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Quote by: Fangrim  Religion and government were fused with the first colonies of the Americas, and with that fusion came state-arbitrated marriage. There's no reason the state should be concerned with it any more than there is a reason the state should help us live prosperously or happily in any other manner. That's just what the state does.
I'm open to the idea of the state abandoning marriage rights, though. |
If it's just something the state does, why on Earth would you be defending it? This hardly seems to be the vital socio-cultural institution it has been made out to be -- especially if you are open to abandoning state-recognized marriage altogether. Tell me, why aren't you arguing for that, as a logical solution that would resolve the entire issue while satisfying the desire for equal treatment under the law? What do we gain by keeping marriage as a government sanctioned and exclusive club?
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Quote by: Fangrim That makes as much sense as saying the government should not be seen as the arbiter of the right to life because they did not give us life; our parents did. |
And that's true: the government does not grant the right to life. They do not decide who lives or does not live. They can decide to take the right to life away, but it does not come from them. So I can understand government taking a hand in divorce, let's say -- the capital punishment of marriage -- but perhaps government shouldn't be the one to say who can or cannot get married.
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Quote by: Fangrim Our Declaration says that our rights were conferred by our creator. They are then protected, arbitered, and regulated by the government.
The government recognizes the right to marry. What it does with that recognition is up to it and the people.
This is certainly a matter of constitutional law because gay "rights" constitute a fundamental redefinition of the right to marriage. |
And there's the problem again. There are two possibilities, as I see it: the right to marriage has been seen as a fundamental right, equivalent to our right to free speech, our right to bear arms, and so on and so forth; it has been regulated and protected by the government pursuant to the government's stated goal of protecting every man's right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. If that is the case, then I can follow and even agree with your argument that redefining the right to marry would be a corruption of our constitutional rights.
If, on the other hand, marriage rights are not a fundamental right, do not originate with the government but are only regulated by it, and if they are not part of the government's goals, then there is nothing particularly sacred and immutable about them. If, in addition, marriage rights have been fundamentally defined and redefined to include or disqualify certain groups, then there is precedent for doing so again.
If, as you say, the government's control of marriage is up to the people, then the people should be allowed to change it. If the right to marriage has been changed in the past, then it can be changed again. And if the whole thing is fairly unimportant, then there is no reason why we should ignore the wishes of a large segment of our population.
So: tell me again, why we should not redefine this ephemeral and mutable right to include homosexuals.