Sansa Stark

You want to use this as a springboard for your bull**** right wing rhetoric? Really?

Paedantic Basterd

I don't think equality is negotiable. I bet you could find places that would overturn the rights of black Americans if those places were offered a vote as well.

Frownland

So Conan married his two employees in New York for nothing? He could've just waited a few months.

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Studies show that when a given norm is changed in the face of the unchanging, the remaining contradictions will parallel the truth.

Freebase Dali

Yea, Janszoon really summed it up with:

Even barring the sanctity of the constitution, human rights don't have to be written on a founding document to validate them. The basic rights that this "majority" enjoys should be available to everyone and not stamped out because it doesn't align with the beliefs of whoever puts the most votes in the box.
When it comes to something like who a person loves and wants to spend the rest of their life with, and being able to reap the benefits of that decision, such a decision should not rest on a democratic process. The fact that there was ever a democratic process to decide such a thing is just as appalling as the outcome of its votes.

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skaltezon

How then would anyone know what they are?

I might think I have a right to a ham sandwich, but demonstrating how I came by that right is what matters.

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Freebase Dali

Not sure if serious...
Pardoning the wildly irrelevant and asinine comparison of human rights to the right of eating a ham sandwich, if you think human rights are solely defined by whether they were written on a document or not, then I am truly amazed.

While I'll give you (or anyone else, assuming you were just picking at a statement out of context of the point it was in) the fact that marital status and the material benefits it brings are more of a legality matter than a human rights mater, the implication of a recognized union that is not discriminated on based solely on whether or not that union is comprised of a male and female is CERTAINLY obvious and should not be referred to in a document.

Any prerequisite not based on personal morality, should you appeal to their nature, whether standardized or assumed, is met in the case of same-sex marriage. It's not hurting anyone if same-sex couples marry, and simultaneously, they would enjoy the same benefits that we afford traditional married couples not being discriminated against because of their choice of partner.

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hip hop bunny hop

Thank you for remembering this is about the material benefits of state recognized marriage.

In regards to the underlined; if that's you're line of argument, why offer anyone benefits for being married? Not being married doesn't harm anyone else, so why should those who are not married pay higher taxes, be burdened with unfavorable loan rates, unfavorable car insurance rates, etc.?

The arguments that justified these unfavorable conditions were primarily related to (1) increased reproductive rates of married couples, & (2) the improved outcomes of children from married couples. But do these arguments still make sense if you're going to extend marriage benefits to same sex couples?

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Have mercy on the poor.

Freebase Dali

Of course those arguments don't make sense in context with whether same sex couples are going to be fulfilling the purpose of (1), but if that was a necessary prerequisite at this point, then it seems to me there would be laws that actually require there be a pay-in to that original reasoning from each couple gaining the material benefits. Since that's obviously not the case, then it stands to reason that the system isn't being harmed by those that don't.

As to whether there should be material benefits at all, regardless of the situation, that's another topic. But, as it stands, there are... and as long as there are people marrying into those benefits with no prerequisites that would contribute to the reasoning behind them other than a statistical likelihood that is more than well off as it stands, considering the world is still full of heterosexuals and also full of people capable of raising a child whether it's theirs or not, then I don't see why a prerequisite of gender needs to be present if based solely on statistics.

Anyway, I don't think the issue (to people wanting to become married to a same-sex partner, and those that support it) is as much about material benefits as it is about acceptance and recognition as wed couples with the same status that other couples enjoy. I could be wrong, but it seems to me more of a societal issue that's being contested, rather than one of hard numbers.

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hip hop bunny hop

Could you please clarify the underlined?

I don't think that's very plausible, sorry; 41 states have outlawed gay marriage, of the six where it's legal not once has it been legalized through popular referendum.

So, then, what? Are people presuming they're going to sue and legislate unpopular legislation unto the American masses and thereby warm the cockles of the heart? Apologies for the sarcasm, but I've difficultly believing that's what they intend.

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Have mercy on the poor.

skaltezon

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Be amazed then, o pompous arbiter of asininity. Your entire argument is bluster.

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