(Erf, an extraneous 'not' is in the second line of my second paragraph, but while I'm about correcting:)

"Remember, your views on this issue are fundamental. In other words, you are convinced that you are correct on all accounts that same-sex marriage is essentially good for society. But there exist other issues and other opinions that cannot be ignored and that may not be inherently wrong either."

That's why we have *freedom* and *equality* in America, River.

Because, us living together in peace is *not* dependent on everyone agreeing, or suffering from our government if we don't.

Most of the issues conservative Christians find 'controversial,' in terms of how you try to use our laws to impose your will, ...are controversial *precisely because* they are personal, and it's not for a religion or party to feel like they are allowed to *arrogate* authority to themselves with that government, when clearly, reasonable people may and do disagree.

This one really *shouldn't* be controversial, in the eyes of the law. You don't have the right to make *me* suffer injustice and inequality... try to pressure *my* family apart, tell me *my* religion, and those of countless others, many of them Christian, who embrace gay unions as also sacred, of *our* rights to freedom of religion, as individuals belonging to minorities, and as American citizens.

The government is not, and should not, be empowered to make these decisions for people, based on who a minority can convince of something unreasonable.

The whole idea that the *will of the people* is supposed to be *important* is based in the notion, not of 'tyrranies of 52 percent,' but in fact that each of us is worthy of *making* important decisions.

If there's great disagreement, well, that's a real good sign it's *not* something the government ought to be deciding for us.

Liberty, justice, and equal opportunity for all. *That's* our state interest.

It does mean growing up and realizing there are other people in the world. People not us. And they have a right to live in peace and equality and human dignity, too.

And though we were parted by some really uncalled-for economic harshness, I hope I helped raise my stepdaughter to know that *deeply.*

We have Liberty *because* people don't always agree with each other's religious dictates. That's where freedom comes in.

Of course, no illusions, nothing I've said has been listened to or recognized, and you're just going to start the same thing over again somewhere else, without ever examining where your presumptions and debunked sources come from.

Mass deception. I know what my life is, you're the one being fooled into thinking you not being used to hurt me prevents something you can't 'define' being *taken away from you* somehow, and real hardship and suffering you seek to defend and impose upon real people be damned.

It *is* bigotry: you think your status gives you the 'right' to say you're better able to make intimate decisions for people you don't know than we are ourselves, even if it *means* depriving us of life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

If you're *really* concerned about families, consider that the leading causes of divorce and domestic and child abuse stem from *economic and social stresses,* you know, those which the GOP's been trying to use to stay in power, and blame on some queers when it failed miserably on all counts.

River:

"Final post: One idea that stood out to me in your viewpoints was your accusation of homophobia among opponents of gay marriage. I do not believe, however, that opponents of same-sex marriage have irrational, crippling fears of gay men and women (the proper definition of that term), nor are they all as bigoted or ignorant to reality as you suggest."

Actually, I was using *you* to demonstrate how claiming you're not being bigoted and not being bigoted are not the same thing. Of course you think you're nice and right, but I think I've illustrated the irrational prejudices you advertise as 'a reasonable position for nice people.'

They're based in and supportive of bigoted ideas about what gay people and gay families *are,* on smears and diversions and obfuscations, and apparently a willful misunderstanding of American jurisprudence.

Even if you say it 'nicely.'

I challenge you to examine this and see if your opposition to equality of all Americans is really how you want to be spending your time and money.

Paganplace: Thank you for your comments. I believe healthy debate is essential when discussing important cultural issues, particularly arguments involving rights and equality. I understand this is an emotional, sensitive topic.

Final post: One idea that stood out to me in your viewpoints was your accusation of homophobia among opponents of gay marriage. I do not believe, however, that opponents of same-sex marriage have irrational, crippling fears of gay men and women (the proper definition of that term), nor are they all as bigoted or ignorant to reality as you suggest. My point, all along, was that this issue is laced with complexity, not only in our legal system, but in the minds of tens of millions of Americans. The verdict is still out on whether the traditional mores and values of an otherwise conservative nation can withstand a redefinition of marriage. In that sense, is legalizing gay marriage a good idea? And will gay marriage only exacerbate the already declining American family? These are important questions that thoughtful citizens, regardless of political affiliation or religion, grapple with.

Remember, your views on this issue are fundamental. In other words, you are convinced that you are correct on all accounts that same-sex marriage is essentially good for society. But there exist other issues and other opinions that cannot be ignored and that may not be inherently wrong either.

Anyway, just my thoughts. My apologies if I offended you in any way.

River, again:

"Another grey spot in this debate: what about polygamous families?"

What about them? That's not the same issue, except inasmuch as certain people call them a lot of the same bad names as us.

"If the government grants marriage to same-sex couples solely based on the argument of equal protection, how can it deny granting marriage to other minority groups that lobby for the same rights?"

Who said it *has* to? It's not the same issue, anyway, as you'd have to write up whole new legal statutes for it, rather than just end discrimination against a minority.

I actually think it's worth doing, (because under our heterocentric laws, what happens when there's polygamy *anyway* is *bigamy,* resulting generally in the inequality of a man having rights as regards several women but each of the women having sharply-reduced rights as regards him, and no protections as regards each other) but the 'slippery slope' argument doesn't hold. We simply don't have laws to cover that circumstance. Division of property and the like get complicated. Not to say I approve of most of the realities of polygamy, (And people who do it might not like the American way, which would have to make sure everyone in the relationship had equal rights) ...but in principle, I see no compelling reason to think it's so unacceptable. But it's a diversion. And used as a smear. The fears of goat-sex will be next, I'm sure. Very rational of you.

"Again, you may disagree and say that's ridiculous, but it sure isn't ridiculous to those families. Grey again..."

No, it's not a grey area, it's a *cloud* of your own generation, trying to associate gay people with *another* fear of yours so no one looks at the issue before us.

"Also, the fact that so many heterosexual couples end in divorce does not negate the argument that children still develop better with both maternal and paternal influences."

I know *you* may like to see gay people socially-isolated and hidden, but... We do have families. Friends, communities. Since heterosexual couples *are* in fact without these influences half the time, anyway, who are you to say what 'influences' our kids get.

We're just an abstraction to you. I've *lived* it.

" The family is indeed falling apart around us, and look what it's doing to our schools, our cities, our nations. Society needs to wake up and recognize the colossal value the traditional family still holds."

The nuclear picket-fence family isn't meant to be a *colossus.* You can't make it any more loving by shrinking the fence.

"The gay rights movement has yet to provide a substantial argument to justify the NEED for redefining marriage."

You can define it however you *want* in your own life, but in America, the burden of proof actually goes the *other* way: you can't abridge equal rights and equal protection unless the government proves a "compelling state interest."

Gainsaying the lives and experiences of millions of American citizens cause *you* want an excuse is not that.

River: "My own two cents: Gay people are not bad, and they do not inherently make bad parents. Their rights should be protected under the law, and many civil union/domestic partnership arrangements do this, depending on the state."

Also gay marriage does. And does it better. Because it's a civil rights matter. Courts can't hide behind 'separate but equal,' not if they want to pass muster in American Constitutional law: It's certainly appreciated where civil unions exist, but you can't on the one hand claim 'Civil unions are just the same, this is only about 'definitions' and then claim 'Heterosexuals are better, they deserve better treatment'

" But there are vast, immeasurable benefits a child receives from BOTH a mother and a father. This fact is undeniable to social scientists, yet is increasingly ignored in our society."

These mysterious 'social scientists' who make these claims don't pass peer review, is why. In fact, where their findings are debunked, the churches still go right on ahead using them.

People aren't blind, they can see that gay marriages already exist, they just aren't recognized. They can see that kids in them in general are very well adjusted, especially considering people subjecting them to scorn, homophobia, and societal and economic and legal disadvantage. What are you saying to *your* kids, "Mommy and Daddy are fighting cause some gay people are around?"

(continued below)

" I do not believe the government should feel obligated to sanction gay marriage, an institution that only aggravates the destructive and growing chasm between children and stable families."

Where gay marriage *is* an institution and has been for quite some time, there's no indication of *any* deleterious effects on society, perhaps even quite the contrary.

*Homophobia* breaks families. The deceptions that people can 'choose' a different orientation lead to untold child abuse trying to *make* queer kids 'choose' to be straight. You see it all the time, it's like for the boys, 'Join the army to 'prove you're a real man,' for the girls it's like 'Have a baby to 'prove you're a real woman.'

Of *course* the straight marriages resulting from this are troubled: they're *false,* and it doesn't take much TV watching that in fact this leads to *great* insecurity in *straight* couples, ...what if hubby really is gay and is going to leave me, etc etc.

*Marriage* as an institution should be free and equal. It's a major step toward everyone being at home with who they *are,* and that can't be bad for *anyone's* life or marriage.

*Your* marriages aren't free and equal, even if you want 'privilege' because as long as there's bias, you can't be fully sure everyone involved is there for the right reasons.

In like wise, you can't try to soft-pedal the fact you want to portray gay marriages as somehow 'unstable' ....as justification for trying to use money and politics to *make* them unstable.

Society ought to stop trying to take the problems of its own ways out on others and call it 'defending the family.

But equal protection under the law is a grey area. Like I mentioned before, if civil unions and domestic partnerships give ALL the same rights to gay couples as heterosexual couples, why is gay 'marriage' necessary? The gay rights movement has yet to provide a substantial argument to justify the NEED for redefining marriage. Now, a supporter of same-sex marriage may say, "It's discriminatory to bar the title of marriage to me and my partner." But an opponent of gay marriage sees the issue in a totally different color. "Equal protection has already been granted," she says, "under existing civil union laws." Hence, the grey analogy.

Another grey spot in this debate: what about polygamous families? Thousands of them spread from British Columbia to Mexico, and they're mad as hell that their families aren't recognized by the state. They claim to love each other, and many insist their children are happy and well-protected from abuse. If the government grants marriage to same-sex couples solely based on the argument of equal protection, how can it deny granting marriage to other minority groups that lobby for the same rights? Again, you may disagree and say that's ridiculous, but it sure isn't ridiculous to those families. Grey again...

Also, the fact that so many heterosexual couples end in divorce does not negate the argument that children still develop better with both maternal and paternal influences. The family is indeed falling apart around us, and look what it's doing to our schools, our cities, our nations. Society needs to wake up and recognize the colossal value the traditional family still holds.

"My point is, there is complexity to this issue. It never was black and white. And those that see it that way are fooling themselves."

Equal protection under the law is not a place you can make a 'grey area.'

Certainly there's bigotry involved: the unsubstantiated claim that restricting marriage to heterosexual couples is 'better for children' when, clearly, half of heterosexual marriages fail, and heterosexuality doesn't seem to stop anyone from abandoning and neglecting their spouse... Certainly not when the more 'Biblically-conservative' people are on this issue, the *more* likely their marriages will end in divorce (while in fact divorce rates are lowest in the places where same-sex-marriage has come first, for the most part.)

It's easy to blame a minority that's different from you for your own failings, but denying same-sex families the same rights as your own doesn't help children.

Gods know that homophobia and the results of this inequality *itself* can be a tremendous (And uncalled-for) stress on same sex couples and our kids, but these are things *you* do, not things inherent to homosexuality, oh, wait, there's no such thing, oh, wait, we're innately disordered, oh, wait, we're anything but what we are. On the whole, children of gay marriages are no less well-adjusted than anyone else's.

If any kids are 'confused' ...it's cause *you* confuse them. Cause you teach them assumptions and fears that make no sense.

What's really 'confusing' is when kids pick up from their parents that for some reason some people are 'bad' if they love each other.

It's you trying to *confuse* *our* kids, actually. You're trying to teach them there's something terrible and unnatural and to be scorned about them and their families that doesn't even *make sense.*

I've heard it said very simply by straight friends to their kids, "They love each other so much they got married. Some men like men and some women like women, and some like both, that's just how they are."

"Oh. OK."

Didn't see any *confusion* there.

LEPIDOPTERYX: Good question. Why is gay marriage a threat? How does it possibly affect heterosexual couples, and where's the evidence that children are better served with both a mother and a father? There's a great article online written by an MIT doctoral student, entitled 'The Secular Case Against Gay Marriage' that answers those questions (though it probably wouldn't satisfy ardent gay marriage supporters). If you're interested, you can find the article here: http://tech.mit.edu/V124/N5/kolasinski.5c.html

My own two cents: Gay people are not bad, and they do not inherently make bad parents. Their rights should be protected under the law, and many civil union/domestic partnership arrangements do this, depending on the state. But there are vast, immeasurable benefits a child receives from BOTH a mother and a father. This fact is undeniable to social scientists, yet is increasingly ignored in our society. I do not believe the government should feel obligated to sanction gay marriage, an institution that only aggravates the destructive and growing chasm between children and stable families.

RIVERSTONE: I think many people see, in their opinion, the threat gay marriage is to the traditional definition of the family, and are weary of the implications it may have for society (particularly children).
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How is it a threat? Gay people have been raising children for a long time now. Their families are no less real than any other.
The legal purpose of marriage relates to consenting adults taking on certain responsibilites toward each other and being granted certain rights regarding each other. Period. Production or adoption of children are not required in order for any of these rights and responsibilities to take effect.
My husband is sterile and I was in the early stages of menopause when we met. We couldn't make a baby together if the fate of the free world depended on it. My daughter was almost grown by then, I had no desire to start over with diapers and colic, and he has never had any desire to be a parent. And none of this was a factor in our being able to get a marriage license. No one at the Clerk of Court's office asked if we were fertile, if we planned to adopt, or even whether we really loved each other or just wanted to be able to inherit Social Security benefits. All they asked for was a birth certificate, picture ID and exact cash.

The same-sex marriage debate in our country is as important as it is fascinating. This article is interesting, because it reminds me of something I often hear when discussing this issue with supporters of same-sex marriage. They often claim, unapologetically, that any person opposed to the legalization of same-sex marriage is an intolerant bigot, plain and simple. But this is obviously not the case with most Americans, and people cannot be categorized under such an inflammatory umbrella term so simply.

I think many people see, in their opinion, the threat gay marriage is to the traditional definition of the family, and are weary of the implications it may have for society (particularly children). There exist deep reservations in citizens' minds and hearts when their definition of marriage is backed in a corner. But they aren't concerned with gays receiving other benefits and protections under the law. What does this mean? How will the gay rights movement respond? The California Supreme Court even said today in its ruling on the constitutionality of Proposition 8 that domestic partnerships and civil unions in the state already provide all the same rights to gay couples as heterosexual couples.

My point is, there is complexity to this issue. It never was black and white. And those that see it that way are fooling themselves.

Let us consider polling as relates to the very apt comparison between same-sex marriage and interracial marriage. What makes these issues similar is that religion was used as the rallying point for opposition to changing marriage laws then as now.

Interracial marriage did not gain a definitive majority of support until 1991 in the U.S. as measured by Gallup polls. 1991! Today only the most craven troglodytes would (at least publicly) support that position, yet it held majority opinion once upon a time.

We should never govern by polls on issues of human rights. There is no negative to same-sex marriage outside of the minds of those fighting against it.

I'm not seeing support for the headline in the article, here, nothing about support for gay marriage 'slipping.' I wouldn't be surprised if there was a downtick after some very high profile ads out there, meant to deceive people what gay marriage actually involves.

Massachusetts has had gay marriage a while, and there has been nothing to complain about for those looking for a reason: in fact, homophobia correlates with *higher* divorce rates and other domestic troubles among straight couples.

Right now it's pretty clear that Religious Right elements, whose candidates and measures have totally failed over the last years and left us in a terrible mess, are looking for scapegoats, and stirring up hatred against a scapegoat has *always* been a way for politicians who got *nothing but prejudice* to direct the anger of people who are having tough economic times.

As long as the word "marriage" carries with it legal rights and responsibilities, it should be equally available to any consenting adults who wish to so unite themselves.
I get so tired of hearing the RR refer to themselves as "edfending traditional marriage." I am a woman, happily married to a man. We have several same-sex married couples among our circle of friends and family. Their marriages are no threat to ours, and we are not in need of defenders.
He and I are the only ones who can damage our marriage - no one else's marriage has any bearing on ours, for good or ill.
If your marriage is so fragile that it can be irreparably damaged by other people getting married, the other people aren't the source of the problem.