Dear Friends of Marriage,
We've just learned that next Tuesday, March 16th, the Pennsylvania Senate Judiciary Committee will vote on the PA Marriage Protection Amendment.
For years, opponents have blocked the marriage amendment, knowing that the people of Pennsylvania support marriage, and determined to keep them from having the final say. Tell your senator it's time to let the people vote -- Marriage is too important to be left to a handful of unaccountable judges. It's high time Pennsylvania joined the 30 other states where voters have already moved to protect marriage.
Tuesday's committee vote is critical, and expected to be close. If the amendment passes in committee it will move forward; if not, it's done for the year.
Please do whatever you can to help assure passage in committee. Call your senator. Then send an email. Or call some of the committee members listed below -- even if you don't live in their district, tell them that you're a Pennsylvanian concerned about marriage, and that as a member of the Judiciary Committee they are representing the entire state.
Click here to look up your senator's phone number.
Then use this link to send an email!
We've set up an online action center, enabling you to send a message to your state senator with just a few clicks of the mouse. The Marriage Protection Amendment currently has 16 co-sponsors in the 50-member senate. (Read the amendment and list of co-sponsors here.) If your senator is not a co-sponsor, he or she will receive a letter urging them to protect marriage by supporting SB707 -- and if they're already a co-sponsor, your senator will receive a message thanking him for his support and encouraging him to continue pressing for passage this year.
Then, please take a few minutes to call members of the Judiciary Committee, letting them know how important this issue is to you and your family.
JUDICIARY COMMITTEE MEMBERS
Sen. Stewart Greenleaf: (717) 787-6599
Sen. Mary Jo White: (717) 787-9684
Sen. Lisa Boscola: (717) 787-4236
Sen. Patrick Browne: (717) 787-1349
Sen. Jay Costa: (717) 787-7683
Sen. Jane Earll: (717) 787-8927
Sen. Wayne Fontana: (717) 787-5300
Sen. John Gordner: (717) 787-8928 (cosponsor)
Sen. Daylin Leach: (717) 787-5544
Sen. Jane Clare Orie: (717) 787-6538
Sen. Jeffrey Piccola: (717) 787-6801 (cosponsor)
Sen. John Rafferty: (717) 787-1398
Sen. Joseph Scarnati: (717) 787-7084 (cosponsor)
Sen. Michael Stack: (717) 787-9608
And finally, please forward this message to three friends who can join you in contacting their state senators.
Time is short. But together, if we each do our part, we can send a powerful message to Harrisburg, as our legislators hear from hundreds of concerned voters urging them to protect marriage.
Let's make it happen!
Faithfully,
Brian S. BrownExecutive Director
National Organization for Marriage
20 Nassau Street, Suite 242
Princeton, NJ 08542
bbrown@nationformarriage.org
Paid for by the National Organization for Marriage.
36 Comments
Off topic, but I just found this from the Center for Disease control. It looks like the gays will have someone else to sue now. There data concluded:
"The data, presented at CDC's 2010 National STD Prevention Conference, finds that the rate of new HIV diagnoses among men who have sex with men (MSM) is more than 44 times that of other men and more than 40 times that of women."
http://www.cdc.gov/nchhstp/Newsroom/msmpressrelease.html
I wonder if this would be a legitimate reason to vote no on same sex marriage. What say you?
Adam, What does one have to do with the other?
Steve, the people have a right to decide whether or not they want the government to promote and encourage an unhealthy lifestyle, thus taking an active role in getting people sick and killed for the promotion of a gay centric ideology.
ConservativeNY, if the government wants to promote eradication of the spread of AIDS, then it would make sense that the government would want to promote monogamy. Marriage promotes monogamy therefore marraige would promote monogamy among same sex couples.
Simply stated, marriage is designed to promote monogamy. There is no evidence to suggest that gays, given the opportunity to participate in a monogamy promoting institution would be any more or less mongamous than their heterosexual counterparts. It is interesting that in the last few years, the incidence of HIV infection has increased among the heterosexual population. Apparently the HIV virus does not discriminate based on sexual orientation.
Should government have an interest in something that creates more HIV diseases? It not just a few here and there, its a significant difference. If I go to the polls. Would I rationally be able to conclude that SSM would be bad and not vote for SSM? Why or Why not based off this study.
Most gays believe its simple bigotry to be against SSM. Now here is some study that shows it leads to more HIV Disease. This isn't simple bigotry, there are many reason to be against SSM and this is just one of the verry good reasons.
Conservative NY: Not surpisingly, you fail to connect the dots in any rational or logical way. Gotta hand it to you all though, you persist without regardless of the fact that facts and common sense are working against you. Your argument is no more legitimate than someone stating statistics about teen pregnancy and STD transmission rates among hetereosexuals and then concluding that marriage between men and women should be explicitly banned in the constitution.
Adam: Wow! Try again please. The study does NOT show that same sex marriage leads to more disease. Are you really this uninformed?
SSM partners do get together and try to have some kind of sex don't they? SS relationships which spreads diseases according to this study. Which concludes its not good for society. Of course not being able to have sex alone by itself should disqualify gays from Marriage.
Steve -
You're right. What this study should do is to persuade the SCOTUS to reverse Lawrence v. Texas. Gay men continue to demonstrate that they are incapable of controlling their sexual promiscuous nature to the extent that they wil engage in life-threatening, unprotected sodomy to satisfy their perverted self-indulgent desires. Texas had it right all along.
If homosexual marriage could stem gay promiscuity (which according to a recent NY TImes article it would not), then gay marriage would actually be a good way to prevent HIV spreading, if we believe that homosexuals really want to get married and be monogamous, LOL
Adam, I sense that you're probably under the age of 20 so I won't be too harsh here. But same-sex couples will have sex regardless of the legal status of their relationship. And you're ignoring the obvious- that promoting (a term that I disagree with but will use here for the sake of argument) stability and commitment through marriage, the incidence of male-male HIV transmission would, in all likelihood, decrease over time. You're still a long way from proving that your opposition to SSM is based on a genuine, research-based, albeit misguided, concern for public health rather than on a personal bias against gay people.
Adam, what you're describing is called swinging and it is not unique to same sex couples who choose to participate in it. Some opposite sex couples do it too, but no one is trying to ban opposite sex marriages because some choose to engage. Why not just put a ban against swingers on the ballot? Perhaps few will support it but at least we'll know that the petitioners stand behind their convictions.
Of course having multiple sex partners increases someone's risk for contracting HIV, gay or heterosexual. Since marriage promotes monogamy, promoting SSM promotes monogamy and therefore hinders the spread of HIV. This is 2010 and not 1986 when many thought the HIV virus could tell the difference between someone who was gay and who was not.
I am really trying to understand your argument that not having sex itself should disqualify gays from marriage. Is it your position that sex is necessary for marriage? If so, why should sexless marriages among opposite sex couples be allowed to remain? Could it be that marriage is not always about sex, sometimes it's about financial leverage, companionship and other things? If you think that such marriages should be allowed to remain because they are already in place, then you must also agree that voters have no right to nullify existing marriages, even if they involve sexless same sex couples.
Surely Maggie Gallagher's own research into the benefits of marriage indicate that this problem would be well-addressed by legalizing same-sex marriage.
Pennsylvania tabled the bill 8-6. This is the third time the bill was rejected.
Steve, you are only demonstrating how uninformed YOU are. The rate of HIV/AIDS infections has increased dramatically since the Massachusetts Supreme Court imposed SSM on the state. Even the gay activist group MassEquality admits as much:
http://www.massequality.org/ourwork/equality/hivaids/
If the threat of getting that fatal infection doesn't promote homosexual monogamy, then SSM certainly won't, and it hasn't.
Besides, the human race needs heterosexuality in order to propogate and survive while homosexuality serves no social or natural purpose whatsoever.
The study speaks for itself ya'll:
"The data, presented at CDC's 2010 National STD Prevention Conference, finds that the rate of new HIV diagnoses among men who have sex with men (MSM) is more than 44 times that of other men and more than 40 times that of women."
You really would like to down play this as much as possible.
"This is 2010 and not 1986 when many thought the HIV virus could tell the difference between someone who was gay and who was not."
Woody, since homosexual contact is based on the rectum, it is the most efficient way of transmitting the disease. That is why the vast majority of all AIDS cases were the result of homosexuality according to the Center for Disease Control.
http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/surveillance/resources/reports/2006report/table17.htm
Also, gay men account for over 60% of all syphilis cases.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0437305220070504
Lastly, if Massachusetts is any indication, the legalization of SSM has only helped to promote homosexuality given the dramatic rise of the AIDS cases there.
http://www.massequality.org/ourwork/equality/hivaids/
Conservative: Honestly, why do you waste your energy on keystrokes trying to legitimize your position and mask your bigotry? This is what it comes down to: If you disapprove of gay people that's fine but our laws are not required to reflect your personal bias or religious view if the world. I know it's hard to accept but that's the truth. I'll ask the question again: Is the fact that there are thousands of heterosexuals walking around with STDs reason to prohibit marriage between men and women?
"Honestly, why do you waste your energy on keystrokes trying to legitimize your position and mask your bigotry?"
I find it short sighted, at best, to interpret my respect for traditional family values to be nothing more than bigotry. If 70% of all blacks in this country recognize the distinction between family values and racism, why can't you?
"I'll ask the question again: Is the fact that there are thousands of heterosexuals walking around with STDs reason to prohibit marriage between men and women?"
Of course not, because unlike homosexuality, heterosexuality is essential to the survival of the human species and the stability of society. So whatever STDs are associated with heterosexual activity is counter balanced by the natural and social benefits of that lifestyle.
In contrast, homosexuality spreads STDs amongst its participants at a far greater rate in exchange for nothing more than the personal gratification you get seeing that unhealthy lifestyle being sanctioned and promoted by the government.
I'm sorry, Steve. But it's not worth it.
Steve is just ignoring the study and trying to change the subject. Many gays ask what does it matter if gays get married. It doesn't effect you. Well this study shows it most certainly does effect people and with a serious disease.
"If 70% of all blacks in this country recognize the distinction between family values and racism, why can't you?"
Good point!
Woody said:
"Simply stated, marriage is designed to promote monogamy."
And it is so designed because the social institution's coherency derives from the combination of responsible procreation and sex integration. The special status of the social institution is based on societal preference for this core meaning. But none of that applies to the types of arrangements -- sexualized or not -- that definitively exclude one or the other sex.
And, true to form, Woody earlier said that sex is not an essential of the SSM idea.
Yet the SSM campaign has emphasized same-sex sexual attraction, same-sex sexual romance, and same-sex sexual behavior. This is supposedly definitive of the SSM idea and yet is, at the same time, not an essential of the SSM idea.
* * *
From the CDC document that was linked in a comment at the top of this discussion [warning some graphic language follows]:
"Also, the risk of HIV transmission through receptive anal sex is much greater than the risk of transmission via other sexual activities, and some gay and bisexual men are relying on prevention strategies that may be less effective than consistent condom use."
Another CDC document:
"Insertive oral sex with a condom has the lowest risk of HIV transmission. Compared with that, the risk of transmitting HIV is 400 times higher for receptive vaginal sex without a condom with an HIV-infected partner and 2,000 times higher for receptive anal sex without a condom with an HIV-infected partner."
It follows that when condoms break, or are improperly used, or when 'safer' precautions are not optimum, the level of risk is much higher for one type of sexual behavior than for the other type. The higher prevalence of STDS among the MSM population is relevant because such infections carry additional means by which elevate the risks for HIV infection.
* * *
From the CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/msm/ymsm.htm
Sexual Behavior
Most (89%) of the young MSM interviewed in NHBS reported anal intercourse with a male partner in the past year and nearly half (46%) had anal intercourse without using a condom (unprotected anal intercourse [UAI]), including 17% who had UAI with more than one male partner (Figure 1). Compared to young men who had UAI with only one male partner, those who had UAI with multiple male partners were more likely to have engaged in UAI with a casual male partner* (77% versus 16%).
Another CDC document:
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5506a1.htm?s_cid=ss5506a1_e
"Certain behaviors (e.g., unprotected sexual intercourse and injection-drug use) are associated with high risk for HIV transmission. Through 2004, of all cases of HIV infection in the United States reported to CDC, 34% were attributed to male-male sexual contact, 14% to injection-drug use, and 20% to heterosexual contact."
[...]
"Sexual Behavior with Male Partners.
"A total of 4,699 (47%) participants reported having unprotected anal sex with a male partner during the preceding 12 months. The prevalence of anal sex with main male partners was highest for younger participants (Table 5). Anal sex was reported by a larger proportion of the men who identified themselves as homosexual or bisexual. Unprotected anal sex, however, was reported by similar proportions of men in all categories of sexual identity [among men who had sex with men]. Unprotected anal sex was more commonly reported with main male partners than with casual male partners."
* * *
Meanwhile, the risk pregnancy is unique to the opposite-sexed sexual basis of marriage. The risk is not a lifelong and life-threatening infection, but a risk of creating new human life. The first principle of responsible procreation is that the man and the woman, individually but also together as a procreative duo, are responsible for the child's life, well-being, education, and moral formation.
The contrast is important in terms of the societal significance of sexual monogamy which is embedded both in the combination of sex integration and provision for responsible procreation. This core of marriage is quite different from the societal interest in avoidance of HIV infection through promiscuous behavior.
Chairm,
Marriage is also designed to keep the money at home, determine who gets to make life and death decisions, who is not required to testify against their spouse, who gets employee benefits, who cares for someone when they're sick, who gets survivor benefits and so on. Marriage is about money, citizenship, love, etc..
Every argument against SSM made by SSM opponents is an expression of their distaste about sexuality among gays. Gay people who wish to do so will engage in sex whether or not they're married just like heterosexuals do. All they're seeking to do is access the benefits described above. I know that you do not believe that gay people are not worthy of having sexual relations among themselves, but what is your rationale behind them not enjoying the non-sexual benefits of marriage? Does someone have to be of the opposite sex to determine if someone should be on a respirator? What makes someone who is of the opposite sex who you just met more worthy of getting your survivor benefits than someone of the same sex who has been there for you for years?
What is so practical about someone marrying someone of the opposite sex if the spouse would really prefer someone of the same sex? Think about all the pain that is called when you try to dictate how others should live. You references to the prevalence of HIV are irrelevant because marriage aims at curtailing the spread of HIV for both heterosexuals and gays.
No one is dictating "how others should live" but you are dictating to all of society that the marriage idea be replaced with your superficial SSM idea.
Marriage is not aimed at infectious diseases. If the SSM idea is, then, it is doing a very lousy job of it and is missing the target even where there has been an imposed localized merger of SSM and marriage. So much for practicalities.
* * *
Society accords special status to the social institution of marriage. That's not in dispute.
But since the SSM idea is not marriage, it does not merit that special status.
* * *
SSM argumentation emphasizes gayness but does not propose a gayness criterion for eligilbity to SSM.
The emphasis on same-sex sexual attraction, likewise, comes with no requirement that makes this compulsory. Same for same-sex sexual behavior.
Yet SSMers emphasize all three of these things in their disagreement with the marriage idea. They do so wherever they press their special pleading for their favored subset of nonmarriage.
The SSM campaign brings that emphasis and marriage defenders (who'd rather discuss the rationale for marital status in the first place -- and promote ways to strengthen the social institution in our society) can legitimately dispute the gay identity politics that has been driving the SSM campaign from day one.
Your emphasis is answered. You are the protaganist who seeks to gut marriage of its core meaning and to install the SSM idea as the replacement. You don't get a free pass arguing that the SSM idea is all about same-sex sexual stuff and then feigning that you are indifferent about that very stuff. On the HIV/AIDS subtopic you got it wrong and so you were answered.
* * *
Contrary to your misrepresentations, there is a very wide consensus that provisons for designated beneficiaries ought to be available to most of the nonmarriage category of arrangements -- especially for vulnerable families -- regardless of your identity politics.
Such provisons have long-existed -- long before the SSM campaign embarked on this attack on the social institution.
Your list is bogus. But you are now asserting that sexual relations is irrelevant to the SSM idea. Fine. The vast majority of the nonmarriage category is not sexualized. So you can withdrawn your emphasis on your favored subset of nonmarriage. That means cutting out about 90% of your pro-SSM rhetoric and recalibrating your viewpoint to include the rest of nonmarriage.
Meanwhile the sexual basis for marriage is extrinsic to the SSM idea -- with or without that 90% of rhetoric of yours that relies on the promotion of gay identity politics.
Ok Chairm, since heterosexuals are immune to HIV and can't spread it, you've made your point.
My point does not depend on your misrepresentation of what I've actually said.
In Massachusetts, right after the localized SSM merger, blood tests for STDS -- includng HIV/AIDS -- were dropped. That contradicts your remarks about the aim of SSM.
Procreation does not, nor ever has required marriage. Marriage does not, nor ever has required procreation.
"....There is a very wide consensus that provisons for designated beneficiaries.........."
No, there is actually not. - designated beneficiary works great for charities and relatives. Marriage is somewhat different, its not a charity. Couples do not propose to each other with "Will you take my hand and be my designated beneficiary?" Designated beneficiary does not quite have the "ring" to it as "Will you marry me?" does.
Further, employer health benefits, hospital visitation, and end of life care/decisions, are best understood through marriage. Not civil unionized, domestic business partners, or designated beneficiary.
No, separate and unequal does not work, never has, never will.
"Procreation does not, nor ever has required marriage. Marriage does not, nor ever has required procreation."
Husbands and wives who cannot procreate are the exception rather than the rule. Society recognizes marriage as between a man and a woman because marriage in general procreates and produces the most stable and nurturing evnvironment for children. Since no homosexual relationship produces children, no gay relationship can fulfill this basic function of marriage.
"No, separate and unequal does not work, never has, never will."
This is not about racial segregation. This is about defining terms. And marriage means a union between a man and a woman, not between two heterosexuals. This does not deny anyone "equal protection of the law" because the qualifications to enter a marriage apply equally to everyone. Every male and female has the same right to marry.
What you are talking about here are special rights. That is, the special right to marry someone of the same sex. But if we grant that, on what grounds can we deny consenting adults who desire marriage for other types of relationships such as polygamy, incest, or bestiality? Should bisexuals get to marry two people?
No this is not about racial segregation, but it is about a separate but unequal status.
There is no requirement in civil marriage law that homosexuals or anyone has to produce children as part of some basic requirement or function of cvill law. Anymore than inmates, sterile or birth control users are subject to this supposed societal requirement.
There has been no evidence produced that heterosexual marriage produces better nurturing environment for children. These specific facts have not been contested in any court case for marriage equality.
Marriage is not a special right, it is a fundamental right that applies to all americans under due process and equal protection. To say that someone can marry someone where there is no physical attraction is a specious argument at best.
On what grounds do we deny child molesters the right to marry? On what grounds do we deny felons the right to marry?
If folks wanted to marry their dog, do you think they have been waiting for gay marriage to come along to bring their court case? Courts usually try the case before and in front them. Sky will fall argumentation does not work. Courts go with reality. Traditional biblical marriage may come back, polygamy, incest etc. but it has not happened yet.
"No this is not about racial segregation, but it is about a separate but unequal status."
Wrong again. Let me repeat: Each individual have the same right to marry any qualified person of the opposite sex. Do you believe that the government MUST recognize every desire to be a right?
Marriage is far more than the private relationship of two people. It is a social institution that provides society with the very foundation of civilization-the procreating family unit. There would be no stability for children and no community without it. It would not be possible or desirable for the state to try to determine which men and women are capable of procreation and which are not. But since no homosexual relationship produces children, no gay couple can fulfill the most basic function of marriage.
And there is plenty of evidence that a mother and a father produces the best nurturing environment for children. Read up on the childhood difficulties children endure when denied either a mother or a father:
http://www.familyresearchinst.org/2009/02/children-of-homosexual-parents-report-childhood-difficulties-2/
Also examine the research done on comparing the lifestyles between gay couples and straight couples:
http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=IS04C02
Do your research before you claim that there has been "no evidence produced."
Requirements, your opinion is outside the very wide consensus that provisions for designated beneficiaries ought to be available to most of the nonmarriage category of arrangements.
Such provisions are not meant to be marriage in all but name. So your objection, as stated, is absurd.
Provisions for designated benefiaries do what they are designed to do regarding even the benefits you mentioned. Gay identity politics demands special treatment, not equal treatment, and that's evidenct in the SSM campaign's complaint about these provisions.
ER said: "Marriage is not a special right, it is a fundamental right"
1. Marital status is a special status. If you deny that, then, you'd pull the rug out from under the SSM campaign. Go ahead.
2. A fundamental right in constitutional jurisprudence is one deeply rooted in our traditions and civilization. The SSM campaign argues for cutting these roots and seperating marriage law from the very features of marriage, its core meaning, that make marriage a fundamental right.
So if you are here to undermine the SSM campaign, great, continue to do that. If you are here to claim that a fundamental right is not a special right, fine, go ahead and tie yourself up into knots. If you are here to demand that your favored subset of nonmarriage be treated on part with the special status of marriage, then, go ahead and state the special reason for special status in our laws, traditions, and constitutional jurisprudence.
SSMers contradict themselves on all three of these points. The third point quickly to bring to the fore the absurdity of demanding a special right based on identity politics of the gaycentric variety. There is nothing about gayness that merits special status; and nothing about gayness that distinguishes your favored subset from the rest of the types of relationships and arrnagements that exist in the nonmarriage category.
So your demands are for a new special right based on gay identity politics and nothing more -- least of all anything that is actually in the US Constitution or anything that is actually at the core of the social institution of marriage which our marriage laws recognize and treat preferentially. Go ahead, demonstrate how wrong you really are.
Chairm
"Such provisions are not meant to be marriage in all but name. So your objection, as stated, is absurd." Domestic partnerships, provide almost all of the benefits of marriage currently in California.
So what's in a name? Sure sounds like "marriage in all but name" eh? If it walks like a duck, quacks, like a duck.. remove the foggy glasses and lets just call it "marriage." Designated beneficiaries are not marriage, so that won't work either.
".A fundamental right in constitutional jurisprudence is one deeply rooted in our traditions and civilization. The SSM campaign argues for cutting these roots and seperating marriage law from the very features of marriage, its core meaning, that make marriage a fundamental right."
Oh really?
Prior to 1967, interracial marriage was NOT deeply rooted in US constitutional jurisprudence. Discrimination is not constitutionally ennobled because its a deeply rooted traditional practice. Honestly its not, I wouldn't lie.
Discrimination based on sex and sexual orientation can not longer stand. Marriage is not a new special right. its a fundamental right as courts have found that apply to all americans. Gayness as a special status? Just like blackness and whiteness as a special status for marriage? SCOTUS has never held that immutable characteristics are the special status. Even in Loving Vs. Virginia, the ruling was based on a fundamental right to marry, not blackness or whiteness. The same is true with the issue that brings homosexual marriage equality before the courts today. The ruling won't be based on gayness or identity politics, but on the fundamental right to marry, period. Same as before.. To somehow think gayness, blackness or whiteness is special reason for the status... is absurd, really it is.
Domestic Partnership is not one and the same as thee provisions for designated beneficiaries. So your objection remains absurd.
What, in 1967, transformed marriage into a fundamental right that, according to you, it was not prior to that year?
Constitutional jurisprudence alone? Well, as I said, a fundamental right in constitutional jurisprudence is one deeply rooted in our traditions and civilization. So your objection remains absurd on that score as well.
The last paragraph in your comment @ March 31, 2010 at 1:16 pm demonstrated that my previous observations are correct.
The marriage law does not unjustly discriminate on the basis of sex since marriage integrates the sexes; and there is no sexual orientation criterion in the marriage law.
You can check with the Goodridge opinion: the otherwise divided court was 1-6 on sex discrimination and 0-7 on sexual orientation discrimination when it came to deciding the basis for casting their judicial votes.
So despite "belt-and-suspenders" your complaint remains an absurdity. Identity politics of the gaycentric variety is all you really have to hold up your SSM idea.
State what makes SSM a fundamental right (go ahead and merge SSM with marriage before providing your answer).
Note that the Goodridge opinion, like the few other pro-SSM court opinions, acknowledges that marital status is a special status. So you are at odds with the pro-SSM justices on that point as well.
I expect that you, as they, depend on gaycentricism and on their abuse of judicial review. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Note that I did not say that whiteness, blackness, or gayness is the special reason for the special status of marriage. You can keep flogging strawmen of your own making, but that makes an absurd spectacle of yourself.
Go ahead, undermine your own remarks some more.
Thank you for the opportunity to let me undermine my own remarks some more.. Here goes:
Domestic partnerships, Civl Unions and Designated Beneficiaries are not the same as Marriage. Its absurd for you to suggest they are an acceptable alternative. Why don't you try divorce and go the designated beneficiary route instead?
"Well, as I said, a fundamental right in constitutional jurisprudence is one deeply rooted in our traditions and civilization. So your objection remains absurd on that score as well." By that [absurd] argument anti-miscegenation laws would still be on the books. Traditional bigotry is not constitutionally ennobled by past practice alone and cannot stand. I guess Justice Kennedy must be absurd in your view.
"The marriage law does not unjustly discriminate on the basis of sex since marriage integrates the sexes; and there is no sexual orientation criterion in the marriage law." Try marrying one of the same sex in the states that don't allow homosexuals the right to marry. Where is this 'sex integration' a civil marriage requirement? Marriage does not require sex integration and sex integration does not require marriage.. Wrong again. Keep trying though don't give up.
"State what makes SSM a fundamental right " Here we may find some agreement. There is no fundamental right to SSM anymore than there is a fundamental right to OSM. There is however, a fundamental right to "Marriage" Numerous SCOTUS decisions support my claim. Redhall, Loving, etc.
"I expect that you, as they, depend on gaycentricism ....." Yes you are saying that "gayness" is the special reason for the special status. You just said it again!!!!!
--
And NO again, gayness, as determined by SCOTUS in past whiteness and blackness only marriage classifications cannot stand. Marriage is a fundamental right... Not OSM, NOT SSM, or past Blackness or Whiteness ONLY marriage.
1. Society may justly discriminate between marriage and non-marriage.
2. The wide consensus for provisions for designated beneficiaries for almost all of nonmarriage is as I described.
3. Domestic partnership status is unjustified. Civil union status is unjustified. Neither of these absurdities is one and the same as provisions for designated beneficiaries which have long-existed without domestic partnership, without civil union, without merging nonmamrriage with marriage.
4. Merging marriage with nonmarriage is an anti-marriage proposal lacks justification. Gayness is not justification. Gay identity politics is not justification.
* * *
Marriage, as a social institution, has a core meaning that is antithetical to the SSM idea. However, that core meanign is the special reason for the special status of marriage in our society. It is also the basis upon which marriage is a foundational right in our constitutional jurisprudence.
The SSM idea lacks such a basis. It lacks a core meaning apart from the promotion of gay identity politics as a trump card over marriage, the law, and the constitution.
* * *
The man-woman criterion of marriage law stands for sex-integration. The SSM idea is to abolish that from the law and from the culture.
* * *
No Supreme Court precedent has severed the fundamental right to marry from the core meaning of marriage. You stand against constitutional jurisprudence on marriage. Loving, for example, repudiated the supremacy of identity politics (of the racilialist kind) and the SSM campaign has failed to refute that repudiation by invoking the supremacy of gay identity politics in place of the supremacy of white identity politics. You stand against the core meaning of marriage and, thus, against the basis for a fundamental right to marry.
* * *
You, not I, insist that gayness is the reason to give SSM the special status on par with marital status. Not, I, but you, argue on that basis.
I asked you to state the special reason for the special status of marriage and you cannot answer without invoking gayness. Go ahead. Try.
* * *
What in your limited view of Supreme Court precedent makes marriage a fundamental right? State it plainly.
And in so doing, your are invited to undermine your own SSM idea, yet again.