I agree we shouldn't sidetrack this with such non-issues, but the point I made earlier was that although such happenings are documented in the bible they should not be construed to mean that God condoned them. They are a part of history for that particular timeframe.
ThansalThe New ScumJoin Date: 2002-08-22Member: 1215Members, Constellation
edited January 2010
So, any comments on why we should ignore the 1st amendment and use religion as a reason for secular discrimination against a group of people?
Also, I'm ignoring the attempts to pull this into religion vs whatever as I would like to see some sort of explanation for why we should ignore our constitution and bill of rights in favor of religious doctrine.
InsaneAnomalyJoin Date: 2002-05-13Member: 605Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, NS2 Map Tester, Subnautica Developer, Pistachionauts, Future Perfect Developer
<!--quoteo(post=1746820:date=Jan 11 2010, 04:57 PM:name=Depot)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Depot @ Jan 11 2010, 04:57 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1746820"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I agree we shouldn't sidetrack this with such non-issues, but the point I made earlier was that although such happenings are documented in the bible they should not be construed to mean that God condoned them. They are a part of history for that particular timeframe.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
So let me get this straight... any practices in the Bible you find distasteful are merely "history", but anything you feel sufficiently righteous about agreeing with can be said to be "God's Law".
<!--quoteo(post=1746866:date=Jan 11 2010, 04:27 PM:name=Insane)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Insane @ Jan 11 2010, 04:27 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1746866"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->So let me get this straight... any practices in the Bible you find distasteful are merely "history", but anything you feel sufficiently righteous about agreeing with can be said to be "God's Law".
How remarkably convenient.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> There are things that happened and there are things that God preached and taught. Certainly you don't blame everything that's written in the bible. or that happened during the time it was written. on God...
One of the major differences between Christianity and Islam is that Christianity doesn't state that their holy book is directly the word of their god. It was written by humans and it gets translated by humans. The content of it is picked by humans too. It can't be interpreted as it is in any unanimous way nor should it. That's one of the reasons why the state should be left separate from any religious viewpoint and let the various religions and their sub branches decide for their intepretation for their members only.
Correct me if I'm wrong on the general doctrine, it has been 5+ years since I last time had to study anything about the religions.
<!--quoteo(post=1746905:date=Jan 12 2010, 05:26 AM:name=Bacillus)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Bacillus @ Jan 12 2010, 05:26 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1746905"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->One of the major differences between Christianity and Islam is that Christianity doesn't state that their holy book is directly the word of their god. It was written by humans and it gets translated by humans. The content of it is picked by humans too. It can't be interpreted as it is in any unanimous way nor should it. That's one of the reasons why the state should be left separate from any religious viewpoint and let the various religions and their sub branches decide for their intepretation for their members only.
Correct me if I'm wrong on the general doctrine, it has been 5+ years since I last time had to study anything about the religions.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
There isn't really much of a 'general doctrine' of 'christianity' because 'christianity' means a whole load of different sects which all have their own weird habits.
C of E, baptist, and catholic are all 'christian' but quite different in their ideologies. And some of the more mental christians do take the bible as being absolutely literal in every way.
Yeah, I'm what you might call a 'displaced' Catholic. We interpret <a href="http://bible.cc/matthew/18-18.htm" target="_blank">Matthew18:18</a> quite literally in regards to the papacy. Basically the assumption is that the Pope is infallible and if he says you're out (excommunication), then you're going to hell and there's not much you can do about it.
So it's not like Christianity is totally for self examination, either.
ThansalThe New ScumJoin Date: 2002-08-22Member: 1215Members, Constellation
So, out of curiosity Depot, how do you deal with Leviticus? Large portions of it are the word of God directly to Moses (or others). In fact that is where a good portion of the fairly obvious "Homosexuals are bad, stone them" comes from (the parts about the Sodomites is kinda harder as the sins they are punished for are not actually their homosexual acts, but instead being rude little buggers). Leviticus is actually where most of the "wow, you Christians are a screwed up lot" comes from. God tells Moses that a child who blasphemes must be stoned. A child who disrespects his parents must be stoned. Catamites (male child ######s) are to be stoned and go to hell. Slavery is cool so long as they are foreigners.
Those are all Word of God passages, they aren't simply recounting events, they are commands from God direct.
Yes, there are areas open for interpretation based on translations (does remove from the lands mean exile, or kill? Are Sodomites ######s? or simply people from Sodom?). But a lot of them are distasteful no matter how you interpret them (the use of stoning for relatively, to us, minor transgressions, hell the use of stoning is horrible flat out).
Or do you say the Old Testament doesn't count? We should only follow the New Testament? If we only stick to the New Testament, is it the Word of God? Was Paul divinely inspired in writing Corinthians? Or was he simply writing? Was Paul talking about Homosexuals? Or was he saying effeminate men (in which case the rise of Metrosexuality is the end of the world)?
Also, the comment about Islam taking the Old Testament literally and Christians not? Almost completely wrong. 1) There are lots of Christians that take The Bible (all of it) as the Word of God. 2) Many Muslims do just as much interpretation of their holy texts (which include the Torah, aka Old Testament) as Jews and Christians.
<!--quoteo(post=1746936:date=Jan 12 2010, 01:01 PM:name=Thansal)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Thansal @ Jan 12 2010, 01:01 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1746936"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Also, the comment about Islam taking the Old Testament literally and Christians not? Almost completely wrong. 1) There are lots of Christians that take The Bible (all of it) as the Word of God. 2) Many Muslims do just as much interpretation of their holy texts (which include the Torah, aka Old Testament) as Jews and Christians.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Obivously you can find the extremes in every case if you want to. The vast majority and all major branches of Christianity that I know take it as a book written by people, not as a direct word dictated by God.
Qur’an on the other hand is considered to be the direct word. Torah isn't. I've understood that it makes a world of difference when it comes to who is allowed to interpret and how, but like I said, it's been 5+ years since I've even heard of the differences in a random high school lesson.
We are straying off quite far away from the actual topic though.
ThansalThe New ScumJoin Date: 2002-08-22Member: 1215Members, Constellation
<!--quoteo(post=1746940:date=Jan 12 2010, 09:47 AM:name=Bacillus)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Bacillus @ Jan 12 2010, 09:47 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1746940"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Obivously you can find the extremes in every case if you want to. The vast majority and all major branches of Christianity that I know take it as a book written by people, not as a direct word dictated by God.
Qur’an on the other hand is considered to be the direct word. Torah isn't. I've understood that it makes a world of difference when it comes to who is allowed to interpret and how, but like I said, it's been 5+ years since I've even heard of the differences in a random high school lesson.
We are straying off quite far away from the actual topic though.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
We are straying off topic because the arguments boil down to: "God says no" "Well crap, you can't argue that"
As for the other stuff:
The Qur'an is Mohammad's book as revealed by Gabriel (as in, Gabriel tells him stuff, Mohammad, or some one else, writes it down). If the writing's are practiced exactly as they are said, or interpreted by individuals, Clerics, or whatever is down to who the Muslim is that we are talking about. There is a HUGE range of how people practice Islam, just as there are with Christianity and Judaism. Remember, Islam is really, REALLY huge.
Large portions of the Torah are actually "And God said unto Moses" (aka, direct word of God). Take a browsing through Leviticus for good examples.
Honestly, the books I am LEAST familiar with (in terms of history, as I know almost nothing of what the Qur'an says) are those of the New Testament, however IIRC they are all written after the death of Jesus and there is a lot of back and forth on how they were written. Be it the secular question of "So, who actually held the pen?" or the religious "Was soandso simply writing? or is this divinely inspired?".
ThansalThe New ScumJoin Date: 2002-08-22Member: 1215Members, Constellation
edited January 2010
A lot of good information about everything: <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/id/229957" target="_blank">http://www.newsweek.com/id/229957</a>
It should be noted that this is the guy who represented Bush in Bush v Gore (over the 2000 election)
Seriously, read the entire thing. I don't care if you already agree with it. He sums up why the concept of discriminating against homosexuals is so wrong.
Well, his argument that tradition shouldn't matter to a conservative is flatly wrong - preservation of tradition and resistance to change are core conservative values.
In any case, if you could wonder what the point of marriage was when it started out, it probably had to do with a community-wide contractual binding of two family houses with some intent behind it, whether that be a Romanesque strategic union to place a son or grandson in position for a power play or to signal the stand-down of arms between two factions or whatever. The idea was the merging of two family lines. That's quite traditional, and it's pretty well meaningless in the case of a homosexual couple that can't procreate. In vitro and adoption don't count here: it has to do with genes.
Of course, these days we don't have those kinds of issues. These days, it's a statement of intent to live monogamously or, more often, intent to draw tax benefits. :)
Given the change in meaning, it's important to decide what marriage should mean to the whole country. Should marriage extend to polygamous relationships or cross-species relationships? Don't get me wrong, I could care less what people do, as long as when most of them do it, it's in accordance with the current moral code of the times. People often imply religious or damning traits with morality when all it really means is to follow the protocols that allow our society to function. If it's immoral to have sex with animals, we'd better not make a law that allows it; if it's perfectly moral, we'd better not make a law against it. You see what I mean?
Unfortunately it's hard to separate "church" (morality) and state so cleanly.
ThansalThe New ScumJoin Date: 2002-08-22Member: 1215Members, Constellation
Two things that you brought up are things that interest me so I'm going to spout a couple lines on each:
1)Conservative, Republican, Right. Those words do not mean the same thing. As far as our media and the general population cares, they do. But in actuality they mean very different things. For one thing Mr. Olson is demonstrating Republican ideals in taking up this case. He obviously believes that the constitution is incredibly important, and that we should strive to live up to the ideals behind the Deceleration of Independence. This isn't to say that Mr. Olson isn't a conservative in other things (I don't know, but I assume he is very fiscally conservative, and probably believes that it isn't the government's job to regulate the economy).
2) <!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Unfortunately it's hard to separate "church" (morality) and state so cleanly.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That is because until very recently there was no separation between church and state. Almost all nation prior to 'modern' times have been theocracies. There has been no concept of separation of religion and society, religion WAS society.
<!--quoteo(post=1746981:date=Jan 12 2010, 02:36 PM:name=Thansal)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Thansal @ Jan 12 2010, 02:36 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1746981"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->... That is because until very recently there was no separation between church and state. Almost all nation prior to 'modern' times have been theocracies. There has been no concept of separation of religion and society, religion WAS society.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This is actually very correct. The separation of church and state so often referred to has more to do with a particular denomination's hierarchy not making legal decisions. It means that elected officials don't have to be of any particular faith. They are, however, supposed to represent their constituents to the best of their ability. Since our moral codes have always been hopeless entwined with our religion, it's only natural that our laws mimic our dominate religion.
I don't think it's possible for a society to exist with two very opposing moral codes. That leads to civil war. And until we can untangle morality from religion, things like ###### marriage will always be a religion vs activist debate. If it's even possible to do so.
X_StickmanNot good enough for a custom title.Join Date: 2003-04-15Member: 15533Members, Constellation
I want to swing this discussion back around to something related to the original topic, just because I'm the OP and I can do whatever I want. You're in *my* thread now, ######, so step off.
It is true that religion and government are hopelessly intertwined. Even with the noble goal of the US' seperation of church and state (to my knowledge the US is one of the very few countries to specifically state in it's constitution that there is a wall between church and state. Other countries act like they do but don't), as long as the country has a government system that gives people power based on the public voting for them, if the public is largely religious, then the government will reflect that. As America shows, you're unlikely to get an atheist official in a largely religious area. Hell, during one campaign, one runner accused the other of being an atheist and this was perceived as an attack on her. Let that sink in for a while. I think it's unfeasible to think that will change drastically any time soon, and any attempts to hurry it along would most likely cause a backlash that would set it back years.
What I *do* think should be enforced, however, is the idea that religious reasoning *by itself* should not be used to dictate laws or policy. This is something that has annoyed me about the same-sex marriage oppostion for an awful, awful long time. There is no biological, sociological, psychological or economical reason to deny same sex partners the same rights that heterosexual partners have. Absolutely none. *All* of the reasoning against same-sex marriage comes from two sources:
1) People going "ewwwwwwwwwww homosexual sex! That's like hairy men doing bum things!" and generally not liking the idea of homosexuality in the first place. 2) Religion.
Neither of these are good enough reasons to deny a sizable portion of the country equal rights. America is a democracy, sure, and the public should be the ones in control of most of the decisions made. *Most* of the decisions made. Public ignorance and bigotry is something the government should step in and override. Indeed, it already does in several areas, such as taxes. I'm willing to bet that if you handed everyone in America a simple form saying "do you want to pay taxes: yes / no" and asked them to circle their response, you'd get far more "no"s. And yet taxes still exist. Because the need to collect taxes is more important than the need to do what the public wants with regards to taxes. Same with driving-while-talking-on-a-phone laws. It's dangerous so we ban it (I think? Does america ban it? It was on mythbusters once so I dunno), even though most people would probably say "dude don't ban it I'm a good enough driver to do it safely" etc.
Same with religious reasoning. It's basically the same as the first one, only it's older. That's all. People in the past hated homosexuals too, so we should carry on doing it. That's the reasoning.
Like I said above, neither of these lines of reasoning are valid enough to deny so many people equal rights. If same-sex marriage was proven to cause volcanoes to erupt in every US city, or to cause hurricanes to batter every town in the world, then yes, that would be a good enough reason to ban it. But "eww" and "so sayeth the book" are *not* good enough.
GISPBattle GorgeDenmarkJoin Date: 2004-03-20Member: 27460Members, Playtest Lead, Forum Moderators, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Squad Five Gold, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Onos, WC 2013 - Gold, Subnautica Playtester, Forum staff
I would go so far and call all whos against same-sex marriages homofobic &(#%" and =(¤6@¨'> not to say a /&¤§½ or `Ø}$å^*... And using religion s a aguement instead of mainking your own damn minds is downright is ?#$€>\+!!! ignorant.
From a non-religious standpoint there really is a slippery slope here. Once marriage has been redefined to include homosexual pairings, what grounds will there be to oppose further redefinition — to encompass people who want to marry their horses, their sisters, or their soccer team? Are all private contractual relations for cohabitation to be rendered equal, or are some to be privileged over others, as has been customary in all times and places?
InsaneAnomalyJoin Date: 2002-05-13Member: 605Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, NS2 Map Tester, Subnautica Developer, Pistachionauts, Future Perfect Developer
Depot, there really isn't a slippery slope situation here. You may get so excited and confused at the prospect of ###### marriage that you feel the need to marry a horse, but that's not an impulse the rest of us experience.
ThansalThe New ScumJoin Date: 2002-08-22Member: 1215Members, Constellation
<!--quoteo(post=1747099:date=Jan 13 2010, 06:33 AM:name=Depot)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Depot @ Jan 13 2010, 06:33 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1747099"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->From a non-religious standpoint there really is a slippery slope here. Once marriage has been redefined to include homosexual pairings, what grounds will there be to oppose further redefinition — to encompass people who want to marry their horses, their sisters, or their soccer team? Are all private contractual relations for cohabitation to be rendered equal, or are some to be privileged over others, as has been customary in all times and places?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
So, homosexuals are inhuman? Incestuous (scientific reason for not doing it)?
As for polygamy, well, that is a different tale. I have no issue with it. There is no scientific reason not to. So yah, it might eventually happen if a significant portion of our society deemed it to be ok, but again, whole other can of worms there. And no. It still isn't a slippery slope.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Are all private contractual relations for cohabitation to be rendered equal, or are some to be privileged over others, as has been customary in all times and places?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Read the article. The man says it much better than I can. Same-Sex Marriage holds the same societal ideals that Heterosexual Marriage does.
<!--quoteo(post=1747107:date=Jan 13 2010, 06:51 AM:name=Thansal)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Thansal @ Jan 13 2010, 06:51 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1747107"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->So, homosexuals are inhuman? Incestuous (scientific reason for not doing it)?
As for polygamy, well, that is a different tale. I have no issue with it. There is no scientific reason not to. So yah, it might eventually happen if a significant portion of our society deemed it to be ok, but again, whole other can of worms there. And no. It still isn't a slippery slope.
Read the article. The man says it much better than I can. Same-Sex Marriage holds the same societal ideals that Heterosexual Marriage does.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> What grounds will there be to oppose further redefinition though? Would it stop at homosexuality? If so, why should it?
X_StickmanNot good enough for a custom title.Join Date: 2003-04-15Member: 15533Members, Constellation
An animal can't give consent to marriage, so that's the retarded "marrying an animal" argument out of the way.
I'm pretty sure that the "marrying a football team" part would present some major challenges in practice. What exactly are you proposing? That one person marries the entire football team, or what each member of the football team marries the other? I'm not entirely sure how the legal status of that would work out. How would the tax benefits work, how would divorce work, what would count as adultery? Either way it's a retarded, stupid argument. It's like saying "if we allow christianity to exist, on what grounds can we deny people the right to sacrifice their congregation to the dark gods?"
That aside I don't see a problem with what consenting adults do, related or not. Please note the term "consenting".
ThansalThe New ScumJoin Date: 2002-08-22Member: 1215Members, Constellation
edited January 2010
Because people don't view them as related.
Unless of course those people think that homosexuals are animals and are some how going to produce twisted offspring.
Heck, by your logic we should have legalized (not sure why besti-ality is blocked) and incest already, but we haven't. And really, it is as simple as that.
The slippery slope argument is a fallacy more often than not. For it to be true you must show that there are such minor differences between each step in the chain that it is a logical next step. In this case there is no relation between homosexuality and the other steps in your chain.
An argument can (and was) made that declaring anti-sodomy laws unconstitutional would lead to the legalization of homosexual marriage (which we hope it does), but it couldn't be rationally argued that it would lead to the legalization of Besti-Ality or Incest (which it hasn't)
So answer my second question, "Are all private contractual relations for cohabitation to be rendered equal, or are some to be privileged over others, as has been customary in all times and places?"
ThansalThe New ScumJoin Date: 2002-08-22Member: 1215Members, Constellation
<!--quoteo(post=1747127:date=Jan 13 2010, 09:06 AM:name=Depot)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Depot @ Jan 13 2010, 09:06 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1747127"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->So answer my second question, "Are all private contractual relations for cohabitation to be rendered equal, or are some to be privileged over others, as has been customary in all times and places?"
Who has the right to differentiate?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This is still an attempt at a slippery slope, and fails for the same reason.
Marriage has a set of defined social benefits that we, as a society, deem to be good and useful, and thus reward them. This relationship, and the benefits within, are the same regardless of the sex/gender/sexual orientation of the 2 people involved.
Comments
Also, I'm ignoring the attempts to pull this into religion vs whatever as I would like to see some sort of explanation for why we should ignore our constitution and bill of rights in favor of religious doctrine.
I've also just decided that I think the legal idea of marriage should be disbanded completely. If nothing else, it will make tax law much easier.
So let me get this straight... any practices in the Bible you find distasteful are merely "history", but anything you feel sufficiently righteous about agreeing with can be said to be "God's Law".
How remarkably convenient.
How remarkably convenient.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
There are things that happened and there are things that God preached and taught. Certainly you don't blame everything that's written in the bible. or that happened during the time it was written. on God...
Correct me if I'm wrong on the general doctrine, it has been 5+ years since I last time had to study anything about the religions.
There's not much more I can say here, other than I will pray for those in favor of homosexual marriage and anyone else here who is "lost".
God bless you all.
Correct me if I'm wrong on the general doctrine, it has been 5+ years since I last time had to study anything about the religions.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
There isn't really much of a 'general doctrine' of 'christianity' because 'christianity' means a whole load of different sects which all have their own weird habits.
C of E, baptist, and catholic are all 'christian' but quite different in their ideologies. And some of the more mental christians do take the bible as being absolutely literal in every way.
So it's not like Christianity is totally for self examination, either.
Those are all Word of God passages, they aren't simply recounting events, they are commands from God direct.
Yes, there are areas open for interpretation based on translations (does remove from the lands mean exile, or kill? Are Sodomites ######s? or simply people from Sodom?). But a lot of them are distasteful no matter how you interpret them (the use of stoning for relatively, to us, minor transgressions, hell the use of stoning is horrible flat out).
Or do you say the Old Testament doesn't count? We should only follow the New Testament?
If we only stick to the New Testament, is it the Word of God? Was Paul divinely inspired in writing Corinthians? Or was he simply writing? Was Paul talking about Homosexuals? Or was he saying effeminate men (in which case the rise of Metrosexuality is the end of the world)?
Also, the comment about Islam taking the Old Testament literally and Christians not? Almost completely wrong.
1) There are lots of Christians that take The Bible (all of it) as the Word of God.
2) Many Muslims do just as much interpretation of their holy texts (which include the Torah, aka Old Testament) as Jews and Christians.
1) There are lots of Christians that take The Bible (all of it) as the Word of God.
2) Many Muslims do just as much interpretation of their holy texts (which include the Torah, aka Old Testament) as Jews and Christians.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Obivously you can find the extremes in every case if you want to. The vast majority and all major branches of Christianity that I know take it as a book written by people, not as a direct word dictated by God.
Qur’an on the other hand is considered to be the direct word. Torah isn't. I've understood that it makes a world of difference when it comes to who is allowed to interpret and how, but like I said, it's been 5+ years since I've even heard of the differences in a random high school lesson.
We are straying off quite far away from the actual topic though.
Qur’an on the other hand is considered to be the direct word. Torah isn't. I've understood that it makes a world of difference when it comes to who is allowed to interpret and how, but like I said, it's been 5+ years since I've even heard of the differences in a random high school lesson.
We are straying off quite far away from the actual topic though.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
We are straying off topic because the arguments boil down to:
"God says no"
"Well crap, you can't argue that"
As for the other stuff:
The Qur'an is Mohammad's book as revealed by Gabriel (as in, Gabriel tells him stuff, Mohammad, or some one else, writes it down). If the writing's are practiced exactly as they are said, or interpreted by individuals, Clerics, or whatever is down to who the Muslim is that we are talking about. There is a HUGE range of how people practice Islam, just as there are with Christianity and Judaism. Remember, Islam is really, REALLY huge.
Large portions of the Torah are actually "And God said unto Moses" (aka, direct word of God). Take a browsing through Leviticus for good examples.
Honestly, the books I am LEAST familiar with (in terms of history, as I know almost nothing of what the Qur'an says) are those of the New Testament, however IIRC they are all written after the death of Jesus and there is a lot of back and forth on how they were written. Be it the secular question of "So, who actually held the pen?" or the religious "Was soandso simply writing? or is this divinely inspired?".
<a href="http://www.newsweek.com/id/229957" target="_blank">http://www.newsweek.com/id/229957</a>
It should be noted that this is the guy who represented Bush in Bush v Gore (over the 2000 election)
Seriously, read the entire thing. I don't care if you already agree with it. He sums up why the concept of discriminating against homosexuals is so wrong.
In any case, if you could wonder what the point of marriage was when it started out, it probably had to do with a community-wide contractual binding of two family houses with some intent behind it, whether that be a Romanesque strategic union to place a son or grandson in position for a power play or to signal the stand-down of arms between two factions or whatever. The idea was the merging of two family lines. That's quite traditional, and it's pretty well meaningless in the case of a homosexual couple that can't procreate. In vitro and adoption don't count here: it has to do with genes.
Of course, these days we don't have those kinds of issues. These days, it's a statement of intent to live monogamously or, more often, intent to draw tax benefits. :)
Given the change in meaning, it's important to decide what marriage should mean to the whole country. Should marriage extend to polygamous relationships or cross-species relationships? Don't get me wrong, I could care less what people do, as long as when most of them do it, it's in accordance with the current moral code of the times. People often imply religious or damning traits with morality when all it really means is to follow the protocols that allow our society to function. If it's immoral to have sex with animals, we'd better not make a law that allows it; if it's perfectly moral, we'd better not make a law against it. You see what I mean?
Unfortunately it's hard to separate "church" (morality) and state so cleanly.
1)Conservative, Republican, Right.
Those words do not mean the same thing. As far as our media and the general population cares, they do. But in actuality they mean very different things. For one thing Mr. Olson is demonstrating Republican ideals in taking up this case. He obviously believes that the constitution is incredibly important, and that we should strive to live up to the ideals behind the Deceleration of Independence. This isn't to say that Mr. Olson isn't a conservative in other things (I don't know, but I assume he is very fiscally conservative, and probably believes that it isn't the government's job to regulate the economy).
2)
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Unfortunately it's hard to separate "church" (morality) and state so cleanly.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That is because until very recently there was no separation between church and state. Almost all nation prior to 'modern' times have been theocracies. There has been no concept of separation of religion and society, religion WAS society.
That is because until very recently there was no separation between church and state. Almost all nation prior to 'modern' times have been theocracies. There has been no concept of separation of religion and society, religion WAS society.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This is actually very correct. The separation of church and state so often referred to has more to do with a particular denomination's hierarchy not making legal decisions. It means that elected officials don't have to be of any particular faith. They are, however, supposed to represent their constituents to the best of their ability. Since our moral codes have always been hopeless entwined with our religion, it's only natural that our laws mimic our dominate religion.
I don't think it's possible for a society to exist with two very opposing moral codes. That leads to civil war. And until we can untangle morality from religion, things like ###### marriage will always be a religion vs activist debate. If it's even possible to do so.
It is true that religion and government are hopelessly intertwined. Even with the noble goal of the US' seperation of church and state (to my knowledge the US is one of the very few countries to specifically state in it's constitution that there is a wall between church and state. Other countries act like they do but don't), as long as the country has a government system that gives people power based on the public voting for them, if the public is largely religious, then the government will reflect that. As America shows, you're unlikely to get an atheist official in a largely religious area. Hell, during one campaign, one runner accused the other of being an atheist and this was perceived as an attack on her. Let that sink in for a while. I think it's unfeasible to think that will change drastically any time soon, and any attempts to hurry it along would most likely cause a backlash that would set it back years.
What I *do* think should be enforced, however, is the idea that religious reasoning *by itself* should not be used to dictate laws or policy. This is something that has annoyed me about the same-sex marriage oppostion for an awful, awful long time. There is no biological, sociological, psychological or economical reason to deny same sex partners the same rights that heterosexual partners have. Absolutely none. *All* of the reasoning against same-sex marriage comes from two sources:
1) People going "ewwwwwwwwwww homosexual sex! That's like hairy men doing bum things!" and generally not liking the idea of homosexuality in the first place.
2) Religion.
Neither of these are good enough reasons to deny a sizable portion of the country equal rights. America is a democracy, sure, and the public should be the ones in control of most of the decisions made. *Most* of the decisions made. Public ignorance and bigotry is something the government should step in and override. Indeed, it already does in several areas, such as taxes. I'm willing to bet that if you handed everyone in America a simple form saying "do you want to pay taxes: yes / no" and asked them to circle their response, you'd get far more "no"s. And yet taxes still exist. Because the need to collect taxes is more important than the need to do what the public wants with regards to taxes. Same with driving-while-talking-on-a-phone laws. It's dangerous so we ban it (I think? Does america ban it? It was on mythbusters once so I dunno), even though most people would probably say "dude don't ban it I'm a good enough driver to do it safely" etc.
Same with religious reasoning. It's basically the same as the first one, only it's older. That's all. People in the past hated homosexuals too, so we should carry on doing it. That's the reasoning.
Like I said above, neither of these lines of reasoning are valid enough to deny so many people equal rights. If same-sex marriage was proven to cause volcanoes to erupt in every US city, or to cause hurricanes to batter every town in the world, then yes, that would be a good enough reason to ban it. But "eww" and "so sayeth the book" are *not* good enough.
Just my 2 cent on the matter...
So, homosexuals are inhuman? Incestuous (scientific reason for not doing it)?
As for polygamy, well, that is a different tale. I have no issue with it. There is no scientific reason not to. So yah, it might eventually happen if a significant portion of our society deemed it to be ok, but again, whole other can of worms there. And no. It still isn't a slippery slope.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Are all private contractual relations for cohabitation to be rendered equal, or are some to be privileged over others, as has been customary in all times and places?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Read the article. The man says it much better than I can. Same-Sex Marriage holds the same societal ideals that Heterosexual Marriage does.
As for polygamy, well, that is a different tale. I have no issue with it. There is no scientific reason not to. So yah, it might eventually happen if a significant portion of our society deemed it to be ok, but again, whole other can of worms there. And no. It still isn't a slippery slope.
Read the article. The man says it much better than I can. Same-Sex Marriage holds the same societal ideals that Heterosexual Marriage does.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
What grounds will there be to oppose further redefinition though? Would it stop at homosexuality? If so, why should it?
I'm pretty sure that the "marrying a football team" part would present some major challenges in practice. What exactly are you proposing? That one person marries the entire football team, or what each member of the football team marries the other? I'm not entirely sure how the legal status of that would work out. How would the tax benefits work, how would divorce work, what would count as adultery? Either way it's a retarded, stupid argument. It's like saying "if we allow christianity to exist, on what grounds can we deny people the right to sacrifice their congregation to the dark gods?"
That aside I don't see a problem with what consenting adults do, related or not. Please note the term "consenting".
Unless of course those people think that homosexuals are animals and are some how going to produce twisted offspring.
Heck, by your logic we should have legalized (not sure why besti-ality is blocked) and incest already, but we haven't. And really, it is as simple as that.
The slippery slope argument is a fallacy more often than not. For it to be true you must show that there are such minor differences between each step in the chain that it is a logical next step. In this case there is no relation between homosexuality and the other steps in your chain.
An argument can (and was) made that declaring anti-sodomy laws unconstitutional would lead to the legalization of homosexual marriage (which we hope it does), but it couldn't be rationally argued that it would lead to the legalization of Besti-Ality or Incest (which it hasn't)
Who has the right to differentiate?
Who has the right to differentiate?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This is still an attempt at a slippery slope, and fails for the same reason.
Marriage has a set of defined social benefits that we, as a society, deem to be good and useful, and thus reward them. This relationship, and the benefits within, are the same regardless of the sex/gender/sexual orientation of the 2 people involved.
Question Answered.
Next?
I'm changing nothing, simply offering additional perspectives.