Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Monday, February 27, 2012
Thoughts on torture
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| Bruising on my left arm from struggling against restraints during anesthesia. |
At about 8 a.m. on Jan. 13, 2012, I went under general anesthesia so surgeons could cut a 12-inch incision along my scalp from near my old widow's peak, along the crown to above my ear, than down and swooping forward, then dropping close along the front of my ear, like a backward question mark or a hand-held sickle. Then they peeled me like an orange to expose my skull and used a rotary drill to bore out two large circles of bone, one about 2.5 inches wide starting at my right temple, the other overlapping it halfway, just above the ear.
I'd been clear under twice before. Once in 1993 when several attempts at an epidural failed because they kept jamming it into my spine at exactly the place where the cord was pinched nearly to nothing by a lumbar stenosis I suffered from later. The second time was Jan. 11, 2012, two days before the brain operation, while a wire was threaded up my arteries (starting at my groin) and into my head and two or three veins were glued shut to starve the tumor growing on the right side of the stem. Oh, and to stuff my fat ass into an MRI for the pre-op scan.
In 1993 I went under peacefully, no worries. In 2012 as I lay under the mask and breathed the scentless knockout gas, I became afraid. I grappled the fear, wrestled it down, kept breathing and knew nothing until I started to revive.
What I didn't know was that, both times at the Veterans hospital in San Francisco last month, as soon as I went under I started to struggle. Coming into the anesthesia room for the second time, the anesthesiologist laughed and said his back had just about recovered from holding me down. For the operation they tied me down.
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| About three days after the operation when the doc removed the tape covering my incision |
I was sedated for 26 hours. That's pretty dangerous, as I understand it, so there must have been good reasons for keeping me as helpless as possible. And I'm sure they were right, because as soon as consciousness started leaking back in, I found myself in a panic.
I couldn't talk. I couldn't control my breathing. My body was in agony, mostly my left hip, and I needed to shit. Oh, I needed to shit, and I couldn't tell anyone. There were straps around my wrists, but I couldn't keep hold of that knowledge for more than a few seconds, and I kept falling back into a fog, reawakening and rediscovering that I had a tube down my throat, and when I reached for my face to tear it out my arm moved a few inches then stopped with a yank. So I would pull and yank and lurch, and out of a blind fog a voice would come saying, "We'll get that tube out soon, Mr. McConkie."
I remember the first thought that formed itself in words. The first memory of anything before the awful present. It was about what it would be like to have a towel thrown over your face, then have water poured on it so you couldn't breath and were certain you were drowning -- and whether that was OK to do to someone, because they had knowledge you needed.
Just weeks before, I'd finally decided, no. It's not right. No matter what's at stake.
One a bed in the ICU I was strapped for ten hours and I don't know how many of them were punctuated by me coming awake and thrashing in panic because I felt like I was drowning. That was probably when I was trying to breathe and the machine wasn't set to blow air down my throat. My heart would race and my blood oxygen level would plummet but the breather wasn't keeping pace and I was physically helpless; I couldn't freaking breathe! I couldn't scream. I couldn't protest. And my arms couldn't move to tear that awful thing out of me so I could suck in air and gasp bellow my existence.
A worded thought finally fell together in my mind:
"I wouldn't do this to my enemy."
No, not if he was a murderer and held the secret to save a city from annihilation. Because at some point we have to stop and not become what we fight.
I'd believed that for a long time, and nothing cemented it more firmly than my eight days in Iraq in February and March, 1991, when I never had to raise my personal weapon, not because no Iraqi soldier ever got the drop on me, but because Iraqis believed we were better than Iranians. Believed if they surrendered, we'd treat them humanely.
Would they do that now? No, probably not, because America has changed and it's known we're not above either torturing people ourselves, or turning them over to people who will.
It's a terrible line we crossed, and I personally will not go there, nor will I give my assent or turn a blind eye. In my heart I know there are things so wrong that we can't do them to our enemies. No, not even such a physically harmless torture as waterboarding.
I don't know how long it was between my first addled whiff of consciousness, and when they pulled cut off the anesthesia, pulled out the tube and slapped a full-face bipap mask on me. When I came awake that time someone said, "We got the tube out, Mr. McConkie."
I replied, and my voice croaked from my throat being raw -- literally, bleedingly raw. My first statement was a phrase I've never said except to quote someone else, because it's always seemed a bit brazen. But it was heartfelt:
"Thank God."
I've almost lost a valued friendship with D. Michael Martindale because of our constant clashes over gay marriage. The sin I have to repent of is getting angry, losing my cool and using obscenities to describe what "gay" actually means, but since DMM started deleting those posts and threatened to defriend me if I kept it up, I've calmed down because I deeply care about being dropped from his list. He's a brilliant fellow and more fair-minded than most people; he's also a great writer and it's a privilege to associate with him.
Since becoming more focused I've found it easier to expand my arguments against gay marriage. Michael continues to reject those arguments, and this still causes distress between us, because honestly I can't understand how he can take one of his arguments seriously.
This was a recent exchange sparked by him posting a statement on Facebook, made by Clint Eastwood, that "Don't give me that sanctity [of marriage] crap. Just give everyone the chance to live the life they want."
After one "Idiot's" last post, Michael deleted my response, which was profane enough that I won't recreate it in full. I started by saying, "I stopped reading after 'spousal rape' and 'reinstate.' [Blank] me, you [blankety blank.]
As for Michael's last statement, I discussed it with him in a thread on Doug Gibson's FB page, and he responded directly to a Socratic proposition I made.
Michael proposes that we force our beliefs on others if we pass laws that aren't based on purely secular reasoning. I wish I could dig up that thread, but I'll summarize:
Michael frequently states that Utah's liquor laws violate the First Amendment. He doesn't take the discredited "separation of church and state" approach that liberals still say, but says that it violates people's personal religious liberty -- that is, their right not to be forced to adopt the religious beliefs of others.
We all acknowledge that is a real right, and the purpose behind the Amendment saying "Congress shall make no law concerning an establishment of religion." The government cannot be allowed to impose religion.
But laws that limit alcohol access don't force anyone to believe the Word of Wisdom. They don't penalize people for believing ANYTHING. They just regulate the sale of alcohol.
Michael won't concede that. He applies the same argument to gay marriage: he says we're forcing our beliefs on others.
I gave this scenario:
Say I'm a drinker who moves to Alaska, to a largely Inuit-populated county that prohibits the sale and purchase of alcohol. Their reason has nothing to do with religion, but because the alcoholism rate among Inuits is 98 percent, so alcohol for them is even more of a killer than in other parts of the U.S.
Question: Does it violate my religious liberty to be subject to that law?
Say I'm the same drinker and move from Alaska to Utah, where it's legal to buy and sell and drink alcohol, but just not from as many places as neighboring Nevada. Does it violate my religious liberty?
With a straight face, Michael answered that the ban on alcohol in the Alaskan county does not violate religious liberty, but any restriction on alcohol "beyond what is normal" is a violation of religious liberty, because "the motive behind the law is religious."
He says restricting alcohol access "forces [LDS] beliefs on others."
This way of thinking is so illogical that I've told Michael he is being deliberately obtuse, that he can't possibly be sincere -- either that or he's sold his intellect to the gods of vice.
This seriously cheesed Michael off and damaged our friendship. Maybe I shouldn't have said that, but most of the time he's such a clear thinker, and this one seems so far from being based on thought, period, that I'm at a loss to account for it, except that his motive to see things a certain way is so overpowering that his arguments have all bent under emotional force. This is the kind of argument I expect from people who are simply hostile to religion, or Mormons in particular, and wish to disenfranchise them by any means possible.
Michael constantly refers to "compelling secular arguments" as the only basis for law. I pointed out that this is based on the mistaken belief that secularism is the same as objective truth. Every man's "truth" is a subjective belief, even if couched in words that don't sound connected to a particular religion. This is provable because there are several distinct secular philosophies with huge contradictions between them: American secular-humanist philosophy, European socialist secular philosophy, Communist secular philosophy, Nazi secular philosophy, libertarian secular philosophy.
Michael is a libertarian, and I told him that if you have to be a secularist, libertarianism is probably the best one, because all the others are more or less totalitarian, in that they don't recognize the supremacy of the individual; they recognize the highest good as the collective.
So by banishing religious motives for passing and supporting laws, secularists are really just disenfranchising people they disagree with and reserving the right to toss out any law they dislike. That is a more radical attack on true religious liberty than about anything else being proposed today.
Response made in Facebook to this thread:
Followup, March 1, 2012
March 1, 2012
Since becoming more focused I've found it easier to expand my arguments against gay marriage. Michael continues to reject those arguments, and this still causes distress between us, because honestly I can't understand how he can take one of his arguments seriously.
This was a recent exchange sparked by him posting a statement on Facebook, made by Clint Eastwood, that "Don't give me that sanctity [of marriage] crap. Just give everyone the chance to live the life they want."
- 4 people like this.
Preston McConkie As always, the question is misrepresented as people standing in the way of homosexuals doing something. They're free to do as they please.Saturday at 8:35pm ·
DMM: No, they're not. They please to get married, and people are standing in the way of that.
Preston McConkie People just aren't granting them their personal approval. They can promise and pair off all they want.
Mormons didn't care that the feds refused to endorse their multiple marriages. When that didn't stop them doing as they pleased they started selectively prosecuting adultery.
So long as we don't arrest people for pairing up and doing whatever they do, we're not stopping them from doing a darn thing.
Preston McConkie The shift in thinking that marriage is a right that's being denied them, is the same as the shift in thinking that we're free people whose rights are protected, not granted, by government. This whole argument is built on the notion that government grants rights and privileges.
DMM: Bullshit. You're stopping them from marrying. Try as you might to make that a trivial thing for gays, it's not to them any more than it is to straights.
And who cares what Mormons did? What difference does that make?
Preston McConkie
It's just an example about the fact that marriage means who YOU make it mean. Doesn't have shit to do with legal status. The legal status was created, though, because nations recognized families -- the kind that create life and raise childr...See More
Preston McConkie
Laws as they existed and functioned until the mid-20th century were primarily about enforcing a man's responsibility to provide for his wife and children. Laws also established guidelines for what constituted a deal-breaker so that a man or woman could withdraw from those obligations. These were primarily rules about sexual fidelity, material support and physical abuse.
Gays already have all the rights of parents for children they actually sire or bear. I object to adoptions that make a non-parent a parent outside of a marriage, but I also object to gay marriage, which is the only scenario where that happens. Still, a legal parent can grant guardian status to any other person in the event of their disability or death, so it's not a big issue in my view.
Only in our time has marriage become seen as a way of getting goodies from the government and, by government mandate, from employers. Thus, the marriage issue is almost entirely about getting goodies, and about securing public approval of relationships that bear only the smallest resemblance to life-creating, child-rearing families.
DMM: Gay couples have spouses they have duties to, and many of them are families with children.
DMM: Single straight adults can adopt a child too--outside of marriage, since they're single.
Preston McConkie
A very few are families with children. And if they want to keep their promises they can. Society has no compelling reason to make one man support another.
I will agree that the amount of social damage to the concept of familiy would be small if we granted universal gay marriage, because the concept of family has already been pretty smashed. The worst troubles will happen in public schools where it will become a discipline issue to say that you disagree with it; that's already the case some places. It will force people to withdraw more and more from the public system in order to have any influence with their kids.
Look at how bad it already is; women are now required to pay alimony to men, for no better reason than the man was a gigolo who didn't earn anything. That is a radical change in judicial doctrine that makes the purpose of marriage law meaningless.
Preston McConkie Yeah, and legally I can't object to a single gay person adopting a child. I do object to gay couples being granted joint parent status.
Preston McConkie
The main problem with legal recognition of gay coupling as equivalent to marriage is that it makes all the mistakes in outlook and judicial doctrine permanent and official, irrevocable without revolution. For people who have hoped to reform policies about marriage that have created the existing value-free, logic-free chaos, it's a mortal blow.
It doesn't have to have anything to do witih hostility toward gays. I know it will sound insincere because I talk so much shit about shitty sex, but I don't look down on gays. I've worked with them as a missionary and loved them; I know them and am closely related to one who has struggled with same-sex attraction but built a beautiful family; I've had my own struggle with same-sex attraction and gotten past it, but consequently understand it to a degree (I've never had an actual gay encounter).
The radical definition of remarriage is a point of no return in the culture struggle. It's not something people can afford to ignore if they want to keep the government from becoming a permanent obstacle to the creation and defense of real families.
Idiot: So, Preston, how do you want to reform marriage? What do you want it to look like? Is it simply a matter of rolling back the the clock to how it was in yesteryear?
Preston McConkie No, there have been some improvements in attitudes that we wouldn't want to abandon. But I'd like it to be more about duty and devotion and less about rights; people are so obsessed with their "right" to a fictional romance with all the benefits and no struggle that half of marriages are ended by immaturity and selfishness.
Idiot: That's pretty vague. So, I think we've established that you're afraid of gay marriage. Any other forms of marriage that you want to exclude? What other reforms do you want to enact? How does excluding groups from marriage accomplish these goals?
Preston McConkie I've already explained your last question. Sorry for being vague, but I'm tired and just checking in and need more energy and reflection to give your original question a worthy reply.
Preston McConkie And what other "forms of marriage" are there? That makes you sound hostile. It's also a puzzling question.
Idiot:
There are lots of different forms of marriage. There's a rather oddly constructed list at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Types_of_marriages .
I was thinking more along the idea of coverture and spousal rape. You seemed focused on responsibilities and duties so I wondered whether these were some that you wanted to reinstate. You seem worried that each person in a marriage fit into a pre-defined role, that the men provide and the women submissively take care of the home and children.
I admit that the question, "Any other forms of marriage that you want to exclude?" is a little odd. I've focused on the fact that the only definite proposal you have is to deny gay marriage. However, you also seem to be upset about marriages in which the woman is the primary, or largest, breadwinner. I presume therefore that you would want to prohibit those arrangements.
And no, you really haven't answered my last question. You've said it's a point of no return, but you haven't explained how that will protect marriage. (Unless you've explained it elsewhere in some other discussion. I certainly haven't read everything you've ever written.) I submit that ending the doctrine of coverture was a radical redefinition of marriage and a point of no return, but I don't think we should roll it back.
Preston McConkie What about Jeff's obscenity of a post? Wait, he didn't swear. Politely worded accusations of villainy are OK.
DMM: Preston, you've been on this rant for a long time. I've been impressed by nothing you've said on the subject, and been generally disgusted at how you've said it most of the time.
You are a poster child for intolerance and bigotry. You want...See More
11 hours ago · ·
1
DMM: "...I don't look down on gays."
Imagine me doing a whopping spit take as I read this, then howling with laughter.
Preston McConkie Well, what was unclassy about my discussion? Other than telling Jeff to blow me. It sounds like you're just mad at me for continuing to take the position I do.
Preston McConkie I'm not being intentionally obtuse, so you're gonna have to school me. If by "classy" you mean agreeing to gay marriage, that's not a straight argument. In this thread I wasn't abusive until Jeff started suggesting I want to "reinstate" spousal rape.
Preston McConkie So my discussion of the topic wasn't the problem, it was my reaction to Jeff being a fuckwad.
- DMM:
It's how most of your arguments were insutling disgusting attacks on gay people using crude and obscene language, until I got fed up with it and started ddeleting it. Now I have little tolerance for any slipping back into that.
It's how yo...See More
Preston McConkie
I apologize for my past behavior. I'm trying to do better. I know you're an intelligent person. I don't mean my vulgarisms to be assaults on people; they were intended to focus attention on the act itself that people are being so self-righteous to defend.
I still think that you've got your brain turned off when you claim you claim a law violates religious liberty, not based on what it actually does to the people subject to it, but based on the motive of the people who support the law.
DMM: You see, that's what I mean. I am basing it on what it does to the people: it forces your belief about gays on everyone else. It's really quite simple: unless you can come up with a viable nonreligious reason for banning marriage from gays, the ban has no business being implemented. Citizens are supposed to be treated equally.
After one "Idiot's" last post, Michael deleted my response, which was profane enough that I won't recreate it in full. I started by saying, "I stopped reading after 'spousal rape' and 'reinstate.' [Blank] me, you [blankety blank.]
As for Michael's last statement, I discussed it with him in a thread on Doug Gibson's FB page, and he responded directly to a Socratic proposition I made.
Michael proposes that we force our beliefs on others if we pass laws that aren't based on purely secular reasoning. I wish I could dig up that thread, but I'll summarize:
Michael frequently states that Utah's liquor laws violate the First Amendment. He doesn't take the discredited "separation of church and state" approach that liberals still say, but says that it violates people's personal religious liberty -- that is, their right not to be forced to adopt the religious beliefs of others.
We all acknowledge that is a real right, and the purpose behind the Amendment saying "Congress shall make no law concerning an establishment of religion." The government cannot be allowed to impose religion.
But laws that limit alcohol access don't force anyone to believe the Word of Wisdom. They don't penalize people for believing ANYTHING. They just regulate the sale of alcohol.
Michael won't concede that. He applies the same argument to gay marriage: he says we're forcing our beliefs on others.
I gave this scenario:
Say I'm a drinker who moves to Alaska, to a largely Inuit-populated county that prohibits the sale and purchase of alcohol. Their reason has nothing to do with religion, but because the alcoholism rate among Inuits is 98 percent, so alcohol for them is even more of a killer than in other parts of the U.S.
Question: Does it violate my religious liberty to be subject to that law?
Say I'm the same drinker and move from Alaska to Utah, where it's legal to buy and sell and drink alcohol, but just not from as many places as neighboring Nevada. Does it violate my religious liberty?
With a straight face, Michael answered that the ban on alcohol in the Alaskan county does not violate religious liberty, but any restriction on alcohol "beyond what is normal" is a violation of religious liberty, because "the motive behind the law is religious."
He says restricting alcohol access "forces [LDS] beliefs on others."
This way of thinking is so illogical that I've told Michael he is being deliberately obtuse, that he can't possibly be sincere -- either that or he's sold his intellect to the gods of vice.
This seriously cheesed Michael off and damaged our friendship. Maybe I shouldn't have said that, but most of the time he's such a clear thinker, and this one seems so far from being based on thought, period, that I'm at a loss to account for it, except that his motive to see things a certain way is so overpowering that his arguments have all bent under emotional force. This is the kind of argument I expect from people who are simply hostile to religion, or Mormons in particular, and wish to disenfranchise them by any means possible.
Michael constantly refers to "compelling secular arguments" as the only basis for law. I pointed out that this is based on the mistaken belief that secularism is the same as objective truth. Every man's "truth" is a subjective belief, even if couched in words that don't sound connected to a particular religion. This is provable because there are several distinct secular philosophies with huge contradictions between them: American secular-humanist philosophy, European socialist secular philosophy, Communist secular philosophy, Nazi secular philosophy, libertarian secular philosophy.
Michael is a libertarian, and I told him that if you have to be a secularist, libertarianism is probably the best one, because all the others are more or less totalitarian, in that they don't recognize the supremacy of the individual; they recognize the highest good as the collective.
So by banishing religious motives for passing and supporting laws, secularists are really just disenfranchising people they disagree with and reserving the right to toss out any law they dislike. That is a more radical attack on true religious liberty than about anything else being proposed today.
Response made in Facebook to this thread:
- BLD: Read your blog. Thanks for providing the link. I think both Michael and u are smart dudes. But I'm for gay marriage (despite my homophobia and all my gay jokes). I just say live and let live. Oh, and I hate all religion too (which seems to be the main roadblock to gay marriage). 666
Preston McConkie Haha. Hey, I don't begrudge anyone their POV on gay marriage, and I support their right to advocate for it, and if it becomes the law and is upheld by the people, then fine, that's that.
Michael and I primarily disagree on whether anyone has the right to oppose it. He says since the only objection is religious (that isn't true) that any court has the right to toss out any law or state constitution amendment that prohibits it. He says that, since there is no COMPELLING secular argument against it, it MUST be law.- I disagree on two points: One, imposing secularism violates religious liberty the same as establishing any other state church; and laws do not violate religious liberty unless they compel belief (or the confession of belief, which is as near as we come to it), prohibit us from carrying out our religious duty (hence exceptions to liquor laws that allow minors to take a sip of the sacramental wine), or compel them to violate their conscience (hence conscientious objector exceptions from military service).
Two: Michael says marriage is a basic human right. I don't think there's a basic human right to have society enforce your relationship promises; society has chosen to enforce just one type of relationship, and that's the one that creates life and perpetuates it as a family. - We already to live and let live, but asking us to call gay partnerships marriage is a request, not for tolerance, but for making it a special case that society says must be upheld by sanctions and protections. He says society has no compelling interest to deny it, so therefore it must be granted; I say that without a compelling interest to grant it affirmative, special status, there is not only not a need, that we should decline.
We keep treating this as if we're taking something from gay people. No, we're just not giving them something special. And they bear the burden of proving that they offer something so wonderful for society that we should get involved in their private lives. - I would make fewer comments if I didn't keep forgetting that an unassisted "enter" posts the comment as it exists.
Thanks for commenting. I value your views on all subjects, Brian, because you're frank about what your beliefs are, you reason clearly, and you don't think you have the right to impose your views without me having any recourse.
.
Followup, March 1, 2012
- DMM: Nope. That's what you say I say, but I never say it.
You can participate all you want. But so can I. And part of my participation is to say that your arguments aren't cutting it, and to explain why I don't think they cut it. But never once have I said you can't participate.
Preston McConkie Bullshit. You say a whole bloc of votes can be tossed because you don't perceive a persuasive argument by a tiny handful of people you've argued with. Oh, you willnobject, but if someone has a compelling secular argument, let them bring it forth.
That makes the process no different than a dictatorship where religious people are free to petition the despot. So long as he isn't persuaded, their voices may as well not exist.- DMM: A whole block of votes can and should be tossed if the vote violates individual rights. Laws voted in by the majority have often been overturned.
Preston McConkie You propose a nonconstitutional criteria that examines the voter's motive, not the law. There is no accepted judicial criteria that echoes yours. Even the 9th Circuit wrongly calls gay marriage a right; it doesn't attack the right of citizens to vote based on their motives. You are a loopier, more malicious radical than anyone I know, D.
I mean, I knew a guy that thought that way when I was in college ... but he was an idiot and everyone knew it.
Right now you feel happy with yourself for standing up for Mormons on some issues, but in the end you'll stand guard by the cloaks of those stuffing us in the ovens. (Acts 7:58)
- Preston McConkie Because I'm not trying to take anyone's donut. I just don't want to set up a government policy to promote and praise the eating of donuts, nor to equate donuts with nine-grain bread.
10 hours ago · · 1 
D. Michael Martindale
That's such bullshit, but you keep saying it over and over. I guess it's all you got to hang your argument on.
"Allowing" is not "promoting." It's not "praising." All it is, is allowing. Just like allowing people to smoke or drink alcohol ...See More
about an hour ago · · 2
Jeff Thompson Karen, I'm not quite sure about the distinction you're making. Would you be more satisfied if the quote were revised like this: Claiming that someone else's marriage should be prohibited because it is against your religion is like prohibiting someone someone else from eating a donut because you're on a diet.
about an hour ago · · 1
Jeff Thompson She seemed to be, "No, it would only be like...". With the Facebook commenting system it's a bit difficult at times figuring out just what someone is talking about.
Preston McConkie
The feds got pissed because clarifying that an American marriage didn't include multiple simultaneous marriages, Mormons kept making promises to multiple partners and THINKING they were married. Thus the feds, who never once gave a rat's as...See More
D. Michael Martindale
I don't need the circumstances between Mormon polygamy and gay marriage to be exact to have the stand I do. No two circumstances are exactly the same. That's what generaliing is all about--being able to see the commonality in things that ar...See More
Preston McConkie Jeff, it's not about being indignant about how the feds handled polygamy. It's just that, in this case, it's an excellent illustration.
Marriage is an action. It's not a status granted by government, as we must all acknowledge because marriage exists with or without government. Government involvement is voluntary; indeed, there are plenty of governments that don't involve themselves in registering marriage, and most didn't until the most recent modern times. It's almost entirely a Christian Eurpoean convention.
Since governments don't need to be involved in marriage, but choose to be, then it devolves upon the people of the United States, from whom the government derives its authority, to decide how they define marriage, and if they want to be involved in licensing it.
The idea that same-sex partnerships are equivalent to opposite-sex partnerships is mathematically impossible; hence it becomes a matter of subjective judgment whether they are of comparable or equal value to society. Today, proponents have adopted the position that there can be no discussion of whether they are of comparable of equal value; indeed, that there is no question of whether they are equivalent. They have decided for us that an apple and an orange are identical to an apple and an apple; therefore, there can be no question of comparable value because there is no difference of any kind.
Preston McConkie Michael keeps saying that equivalent status must be granted because there is no compelling secular argument against it. This is, of course, horseshit of the highest order, since if they weren't different it would be impossible to distinguish between a gay or straight marriage; and if they are obviously not the same, then there must be a compelling argument that they are of some similar or equivalent purpose or value before it is even arguable that they should be considered for equivalent status.
It's nothing but secular bullying, and the denial that there is a secular case AGAINST what they've made no secular case FOR, that carries this argument forward. And the fact that more and more people are giving in is largely for the same reason the gay agenda has advanced along every step in the past: people are so sick of hearing about it and say, "OK, fine, whatever. Now, will they finally shut the fuck up and leave me alone?"
Preston McConkie And before you point out that Rome registered marriage, I already know that. They also invented monogamy. Thank you, Rome, you bunch of busybody assholes.
March 1, 2012
- Preston McConkie I spent a year typing a response and accidentally deleted it. This proves that you have been standing in a circle drawing pentagrams and smearing blood on your naked body to thwart me.
- DMM:Do you mean this one...?
[Lost post inserted by Michael here; apparently it showed up on his thread but vanished from mine.]
Yeah, yeah, yeah. A few years ago bigots -- which you call conservatives, cuz you're a bigot -- argued against miscegenation. So what? People made their case that race was irrelevant, and it was accepted.
One thing is completely different. Not only did miscegenation laws withhold recognition of interracial marriages, but it prohibited humping between the races. You'd go to prison for screwing the wrong chick. Those laws perfectly resembled the anti-polygamy laws in the way they were prosecuted. It wasn't about withholding state recognition, though that was part of it; it was about aggressively punishing people who acted a certain way.
Now, of course, you can hump anyone you please.
The objection in miscegenation cases was, not that it didn't resemble marriage, but that it did exactly what marriages do: produce babies. And the objection was that the babies would be racially tainted. In the case of gay marriage, that central element of marriage is completely absent. The only similarity between miscegenation arguments and today's argument is that, in both cases, people used the word "marriage" when they discussed the issue. It would be just as legitimate to argue for interspecies marriage because it involves some of the words used to argue about interracial marriage. And no, I'm not saying gay marriage would lead more than one or two crackpots to argue for interspecies marriage; I am saying, though, that they have just as much resemblance to the miscegenation issue.
As for one guy's position that Prop 8 isn't rational, that's his opinion. The two justices who ruled against Prop 8 were expressing their opinions. And in fact, what they're doing is creating a dangerous doctrine that judges get to define what is and isn't "rational," and they get to apply their own standard. What D is saying is that this opinion is not an opinion, but a statement of the objective truth.
It's one thing to say you're right, but to say that the law has to agree with you and that anyone who disagrees with you forfeits their right to vote based on their opinions -- is in effect advocating the establishment of a state religion. -
- JT:The point in bringing up the anti-miscegenation laws is to establish pattern, precedent, and similarity. It isn’t to say that the two are exactly the same. However, the similarities are striking.
You actually bring up yet another similarity in the issues when you discuss who can “hump” whom. The current wave of change regarding marriage equality, especially in the courts, basically started with Lawrence v. Texas. Prior to that, many states prohibited specific sexual practices between consenting adults. Primarily these impacted gay men. They were rarely enforced against straight couples. Lesbians frequently get ignored. When Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the decision in Lawrence v. Texas it denied the state had any interest in the private sexual practices of consenting adults. At the time many people, including Justice Sandra Day O’Connor pointed out that ruling made it difficult to prohibit gay marriage. When a gay marriage case makes it to SCOTUS, Kennedy’s vote will be crucial.
It isn’t a matter of being able to distinguish between heterosexual marriage and homosexual marriage. The point is whether doing so supports a valid government interest and whether that law directly supports that interest.
We have a word that we call “cat”. That word can mean a number of different things. It can mean a house cat, a mountain lion, a tiger, a bobcat. Yet we still manage to work just fine with these different meanings. If I say I met a cat while walking out in the alley, you’d probably assume it was a domesticated cat (Felis catus) unless I came in ashen-faced and then you might wonder if it was a mountain lion (Puma concolor), or if I came in excited and then you might wonder if it was a bobcat (Lynx rufus). You might not know to distinguish between their various official names, but my daughter probably would. You probably also wouldn’t be too confused as to whether I “met” the cat by encountering it or by shaking its paw and inquiring where it was from and where it worked.
We have lots of laws regarding motor vehicles. When hybrid vehicles became available we accepted that they are just one more variation in the class we call motor vehicles. It didn’t require the writing of new laws to deal with them. When there are things that are specific to hybrids then laws can be introduced to deal with those specific differences. For example, some have suggested that hybrids are too quiet, causing danger, and perhaps some noise should be added to them.
The law should not or cannot distinguish between men and women, except in ways that fulfill a valid government interest and directly relate to that interest. Women cannot be prevented from voting, driving, working, etc., just because they are women. In issues that are distinct to the nature of women, then laws can distinguish, but they must pass a very high bar.
We have already established that tradition is not a sufficient basis for laws regarding marriage.
Until the anti-gays can describe why their prohibitions directly serve a legitimate governmental purpose, they will continue to lose both in the court of law and in the court of public opinion. They must do so based on evidence and not simply because of animus, their god said so, or they say so. Charles Cooper, considered one of best legal minds in the country on social issues, failed to do so. I’m still looking for someone who can elaborate an evidence-based, substantive reason. - DMM: I'm looking for that same person too.
- JT:“As for one guy's position that Prop 8 isn't rational, that's his opinion. The two justices who ruled against Prop 8 were expressing their opinions. And in fact, what they're doing is creating a dangerous doctrine that judges get to define what is and isn't "rational," and they get to apply their own standard.”
That’s what the courts do. That one guy is given the special designation of judge. He heard a case based on evidentiary rules. He made a ruling based upon the evidence (or lack thereof on the proponents’ side). Then those other two justices get to make a ruling based upon the law regarding the initial judge’s actions. The next appellate court gets to give their opinion on whether they want to give their opinion. Then SCOTUS gets to decide whether to have their say. Judges have been deciding what passes rational basis review, what passes “rational basis plus” review, and what passes heightened scrutiny for some time. It’s an imperfect system, but I’m rather fond of our constitution and our rule of law. I’m glad our system has protections for individual rights.
“"It's one thing to say you're right, but to say that the law has to agree with you and that anyone who disagrees with you forfeits their right to vote based on their opinions -- is in effect advocating the establishment of a state religion."
Not at all. There is nothing in there about losing a right to vote. People can vote. They just don’t get to vote to strip minorities’ rights without sufficient cause. The 14th Amendment established Due Process and Equal Protection as the law of the land. People cannot establish covenants that prohibit blacks from buying homes. People cannot vote to require blacks to attend different (but unequal) schools. It doesn’t matter how deeply held their beliefs are these things cannot and should not be put to a vote of the people.
This has nothing to with the establishment of a state religion. It simply requires that civil matters must be evidence-based. As much as Charles Cooper claimed the judge didn’t need evidence, that’s what the system is set up for. There's an old legal aphorism that goes, "If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither on your side, pound the table." In the last hearing on Prop 8, Cooper was pretty much pounding the table. (Not that he pounded either law or facts earlier in the case.) - Preston McConkie I wonder if we can examine the beliefs of a judge and decide whether his motive disqualifies him from ruling?
- Preston McConkie Jeff, I haven't taken time to go through your last two posts and I may drop dead on this subject from sheer exhaustion, but you are definitely right that the Texas sodomy case turned the corner on this issue. As I pointed out elsewhere, there are three legal positions on an action: Criminalized, neutral, sanctioned.
Sodomy used to be criminal in all states, and still was in most states until those laws were overturned by the Supremes. Since then the law has been neutral. But now we're making gay coupling sanctioned, protected behavior on par with behavior that perpetuates the human race.
Decriminalization had to happen first, and that's why I didn't want to see it happen, because that was the only way we'd have de-facto "live and let live." You couldn't call it a pillar of civilization so long as it was criminalized.
Now I long for the days of neutrality.
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