Rick Moran makes the conservative case for gay marriage:
A hundred years ago when traditional marriage and child bearing was vital to the continuation of society due to shorter life spans and much higher rates of infant mortality, such an argument made sense. But since this is no longer the case, most objections to gay marriage today center on religious strictures against it – and gays as human beings. Without seeking to alter anyone’s religious beliefs, it needs to be said that the noxious, unconservative idea that religion should be a determining factor in whether American society accepts gay marriage must be abandoned while, at the same time, recognizing that traditional marriage be celebrated and even promoted as the best option. The two goals are not at all incompatible if you believe the only important thing is that two people love each other.
There is no delegitimizing love be it between a man and a woman or two members of the same sex. The same electro-chemical reactions in the brain that cause sparks to fly between a man and a woman also affect same sex couples. The same stages of love experienced by heterosexual couples are also felt by gay partners. Love is love in any context and only man in his ignorance defines the emotion felt by gay couples as “illegitimate.” Why that has been accepted by conservatives as a reason to oppose the idea that two members of the same sex who love each other should be legally kept apart is beyond me. You can disapprove of gays and gay marriage out of religious conviction or personal prejudice but it is decidedly unconservative to force the rest of us to agree with you by preventing the union of gay couples.
Well said.
No one is attempting to delegitimizing love between anyone, that statement alone equates all love to marriage, all love does not lead to marriage therefore all love does not need to end in marriage.
The question is, should government recognize all forms of love, using the chemical attraction argument just opens Pandora’s Box. If we recognize love as defined by chemical attraction then we have to recognize pedophilia, bestiality, polygamy, bigamy, and all other forms of chemical attraction. Although I don’t equate homosexuality with any of these the argument above does. Love between a man and a woman is different than love between a man and man, its end result is different.
Although I don’t think that religion needs to play any part in this debate to ignore the fact that this is a Judeo-Christian country that was built upon Judeo-Christian values just ignores our own history. The Constitution was built upon a religious foundation and to separate people’s religious morals from the way the country is run or even the way the Constitution was created is asinine. People’s religion plays a major role in how they govern, whether conservative or liberal. And in no way does the Constitution speak in either direction concerning this point, in fact one could make the argument that the Constitution exists to uphold the morality of those that govern.
You cannot separate religion from morality and morality from government.
Also Doug, I respect your opinions even though I do disagree often, but it is nice to have open debate without name calling, it’s nice being able to argue moral and political questions without being called a bigot and a Nazi.