This is my first visit to The Cellar, and I love it. I've only read this one thread, but it seems like a lot of people 'preaching to the choir', as they say - don't the (in this case) anti-gay marriage types ever check in here with their opinions, worthless and hackneyed though they might be?
I have difficulty believing that any person of even moderate intelligence and at least minimal education could possibly, honestly believe that recognition of same-sex marriages will somehow adversely affect their own marital relationship, or 'encourage' people to 'be gay.' The Religious Right are simply asserting what they believe to be their prerogative to control every aspect of 'their' society - putting their scent on everything, like a dog marking territory.
There is no rationally defensible reason that two law-abiding, unrelated adult citizens should not have access to the exact same legal status - marriage, in this case - regardless of their sex.
Aside from advancing and codifying a relatively obscure religious prohibition, in a realm - our government - into which religious doctrine and prejudice are, IN THEORY, not supposed to intrude, there is no logical reason to be against the State's recognition of gay marriage relationships.
Here are a couple of great quotes from 'Created Equal: Why Gay Rights Matter to America', by Michael Nava & Robert Dawidoff:
"America tells us that citizens of this country possess the inalienable right of freedom, and that government exists for no higher purpose than to protect the exercise of that freedom. America promises that the law shall be applied equally to all of us, regardless of our differences and especially if those differences incite prejudice in others. America tells us that the Constitution is a living thing, a framework that bends to accommodate and protect the freedom of every group of Americans that seek its protections, whether or not the founders could have envisioned their specific claim. America guarantees that we shall be free to worship God in the manner of our choosing, but that no other person's God will dictate how we are to live our own lives."
"It all comes down to this: Are people equal in this society by virtue of their citizenship, or not? If the answer is no, then we will be saying that equality does not exist in America anymore but has been replaced with tiers of citizenship, and that what tier you occupy depends on whether people like you or not. And if we accept this, then we will have repudiated the constitutional principles of liberty and equality upon which America was founded and which have been its historic challenge to the world."
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/AS...844439-5612816
America is a country of many traditions and national impulses; between many of them there exists a state of tension that sometimes breaks out into conflict or crisis. We're a people that extols the virtues of nonconformity, yet we're constantly trying to pressure our neighbors to be more like us in every conceivable way. We're justifiably proud of our Constitution, our court system, and the rule of law that they support, promote and defend - yet we balk and equivocate and rebel when these institutions, the envy of billions of people throughout the world, work as they should and protect the rights - to privacy, to equal treatment - of an entire class of Americans.
godwulf