Thoughts on Marriage

Or, more appropriately, on why politicians feel the need to tromp on the idea of two loving people commiting to a partnership that's protected by law. That's the issue they aren't discussing, of course. They don't want gay couples to have equal protection under the law. If we do that, folks might start thinking that your sexual orientation doesn't define you every waking moment of the day. Instead of seeing a gay couple, we might see the lawyer and the landscaper who own the house down the block. We might see the dedicated parents who suffer through the screeching of the 6th grade band with that same rictus smile we all put on while our eardrums bleed. There's community in that sort of trauma. Can't have people reacting to each other according to whether or not we have ideas or beliefs or dreams in common. Much better to categorize us according to who we want to shag.

And that leads us to divisions. If fundamentalists can successfully divide people by sexual orientation, then they can move on to dividing by gender. And religion. And whatever other category they decide should be used to create a subset one can label "Other." The divisions on party lines provided a model for how this should be done. It required co-opting the media to pound out the message that the two sides are radically different to the point where there cannot be agreement. Repeating that idea for a couple of years ingrained it in those who were listening, and while a good number of us are skeptical about "news," a large portion of media consumers are not. Or, if they are, they are skeptical in a way that the media has informed them they should be. Hence, the "liberal bias" to newspapers that no liberal can actually find.

Activist judges decided that people of different races could get married. Most of the people were not in favor of that at the time. Other activist judges decided that married women could own property without their husbands. Judges are not supposed to focus on the will of the people. They are supposed to interpret the law. Sometimes, the people are wrong and need a push to see that. We are a nation of laws. Politicians should be ashamed to propose making discrimination legal again. If they are not, we should make them ashamed. These folks are actively working on that, and while I am not always in agreement with them, I support this initiative.

Yeah, this glosses the surface and is covered better by bigger bloggers than I. Doesn't stop the whole shebang from pissing me off.