Obama: 'TX Pressure Congress to pass my agenda' (Turkey: employment, legally)

[hoffdano]

Originally Posted by Cathy4017

Ok, let me clarify.

Many straight people feel as I do that traditional marriage should be reserved for one man and one woman.

The dead part? I was referring only to myself.

Having said that, I don't care how gays choose to live their lives, as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else. I have no problem with civil unions and legal protections. But traditional marriage as we know it--nope, sorry. Can't agree with that. It just simply isn't normal.

I just don't want to see gay marriage photos and writeups in the social section of the newspaper, LOL!!

The bolded part - there are so many things people don't consider normal, but acceptable (and legal).

If you are interested in preventing people from doing things that hurt other people - you have a vast area of things that a variety of politicians want to do. Both left and right. Guns is a popular area for consideration. So is food. Is a married gay person more impactful to you than second hand smoke?

If we want to talk about activities that harm other people - lets chase deadbeat dads instead of limiting who can marry who.

Photos of married gay couples will really bother you? Would you be harmed if that happened?

[hoffdano]

Originally Posted by doctorjef

The problem with this is that there are lots of areas that constitutionally fall under the purview of the federal government that do, in fact, affect couples and families. The federal government constitutionally controls immigration. In the case of an American citizen marrying a foreign national, the American citizen may sponsor his or her spouse for immigration purposes. This is a basic international principle of not breaking up families or placing undue burdens on bi-national married couples. This isn't something you can get the federal government out of -- it is a fundamental aspect of the federal government's constitutional role. The same is true of everything that falls under the federal government's power to levy taxes on individuals. The federal government has a broad range of indisputable constitutional authority, and some of this authority affects couples. Just to take another example, it is part of the federal government's role to operate and fund the national military services. Spouses of military personnel get various benefits, essentially as part of the remuneration package, as well as to provide for the humane needs and the morale of military personnel (it would hardly be realistic to set up a military of celibates or one in which personnel were deprived of their spouses and children when not serving in combat or in a war zone).

I'm afraid you don't seem to be thinking these issues through. It is because of such issues that fall under the proper authority of the federal government that lesbian and gay couples need equality before the law in respect to their relationships.

This is an interesting issue. But it could still be accomplished if the feds largely got out of the marriage business.

DOMA must go, and I am betting it does when the SCOTUS rules. Too many federal laws are applied inconsistently based the states' disparate treatment of marriage.

I think long term the feds should get out of the marriage business. It should begin the move to take marriage out of the tax code. Civil law should be streamlined (which would be eased by simpler tax law) to make it easier to define a legally bound couple and the rights and consequences of being such.

[SloopJohnZ]

Originally Posted by turkeytrot

Whatever makes you sleep better.

Likewise. If you think homosexuals are just being stubborn by choosing to be outcasted, bullied, rejected by their families and society to the point of suicide, I hope you sleep better. If you think there are gays in other parts of the world that risk getting executed or stoned to death for their lifestyle "choice," then you've found a way to shut off the rational logic valve in your brain.

[turkeytrot]

Originally Posted by Fillmont

Yes, knowing the truth is a nice way to go to bed every night.

It sure does and I don't miss a wink. Thanks!

[turkeytrot]

Originally Posted by doctorjef

And this seems to be the crux of the matter, as far as you are willing to state it. But what rights are gay people taking away from you? The right to get married? The benefits of being able to sponsor a spouse for immigration purposes, file a joint tax return, have social security survivor benefits, etc, etc? And I'm only citing a few federal rights and benefits here, not the many that fall under the purview of the individual states. No: you aren't losing any rights or benefits. Rather, it is socially contributing, tax paying gay and lesbian American citizens who are without full rights and equality before the law.

What you are talking about amounts to privileging one group of persons - heterosexuals - above another group of citizens, homosexual persons. You justify it by calling us "not normal", which translates to "unequal" -- just as African-Americans were once "inferior" and therefore held unequal before the law, denied basic human rights and routinely discriminated against.

What I'm "willing to state" is complete with no personal bigotry or hate just simple knowledge of right and wrong.
As I already said when an employer threatens the job a person unless they sign a statement making them deny deeply held beliefs, religious or not or be terminated, corruption is at work. I still have the letter stating so from an employer I worked for in the DFW metroplex.
I don't care about the choice of another unless it effects me and my family which it has.

Homosexuality is still not a widely accepted lifestyle for a reason. It never has been sadly however the opportunists and power hungry will sell their souls to make a name for themselves.

My cousin, who I haven't seen or heard from in twenty plus years was swallowed by a lie. He said furthered the gay agenda. He was a great guy we visited each other all the time.
I never questioned him about his lifestyle because it wasn't my business. Not until he said it was better to be ostracized his family. Never thought of him gullible til that day. He lives with the consequences of his choices if he's still alive.

Just as I'm sure you and others who believe the homosexuals deserves laws to live as you want.
I am quite sure you don't. You and everyone else deserves protection from physical harm. I don't condone hate crimes against anyone. Hate is an enormous burden to bare and it solves nothing.

[turkeytrot]

Originally Posted by doctorjef

Oh yeah, I'm sure rural West Texas is just swarming with drag queens and bull dykes One of the things that happens in such places, however, is that people who don't have the wherewithall and courage to leave, and who are unable to closet themselves in a heterosexual marriage, sometimes do manifest a combination of protest and personal pain by affecting a silly caricature of male or female homosexuality. Actually, some of those folks may not be gay or lesbian at all, but rather trans-gender people who again feel stuck in their environment, haven't the courage or imagination or intelligence to get out, and who act contrary to manifest biological gender because they actually have the psychological identity of the opposite gender. In any event, as a late adolescent in Lubbock, a couple of the most stereotyped effiminate gay males I've ever run across were right there in the Hub. One of these was a young man who had previously lived in Morton (I knew several kids from that town - long story) and had moved to Lubbock I guess to improve his lot in life, so I suppose that took a bit of imagination on his part, though he still seemed isolated, stuck in a stereotype that even back then was past its sell-by date, and kind of pathetic. So I'm not entirely surprised when you tell me you see these caricatures out there who are sixty years out of date in terms of the way they present (think Quentin Crisp coming out in 1940s Britain and you will have the type, only without Crisp's talents as a writer and self-promoter).

I'm not positive about drag queens but I will make room for the possibility just from a few males I had seen. However, there are plenty of "bull dykes" around. My youngest daughter graduated from high school with the daughter of two moms. She couldn't understand the lifestyle and disliked her real moms life and disliked "the other person" that lived there. Sad

[doctorjef]

Turkeytrot, your posts are becoming increasingly incoherent. Please have a look back at your penultimate post, which makes little sense. Really, I can't make heads or tails of what you were trying to convey. What is clear, however, is that your mind is utterly closed and you have a quite distorted picture of reality, which you clearly cherry-pick like hell. Most of your assertions are simply non sequiturs that brook no challenge or possibility of engagement.

[Cathy4017]

Originally Posted by hoffdano

The bolded part - there are so many things people don't consider normal, but acceptable (and legal).

If you are interested in preventing people from doing things that hurt other people - you have a vast area of things that a variety of politicians want to do. Both left and right. Guns is a popular area for consideration. So is food. Is a married gay person more impactful to you than second hand smoke?

If we want to talk about activities that harm other people - lets chase deadbeat dads instead of limiting who can marry who.

Photos of married gay couples will really bother you? Would you be harmed if that happened?

When you get right down to it, it really doesn't matter how I feel about all of this. It's going in a certain direction, and I have little doubt that it will continue to do so.

There are just certain things that I consider not normal, and would prefer not to see, but that's beside the point. I'll just choose to ignore most of it to the extent that I can.

[jbarn]

Originally Posted by sxrckr

That is a belief, not a fact.

From a scientific standpoint, it's more complex than most realize. But the "gay gene" theory was debunked in the 90's.

I am gay and believe me, I did not choose to be this way. I fought it for many years, as did my brother, who came close to committing suicide more than once because of it. At some point, you learn that no matter what you do, you are not going to change, it is WHAT you are, not WHO you are, and you have to learn to be happy with what you are. Why would anyone CHOOSE a lifestyle that would subject them to ridicule by a large percentage of population? This thread is a perfect example of the way that many people feel about gays. I think if most gays could choose to be straight and not subject themselves to the type of ridicule and hate seen on this thread and by the population in general, most would jump at it.

[jbarn]

Originally Posted by turkeytrot

I beg to differ. If it was a normal lifestyle the strategy of normalizing wouldn't have been pushed.
I don't hate people, what I do hate is the sense that one group should take away the rights of others so they can feel good about themselves or accepted.

Which one of your rights exactly is being taken away if gays are allowed to marry? How exactly will gays getting married affect you personally?