[SampleMan]

They could coexist, but the government would have to start respecting freedom of association and stop forcing people to provide things for other people.

If two homosexuals want to call themselves married and live accordingly, they are allowed to do so anywhere within the United States. Thus, if its not illegal, its legal.

What is being debated is the ability to force third parties to provide them with benefits based on that status.

If people were allowed to interact or not interact as they chose, then gay marriage would be a non-issue.

[supercat]

What is being debated is the ability to force third parties to provide them with benefits based on that status.

I have said this many times, and I wish conservatives would shout it from the rooftops. The left has been able to spin "gay marriage" as "giving gays the same freedoms as everyone else", rather than as a "forbidding people's right to voluntarily offer benefits to those they like without forcing them to offer such benefits to those they don't."

I'd like to see some "gay marriage" advocates asked a relatively simple three-part question:

1. Does a mother who is considering voluntarily giving her child up for adoption have the right to refuse any prospective adoptive parents for any reason whatsoever she sees fit?
2. Should such right apply even if the mother couldn't articulate any basis for such refusal other than a desire to have her child raised by one parent of the same sex and one of the opposite sex, and a belief that particular candidates would not provide that?
3. Should a mother who is seeking the help of an agency to find adoptive parents for her child be allowed to ask such agency to filter applicants using any criteria she sees fit, subject only to the constraint that if her criteria are unreasonable the agency may not find any candidates that meet them?

I don't know that many people would want to go on record as opposing a mother's absolute right to refuse prospective adoptive parents for any reason whatsoever that she sees fit. On the other hand, gay-power groups are already pushing to punish adoption agencies that want to supply each child with both a mother and a father. While I don't think that states should restrict adoption to married man-woman couples (in some situations, such as where an orphan's only surviving relative is gay, adoption by that relative might be better than adoption by a husband and wife who are not related to the child), that doesn't mean they should restrict private agencies' ability to do so should the mothers who place children with such agencies desire them to apply such criteria.