The right to marry is a human right.

[Beam Me Up]

The right to marry and form a family is a fundamental human right. It isn't a "straight" right or a "gay" right or a "religious" right or a "white" or "black" or any other minority right. As a human being, I have the right to marry anyone I love and who loves me in return regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation and gender -- and ANYONE who opposes that right opposes a FUNDAMENTAL human right. Doesn't matter what their sexual orientation is or their race is or their religion is.

That's how I see it and I think (I could be wrong but this is what I think) many people who voted yes on 8 don't understand it this way. They just don't 'get it' that marriage is about love, about creating a special relationship that may become a family (by whatever means), not about gender or even about sex. They are somehow partitioning "marriage" off and saying it isn't a fundamental human right but a right that belongs only to some people, specifically heterosexual people -- as if only heterosexual people of the opposite gender can love one another. But what if two straight men or two straight women fell in love and wanted to form a union and have a family by whatever means available to them? Perhaps they were in marriages with an opposite gender partner previously and have children or perhaps they want to adopt children. I know that sounds rather odd to most of us and might be extremely rare but so what? Are you going to tell me that two straight people can't fall in love? That there are no "odd couples"? I'm certainly old enough to know that marriage isn't about sex! It may begin there in most instances but something far deeper is required to sustain a loving relationship through time. Everyone has a fundamental right to express their mutual love and relationship with another person AND the fundamental right to expect government to secure their safety and pursuit of happiness equally under the law. Whether or not certain groups within society "accept" these marriages should be a social, not a political or legal issue. I can't demand anyone accept me socially but I can demand they respect my fundamental human rights.

[azurnoir]

1. Well said

Personally I just do not get it, what is the big deal for some people? If 2 people want to establish a life together and want to put a legal stamp on it then wtf, let them. As to "putting marriage" in danger they never say exactly in danger of what. I mean if the hubby is eying the guy next door or the wife is eying the lady down the block your marriage is in trouble and most likely over anyway and not because the spouse can't marry the object of their eye.

[patrice]

2. I agree! But what I don't get is how do we establish that the churches are acting politically

when they will just claim that they are acting on moral grounds?

They can't advocate for candidates, but they can advocate on Issues. Issues-->Candidate-->Issues. They have us cornered on the chicken-or-the-egg question.

So do we need somekind of porgram to get OUR candidates positioned appropriately on the Issues and then into the churches, directly or indirectly, to present the alternative perspectives on Issues and then, when some churches refuse to allow/support that alternative perspective, we get to go after their tax status, because they're favoring a certain other candidate? Won't they just say something such as "We don't favor the candidate that you claim we favor; what we favor his/her stance on the Issue because it is more morally correct than that of the candidate/perspective that we do not allow/support in our church." What is our response to this?

The only thing I can think of is that we need to create this PUBLIC DIALOGUE on the MORALITY of the issues - outside of the churches.

[Beam Me Up]

5. I don't think framing this as a "moral" issue is a good idea.

That is largely my point. I think it is a human rights issue, not a "moral" issue. I confess to being a bit fuzzy when it comes to understanding the differences between "morality" and "ethics" but isn't "morality" subjective?

Human rights are not subjective, not a matter of opinion. Our Constitution states that we have certain inalienable rights: Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. What could be more fundamental to my life, my liberty and my pursuit of happiness than my right to love and be loved and form a lasting mutual relationship? These rights aren't granted to us by the Constitution, rather the Constitution states that these rights are, "inalienable," fundamental, and that government is instituted among us to protect these rights from any individual or group who may try to take them from us -- including a majority who may want to deny us these rights for whatever "reason". That is why this country is a democratic republic where the rights of individuals and minorities are protected under the law. The law should apply equally to all, it should protect your rights from my subjective opinion, however "morally" virtuous I may believe it to be, and vice-versa. Doesn't matter how many people agree with either of us. Doesn't matter what religious text or historical tradition we believe in or put forward to validate our position.

I'm saying, first of all, that I think some (not all) who may have voted for proposition 8 did not think about it in this "human rights" way. Perhaps they are used to thinking about "marriage" as only being between a man and a woman -- which, traditionally, it has been in the past and, certainly, the majority of marriages will always be heterosexual. But there was a time when tradition dictated that men and women of certain religions could not marry one another, or men and women of certain ethnic groups could not marry outside their own group, etc. All sorts of "moral reasons" were found to justify such prejudices but over time were discarded because we have a Constitution that preserves and defends our inalienable rights.

Now the passing of prop 8 has brought us to another step in the long, long road of establishing equal human rights. In this instance it was a step backwards but it is only a temporary step-back which, if people continue to discuss it and press it as an issue of human rights equality, will eventually be turned around. We have to educate one another. We have to educate those who can grasp the significance of this as a human rights issue. We have to especially educate our political leaders such as President elect Obama. The Constitution guarantees us this right but, unfortunately, as has happened throughout our history, this guarantee will not be enforced until a) enough people understand this issue in human rights terms and b) from this human rights perspective enforce the protection of this right under the law.

Edit: changed "me" to "us" in one sentence

[patrice]

6. Churches are justifying their pro8 actions on the basis that it is a moral issue.

The truth is that they ARE being political, but they are hiding that behind claims about their moral responsibilities. This is how they avoid being taxed, when they, in fact, are politically active.

[Beam Me Up]

8. Ask them to explain what is "moral" about denying fundamental

human rights to anyone.

[NorthernSpy]

25. Yes, and they'll just say that marriage is by definition the union of a man and a woman.

And then we're all right back where we started. Those kinds of debates just keep going around in circles.

[SmileyRose]

3. Marriage is a legal and social contract - not a human right.

This country and this society provide for marriage as a legal and social way to recognize the family. We even have "common law marriage" which legally recognizes the financial claims of heterosexual domestic partners. There is absolutely no reason to deny this legal and social contract to homosexual partners. Absolutely none.

Having said all that, intimacy is a human emotional and biological necessity. Not sex, but intimacy. Ideally, a marriage or domestic partnership situation provides for intimacy but this is often not the case and people commit adultery as a way to meet that need. This is just the reality of life.

But I don't see where human right comes into any of it.

[IndianaJones]

4. Supreme Court disagrees. nt.

[SmileyRose]

11. I missed that - link?

thanks

[IndianaJones]

12. Loving v Virginia. nt.

[SmileyRose]

20. that was a CIVIL rights case, not HUMAN rights

and it had to do with race, not gender.

The court specifically state Marriage is a civil right. I see no mention of human right. - Civil rights are granted by law, not by birth.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=CASE&court=US&vol=388&page=1

[geomon666]

22. Totally agree, This is not a human rights issue.

You can have a family and live the rest of your days a happy human being without being married. Happens every day and people make that choice every day.

[justiceischeap]

7. I agree with everything you've said however...

The issue really comes down to how the GLBT community is viewed by people who don't have a gay family member, don't know gay people or don't/won't acknowledge the gays they do know.

Too many times I've heard the following arguments about myself:

It's impossible to love someone of the same sex
It's against God
It's a choice
It's unnatural
It's a mental health issue
If you try (pray) hard enough, you can be "normal"

Until we are seen as HUMAN by the majority, we will never receive our HUMAN rights.

[Beam Me Up]

16. "Until we are seen as HUMAN by the majority, we will never receive our HUMAN rights."

I understand what you are saying -- like you I am gay and have been the subject of prejudice my whole life. Everything you list I've heard and then some. However, I disagree. First because we are seen as human under the law. That is the most important point and is already established. The law says we are human beings (regardless of whether we are accepted by certain individuals, groups or society as a whole) and as such we have inalienable rights. What we're pointing forward now is that the law is not applied equally. Some are given the legal right to marry while it is denied to us -- and we are challenging that. Our right to marry the partner of our choice should never have been a political issue put to a vote. This is a fundamental human right that can not be denied by a majority. That is the argument I'm making here.

Of course in our individual lives, regardless of the law, we're always going to have to contend with prejudice. How we do that is going to be as individual as each of us are. Social attitudes toward an identified 'other' change very slowly -- so slowly that we often don't see these changes or how significant they are. We have to look back into history to 'get it' that although we still have to confront prejudice, physical abuse and so forth -- at least we're no longer legally and publicly burned at the stake, imprisoned or denied equal opportunity. Oh, yes, I'm sure there are those who think we should be -- but that is precisely my point. However much they may want to, legally they can't and if they do or even try to we should be able to bring the law to our defense. Of course they're not at all happy that we're trying to claim our right to marry because they perceive that as a further erosion of some outdated "values" they identify with. They see a 'win' for us as a 'loss' for them. They haven't yet understood that no one has equal rights unless we all have equal rights. In other words, they don't see it as a 'win'/'win' situation -- but then men didn't see women's suffrage as a 'win'/'win' situation either and neither did whites when blacks were emancipated and as they progressed along the long, long road toward equality. We've come a long way and we still have a long way to go but we'll get there. It is as inevitable as the sun rise.

[justiceischeap]

24. I get your point, I really do :)

I know we are human beings and we are entitled to the same rights as everyone else however, the problem as I see it is that the majority who are voting against us, creating new laws to discriminate against us in every election cycle, don't see us as human beings deserving of those inalienable rights.

Why else would they vote to deny us the same rights they take for granted? I guess that's where I slide down the rabbit hole. I know a lot of it is hatred, fear and prejudice and using those inner demons against us is, in a real sense, dehumanizing us to society as a whole. As their voting takes away our inalienable rights, then we aren't protected the same as everyone else and the more that happens we'll be continued to be seen as lesser beings.

Basically, until the majority step up and decry that what is happening to us systematically is wrong, it will continue to happen.

26 states have constitutional amendments explicitly barring the recognition of same-sex marriage, confining civil marriage to a legal union between a man and a woman. 43 states have statutes restricting marriage to two persons of the opposite sex, including some of those that have created legal recognition for same-sex unions under a name other than "marriage." That's a lot of people saying we don't have the same rights as they do. I think it's an issue that will end up being decided by the Supreme Court because at this rate, we don't have much to win on a state by state basis.

[aquart]

9. Could you stick "consenting adults" in there somewhere?

[Beam Me Up]

17. Why?

I mean I think it is obvious I'm talking about relationships that are mutually consensual. I don't want to get side-tracked into some discussion of what an "adult" is. Each state has laws which define the legal age for marriage, I assume, or whatever is necessary, such as parental consent in the case of someone who may be under the legally stipulated age.

I guess I'm not sure why you want to open up that discussion. What is it you're thinking?

[Oregone]

10. But ANYONE can "marry"

Private ceremonies can be conducted by anyone, and such relationships can be recognized by the participates. "Marriage" isn't illegal. Its about the state recognition of marriage, and without state recognition, private marriage ceremonies are largely symbolic.

The real rights in question here are hospital access, inheritance, medical coverage, tax benefits, etc. You see, its a right to the legal benefits that people receive from marriage that is the underlying civil rights issue. I don't find "marriage" to be the right in question here, whatsoever. If it is a "human right", as you claim, no one is being denied that. They are being denied our government's defined benefits and legal status that should be derived from it.

[End Of The Road]

14. Exactly.

When you get rid of the word "marriage" and focus on benefits and legal status, it lessens the emotional & irrational kneejerk reaction. Let's get the laws passed, and call it what you will.

It makes no sense to me why both sides are soooooo hung up on the damn word.

[Beam Me Up]

18. For what it is worth, personally I'm not hung up on the word "marriage"

I personally don't care whether it is called "marriage" or something else -- but of course what I'm talking about is not merely the symbolic marriage ceremony but all the civil rights that accompany a union of two people.

[NorthernSpy]

26. But the opponents ARE hung up on the word, and you have to anticipate that...

That's just reality.

[applegrove]

13. I agree it should be considered a human right.

[IndianaJones]

15. it is...see Loving v Virginia. nt.

[SmileyRose]

21. see above. I believe you are mistaken

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=CASE&court=US&vol=388&page=1

[patrice]

19. Love? You've heard of Gaia? Organically & Systemically: What if one of the ways that we

experience Gaia's ORGANIC nurturing/preserving energies is Love and what if Gaia has a bad case of "viral flu", CAUSED by human population at critical mass and producing all kinds of evolutionary factors, some of which are dysfunctional mutations and some of which are functional mutations, and what if some of the functional genetic changes are like anti-bodies that result in modifications to sexual orientation that results in FEWER humans and yet the organisms still has the preservation gene that manifests itself as what we know as Love. Would this not make some degree of LGBT actually "pro-Life"?

[Beam Me Up]

23. Who, except for the criminally insane, are 'anti-life'?

I don't see what you're getting at with all these 'what if's.

The right has held the semantic high-ground for far too long on this and many other issues.

We're all pro-life. Some are anti-abortion.

[patrice]

27. The interplay between constructive and destructive organic energies is not exclusively

Conscious; it has a large sub-Conscious component i.e. you are not always aware of the particular overall valence of some dynamic you're involved in or you may lie about it or label what is un-acceptable with an acceptable label, e.g. women have been known to get pregnant in order to land a "meal ticket" rather than for Love; people enlist and end up killing others for what they may be calling "patriotism" but what could be, in fact, fear and ignorance; authoritarian personality types have been known to become police, because it satisfies their need for power over others . . .

Parenting? Patriotism? Law and Order? all appear to be "Pro-Life" on the surface, but can actually be more anti-Life than anything else.

Sigmund Freud thought personality is the result of how the tensions between two organic energies: Eros (Life) and Thanatos (Death) are negotiated into a functional whole. The same idea is mirrored in the Tao's Yin & Yang, Christian Angels and Demons, and the Hindu's Kali Yuga to name just a few out of possibly hundreds of other manifestations of the concept.

[patrice]

28. So, in answer to your question: All of us are anti-Life to one degree or another at one time or

another, and in one situation or another.