I support gay marriage but I think it is pretty hard to believe that in Washington's day homosexual conduct would have met his standard as "worthy" conduct. It is always difficult to say what people long dead would have thought about issues today. Thats why voters should be allowed to vote on it.

 

What would a dead president say about it? Who cares? He's dead.

our democracy is NOT all about voting. (i'm sure that statement will get twisted) especially when it comes to a minority opinion. the courts specifically protect minority rights. if the states would have been allowed to vote on civil rights ruligns in the south back in the 50's and 60's, do ya think they would have passed? hell no. the courts were the only course for the minority to achieve their rights as citizens.

this is a very sim. civil rights issue. turning it isnto a political popularity contest is a b.s. way to handle this.

The problem is that we let government define marriage in the first place. Marriage should not be a government institution.

Marriage should not be a government institution

ultimately, i think i would have no problem with that.

The problem is that we let government define marriage in the first place. Marriage should not be a government institution.

 

That is pretty much a State's right issue. This is an amendment of a State constitution. It is pretty hard to call a vote on a State amendment a "popularity contest" unless we are just reducing all votes to that same status. Maybe we should just scrap it all and let the commisars sort it out then? 

I find it hard to believe that people in the times of George Washington considered how the world would be the way it is today with all the tech we have, all the things we are willing to accept, all the music of today, all the enemies and allies we have, etc. While I understand his point was in a universal sense. I just find it hard to believe that an opinion like his can be universal in todays world.



Something like that could probably be interpreted in so many different ways.

Treating gay rights as a civil rights issue is essentially spitting in the face of every minority in this country, Sean. One's sexual preference does not deserve Constitutional protection, whether that preference is gay OR straight! Somehow me telling gay jokes at the bar is NOT morally equivalent to buying, selling, shackling and shipping millions of slaves across the ocean, and then, once they are free, subjecting them to 100 years of Jim-Flipping-CROW!

i absolutely disagree with
that. every american citizen deserves the same rights regardless of their personal beliefs. limiting civil rights only to a race thing might serve you well. but it applies to a whole host of personal decisions.



any vote is essentially a popularity contest. doing everything that 51% of the people dictate isn't democracy, it's mob rule. in a democracy, the majority is responsible for protecting minority rights. when the majority attacks a minority, the courts are the only branch of government they can utilize.

of course, a pundit who just wants their side to win will never be able to conceive that. only a person who respects the constitution can.

the true test of democratic ideals comes when you must defend that which you disagree with. jumping on bandwagons and piling on to crush a minority viewpoint is easy as pie.

when it comes to voting on these issues, i do believe that the majority should rule.
we had a vote in our city a few years ago about same-sex couples (or rather gay people) who work for our city. whether or not their partners should be able to recieve health benefits.
the people voted no.
one judge over turned the vote, saying that it wasn't constitutional to deny them benefits.
we were set up as a majority rules country, and we make a big deal about the right to vote, not just for people to represent us, but for the direction the majority of people in our country, or in this case our city want things to go.
i believe that the decision should be challenged, or brought up again in the next voting cycle, but you can't just ignore the will of the people.
i missed the vote because i got wrapped up in work that day, but i planned on voting for the gay city workers to get the benefits. now i am pissed that they do.
nothing at all against them, but the majority voted against it, so now i feel like it was cheated in somehow.

So do I get special protected status for my preferred sexual positions, too?

there's a lot more to it than that according to our constitution



i said nothing about a protected status. i just support giving equal status to same sex couples. and i defend your right to f*ck in any position you like without interference of the government.   

there is more to it.
but at the core, we are supposed to be governed by ourselves. we are supposed to go by what most of us want.
the majority has a responsibility to think of and make allowances for the minority,
uncle ben (not the rice guy) said it best. with great power comes great responsibility.
in the end we are supposed to decide things by what most of us want, not by what some judge decides by himself in his chamber somewhere. not by people who think they know better than an entire city full of voters.

if the judge is following the constitution and honestly (notice i didn't subscribe to any particular ideology there) interprets the law as they are sworn to do, then there is no problem.

you are combining issues and assuming the judge is going to simply "do what he feels like."

the judge represents the people as he is the arbitrator, mediator and interpreter of our constitution, statuetes and other applicible law. when any group, whether it be 1 person or a large group petitions the court for a decision, the judge is to consider it with what i listed before. but what any majority thinks about the case is irrelevant to the judge, as are his personal feelings and biases.

i'm not saying all judges do that, but that is what they are supposed to do. and i believe most at least aspire to. but it's not like they are alone, we have plenty of executive and legislative derrilictions (sp?) of duty as well.

In the end it is "what you are" versus "what you do". George Washington wouldn't have seen homosexuality as a type. He would have seen homosexuality as an act. People who assume that past political figures would approve of stuff like this ALSO assume they'd have our modern opinion that homosexuals are naturally predisposed and there's nothing they can do about it.

The fact of the matter is there is no real reason to believe that, other than the pressure we feel to accept homosexuality as such from our culture as a whole. Predisposition, habit, neurotic fixation, passing on previos abuse, etc.; there are many reasons people are compelled to act in a given way against the general flow of biology or culture. When people start talking about the darker side of the biological option, namely curing homosexuality, the whole "choice" thing seems to take a larger role in the homosexuality argument.

So, it isn't a matter of just reading the constitution. People are often genetically predisposed to chemical addiction, but we don't define them as having the right to abuse chemicals. Whether homosexuality is a choice or a predisposition, and then whether that predisposition is accepted by society or not, etc., there are a ton of different aspects of this that go deeper than the 14th amendment.

P.S. You might also want to take into consideration that Washington was a military leader, as well. It might put a different spin on what attitudes he might have. I don't think you can for any reason assume he would have opposed a ban on gay marriage. Nothing you have there seems to lead to that conclusion.

Also, people seem to forget that a lot of these people spent their nights doing things that during the day they supported laws against. People always cite Benjamin Franklin, etc., saying that "thinkers" of that time were loose morally and very idealistic. In the end staunch conservatives now do the same thing, chasing interns and trying to outlaw gay marriage.

How do you know you wouldn't have the run-of-the-mill Washington bobblehead, doing one thing and outlawing another? That seems to be what Jefferson did with slavery, didn't he? You grant the founding fathers too much idealism. If they'd had that much idealism, I think they would have attempted a lot more.