that stupid argument
B-Ho continues to make this totally retarded argument:
I’ll repeat what I’ve said before: voter approval of the amendment will not take away any rights or discriminate against any individuals in Tennessee. After it passes, just like before, all unmarried adults – gay or straight – will have the identical marriage right in Tennessee: the right to be married to one person of the opposite gender.
If an argument is redefined to, in no way, reflect the nature of the other side’s concern, it don’t mean dick (heh!). If, for example, you say that McCain-Feingold’s ban of advertisement on TeeVee is unconstitutional and, well, stupid and I say But you can advertise on the Internet then I have in no way addressed the merits of your argument. I’ve redefined the debate in a manner that is disingenuous. If you tell me that you want a Pepsi and I say Well, everyone else has Coke, it’s of little comfort to you.
So, please, let’s stick with the real reason people support this nonsense:
1) Fear of gay cooties
2) An invisible man in the sky said so
Seriously, I have yet to see a convincing argument against allowing gay marriage. As you were.
October 2nd, 2006 at 10:28 am
It is already illegal for people of the same sex to marry. There is no need to write discrimination into the Constitution. Besides the outright bigotry of it, that is my primary complaint. This is completely unnecessary.
October 2nd, 2006 at 10:32 am
It’s fine to argue against the marriage amendment – I plan to vote against Virginia’s next month – but that doesn’t make Hobb’s argument stupid. What legal rights to marriage to gays have now, under current Tennessee law, that they won’t have if the amendment passes?
October 2nd, 2006 at 10:48 am
I concur. Hobbs’ argument is stupid all by its own self.
Now, you’re doing it too?
October 2nd, 2006 at 11:08 am
Asking a question isn’t stupid unless the answer is obvious, which in this case it isn’t. If all the Tennesee amendment will do is regurgitate existing Tennessee law, then Bill Hobb’s argument is not stupid at all. His conclusion may be, of course, but that’s another matter.
October 2nd, 2006 at 1:40 pm
The purpose of the amendment is probably not to change the law, but (assuming that voters will become less opposed to gay marriage in the future as old fogies die off) to greatly delay the day when a majority can change the law. Don’t try to tell me it’s to keep some !@#$%^&* liberal judge from re-writing the law. For that, you could write a much simpler amendment, (for instance) simply affirming that the legislature alone had the power to determine who could marry whom.
Not that tieing the hands of a democratic majority is necessarily a bad thing. It’s what Constitutions are for – but in the past, this has (almost) always been used to limit the power of government and protect individual rights, not to deny rights to a minority even when the majority wants to grant them.
October 2nd, 2006 at 11:24 pm
I agree with you that there is no convincing argument against allowing gay marriage. I’d go further and say there is no good argument for the presence of government in marriage-type partnerships, though the presence of lawyers might be beneficial.
October 3rd, 2006 at 11:41 am
OK, after re-reading Hobbs’s post, I see there are two arguments in there, not one:
1. Aside from constitutionalizing existing law, this amendment will make no substantive changes to the rights of gays vs. straights in Tennessee.
2. Under either existing law or the proposed amendment, gays have the same right to marry members of the opposite sex that straights have.
I was focusing on #1, which is not retarded. If your point is that #2 is retarded, I agree. However, turnabout is fair play, so as long as AIDS activists continue to argue that “AIDS doesn’t discriminate” (it does, after all, spread just as easily between straight men who stick their schlongs in other men’s rectums), then I’m not sure why advocates of traditional marriage should feel all that guilty about using it.
October 3rd, 2006 at 9:17 pm
I have yet to see any reason for the state to be involved in marriage at all. If you want to make a mutual promise to someone, have at it. What’s the State got to do with it, got to do with it?