cnn.com — On the first Sunday after a gay marriage ban passed in California, activists rallied in defiance, including hundreds of protesters outside an Orange County megachurch whose pastor brought Barack Obama and John McCain together last summer for a "faith forum."
Nov 10, 2008 View in Crawl 4
djskepticalNov 11, 2008
All states have restrictions against marriage between blood relations called "consanguinity laws". Generally these restrictions are not written with regard to marriage between brothers, but one would expect a court to rule that a brother-brother marriage is the same as a brother-sister marriage in this respect, since the two relationships have the same degree of consanguinity.
Closed AccountNov 11, 2008
Well the Mormons are a bunch of dangerous crooks and brain washers. What do you expect?<a class="user" href="http://www.exmormon.org/tract2.htm">http://www.exmormon.org/tract2.htm</a>
eir574Nov 12, 2008
"The animal? I don't see how."You don't think there's a possibility that the animal might be physically hurt or may otherwise find the process of sex with a human to be unenjoyable? My parents had a dog that didn't even like to be held. The animal can't give informed consent, so we don't assume that we can tell whether it's consenting freely, which is required to have legal sexual relations with another being.
gordonjNov 12, 2008
"Is it really morality that dictates the rectum was designed to expel harmful waist from the body and not receive a penis, fist or tongue?"That is certainly one function of a rectum. Another is fitting a penis. Are you aware that in nature some creatures actually have a combined rectum and urinary tracts? It's called a cloaca and is found in birds, reptiles, amphibians, monotremes and marsupials. Seems like they were "designed" to have anal sex after all. Why would an anally accessible prostate exist in male humans if the rectum was purely "designed" for waste disposal? Why can there only be one function for the rectum? After all, a penis has more than one function too (excretion of waste, and reproduction). Why is anal sex so prevalent in nature if there is only function. Actually, I don't think morality comes into it at all. You keep talking about justification of these actions. If not on moral grounds, then what are you talking about? Why do people need to justify these actions at all, if morality doesn't come into it? If it feels good, it is natural that people will do it.
eir574Nov 12, 2008
"I'd also say that a person that chooses to engage in bestiality can still be hurt, "True, but that's not a good basis to make an act illegal. I don't need the government to prevent me from making my own mistakes. But, you're right that I forgot to mention the argument that the animal can't understand (or at least we have no way to know if it understands) the long term ramifications of sex. This is the same reason why we don't permit people to have sex with a young child, even if the child says it's enjoyable.
compucomp2Nov 12, 2008
It is a very good thing that Barack Obama is either against gay marriage or at worst completely ambivalent. In fact Obama robocalls were used in the campaigning for Prop 8.
essteeNov 13, 2008
@This is what you believe, not what Prop 8 is actually about. To help illustrate my point, I copied and pasted the following from a Prop 8 document.Voting YES on Proposition 8 does 3 simple things: It restores the definition of marriage to what the vast majority of California voters already approved and what Californians agree should be supported, not undermined. It overturns the outrageous decision of four activist Supreme Court judges who ignored the will of the people. It protects our children from being taught in public schools that “same-sex marriage” is the same as traditional marriage, and prevents other consequences to Californians who will be forced to not just be tolerant of gay lifestyles, but face mandatory compliance regardless of their personal beliefs.It is the final portion of this statement that I found the most significant.In this part, people are torn in the complications of trying to justify the abnormal social arrangement of a homosexual relationship. Do you still believe this to be of my own limited belief? -@All of your examples were cultural, not biological.Well this is somewhat of a slippery slope isn't it? We are biological beings who share similarities with all things relative within our environment and so the concept that humans are animals can be very misleading. On this premise, we could also conclude that we are all made of matter without ever being wrong and so it becomes apparent quite early on that in order to properly evaluate the human condition, it is equally important to consider the outcomes as well as the causes. How much of a difference would it take to conclude that humans are unlike animals? Because in 2007 a researcher by the name of Premack, wrote a very convincing paper which claimed that the similarity between animals and humans seemed small, though ended-up being quite large in differences. He demonstrated that though animal behaviors focused mainly on adaptation(such as food-seeking), the human side of things seemed to have an infinite number of goals. Such disparities were consistent with the observed differences in brain structures and that we faced the challenge of understand the function of those cellular differences.With this in mind, one has to question whether or not our human uniqueness's are even found in the outer physical layers. Whatever the case, only a fool would expect anyone to dismiss societies achievements for an argument. Otherwise, bestiality would be all the rage. However, for some strange reason it ends up being illegal. Animal abuse? I think not... as many animals would be more than happy to participate.This is not about human rights as you so willfully put it. Nor is this discrimination. There is no way your going to convince anyone that homosexual connections are somehow reliant on marriage. Then again... this entire conversation was not etched on this topic either. It was based on the fact that nature did not support the concept of a man having sex with another man. And to this(despite your determination), you have yet to provide any evidence that says otherwise.
trimarkcNov 16, 2008
I disagree. While the nature of language is indeed a tool, once that tool has created something, that thing then exists, with its own causes, effects, pros and cons.The word "marriage" has been used by the majority of humanity for thousands of years to primarily mean the union of one man and one woman. Certainly, anyone knowledgeable in world cultures and history can find exceptions to this basic standard. BUT, these are indeed exception to the standard of how cultures around the globe have used and intended to define what "marriage" is. So it is culture, and not necessarily religion that has defined this particular word.Further, this word, and the basic relationship of the family that it defines, can very easily be argued to be the basic building block that most global legal systems and governments are based on! The family unit, as defined by this word, creates a provider and care-giver relationship that not only permits procreation, but whose roles permit the protection and care of the entire family. From these foundational elements related laws of protecting and caring for the community have been extrapolated.Of course, we do not live in an ideal world - entropy alone predicts that organizations from tissue to man-made structures will erode to decreasing efficiency. So just because some marriages fail is not a reason unto itself to say that all marriages fail. And similarly, just because some civil rights have been wrongly blocked does not mean that all desires are or should be raised to the level of a "civil right". As you said, "We each define our lives for ourselves and need not adopt the definitions of others without question nor without variation nor for all time." BUT, if society determines that your decisions are against the common good, then society will make sure that you do not harm the common good. In this case, California's voters, notorious for voting for more rights for the individuals, have TWICE now voted to support the traditional definition of "marriage".In order for Prop.8 to have passed, that means that if every single Republic and conservative in CA voted for it, something like 12-15% of liberals would also have had to vote for it. Since we know that a reasonable percentage of Republicans voted against Prop.8, as well, then that means that an even greater percentage of liberals voted for Prop.8.So, it is possible for some people to be against Prop.8 for reasons other than religion. Other reasons that have been listed in several exit polls include health, taxes, wealth, education, and others. Just because you want to summarily classify anyone that voted for Prop.8 as "religious zealots" doesn't make it so.
skepticaNov 20, 2008
The Mormons got it all wrong. They are wrong about marriage as they are wrong about Christianity. Instead of defining what marriage is, we should define what Christians are. Let's start a proposition to define what a Christian is: Christians are defined as followers of Jesus who believe that there is only one God, and Jesus is God in flesh (John 1:1, 14), eternal (John 1:1, 2, 15), uncreated, yet born on earth (Col. 1:15), and the creator of all. See <a class="user" href="http://gatholic.com.">http://gatholic.com.</a>
xonahuiaDec 25, 2008
Their should be a class action lawsuit against churches for false advertisement!
xonahuiaDec 25, 2008
imightbewrong just got owned by Bethling lol