Marriage Equality

[wearestardust]

Just how low can a bigot go?

Bill Meulenberg can go this low:

http://www.billmuehlenberg.com/2012/05/04/witnessing-social-suicide/

Warning: read on an empty stomach, half and hour before or two hours after eating.

Aside from saying that gay marriage is the same as the rise of Nazism and communism, what does one say about someone who asserts that:

Imagine telling anyone on planet earth just a few short decades ago that we would soon be holding public hearings to see if we think marriage and family are worth continuing with.

That much stupidity, or intellectual dishonesty, or both, is hard to fathom.

On the subject of picking between stupidity or intellectual dishonesty, Meulenberg quotes Reagan:

So the most amazing social upheaval of modern times is taking place, and most people who should be speaking out have chosen to do nothing and say nothing. If Western civilisation manages to survive, future historians will one day write about our strange times, and how so many people allowed this social tsunami to take place unopposed.

I am reminded of the words of Ronald Reagan in this regard: “History will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening.” Quite so. We have seen that happen before with tragic results, and we are seeing it happen all over again today.

huh? This quote is from Reagan's 1964 "A Time for Choosing" speech. And what was Reagan talking about? Actually, he was talking about the harsh judgement of history on the US ... had the US at that point left Vietnam, in the general context of talking about the awesomeness of war ...

As for the peace that we would preserve, I wonder who among us would like to approach the wife or mother whose husband or son has died in South Vietnam and ask them if they think this is a peace that should be maintained indefinitely. Do they mean peace, or do they mean we just want to be left in peace? There can be no real peace while one American is dying some place in the world for the rest of us. We're at war with the most dangerous enemy that has ever faced mankind in his long climb from the swamp to the stars, and it's been said if we lose that war, and in so doing lose this way of freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening. Well I think it's time we ask ourselves if we still know the freedoms that were intended for us by the Founding Fathers.

It further occurs to me - and I don't mean to appropriate Reagan for LGBTI rights like a theist abusing a Hawking quote in support of god-belief - Reagan's overarching point is about government keeping out of people's personal space. You might like to think about that, Bill.

[Inedifix]

Just how low can a bigot go?

Bill Meulenberg can go this low:

http://www.billmuehlenberg.com/2012/05/04/witnessing-social-suicide/

He sounds like he's trying desperately hard to sell his silly book.

The opening para is a big giveaway:

It is not very often that we find ourselves witnessing – and even taking part in – a pivotal turning point in a civilisation. Only rarely in human history are people allowed to take part in, or at least observe, transformations and revolutions which are far-reaching and earth-shattering.

WWII anyone? The Cold War? The Internet? Space exploration? The kind of events he's talking about happen in just about every lifetime - life generates social and cultural change. Marriage equality is a bit of a minnow in comparison to much of the above.

What really gets me is how he leaps from the fact that LGBGT people want to get on board the Marriage Train, to the assumption that they, or someone, is trying to rip it off the rails.

His whole argument seems based on this straw man: that wanting to play is the same thing as trying to stop the game.

[rayne]

Imagine telling anyone on planet earth just a few short decades ago that we would soon be holding public hearings to see if we think marriage and family are worth continuing with.

Yeap yeap because when same sex marriage is legalised then everyone will stop starting families and not get married because same sex couples are allowed. You've cottoned on to our gay agenda. Stop people starting families by marrying. Smart lad...except, you know, that didn't happen in any of the countries that legalise same sex marriage now..

[Logic please]

Congratulations - Bill Muhelenberg has arguably elevated his public utterances to a rarefied level of antipathy, usually only occupied by those from people like George Pell and Jim Wallace. Esteemed fellow-travellers, indeed.

So the most amazing social upheaval of modern times is taking place, and most people who should be speaking out have chosen to do nothing and say nothing. If Western civilisation manages to survive, future historians will one day write about our strange times, and how so many people allowed this social tsunami to take place unopposed.

Bill, may I draw historical parallels to your obscene attempts at argument, that seem to have escaped you? For example... Abolition of slavery:

Abolishing slavery would threaten the structure of society
This argument was popular at some periods - but it was perhaps an argument that a particular society was ethically flawed and needed reorganisation.

I also had a nifty trump card to make use of this morning: I had a wonderful fellow whose testimony I featured in the end of my new book, Strained Relations. This former homosexual is now happily married with children, and he gave a terrific and powerful testimony, not only of his own life, but about the many homosexuals he now counsels.
This really got the off-side Senators even more off-side. You see, to the activists and their supporters, this guy simply does not exist. He is an invisible person. There are not supposed to be any former homosexuals around. So we treat them like we used to treat blacks: completely out of sight and out of mind.

Funny example chosen, there - given the history of... Interrracial marriage:

While there are significant differences between antiquated bans on interracial marriage and contemporaneous bans on same-sex marriage, the similarity in rhetoric which has been used to defend both is striking. Indeed, many of the same moral and religious arguments originally utilized to oppose miscegenation have simply been recycled in recent times and inserted into the gay marriage debate.

And universal enfranchisement, and inter-religious marriage, and de facto relationships, and... need I go on? Similar self-serving defenses of privilege and bigotry have formed the opposition to so much social progress throughout human history.

Guess what? They failed miserably, every time. And will ultimately fail again in this case, methinks.

[rayne]

As always Foamy says it best.

[stevebrooks]

Does it never end!

http://www.news.com.au/national/gay-...-1226353925146

Professor Kuravilla George, who is Victoria's deputy chief psychiatrist and the State Government's equal opportunities champion, claims that gay marriage poses a health risk to society.

This would be the same Professor Kuruvilla George who attended the seventh annual Bioethics Colloquium of the Australian Association of Catholic Bioethicist.

http://www.cam.org.au/life/bioethics...bioethics.html

And yet the fact that the professor is a catholic and this would have some bearing on his opinion is not mentioned anywhere in the article. And no citations of research I noticed as well, funny that.

"We submit the evidence is clear that children who grow up in a family with a mother and father do better in all parameters than children without," they wrote.

Note they failed to submit the evidence, or indeed any link to the research, or any of the researchers who presumably carried out this research. Granted a newspaper column isn't an exhaustive coverage a simple inclusion of any of the various possible ways for a reader to actually look at the research themselves shouldn't be beyond the capability of the newspaper in this day and age.

[ArcaneMagik]

Might also add that Professor Kuruvilla George's field of experience seems to be with the Elderly and not with children.

[stevebrooks]

Forgot to add also, not only did they fail to add any citation for this research, they failed to differentiate between families with same sex parents and families with only one parent. In fact the statement;

"We submit the evidence is clear that children who grow up in a family with a mother and father do better in all parameters than children without," they wrote.

Is almost certainly related to families with a single parents and not families with two parents of the same gender. In my personal opinion, since I haven't seen the research and have no way of accessing or finding it, there simply aren't enough same sex parent families for any research based on them to be valid in any meaningful way.

[Mjt]

in today's hearld sun here in beautiful Victoria, a teen tiny article headlined
"approval for gay marriage"
In Croatia.
Yep, they can have it but we cant.
Come on Joolya, this is just embarrassing.
Sorry cant find the article on the net, but its on page 29 of today's paper.

Oh and just underneath another article on naughty catholic priests being investigated by the vatican. Any guesses on what for?

[wolty]

For mjt.

CROATIA TO RECOGNISE SAME-SEX MARRIAGE


Interesting, very catholic, patriarchal. A coming under fire from the opposition.