? Why aren't they boycotting black and latino businesses?
Those are the people that put prop 8 over the top.
Because attacking Mormons is considered politically and socially acceptable and no one really cares about them.
Whereas attacking, or even criticizing, blacks, gays, feminists, Latinos, and Jews is considered intolerant and a horrific violation of human rights.
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