The Party of Stupid is at it again: GOP pushing for gay marriage ban in DC
The Party of Stupid is pushing for a gay marriage ban in DC.
Oddly, this reminds me of something my boyfriend Justin does every time he comes to Buzzquarters and sees all the Hillary 2008 campaign memorabilia we have everywhere on the walls. He can’t spend five minutes in my room without blurting out something about Hillary “killing that man, Vince”, though he never remembers his last name. We’ve been dating since before Thanksgiving and this happens EVERY TIME he’s here. I can actually see the thoughts bubbling up inside him, like water boiling in a tea kettle, until he finally blurts this stuff out, Tourette’s style, because at home in Arkansas, growing up in a conservative household that hated the Clintons, this is what his parents talked about at the dinner table all the time. ”That man Hillary Clinton murdered”. And, I add, they talked about it as if she in fact murdered him with her own two hands, while dressed in a black ninja suit, cackling the whole time.
No matter how many times Justin comes here, or how often we talk about how non-murderous Hillary Clinton is, he just can’t stop doing this because he can’t unlearn everything he was taught…no matter how crazy it is.
This is the same thing with the Republican Party and gay issues. They are so programmed to handle these things in the worst way possible that they make themselves look like the Party of Evil as much as they act like the Party of Stupid.
Justin and I are both gay, but neither of us believe in “gay marriage”…any more than we believe in “gay baptism”, “gay communion”, “gay confirmation”, or “gay confession”. ”Marriage” is a religious ceremony and it is a religious word.
Unfortunately, the state has stolen this word and repurposed it for a civil contract.
The state should not have the ability to marry anyone. Period.
The state should have the ability to join two willing, consenting adults in a contract that forms a civil union between those two people. That is the right job for the state.
Churches can decide to marry whomever they choose, based on their religious traditions, which the state should be separated from in all things.
If Republicans were smart, they’d change gears and throw Democrats off by putting an end to the senseless attacks on gays that relate to this crusade against “gay marriage”. The GOP has never been able to hire a decent PR and branding firm, for whatever reason, and keeps making the same stupid mistakes because that’s just what they’ve always done and it’s programmed into them for some bizarre reason.
If they wised up, they’d instead launch a crusade against the term “gay marriage” itself, and they’d find a way to call the Left intolerant for trying to jam the church and state together. That’s a very interesting and winning angle, making the Left the bad guy that wants to force religion into civil matters.
Republicans should clearly affirm as loudly as possible that “marriage” is a religious term and that the state should not be using that language ANYWHERE, for ANYONE. All actions the state performs are civil in nature, by definition of that word. The joining of two people in a legal contract is a union. Therefore, the state’s joining of two people is a civil union. That is what should happen at a court house, where a “civil union license” is issued…NOT a “marriage license”.
Marriages should only happen in churches, just like baptisms, confirmations, first communions, and other ceremonies that churches have but the state does not.
This is how the Party of Stupid could smarten up and take away from the Left one of the key wedge issues that prevents gays from voting in their own economic best interests, which would mean they’d vote conservative.
The reason gays DON’T vote conservative is because the Party of Stupid keeps falling into the Left’s trap by appearing evil and single-mindedly bigoted against gays, when in reality the uproar about this issue is related to the usurpation of a religious word for a civil function, which was wrong to begin with and needs to be corrected across the board.
What think you?
© 2011, Kevin DuJan. All rights reserved.
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Spot on. They can’t help themselves.
I cannot say yes enough times to this post!
Yes! Just like the abortion issue is supposed to bind women to the Dem party FOREVER, these are the 2 biggest red herrings in politics today. It is times like these–Jim DeMint boycotting CPAC because it’s been tainted with TEH GAYS–I despair of the GOP and like TEA partiers.
Yes and there are simple solutions to these issues.
Exactly like Kevin says about the gay marriage/civil union argument. Marriage is a religious act and should be delegated to the religion of the participants choice. Civil Unions is between two consenting adults and should be the action of the local/state governments.
Abortion is a STATE or LOCAL issue and not a federal issue. It is not in the Constitution as a Federal Right and therefore is a State or Local issue.
Get these out of the National and Presidential elections. Let the local citizens decide what THEY want.
I have discussed this with several gay friends and non-gay supporters of “gay marriage” who also happen to be Catholic. For both groups they want marriage or nothing.
Everyone has their own beliefs and these are HOT topics for sure. (More reason to have local and state powers on these).
But if the Government (local & state) change everything that they do to “Civil Union” instead of “marriage” Then a couple (any 2 consenting adults) can form a union. If they want to be “married” then they have to find a religious group that they like to perform the ceremony. If they are Catholic – then that is between them and their church and does not have anything to do with what the government will allow.
If they want a Pagan ceremony then that is their wishes. Marriage should be a religious ceremony and civil unions the government’s obligation.
That may be because the Defense of Marriage Act means that the legal marriage of a same-sex couple in one state is not equal to the legal marriage of an opposite-sex couple in that state or anywhere else. If a man and a woman get married in Massachusetts, they can move to Maryland and they’ll still be legally married. If two women get married in Massachusetts, that relationship is not recognized in many other states and has no legal standing there.
Can’t say I’m surprised to hear this.
For goodness sake stick to the Economic Issues and let the Social Issues alone Republicans!! They do it every time!!
Oddly enough Kevin, you’re position on “gay marriage” is identical to most of the conservatives that I’ve talked to. Although I don’t think the “marriage is a religious ceremony and should not be conducted by the state” angle has occurred to most of them. On the bright side, the bulk of the GOP seems to have called the DeMint type’s bluff. They seem to be telling them that they don’t care if they boycott CPAC or not.
Kevin. Kevin! You are simply brilliant and as a previous buzzer note, “spot on.” We MUST change the conversation & stop falling into the predictable mantras that “prove” to the left our labels are justified. As you so aptly point out, this is a bizarre area in which the general public is confused about religion and state mixture. I’m a heterosexual female conservative, and am fully supportive of the STATE creating a civil union with a clear definition, mutual expectations & responsibilities, etc. Why do we keep falling into the same traps????
I think your idea is implausible, simply because the institution of civil marriage has existed for a long, long time in America and is a crucial point in various types of law. Family law is maybe 75% about who is married to who or was married to who or wasn’t married to who (whom?). You file taxes differently if you’re married. A couple who got married in a courthouse is as legally married as a couple who got married in a church – provided both couples have legitimate marriage licenses and were married by proper authorities – and people are not going to want to hear that they’re now less married than their neighbors because their ceremony wasn’t religious. They’re going to argue that that’s bestowing a special privilege on people who got married in religious ceremonies. Couples who have been married for decades aren’t going to want to have to switch to talking about their “civil contract” in order to be legally and technically correct. Lawsuits would be springing up all over the place.
One argument behind same-sex marriage has always been, how will it make you any less married of people of the same gender marry each other? This idea WOULD make some people “less married.” It would make people feel decieved and cheated.
Just for the record, a civil marriage and a civil union aren’t the same thing.
The point is that civil marriage shouldn’t be called civil MARRIAGE. If the word Civil Union is already charged with too many legal meanings, come up with a different term. Call it Civil Blooberblaaber or whatever, it will mean the same thing, just not using the word marriage which has religious connotations and could therefore lead to undue pressure on religions to conform their definition of marriage to fit with the state.
Kevin’s point isn’t how things stand now, it’s how things should be standing in the future if we know what’s good for us.
It’s not going to be good for us. It’s going to create a whole new host of issues and quite probably a lot of resentment towards GLBT people.
“people are not going to want to hear that they’re now less married than their neighbors because their ceremony wasn’t religious.”
All previous marriages (or whatever we’re going to call it) would be grandfathered in to the new Civil Spousalships (or whatever it’s going to be called) so no one’s legal standing is going to change.
But the “They don’t wanna hear they are less married” argument? They won’t be any less “civilly espoused” than they were before… legally… and if they aren’t religious, why do they feel some entitlement to a religious word? I’M not religious but I won’t be offended if I can’t say the word married on my legal documents (provided the new civil spousalship has exactly the same rights currently used in what is now called civil marriage)
Marriage was religious long before it was civil (back when they overlapped) and if we’re not living in a theocratic society, we shouldn’t be mixing religious functions with state functions.
Because marriage has not been a purely religious word for a long, long time. Marriage has a legal definition in America. You can religiously marry ten wives in the FLDS, but are you legally married to them? No.
A religious marriage joins two people in holy matrimony before the eyes of God. Religious marriages can also be civil marriages. A civil marriage is a legal concept and does not involve God in its definition.
Just wanted to add – I’m a third-year law student (less than a semester left), and I think there are a lot of legal implications here that you haven’t considered.
Then maybe you can answer this:
How is it legal to offer both advantageous legal standing and tax benefits to someone that has has a religious ceremony that is not freely available to all citizens in a nation built on the foundation of separation of church and state?
Perhaps you offer the same legal standing and tax benefits to those who choose to participate in the religious ritual and contract of marriage as dictated by various religious entities AND the civil equivalent of unions as dictated by the state(s) and/or fed? Is this such a legal stretch (and I am not an attorney, so honestly do defer to your insight). There are public unions (such as Princess Diana and Prince Charles) in which a civil ceremony (of the state?) is performed along with, but separate from, the religious marriage event (of the Church?), leading me to think that perhaps one could choose the civil ceremony only.
On a side, and perhaps related note, the passport applications for children have been changed from “Mother” and “Father” to “Parent One” and Parent Two” reflecting the reality of same-sex, custodial, legal parents of some of the youth in our country. Are there legal implications here? I can assure you that I still feel as much a mother even though my title according to the US Passport Office has been changed to Parent One (or maybe I’m two???) Just a thought.
You’re describing a situation that doesn’t exist. As long as two people are legally married to each other, it doesn’t matter in the eyes of the law whether the ceremony was religious or not.
“A couple who got married in a courthouse is as legally married as a couple who got married in a church – provided both couples have legitimate marriage licenses and were married by proper authorities”
Actually, those who get married in a courthouse are ‘more married’ in the eyes of civil authorities.
I’m a heterosexual married male, but have pointed out in conversations on this topic that once my wife and I completed our church ceremony, we then had to sign an additional set of papers in order for our ‘religious’ marriage to be recognized as official by the state.
So, what is the reason civil authorities can’t authorize a legal relationship between consenting adults of any gender if they so chose?
I don’t think there is one. I agree that the conservatives/Republicans need to include this in the ‘smaller/less intrusive government’ part of their agenda and make the libs the bad actors.
And once you signed the papers, you were on equal legal standing. Because of the role of marriage in various legal issues, the government needs a record of who’s married to who – in case someone dies intestate, if someone marries a third person (bigamy or not?), to determine who the legal parent of a child is, to know if you cheated on your taxes, to know whether someone can’t be legally compelled to testify against their mate.
I don’t think there’s a reason why civil authorities can’t authorize a legal relationship between two consenting adults either, except if there’s some nation-wide rule in place. For example, bigamy and polygamy were officially declared illegal by the Supreme Court.
Kevin, you are right on the money with this topic as you are with so many issues. My parents, both ordained ministers in a conservative evangelical Christian denomination (which has always ordained women, by-the-way), has been on board with this line of thinking for quite some time.
A few years back, Dad got a call from a “family values” organization trying to get him to its anti-gay marriage agenda. He refused to participate in the survey, saying he thought the organization really was not interested in marriage, implying he believed it was more interested in harrassing gay people.
The Rev. Dad is a wise man. And so are you, Kevin.
I feel the Dems use anything to try to split people, they take any issue that can anger people & use it to polarize (yep…I got Polar into a post yay!)us from each other…the language is so confusing sometimes I think people just get mad about that. If you are living together you are in a marriage & it is what you make it…
Anyway what issue will they use next to try & split us up into unhappy angry individuals? It is all just a tactic anyway!!!
Love you Kevin thanks for all you do!!!
I’m a conservative through and through but the Republican party loses me on this one. I think Kevin’s solution sounds reasonable and there will be time in the future to debate the issue. Right now we’re fighting for the future of our country and all we’ve known and loved about this nation. Do we really have to spearhead such a divisive issue right now? That’s what I love about the Tea Party…it’s all about fiscal issues and NOT social issues.
I couldn’t believe this when I saw it.
I think the state should stay out of this issue and let the states decide. But beyond that … when the focus should be on nothing but jobs, jobs, jobs …. how could the leadership be SOOO stupid as to let the left wriggle out of that topic one bit? And why on such a stupid, stupid issue. Why does the federal government have to get involved in a local DC issue that frankly will produce negative nation wide headlines but simply doesn’t matter one bit against any reasonable set of priorities?
I’m fiscally very conservative, pro-life, but a bit more libertarian on other social issues outside of some the pro-life topics, but largely pissed off at the left’s assault on religion and other social norms. But I cannot understand this issue.
It is stupid, legislative malpractice beyond belief.