Same-sex marriage: where does my objection go wrong?

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jenwha said:
He’s never going to answer.

And even if you give him 10,000 reasons why it’s not marriage, he’s still going to not answer any questions and keep repeating the same dodgeball tactics ad nauseam and pretend he doesn’t understand.
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If you were paying closer attention, then you’d know that the one employing “dodgeball tactics” is surritter, who has chosen to ignore my various objections to this “biology” rationale (something involving procreation). This is a fact: he refuses to address post #212. Why is that? After changing the subject, and after I remain adamant about sticking to our previous discussion, he accuses me of dodgeball tactics – interesting revisionist history.
jenwha said:
It will never end. I say ignore him. I think you started asking Spencelo about 24 hours ago what his definition of marriage is and he’s still refused to answer.
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Marriage = civil marriage (not religious marriage). I’m sorry that a central concept in the SSM debate is so difficult to understand for people who are so eagerly opposed to it.
jenwha said:
So now the right to marry apparantly does have relevant requirements, he just won’t explain what they are. But if it is the same as he says from couple to couple than I think that means I can marry my father. Yesterday he said incest had nothing to do with what he was saying but by Spencelo’s above quote I guess it does.
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The relevant requirement at issue is the “one man one woman” requirement. Why is that a rational requirement to have? The typical response is the “procreation” rationale that i addressed in my op, but apparently no one here seems willing to defend it. Can you? Incest has nothing to do with the present discussion.
 
spencelo said:
When are you going to address post# 212?
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Wow – you really are playing games with us. Try using logic instead of diversionary tactics.

I answered it numerous times, most recently in post #271. That’s not dodgeball, that’s you overlooking things. Since you missed it, I’ll paste the relevant paragraph here:​

So what does biology have to do with marriage? Simple: the biology of a man and woman is such that, in normative circumstances, they produce a child. This is the root reason for a government to get involved.
Since a homosexual relationship, even with normal faculties present, can never produce a child, there is no reason for a government – civil, not a religious government – to get involved. It’s not discrimination in the horrible sense that you perceive that word; instead, a homosexual relationship is totally irrelevant to the foundational reason for marriage.​

Now, enough with your questions.
 
surritter said:
Wow – you really are playing games with us. Try using logic instead of diversionary tactics.

I answered it numerous times, most recently in post #271.
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But you didn’t. I asked you to clarify the difference between the “inability to procreate” rationale and the “ordered towards procreation” rationale, which you said were different. Here is what I wrote:
Your “ordered towards procreation” rationale sounds exactly like the “ability to procreate” rationale, which is susceptible to my op objection, but you claim that the two are entirely disconnected: a coupling can be “ordered towards procreation” even though procreation is impossible. So I have no idea what “ordered towards procreation” even means. It would be helpful if you would provide a sufficiently clear and rigorous definition of the term (since what you’re telling me doesn’t square with what other Catholics on here have said.)

And yet, you’ll say that I’m misrepresenting you, that the “inability to procreate” has nothing to do with why same-sex couples can’t marry. On one hand, you say the rationale for excluding same-sex couples from marrying is (your words) “a biological thing,” but on the other (when you talk about "ordered towards procreation), you say that that biological thing has nothing to do with the ability to procreate. I hope you can see why I’m terribly confused.

You’re the one moving away from biology. If we’re talking about biology, we’re talking about procreation or the ability to procreation. But if we’re talking about “ordered towards procreation,” we’re no longer talking about either, so I have no idea why your concept (despite having the term “procreation” in it) has anything to do with biology.​

surritter said:

So what does biology have to do with marriage? Simple: the biology of a man and woman is such that, in normative circumstances, they produce a child. This is the root reason for a government to get involved.
Since a homosexual relationship, even with normal faculties present, can never produce a child, there is no reason for a government – civil, not a religious government – to get involved. It’s not discrimination in the horrible sense that you perceive that word; instead, a homosexual relationship is totally irrelevant to the foundational reason for marriage.​

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But this doesn’t interact with what I wrote at all. Are you endorsing the “inability to procreate” rationale or the “ordered towards procreation” rationale, or are the two the same? If they’re the same, then how do you deal with my op objection, which you still haven’t addressed? Again, the right for same-sex couples to marry cannot possibly turn on whether or not they can satisfy a non-existent requirement, and yet that is precisely what the “inability to procreate” rationale amounts to: the imposition of a non-existent criterion for a marriage license. Call me crazy, but this strikes me as **extraordinarily **arbitrary and irrational. Where does my objection go wrong? Will you explain?
 
Wow – you really are playing games with us. Try using logic instead of diversionary tactics.
Now, enough with your questions.
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I agree. Can you go bother someone else besides us Catholics now? We obviously don’t see eye to eye and never will, so what’s the point?
 
jenwha said:
He’s never going to answer.

And even if you give him 10,000 reasons why it’s not marriage, he’s still going to not answer any questions and keep repeating the same dodgeball tactics ad nauseam and pretend he doesn’t understand.

It will never end.
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👍
(Which is why I said yesterday that his purpose is polemical. Pretty obvious. 😉 You’re spot on.)
 
jenwha said:
I agree. Can you go bother someone else besides us Catholics now? We obviously don’t see eye to eye and never will, so what’s the point?
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Since you Catholics keep coming back for more punishment, obviously you enjoy being bothered.
 
We’re not being punished at all. You can’t justify your perverted definition of marriage no matter how hard you try. It’s laughable.

You just keep repeating the same stupid questions without answering our own. I think you need to take a basic philosophy course. Unless you are under eight years old, which I’m really wondering if you are, you’re completely embarrassing yourself over and over. You’re like an annoying fly that keeps buzzing around incessantly.
 
spencelo said:
Okay Stephen, I don’t see any good faith effort on your part, but I will try one more time.

To use your analogy, same-sex couples are fighting for the “right to drive” – the right to get that license which allows them to assume all responsibilities and privileges associated with driving. The debate has nothing to do with the state of “being a driver,” but with who has “the right to drive.” The “right to drive” is granted to anyone who can meet the relevant requirements, which are the same from person to person. “Being a driver,” on the other hand, is a “state of being” that differs from person to person – some enjoy it, others don’t.

Similarly, same-sex couples are fighting for the “right to marry” – the right to get that license which allows them to assume all responsibilities and privileges associated with marriage. The debate has NOTHING to do with marriage as “a state of being,” but with who has “the right to marry.” The “right to marry” is granted to couples who can meet the relevant requirements, which is the same from couple to couple. The current debate is about those requirements: are they or are they not rational? The debate has nothing to do with marriage as “a state of being,” which varies widely from couple to couple. You are (deliberately, it seems) conflating the legal right to marry with what marriage ought to mean and look like once people are legally married.
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The “right to marry” is afforded to individuals. Everyone who is of age and not already married is afforded that right. Irregardless of someone’s sexual preference, they have the right to get married. But, anyone who wants to get married has to meet the requirements. For example - Both I and my brother are free to get married, but no matter how much we love each other, our relationship is not and never will be a marriage (beyond the fact that it would be just ewww)

Using your driver’s license analogy. You have the right to get a CDL or a regular license, but you do not have the right to use your car to try and pass the CDL driving requirement or to pass off your regular license as a CDL.
 
jenwha said:
So now the right to marry apparantly does have relevant requirements, he just won’t explain what they are.
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It will not say what the requirements are because it doesn’t truly believe there are any requirements. It will not take a stand of any kind because 1) it would have to defend itself 2) it could no longer carry on its irrational rant against the Catholic Church. Another poster from that side almost said as much on another thread.
 
Dawnia said:
The “right to marry” is afforded to individuals. Everyone who is of age and not already married is afforded that right. Irregardless of someone’s sexual preference, they have the right to get married.
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I have a homosexual Uncle that was ‘married’ to a Lesbian for five years, so I know it can be done.
 
Dawnia said:
The “right to marry” is afforded to individuals. Everyone who is of age and not already married is afforded that right.
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Yes, people of age are afforded the right to marry someone of the opposite sex, but that isn’t the right proponents of marriage equality are seeking. Proponents of marriage equality are seeking the right for people marry someone of the same sex. This discrimination of same-sex couples lacks a rational basis.
 
Stephen168 said:
It will not say what the requirements are because it doesn’t truly believe there are any requirements. It will not take a stand of any kind because 1) it would have to defend itself 2) it could no longer carry on its irrational rant against the Catholic Church. Another poster from that side almost said as much on another thread.
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So I’m an “it” now?
 
spencelo said:
Yes, people of age are afforded the right to marry someone of the opposite sex, but that isn’t the right proponents of marriage equality are seeking. Proponents of marriage equality are seeking the right for people marry someone of the same sex. This discrimination of same-sex couples lacks a rational basis.
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Do you discriminate against pedophiles?
 
livingwordunity said:
The connection is the hypocrisy of you criticizing the Catholic Church for discriminating based on her standard for morality when you are discriminating based on your standard of morality.
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Pedophilia is a crime; sexual relations between consenting same-sex couples isn’t. Why can’t you see the distinction between the two?
 
spencelo said:
Pedophilia is a crime; sexual relations between consenting same-sex couples isn’t. Why can’t you see the distinction between the two?
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Again, you are being a hypocrite since you didn’t respect the law when so-called “same-sex marriage” was not legal.
 
livingwordunity said:
The connection is the hypocrisy of you criticizing the Catholic Church for discriminating based on her standard for morality when you are discriminating based on your standard of morality.
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The clear difference is that pedophilia causes psychologically verifiable harm to the child. Consensual relations between of-age homosexuals in a relationship do not cause any verifiable harm.
I stress “verifiable” because I am sure somebody reading this will be tempted to mention that the Church says homosexual relationships are spiritually harmful, but there is no way to measure this so it is moot.
 
I think this post is starting to crumble into name-calling.
I would like to propose an alternative. Towards the end of this thread was the debate over legal versus moral marriage.
Now, this isn’t completely a fight between religion and secularism. Many religions claim that God approves of gay marriages, while most do not. Furthermore, many religions which forbid gay marriage do not require fertility for a marriage to be valid. The US does not have a single state religion; it cannot arbitrarily choose which moral code it believes is the correct one. In the same way that it would be unfair to ask the government to forbid divorce or marriage between people who do not want children, it would be unfair to ask this political body to define whether gay marriage is possible.
So, why not have the government stop declaring marriages altogether, and instead declare civil unions? Any couple that wanted the economic rights of what is now called “marriage” could apply for a civil union. As long as both are able to consent, the gender and any other factors do not matter to the state. Following this, if the couple wanted to be married, they could go to a church or other entity to have a marriage ceremony.
My question is, does anyone on either side oppose this? And why?
 
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