While I have significant qualms with Limbtaker's assertion that feminism yielded an "orgy" of immorality, I'm going to try to dance around those concerns for now--in a very homosexual fashion--and keep my discussion relatively focused on gay marriage. I think my position is pretty nuanced and seemingly contradictory, so I'm actually going to take a little while to explain it. I hope I don't come off as a waffler like that ****er John Kerry.
I'm actually against same-sex matrimony at this point. I think what Gavin Newsom has gone and done in San Francisco is irresponsible and unbecoming of an elected official, for one thing, and for another I think it's cruel to use the real aspirations of homosexual couples to wed as a political stunt. I think his intentions are good, but the way he went about challenging the law by executing an end-run around the state code was childish and unacceptable.
But Gavin Newsom's antics only represent one facet of the debate, not a microcosm of the issue that faces the nation. Essentially my problem with the notion of gay marriage is that marriage isn't really a civic entity; it's an invention of the church, and as such I don't think it ought to be subject to political alteration. That said, in my ideal society, in my utopia, men and women of any sexual orientation would be able to wed, and there would be no church, but that's neither here nor there. At this point, the country isn't ready to redefine the institution of marriage. I think that's what it comes down to. There are too many people in this country who rightly or wrongly believe that matrimony is a sacred bond between a man and a woman, and that the recognition of homosexual unions by the church would represent an assault on the sanctity of that bond. I happen to disagree, but I'm not a part of the church.
I think the real issue here isn't one of marriage; it's one of human rights. Some states don't even recognize civil unions, and I think that's reprehensible; that needs to change, and it needs to change immediately. That would satisfy my concerns surrounding the constitution's equal protection clause, and apart from granting gay and lesbian couples the basic civil recognition of their heterosexual counterparts, I'm not too gung-ho on recognizing gay marriages because of the needless strife they would generate in the country, which is already painfully divided the left from the right. That said, it gives me pause when I consider that in our secular society marriage isn't the religious property it used to be, and in some cases I think 'civil unions' are all most heterosexual marriages amount to in the first place. It's a thorny issue, but I don't think it warrants tinkering with tradition.
In light of those concerns, I think amending the constitution to smother the issue is absolutely ridiculous. For one thing it would never be ratified--the constitution is maddeningly difficult to change--and for another, if the federal government doesn't have the authority to spell out what constitutes marriage, it certainly doesn't have the authority to spell out what doesn't. That's for the church and the states to decide. I think the legitimization of gay marriage is inevitable in the future, but now isn't the time.
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--Bryan Keers, biggest badass ever
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