Proposition 8 violates the Equal Protection Clause

[secular_freedom]

Actually I’ve already done it.

Yes, you work that imagination!

 

[Betterave]

Your claim that “no women are able to play at this level” is not only a textbook example of hasty generalization, but false. For your claim to be true, it would have to be true that no women are able to play on par with any player in the NBA. In fact, your claim implies that the best WNBA player (or best female player in the WORLD) is much worse than the worst NBA player! This is just “obvious,” right?

LOL! Have you watched the WNBA and the NBA? It is just obvious! Sorry if you have trouble seeing the obvious, but I can’t argue a blind person into seeing. (On the other hand, it might just be possible to convince an ostrich to get his head out of the sand, so hopefully that’s your only problem and I have a chance here.)

I don’t know if you know this, but there was once a female goalie in the NHL. But even in that less athletically-demanding position, she wasn’t really good enough to stick around and play. And obviously basketball doesn’t have goalies. (Yes, obviously!)

In any case, even if it were a hasty generalization, this would obviously be irrelevant to the conceptual point being made, so your comments here are not just ill-informed but irrelevant.

It is not nonsense at all; women are not incidentally prevented from playing in the NBA, but intentionally prevented from playing in the NBA (as you admitted above).

You appear to be asserting a false dichotomy here: It is foreseen and intended, or incidental, but not both. The correct usage of the world “intend” is controversial, but I intended it in the weak sense in which anything we foresee and assent to is intended.

How you can think this difference in treatment is discrimination merely in the “incidental and statistical sense” is beyond me.If I intentionally exclude skunks from my house, then I discriminate against such creatures intentionally, not incidentally in a statistical sense.

With the clarification given above you should be able to see that that’s an obvious non-sequitur.

First of all, to say that the NBA “discriminates against” women is to say that the NBA “discriminates on the basis of their being women.” If a store owner “discriminates against” Mexicans (say, but not allowing any Mexican to buy milk there), then he “discriminates against them on the basis of their being Mexican.”

No, that’s not true as I’ve clearly explained. For your Mexican example, suppose the store owner has a daughter who she cares for while she minds the store and her daughter has psychotic episodes whenever she hears Spanish or a Spanish accent. In this case the store owner would ‘discriminate against’ Mexicans, without discriminating against them on the basis of their being Mexican.

Third, prop 8 does not discriminate against homosexuals in a “trivial, merely statistical sense.” What do you mean by “trivial?” How is the discrimination trivial and “merely” statistical when it’s virtually 100%? For gay couples who wish to have their wedding day, the discrimination surely isn’t trivial!

I have already clearly explained what I mean by ‘trivial’ and ‘merely statistical.’ Hopefully you get it now.

As for your citing a statistic in order to call into question the possibility that something could be ‘merely statistical’… very strange, very illogical.

 

[Betterave]

Since I never discussed eating in this thread, no I haven’t committed this non sequitur. If you want to show the fallacy, show it directly - not through poorly constructed analogies.

Your claim: “I was clearly indicating that for many marriages, the fundamental purpose is not procreation. Thus the fact remains that not all marriages have the fundamental purpose of procreation.”

It does not follow from the fact that -]not all eating is for sustenance/-] not all marriages are for procreation that -]sustenance is not the only fundamental purpose of eating/-] procreation is not the only fundamental purpose of marriage. You repeatedly commit this non sequitur in your claims.

Actually, it’s not a non sequitur at all! Your contention is that before partnerships -]can be/-] SHOULD BE AND BUT FOR MINOR EXCEPTIONS (E.G., IN CANADA) ARE legally recognized as marriages, it is a requirement they must not be fundamentally alien to procreation. In other words, it is your clam that this requirement can be found in law (otherwise, it would not be a requirement in the relevant, legal sense). Hence, it is your burden to cite the legal authority for your proposition. To claim that “the law requires X,” you need to produce legal authority that shows this.

So I’ll ask again: what legal authority can you cite for this requirement that before partnerships can be legally recognized as marriages, they must not be fundamentally alien to procreation?

No, I’ve corrected you on this already, please stop making the same mistake. We are interpreting and critiquing the status of the law here, not appealing to its authority.

It’s not self-evident at all. Please explain those biological reasons. Please explain how a heterosexual partnership involving two 90-year old individuals, where one had a complete hysterectomy and the other is sterile, is not as fundamentally alien to procreation as a homosexual partnership.

I’ve done this already. Some additional considerations: The male-female couple may already have procreated in a similar male-female coupling. The same-sex couple most certainly have not and never will, unless it was in a prior and different kind of coupling which fit the fundamental procreative model (namely, male-female couple). Therefore, etc.

I stand by what I said. Here is the Argument again:

1. Partnerships that are fundamentally alien to procreation should not be recognized as marriages.
2. Therefore, under current law, partnerships that are fundamentally alien to procreation (i.e. certain heterosexual partnerships) SHOULD NOT be recognized as marriages.

For the argument to be valid, it is not required that certain heterosexual partnerships be as fundamentally alien to procreation – it is only required that certain heterosexual partnerships ***are ***fundamentally alien to procreation. Again, given your logic, you should endorse (2). And while you’re free to endorse it, it certainly isn’t the law.

But I have explained to you what is meant by “fundamentally alien” so your (2) is just begging the question again.

The only way you can hold to (1) and deny (2) is to hold that no heterosexual partnerships can ever be fundamentally alien to procreation. Is the the move you want to make?

YES - in the relevant sense of “fundamentally alien,” of course.

Both of those claims are not false. I repeat: “What you want to claim is that, under current law, partnerships must meet the “minimal requirement of conformity to the fundamental purpose of marriage” before they can be recognized as marriages. But what is the “minimal requirement?” And what authority can you cite for this proposition (other than yourself)?”

Since the most reasonable construal of the purpose of the secular institution of marriage in our society is that it is fundamentally about honoring the value of procreation, marriages must minimally respect that value by including both a male and a female partner. Partnerships that do not include a male and a female partner are inherently non-procreative and therefore should not be called marriages because they do not reflect that affirmation of the value of procreative pairings which is the raison d’etre of the secular institution of marriage.

And now I must go to bed!

 

[captainmike]

Well, the reason I can’t “understand” this is because your conclusion is based on fallacious reasoning. You want to argue:

1. Based on the evidence, boys don’t do well without fathers.
2. Hence, a boy raised by a lesbian couple won’t do well.

The problem with this argument is that (1) is ambiguous. (1) could mean: Based on the evidence, boys don’t do well without fathers in households where children are raised by one female parent. Or: Based on the evidence, boys don’t do well without fathers in households where children are raised by multiple female parents.

Your argument is valid only if we adopt the second reading of (1), but of course, I doubt you can supply evidence for it.

haven’t read the studies and don’t have the time or inclination to do so. i believe that, at a minimum, they would show that boys raised without fathers don’t do as well, in lots of different ways. would the studies differentiate between boys raised by single moms and boys raised by two lesbians? don’t know. again, since lesbians haven’t been raising boys for very long, there may not be a scientific study on that. so, left without a scientific study, i am left with my own experience (which you call “bias” or “prejudice” or “bigotry”). my own experience tells me that there are huge differences between men and women, and that if a boy wants to learn how to be a man, he will do so from another man, not from a woman. because you don’t agree that (a) there are meaningful differences between men and women and (b) it is important for a boy to learn how to act like a man (e.g., to you, if a man wants to wear a dress, that is perfectly normal and appropriate), you are not persuaded that a boy needs a father. the reason you and i can’t convince each other is that my ideal of what a man should be differs greatly from yours.

 

[larkin31]

Yeah, four pages and a few hours! I’ve finally caught up however. I have given real answers, very clear and obvious ones. Now I will go back and reply to those who have attempted to undermine those answers.

<finger tap, finger tap>

 

[larkin31]

…Since the most reasonable construal of the purpose of the secular institution of marriage in our society is that it is fundamentally about honoring the value of procreation…

Your initial premise is clearly actually a conclusion.

So, how do you get to this conclusion? You can’t mask a premise as a conclusion in this semi-syllogism.

The “purpose” of marriage is not about “honoring” anything until you demonstrate it as such.

SO, we wait for you to do this.

Secondly, you need to argue/demonstrate that marriage is “only” about doing this, to give you grounds for denying marriage to those forms that do NOT honor it.

 

[captainmike]

Your initial premise is clearly actually a conclusion.

So, how do you get to this conclusion? You can’t mask a premise as a conclusion in this semi-syllogism.

The “purpose” of marriage is not about “honoring” anything until you demonstrate it as such.

SO, we wait for you to do this.

Secondly, you need to argue/demonstrate that marriage is “only” about doing this, to give you grounds for denying marriage to those forms that do NOT honor it.

why do people who are born desiring only homosexual sex desire what only heterosexual sex can produce, namely, children?

 

[colmcille1]

The law in the USA is not immune to the dictates of the Constitution. Any “dictates” of moral relativism can only work through that Constitution. If you do not like this then you are free to work to change the Constitution.

As a Buddhist I also take my morality very seriously. That is why I do not want a morality imported from a different religion to be imposed. I have a perfectly good moral compass thank you.

rossum

rossum,
Believe me, my friend, if I lived in your great country, I would be out there in the thick of it, changing that constitution so that God could get a look-in!
I never implied that you, as a Buddhist, do not take your morality very seriously.
What I will continue to state, however, is that when Catholics take their Faith seriously it is as life-enriching as the very air we breathe. It is Life.
And again, I did not imply that you lacked a moral compass but that the moral relativists would have us all do without one altogether!
I am not a wet week-end on this website and the level of moral relativism I have seen displayed on these threads by atheists, agnostics, robotologists(!) et al is astonishing. It presents a challenge to the more seasoned Catholic debaters here and, judging by their posts, they are doing a magnificent job!
God Bless,
Colmcille.

 

[colmcille1]

So you will not deal with the actual world issues and instead will retreat to your religious views? That usually means that you cannot make the logical and empirical connections to the real world necessary to formulate a proper, well thought out argument. Even those I disagree with here at least attempted to steer away from theology but you jumped right in with Leviticus (figuratively speaking).That’s pretty bold.

What I am doing is not a “tactic” but rather an attempt to keep the conversation on an objective basis because then there is the possibility of dialogue on common terms. We are discussing secular public policy and civil rights. This is not a theological debate, so I try to keep mention of it to a minimum because such discussions don’t really get us anywhere. Not everyone is a Christian, or a Catholic, or religious. As I stated earlier I appreciate the fact that one’s religious leanings informs their view of the world, but appeals to faith are simply unconvincing to those who do not share your belief, so why would you want to use them in the first place? It’s a total conversation stopper.

Oresteian,
I am an Irishman. It is my duty to be “bold”! I never “retreat” from anything or anyone, least of all a fellow who would utter “Leviticus” out of one side of his mouth and “noncognitivist” out of the other!( Admittedly, said boldness has gotten me into a few serious scrapes in my time but I have always come out smiling!)

I have assiduously followed your argument and “objective” is not the adjective that comes to my mind. While you may think that theological discussions “don’t really get us anywhere”
let me assure you that those of us with a vested interest in our Faith view the world completely
via said Faith and we constantly challenge ourselves to challenge this world.
I understand that this may be an unfamiliar concept to you but, judging by your quick and easy recourse to Scriptural reference when it suits you, all may not be lost with regard to your soul’s salvation. (BTW, you and every human possess a God-given soul and Scripture can feed it wonderfully.)
Given the fact that we are soul-ful beings, would you care to revise your opinion that Faith is “a total converstion stopper”?
Go on, reply to this post and prove me right!
God Bless,
Colmcille.

 

[Oresteian]

Oresteian,
I am an Irishman. It is my duty to be “bold”! I never “retreat” from anything or anyone, least of all a fellow who would utter “Leviticus” out of one side of his mouth and “noncognitivist” out of the other!( Admittedly, said boldness has gotten me into a few serious scrapes in my time but I have always come out smiling!)

I have assiduously followed your argument and “objective” is not the adjective that comes to my mind. While you may think that theological discussions “don’t really get us anywhere”
let me assure you that those of us with a vested interest in our Faith view the world completely
via said Faith and we constantly challenge ourselves to challenge this world.
I understand that this may be an unfamiliar concept to you but, judging by your quick and easy recourse to Scriptural reference when it suits you, all may not be lost with regard to your soul’s salvation. (BTW, you and every human possess a God-given soul and Scripture can feed it wonderfully.)
Given the fact that we are soul-ful beings, would you care to revise your opinion that Faith is “a total converstion stopper”?
Go on, reply to this post and prove me right!
God Bless,
Colmcille.

More dogmatizing and question begging. If you are gonna make this a theological discussion, I think this will be the last i will say to you. You just retreat to your Catholicism like self sealing shell that it is and not address ANY of the salient points being made by myself and others (Even Betterave and Los_Angeles made the attempt to keep it in the world of people)

Ich wasche meine Hände in dieser (Yeah I can quote scripture just as well as any Catholic)

 

[Oresteian]

why do people who are born desiring only homosexual sex desire what only heterosexual sex can produce, namely, children?

Not everyone desires children, whether they be homosexual or heterosexual. For those that do, I think the matter of having and raising kids is independent of sexuality. Some people adopt because they do not want to go through the pain of pregnancy (obviously people can adopt for other reasons).

 

[captainmike]

Not everyone desires children, whether they be homosexual or heterosexual. For those that do, I think the matter of having and raising kids is independent of sexuality. Some people adopt because they do not want to go through the pain of pregnancy (obviously people can adopt for other reasons).

having kids is “independent of sexuality,” huh? no, it’s independent of homosexual sexuality.

why don’t we do this? all gays and lesbians pick out 10 states that you want and we straights will take the other 40. you can live there in peace, get married, do whatever you want. we’ll check back with you in a generation and see how you are doing. oops–you won’t be there; you will all be extinct.

 

[vsedriver]

I still don’t understand how Proposition 8 violates the Equal Protection Clause.

Sexual orientation isn’t part of the definition of marriage. It’s one of the reasons I don’t see any discrimination in Proposition 8. No where in any marriage law does it state that the individuals MUST BE heterosexual. It only says they must be one man and one woman.

Now if you want to make sexual orientation part of the definition of marriage than you can make anything part of the definition of marriage. At that point marriage as a social and cultural institution ceases to exist.

 

[Oresteian]

having kids is “independent of sexuality,” huh? no, it’s independent of homosexual sexuality.

why don’t we do this? all gays and lesbians pick out 10 states that you want and we straights will take the other 40. you can live there in peace, get married, do whatever you want. we’ll check back with you in a generation and see how you are doing. oops–you won’t be there; you will all be extinct.

Independent in the sense that one can desire kids regardless of one’s sexual orientation, and most sex is commenced for purposes other than procreation. Obviously a male and a female sex cell have to combine to form a child (for now).

I am not interested in separating people by any arbitrary standard. That suggestion sounds eerily too familiar. replace homosexuals with black or Muslim and the result is the same.

By the way I NEVER disclosed my sexual orientation. The assumptions you make about me are unwarranted.

 

[captainmike]

replace homosexuals with black or Muslim and the result is the same.

wrong. give muslims 10 states and in a few generations you will have several times as many muslims. give gays 10 states and in one generation they will be dead. without heterosexual sex, there are no people to engage in homosexual sex. homosexual sex yields nothing posittive for society. hence, society should never celebrate it the way it does marriage.

 

[captainmike]

I still don’t understand how Proposition 8 violates the Equal Protection Clause.

Sexual orientation isn’t part of the definition of marriage. It’s one of the reasons I don’t see any discrimination in Proposition 8. No where in any marriage law does it state that the individuals MUST BE heterosexual. It only says they must be one man and one woman.

Now if you want to make sexual orientation part of the definition of marriage than you can make anything part of the definition of marriage. At that point marriage as a social and cultural institution ceases to exist.

in a sense, you are correct. prop 8 violates the = protection clause only if you believe there are four genders, not two–i.e., straight female, gay female, straight male, gay male.

 

[Oresteian]

I still don’t understand how Proposition 8 violates the Equal Protection Clause.

Sexual orientation isn’t part of the definition of marriage. It’s one of the reasons I don’t see any discrimination in Proposition 8. No where in any marriage law does it state that the individuals MUST BE heterosexual. It only says they must be one man and one woman.

Now if you want to make sexual orientation part of the definition of marriage than you can make anything part of the definition of marriage. At that point marriage as a social and cultural institution ceases to exist.

As has been pointed out ad nauseum

Under Prop 8, a woman is allowed marry a man but not another woman

A man is allowed marry a woman but not another man

Under Prop 8 men are allowed to do something a woman is not allowed to do because of her sex.

Under Prop 8 a woman is allowed to do something that a man is not allowed to do
because of his sex

For men and women, if there romantic partner is of the same sex, then Prop 8 prevents them from marrying their romantic partner, whereas the same law DOES NOT
prevent heterosexuals from marrying their romantic partners. As a result, the Equal Protection Clause is violated.

There is nothing preventing same sex marriage from occurring other than the law, as the ceremonies were being performed before prop 8 and are currently performed in other parts of the world.

Marriage has existed in many forms throughout history that do not conform to your definition of marriage, so your assertion that this will fundamentally change it in some way is unfounded. I do not think homosexuals can sully the institution of marriage any more than what heterosexuals have not already done.

 

[captainmike]

As has been pointed out ad nauseum

Under Prop 8, a woman is allowed marry a man but not another woman

A man is allowed marry a woman but not another man

Under Prop 8 men are allowed to do something a woman is not allowed to do because of her sex.

Under Prop 8 a woman is allowed to do something that a man is not allowed to do
because of his sex

For men and women, if there romantic partner is of the same sex, then Prop 8 prevents them from marrying their romantic partner, whereas the same law DOES NOT
prevent heterosexuals from marrying their romantic partners. As a result, the Equal Protection Clause is violated.

There is nothing preventing same sex marriage from occurring other than the law, as the ceremonies were being performed before prop 8 and are currently performed in other parts of the world.

Marriage has existed in many forms throughout history that do not conform to your definition of marriage, so your assertion that this will fundamentally change it in some way is unfounded. I do not think homosexuals can sully the institution of marriage any more than what heterosexuals have not already done.

men are allowed to marry those of the opposite sex.

so are women.

no difference.

 

[Oresteian]

wrong. give muslims 10 states and in a few generations you will have several times as many muslims. give gays 10 states and in one generation they will be dead. without heterosexual sex, there are no people to engage in homosexual sex. homosexual sex yields nothing posittive for society. hence, society should never celebrate it the way it does marriage.

I am referring to the logical form of your argument and not it’s content (although think it is equally as appalling). For whatever reasons, there have been people suggesting to send some group “back to where they came from” or create ghettos to put that group. It’s a horrific idea and nothing will come from it.

Just so you know there are other ways people can reproduce other than having intercourse, and I can imagine there will be more to come as our knowledge increases.

 

[Oresteian]

in a sense, you are correct. prop 8 violates the = protection clause only if you believe there are four genders, not two–i.e., straight female, gay female, straight male, gay male.

what you have described above is sexual orientation and sex, not gender.

Gender would be something like “masculine” and “feminine” which are social constructs. We have this notion that in order to be a “man” or and in order to be a “woman” one must act in the way society expects us to act. the way we act does not change our chromosomes in any way.