Re: My Response to Dawn Eden

I was told to consult this link.

And my response/fisking:

>>The FMA does not eliminate the "right" of gay people to marry.

Well, yes it does. Unless they're supposed to enter sham marriages with members of the opposite sex.

>>It does, however:
>>
>>1) Promote the right of children to be raised in married, healthy >>homes with both genders as role models

A constitutional amendment banning divorce would affect far more children than will every be raised by gay parents. Strange that no one is proposing such an amendment. Could it be that this actually doesn't have quite so much to do with the rights of children? Of course it is the case, since gay people who want to get married want their kids "to be raised in healthy, married homes." Ah---but the crucial "with both genders as role models" proviso. Let's start putting the children of single moms and dads into foster care right now and banning them from adopting children until they find a spouse. In fact, let's create a regulatory body to make sure unmarried people don't have unprotected sex.

>>2) Give gay couples more liberty by preserving the privacy (and free >>markethood) of their relationships.

The FMA in its current language not only prohibits gay marriage, but also "any legal incidents" of marriage rights; in other words, no civil unions or domestic partnership agreements. That's the whole point. Gay couples are to have no legal rights whatsoever.

Is the privacy of heterosexual couples endangered by marriage, let alone their mere right to marry? The fact of the matter is that the desire, ability, and financial capacity to have children have no bearing whatsoever in the validity of a civil marriage. There is no criterion that heterosexual couples meet for obtaining a marriage license but that gay couples would fail to meet---save that they are gay. That is the very definition of arbitrary discrimination. The right to marry is one of the most fundamental civil rights of all citizens, on the same level as the right to vote and the right to serve in the military (hey, there's another discussion). No two people marry one another so that the government will recognize their love for each other; they marry because marriage is the most binding commitment of love that any two people can make. The "legal incidents" of marriage, i.e. the rights concordant with a valid marriage license, are secondary to the psychological bond forged by marriage---which is why any substitute for marriage is so deeply inadequate.

Love between gay people is every bit as deep, genuine, and complex and love between heterosexuals---or as shallow and insincere. Gay people want merely for their love to be given the same legal standing as love between heterosexuals, and they don't want and can't force any religious group or intolerant community to accept them. As citizens, they are entitled to 15th amendment protections. As human beings, they are entitled to a certain level of respect and decency. If you were suddenly told you were not allowed to marry the person you love, would you be satisfied to know that it's actually okay, since you don't need government validation of your relationship? Or could it be that you would be robbed of something fundamental to your identity.

Gay men and women aren't some foreign community living in isolated enclaves along the coasts. They have parents, siblings, nieces and nephews. They want to be a part of their own families; they attend the weddings of their brothers and sisters, and don't deserve the insult of some watered down substitute. Their love isn't any less real.