[DTO Luv]

You can look at it that way if you want, you're still wrong. You're ignoring the fact that our whole legal and legislative processes are supposed to be secular in nature. Why is it so hard for christians to understand to keep their religion to themselves? I've never seen hindus try to force people to not eat beef since it's a sin in their religion. Allowing people to practice their religions does not mean that the rest of us have to adopt their laws to be accomodating. No one is trying to push an "athiest" viewpoint on anyone. The only viewpoint any athiest shares from one to the next is we don't believe in dieties. Same-sex marriage IS a civil rights issue. It does not matter if you keep calling our love wrong, incomplete, twisted, etc. It also does not matter if the majority of the country is against same-sex marriage. America is about protecting everyone's rights and those include those of any minority group, even religious ones.

[McBain II]

Originally Posted by DTO Luv

our whole legal and legislative processes are supposed to be secular in nature.

This.

[JustMe_T3K]

Originally Posted by DTO Luv

At this point I can't offer anything other than anecdotal but I will say this. If we still had Jim Crowe laws in the south, would you expect black-owned businesses to want to locate there? It's not uncommon for people to boycott businesses for social reasons. Look at Arizona. They passed legislation that was discriminatory and people reacted with their wallets and pulled a lot of business out of that state. It does not help our state to look backwards and unprogressive with a population that votes discrimination into law. The world is a more connected than before and when a place like Omaha or Nebraska is up against a Des Moines or Iowa, social issues affect where companies want to do business. I'm not saying it's the end all be all of decision making for business owners but it makes us look more attractive over another place if we offer married gay employees the same legal standing as straight employees.

This could also keep businesses from coming to Nebraska by HAVING to give benefits to gay employee's spouses.

Then there is the question if there will be a need for 2 more bathrooms.
Men
Women
Gay Men
Gay Women
That may sound silly, but still it could be an issue.

[dsrich98]

Originally Posted by JustMe_T3K

This could also keep businesses from coming to Nebraska by HAVING to give benefits to gay employee's spouses.

Then there is the question if there will be a need for 2 more bathrooms.
Men
Women
Gay Men
Gay Women
That may sound silly, but still it could be an issue.

Why would you need seperate bathrooms?

Oh wait I get it, like bathrooms for black people and bathrooms for white people. So you don't have to relieve yourself around someone who makes you uncomfortable.

[xo.stevers.xo]

Originally Posted by JustMe_T3K

This could also keep businesses from coming to Nebraska by HAVING to give benefits to gay employee's spouses.

Then there is the question if there will be a need for 2 more bathrooms.
Men
Women
Gay Men
Gay Women
That may sound silly, but still it could be an issue.

?????? hmmm....

anyways...I think it's great that the World Herald is announcing this now. Omaha needs to start doing more progressive things!

[pheaton]

Originally Posted by DTO Luv

Same-sex marriage IS a civil rights issue. It does not matter if you keep calling our love wrong, incomplete, twisted, etc. It also does not matter if the majority of the country is against same-sex marriage. America is about protecting everyone's rights and those include those of any minority group, even religious ones.

There are 2 conversations going on here. Legality of same-sex marriage, and morality of it. I'm saying that society as a whole straight and gay has a really messed up twisted view of what love is. This is what I see as a Christian recognizing how messed up society is.

Now legally. If the state passes the laws to not recognize marriage, all you can do is protest and say how we are infringing on some kind of fundamental right and people like me will counter that by saying how it's how it should be. Back and forth we go. If the state passes a law to recognize gay marriage, the argument is flipped.

The bottom line is that love doesn't matter at all according to the law. The court, the state could care less if you love the person. When I got married I didn't have to check a box saying I love this person. I can't get married simply because I love. I can get married because the law from the beginning of American law assumed male/female complementarity not love.

The Supreme Court said that marriage is a civil right. They did not say the recognition of that marriage is a civil right. There is a difference. America is about doing what's best for the common good. Not for warm fuzzy feelings.

[marmom]

Originally Posted by pheaton

I can make the same argument in the other direction. I feel that secularist and non-religious standards form their own "members only" club that is trying to force me into compliance with their destructive and self-serving ideas on what freedom and happiness mean. Trying to force me to accept this counterfeit idea of love that everyone is buying into. At the end of the day the law in Nebraska is one that does not recognize same sex marriage as with most other states. The fact that people want to change those laws suggests a forcing of non-religious secular belief onto us, not the other way around. Many non-christian religions, heck many non-christians have these same views, this isn't just some crazy Christian idea. This is an idea shared by God's people no matter how or if they follow God.

"True freedom is liberation not from the external constraint that calls me to good, but from the internal constraint that hinders my choice of the good." - Christopher West

Just curious about some of your arguments here. If under U.S. law (or state law) homosexual marriage is recognized, how is that forcing you into compliance with anything? It does not change what you believe about God, love, or anything else. It does not mean that you have to recognize the marriage, or that your church has to perform the marriage ceremony. How does the upholding of constitutional rights (e.g. the first and fourteenth amendments) have any bearing on you??? Do you really believe that people should only be allowed under United States law to do things that you agree with? I am genuinely curious, particularly about the last question.

[marmom]

Originally Posted by JustMe_T3K

This could also keep businesses from coming to Nebraska by HAVING to give benefits to gay employee's spouses.

Then there is the question if there will be a need for 2 more bathrooms.
Men
Women
Gay Men
Gay Women
That may sound silly, but still it could be an issue.

What???

So you are saying that if people who are gay are allowed to get married under the law, then there will be a need for two sets of bathrooms? Why would that be? Because gay people don't currently use public restrooms? Because getting married makes a person more gay (and this is somehow bad?)? Because in the bathroom you might see a body part on another person that you have never before seen in your life? Because going to the bathroom is somehow sexual in nature? Because a gay person in the bathroom might lose control if someone of the same sex is peeing in close proximity? Because gay people are more obsessed with sex than straight people and will be predatory peeping toms in the bathroom? Because somehow gay people are a threat to straight people or vice versa (but only in the bathroom for some reason)? Wow.

Truly, I am blown away. No offense intended. I just can't wrap my mind around this kind of thinking.

[pheaton]

Originally Posted by marmom

Just curious about some of your arguments here. If under U.S. law (or state law) homosexual marriage is recognized, how is that forcing you into compliance with anything? It does not change what you believe about God, love, or anything else. It does not mean that you have to recognize the marriage, or that your church has to perform the marriage ceremony. How does the upholding of constitutional rights (e.g. the first and fourteenth amendments) have any bearing on you??? Do you really believe that people should only be allowed under United States law to do things that you agree with? I am genuinely curious, particularly about the last question.

Does the law change my views of the morality of the situation? No. Just because something is legal doesn't make it right or moral for that matter. But the law isn't interested in morals, is it? Or is it? Does the law have some kind of responsiblity to uphold a moral code? Does the law have the responsiblity to uphold the rights of the common good? Legally, no, they don't have to do that, whether or not they should is kind of where this debate is seated.

Does the upholding of the constitutuion have any bearing on me? Yes of course. The law does have the responibility to protect the fundamenal common law that we inherited from the english courts, the foundation to which our laws are built, the constitution. I'm trying to defend the constitution just the same as you are. What I'm suggesting to you that under that common law the requirement of a marriage is the complementarity of a male and female and their willingness to be joined legally. Love was assumed, but not required, the fact that gay people love each other and want to be married gives them no legal backing, you said it yourself you can't make laws based on feelings. Gay marriage is not protected under the constution, nor does it have any thing to do with equality, because by the very nature of the persons, they are incompatible with the common law definition of marriage. The state meaning of marriage is not love, or good feelings, it's complementarity and a mutual agreement.

I feel that all of our laws are judeo-Christian in their nature. At least up until recent history when we started making laws based on feelings and letting everyone do what they want to do and calling that true freedom.

[dsrich98]

Originally Posted by pheaton

It's kind of a stretch. But many people that do not endorse the "normality" of homosexual behavior really see homosexuals as disordered in terms of their view of sexuality. They see their lifestyle as a perversion. A construction worker doesn't want to stop for a restroom break and have SurfO in a green hat and fabolous belt checking out his package. I'm attracted to women, so I don't go into the womens restroom. Should men attracted to men go into the mens restroom? No the restroom break isn't in itself sexual, but there is a reason we seperate men and women. Privacy.

WOW!!! This is truly ignorant and offensive. I don't know what kind of bathroom you go into but I'm not usually in a position where anyone can see my junk. If you are afraid of someone seeing your package in the restroom, you are either using it wrong; or perhaps more likely, you've got something to hide.