Strike a blow for common sense

[mithriltabby]

Marriage is love.

“There’s been a tremendous discussion recently in this country about gay marriage, and I’m a little concerned — are they going to make us marry gay? Cuz... cuz I... I don’t think my wife would like that, you know, if I had to go off and marry a man. But, see, I figure they must be trying to make it mandatory, because otherwise, why would anyone care?”
— Jon Stewart

Personally, I think gay couples should be allowed to marry. If marriage can be endangered at all, it’s not from loving couples who want to solemnize their long-term commitments.

Is the United States collectively ready for this yet? Probably not. There are too many people out there who are freaked out about homosexuality. (Never mind that it’s observed in many other species than human; some people think it’s “unnatural”. Have any of these people ever actually studied nature?)

What we need right now is a position that the country can agree on without becoming rabidly partisan. The best one I’ve heard of is to invoke the basic notion of separation of church and state: because marriage is a religious sacrament to some, and some religions believe that marriage should be only between a man and a woman and others believe that it should be between two people who love each other, regardless of gender, the government should just step back and not get involved. What part of “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” do they not understand?

So if Congress have any sense (I’m not holding my breath), they’ll pass a law that does a string-replace operation of “marriage” with “civil union” (or any more poetic name for it that anyone can come up with) in all governmental documents, let the gay couples pay the marriage penalty to the IRS, and let the religions wrangle over the details. Naturally, the religions that think homosexuality is sinful will complain bitterly that the government isn’t supporting their agenda, but if they don’t like being in a nation founded by Deists, they can pack up and go someplace else. America: love it or leave it.

Comments

[cmccurry.livejournal.com]

I wonder how quickly this issue is going to hit the Supreme Court.

[mithriltabby]

Hmmm... what would the legal issue be? An insurance company seeking to deny coverage to a homosexual’s partner? A homosexual suing for access to a loved one at the hospital? A homosexual couple suing the IRS for the right to pay taxes as a married couple filing jointly? (That would be an entertaining precedent to set.)

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[cmccurry.livejournal.com]

I think the first legal issue is going to be the Constitutional Amendment defining marriage in America as being strictly between a man and a woman.

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[mithriltabby]

That one will be tricky to bring before the Supreme Court. Can a constitutional amendment be ruled unconstitutional? I just hope it has no hope of ratification, even if it passes Congress...

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[cmccurry.livejournal.com]

As far as I know, an amendment can't be ruled unconstitutional but it can be repealed by another amendment (e.g. Prohibition). I have a tough time believing that Congress would pass this one though.

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[mithriltabby]

Never underestimate the venality of a politician seeking re-election.

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[cmccurry.livejournal.com]

Or the power of appealing to the Lowest Common Denominator.

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[mithriltabby]

Yep. I suspect that there are a lot of people out there who are beginning to cope with tolerating gays, but still feel threatened by the notion of having them get married. If that becomes a hot-button issue during the presidential campaign, it might split the country up very effectively...

*sudden deranged vision* I just had an idea of a “revolution clock”, kind of like the clock on the cover of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists— a little bar graph covering “When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.” When the government does something egregiously stupid, the clock moves forward. When they do something sensible, it goes backward. If it goes all the way, it’s time to do something radical. The problem would be mobilizing enough people for passive resistance— violence would be entirely the wrong message, and you’d need to give all those people enough training that they couldn’t be riled up by an agent provocateur— and doing an end run around the corporate-controlled media to get honest coverage to at least 90% of the citizenry.

Still, it would be appropriate for a populace ruled by a King George who are being taxed without being given decent representation in their government.