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Redefining Marriage: Proponents of same-sex marriage insist they’re “on the right side of history.”
The National Review ^ | February 19, 2014 | Dennis Prager

Posted on 02/23/2014 11:44:35 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet

In 2006, 57 percent of Virginia’s electorate voted to amend their state’s constitution to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Last week, U.S. District Judge Arenda Wright Allen ruled the amendment unconstitutional.

In 2004, 76 percent of Oklahoma’s electorate voted to amend their state’s constitution to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman. On January 14, 2014, U.S. District Judge Terence Kern ruled the amendment unconstitutional.

In 2004, 66 percent of Utah’s electorate voted to amend their state’s constitution to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman. On December 20, 2013, U.S. District Judge Robert J. Shelby ruled the amendment unconstitutional.

In 2004, 75 percent of Kentucky’s electorate voted to amend their state’s constitution to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman. On February 12, 2014, U.S. District Judge John G. Heyburn II “struck down part of the state ban that he wrote treated ‘gay and lesbian persons differently in a way that demeans them’” (Washington Post).

In 2008, 52 percent of California’s electorate voted to amend their state’s constitution to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman. On August 4, 2010, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker ruled the amendment unconstitutional.

There is no doubt that federal judges will continue to do this throughout the country. Even the vote of 81 percent of Alabama voters will count for nothing to some federal judge.

Society is no longer being permitted to define marriage in the only way marriage has ever been defined in the annals of recorded history. Many societies have allowed polygamy, many have allowed child marriages, some have allowed marriage within families; but none in thousands of years has defined marriage as the union of people of the same sex.

None of this matters to these judges or to all those who seek to redefine marriage and can’t convince a majority of their fellow citizens to agree.

For them, it is identical to ruling that laws that banned interracial marriages were unconstitutional. But that argument is utterly flawed. First, the analogy is false because there is no relevant difference between black people and white people, while there are enormous differences between males and females. Second, no great moral tradition or thinker ever forbade interracial marriages (interreligious marriages were sometimes forbidden). Moses, for example, married a black woman, and neither the Bible nor God hinted that it was wrong.

Some conclusions:

Proponents of same-sex marriage regularly label opponents “radical” and “extremist.” However, given that no society in thousands of years has allowed same-sex marriage, it is, by definition, the proponents of same-sex marriage whose position is radical and extreme. You cannot redefine marriage in a more radical way than allowing members of the same sex to marry. You can argue that this is the moral thing to do. But you cannot argue that it is it not radical.

All these judges have a hubris that is simply breathtaking. They not only know that they read the Constitution more accurately than the vast majority of the residents of many of America’s states. They are also entirely comfortable with forcing great majorities of Americans to accept this new definition of marriage.

That it is conceit rather than legal reasoning is easily shown when one peruses the opinions of these judges.

I will cite only Judge Vaughn Walker as an example:

Walker: “Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license.”

“No rational basis”? This is hubris. What he is stating is that for all of Western history — and contemporaneous non-Western history — there has not been a rational basis for defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Vaughn Walker is convinced that he thinks more rationally than every moral leader and thinker in history, not one of whom advocated same-sex marriage. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, the Enlightenment — all were irrational regarding same-sex marriage, according to Judge Walker.

In his mind, it is irrational, just to cite one example, to prefer that men and women form families in order to provide children with a mother and a father.

Walker: “Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite-sex couples are superior to same-sex couples.”

Yes, without in any way reducing the worth or the decency of any gay human being or dismissing the depth of same-sex love, California, like the rest of the world, has indeed believed in the superiority of man–woman unions. Not in the superiority of straight men and women as people: The gay human being is created in God’s image every bit as much as the straight human being; and there are gays who have led vastly more moral lives than many straights. But regarding how the family — the building block of society — should be constituted, the civilized world has always believed that it should be based on a married mother and father.

Society has also believed in the superiority of mother–father families to single-parent families; and that, too, never meant that every married person is inherently superior to every single person.

Walker: “Proposition 8 prevents California from fulfilling its constitutional obligation to provide marriages on an equal basis.”

This is another example of the lack of serious thought — as opposed to serious passion — that underlies the movement to redefine marriage. If American society has a “constitutional obligation to provide marriages on an equal basis,” then there is no plausible argument for denying polygamous relationships, or for denying brothers and sisters, or parents and adult children, the right to marry.

On the matter of same-sex marriage, mass passions and coercive judges are winning. Above all, hubris is winning. That is why proponents always assert that they are “on the right side of history.”

But history is very long. Our grandchildren, or their grandchildren, will judge whether this is true. The Left since Marx has asserted that every one of its radical positions — such as the demise of capitalism — is on the right side of history. Virtually none turned out to be.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Government; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: activistcourts; culturewar; gaybullies; gaymarriage; homosexualagenda; homosexualmarriage; listentothecoolkids; mediabias; nuclearfamily; pinkjournalism; romneymarriage; romneymarriage4all; samesexmarriage; sexpositiveagenda; sexrevolt; sexualrevolution; smashmonogamy; smashthepatriarchy; waronchildren; waronmarriage; waronreligion
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Progressives use “right side of history’ as their stamp of approval because they can’t use ‘right side of God.’


41 posted on 02/24/2014 5:22:36 AM PST by servo1969
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

No government license was required to get married until “Miscegenation Laws” were enacted, requiring a license for mixed race marriages.

It shocks the conscience how we manage to ignore a “separation of church and state” doctrine, and somehow turned over a religious act (marriage) to the government, to regulate.

This unfortunate turn of events is also how we began down the slippery slope of losing our children to the State via Parens Patriae, by making government a contracted part of our families and have a multi-billion dollar family court industry with all of its ancillary parasites (therapists, counselors, evaluators, child support enforcement officers, child protective services agents and a host of others) all dependent upon the destruction of the family for their livelihoods.


42 posted on 02/24/2014 5:38:10 AM PST by Ex-Pat in Mex
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

“I will cite only Judge Vaughn Walker as an example”

A faggot judge living with his “partner” should have recused himself from the case. What a bunch of BS the US Supreme Court could have cared less if Walker was a fag. He was a judge and in their eyes he is GOD.


43 posted on 02/24/2014 7:46:42 AM PST by NKP_Vet (“From man’s sweat and God’s love, beer came into the world.” – St. Arnold of Metz)
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To: Slyfox

If any judge can override the rule of the people, why in the hell do we have elections.........and why in the hell has their not been a recall election on Barry Bathhouse?????????????


44 posted on 02/24/2014 7:48:08 AM PST by NKP_Vet (“From man’s sweat and God’s love, beer came into the world.” – St. Arnold of Metz)
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To: tanknetter
These microaggressions come about when heterosexual people consider LGBTQ people to be sexual deviants or overly sexual. One example of this on a systemic level is the federal ban for any man who has had sex with another man to donate blood. So even if a man is HIV-negative and has been in a monogamous relationship all of his life, he is considered to be at risk and therefore an ineligible donor.

Any studies to indicate how many homosexuals ever have a 1-and-done monogamous for life relationship with a partner who also was a virgin and remains monogamous?

- Homosexuals are a small subset of the population.
- Monogamous people who only ever have 1 partner in life is a much smaller subset of the population than it once was.
- Homosexuals who remain monogamous even in marriage are a tiny subset of all of that.

And he wants us to accept the pink unicorn of two such persons (one or both of whom want to donate blood, even a smaller subset) to taint the nation's blood supply so hedonistic sodomites can feel better about themselves?

45 posted on 02/24/2014 8:03:56 AM PST by a fool in paradise ("Health care is too important to be left to the government.")
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To: fwdude
There is no “side” of history. These people are knuckleheads.

History is written by the victorious. We are engaged in a cultural revolution that began in post-WWII America as waged by Socialists. It continued through the 1960s as the red diaper doper babies began to go to college, and is now bearing fruit.

46 posted on 02/24/2014 8:06:51 AM PST by a fool in paradise ("Health care is too important to be left to the government.")
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Walker: “Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license.”

Walker's opinion is facially absurd. No state denies marriage licenses to gay men and lesbians.

What states deny are licenses for men to "marry" men, or women to "marry" women.

47 posted on 02/24/2014 8:10:44 AM PST by Jim Noble (When strong, avoid them. Attack their weaknesses. Emerge to their surprise.)
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To: freerepublicchat

**People don’t marry each other. The government marries them. **

Are you familiar with the Sacrament of Matrimony?

The hands and the vows of the couple are most important!


48 posted on 02/24/2014 9:06:05 AM PST by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: All

Those that worked so hard to present the idea that marriage is only between a man and a woman should appeal these rulings to the supreme court.

Or the court of appeals and then when the leftist unconstitutional ruling Judges support the other Judges’ unconstitutional rulings, then to the supreme court.

This also should have been done for all the states that voted for limiting gov benefits to citizens, not illegal insurgent invaders, also.

The constitution needs to be interoperated correctly, not “changed” to suit the leftists.

There is nothing in the constitution that condones homosexuals getting married.


49 posted on 02/24/2014 9:06:56 AM PST by Syncro (So? -Andrew Breitbart [1969-2012] RIP King of The New Media)
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To: NKP_Vet
why in the hell do we have elections

We have elections because we were founded as a lawful and virtuous nation.

Obama and all his ilk are neither lawful nor virtuous.

They are playing by their own rules by which they are working to stomp on our necks until we are hammered into the ground like a nation littered with tent stakes.

Moochie and Bammer have told us about their desire to fundamentally change our nation...

50 posted on 02/24/2014 9:46:14 AM PST by Slyfox (When Jesus sees a momma holding her little baby, he remembers when his own momma held him.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

“Beware of the compassionate” - Flannery O’Connor


51 posted on 02/24/2014 1:56:36 PM PST by NYer ("The wise man is the one who can save his soul. - St. Nimatullah Al-Hardini)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Prager’s great on this subject, I don’t always get to listen to him but did yesterday. Smart man. Thumbs up DP.


52 posted on 02/27/2014 9:24:38 AM PST by BeadCounter
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