You don't think that they're entitled to marriage or respect.
Absolutely not true. They can get married! I've never said otherwise. What they cannot do is take a social institution as valuable as marriage and simply re-make it in their image. We have laws protecting us from oppression like that.
The rest of your comment is typical verbal abuse, insult and intimidation. Definitely not befitting a educated enlightened soul like yourself.
i think the parent got mixed up and meant to say that to your point 2
Quite possibly. While the source based nature of the distro is often hearalded, the refreshing touches were things like; named (not numbered) runlevels, dependancies you can put directly in the init.d scripts, emerges way of letting you specify which configuration files get over-written during an update (not very great all the time), ramdisk for certain time-critical temporary files, etc...
i find the debian way of doing it is much more efficient... but then, the last distro i used was LFS... and it takes a hellova lotta time to maintain!!
A Debianite of good repute, came into #gentoo in the early days of its popularity and declared, "nice little distro, should mature into something good someday, but its pretty crappy now becuase it doesn't conform to the FHS." Drobbins (or one of the other top people) simply replied, "FHS compliance and good distro are not the same thing".
While o-o's complaints were shown to not really be FHS non-compliance I appreciated the moral I took away from that as do it the best way you can first then worry about comprimise afterward.
That old hat is a refreshing outlook on a distribution? Surely you jest. Its a good outlook, don't get me wrong. But I don't know that I'd call it refreshing.
So? my apps will go 5% faster if I bother to wait 5000% more during the install?
You get some kick out of spending good money on hardware, and then running software on it that uses nothing more than what could have been done with a 386?
Its true that one will probably never recover the clock-cycles used to compile a distro with the spead that the optomization brings. But then again, just how many spare clock cycles does your computer have? Chances are even while typing your post into IE your computer is using only 2% of its clock cycles. Think of all the clock cycles you wasted while sleeping last night.
Those times you really need speed (games, heavy computation, etc...), it really pays for itself.
Its well enough. It goes to show that talent is something you cannot fake, not even with a committee. When I saw Gentoo three things really stood out for me,
1) It was a truely refreshing outlook on a distribution 2) It is source based 3) I was free from being unwitting pawn in the software binary release freedom debate
When I ran and got to know Gentoo I saw genius was at work, the light nimble free-floating kind of genius unencumbered by committee. Much of that was DRobbins shining through (as shown by his technical writings of frontier Linux applications for IBM.)
I will be sad to see him go, but to me it looked as if his inspiration was diluted by so many faces long ago. Don't get me wrong Gentoo is still my favorite and I run it exclusively at home. I think its gained much from Seemant and the others. But you just have to admire sometimes what individual talent can do on its own.
I thought, I explained myself in the part of my quote, which you carefully cut out... "so I assumed, it must derive meaning from outside Simpsons."
It is a much clearer example of your contradiction. It is where you admited you knew of the Simpsons reference even though you said you were not aware of any TV show.
Also there wasn't even a need to look elsewhere for meaning, it was sufficiently defined at the time. The Simpson's use of the "Monkey Butler" was to describe the delusion of the ignorant, where nature was somehow a servant to ones self-centeredness. Its reference every time after that was to mark where you used a simular device. The most glaring example (which you continue to press through an appeal to your own proclaimed sincerity), "what I'm proposing will do no harm to marriage or the State". You have presented no evidence to back up such a claim, and simply ignored evidence discrediting your claim.
Instead of answering a direct question, you blame me for not seeing the answers myself. How convenient...
You are the one who admits you didn't see the answers when you said, "I fail to see any legitimate interest, the State may possibly have in Marriage other than (possibly) as a conduit to procuring new generations." As I said previously, "That may be true, but that isn't my fault or the fault of any of the AC's who have posted in this thread. (Re: Lack of imagionation fallacy)."
Indeed, the answers have been provided via hyperlink time and time again in this thread --as well as stated explicitly. Other state interests in marriage include health, longevity, and increased productivity even in childless couples (and benefits that do nt seem to be apperent in same-sex unions). In fact, the AC you started to in the begining said that also, to your apperently deaf ears.
The main foil of the arguement from ignorance when another reader has seen just what you turned a blind eye toward, thus exposing your ignorance as willful. Such an excercize is left for the reader lest I be accused of stacking the deck or forumulating "pre-made responses". Others read that link, apperently you did not. And now you are left looking pretty foolish.
And either way, even if the state only cared about child rearing, saying that marriages are of no worth until there is a child is like saying gun safety laws are of no use until the bullet is heading towards someones head. Preperation for child-birth is beneficial, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
I have not been dishonest, but you have proved to fulfill this AC's prophecy...
The pattern is now complete. Like the other anti-marriage hacks you started with an unsupported idea and end up hurling unsupported accusations. You start discussing an argument, you leave discussing the arguers.
As all things, a marriage has pluses and minuses. It helps partners in life and in raising children, while holding them together and responsible for each other and forcing them into compromises for the sake of staying with each other. As productivity grows, the partners don't need as much help in life and in raising children (where they are also often aided by the state), so they are not willing to sacrifice as much for their marriage. This -- to me -- explains the growing divorce rate, and I submit, that my view is a lot better explained than the rock/tiger thing. The divorce rate is kept down a little by tradition and religion -- not unlike how the horses are still used for transportation because of people's affection for them. When OnLawn cited Sweden -- with its lower influence of religion and higher divorce rate -- it played right into my argument. Swedes' productivity may be lower, but their generous welfare state makes child rearing easy -- intentionally or not, Swedes made Marriage even less important to people. Note, that I did not express my judgement of this. Personally, I like horses very much.
All your analogy to horses says is that you think marriage antiquated. However horses were antiquated by the refining of the internal combustion engine. I see no such institution that has simularly antiquited marriage.
The closest device you mention as antiquating marriage is productivity. Productivity does not raise children, provide for children or take responsibility for children.
Also you say that productivity means couples do not need as much resources in raising children, yet the benefits (unnamed) you wish to cut are for people without children.
Also a much more direct line can be drawn between "partners don't need as much help in life and in raising children (where they are also often aided by the state), so they are not willing to sacrifice as much for their marriage," as that is a product of the state welfare not requiring marriage. Productivity in and of itself has nothing to do with it except provide a means to pay for the state welfare (As mentioned in the Sweden Essay). And as you are against the paternalizing of government, you would then be apposed to the institution that is (as you put it) negating the need for marriage.
And none of this even counters my observation that marriage is just as potent, useful and valuable to the individual and the state as ever.
It was you, who referenced a monkey butler episode. It made no sense to me then, it does not make sense to me now
Funny, you said you knew of no TV show I could be referring to --not that you didn't know what it meant. Lets look at that quote again...
Your continuing use of the term "monkey butler" tells me nothing -- I have no idea, what children book, old saying, TV-show, or soap opera it comes from;
Moving on...
I read them as quoted by OnLawn, my respect for whom, although diminished, is still a lot higher, than for someone, who cares not and/or dares to speak under so much as a SlashDot alias
Awww, your respect for me has diminished and you think AC's are less-than-humans. Can I play this elitist game too? Maybe I should start a policy of not reading posts from people with a slashdot number higher than 10000. No, don't worry I won;t. The fact is, your attacking the messenger not the messege. He could have posted as CmdrTaco or OogTheCaveMan for all I care, its the argument that counts.
What I meant was simply to observe, the Marriage is diminishing. You seem to blame me and my views for the diminishment,
You meant no such thing, and you are hardly just an observer in this. You chanted about replacing marriage in the state with a foster-care like program.
I find his language offensive (increasingly so, compared to the initial posts)
It accurately described your position, that is all. You have learned (as many do) that there are plenty of rudeness you can perpetrate on someone and get away with it if you couch it in a polite tone. You're not really all the clever to have discovered that. I've responded to your rudeness anyway, and now you say I'm the rude one?
I fail to see any legitimate interest, the State may possibly have in Marriage other than (possibly) as a conduit to procuring new generations.
That may be true, but that isn't my fault or the fault of any of the AC's who have posted in this thread. (Re: Lack of imagionation fallacy).
there are no words "marriage", "spouse", "wife", "husband" in the Constitution nor in any of the Ammendments.
Another trivial fact, but at least this one is accurate. Marriage, spouse, wife, husband are all mentioned in every law in every state in the union, and many state constitutions.
And contraception negates the interest the state has in marriage like rubber bullets negates the need for gun laws.
Trying to preserve Marriage for the sake of Marriage is foolish.
I agree. Preserving marriage for the sake of the citizenry and what marriage can provide them, the state, and the future is the reason to preserve marriage.
Justifying such attempts by Marriage's "imposition of social responsibility" is a paternalistic trampling on personal liberties at worst, and social engineering at best.
Oh, I see. You are a part of the growing "no more grups!" movement. (Re: Miri)
If that is how you see things than your conflict is with authority, not marriage. Marriage is not slavery, its a voluntary institution that anyone can choose to enter in or not enter in.
All, I am proposing is for the State to shift focus. Leave the meaning of Marriage to individuals. What may concern the law is not "are you married?" but "do you raise children together?".
I agree, the meaning of marriage should be left to individuals. It should be left to the states to define legislatively and popularly. What you've failed (time and time again) to address is just how the state knows, "do you raise children together[?]" especially if everyone gets to define that for themselves.
If this sounds like a mere deck-reshuffling -- than why are you objecting so loudly?
That the analogy was benign in nature was a contravance of being told as the best case y
That is uninteresting and, frankly, trivial. You've read them now and continue to ignore them, and that is the most relevant fact speaking of your position.
I "hold self-evident" [marriage's] relative demise and explain it by improved economics;
Technically you correlation more than causality (as the parable of Lisa's rock dictates). The small amount of explanation you provided was eclipsed in depth, resolution and research by the essay provided (which although was not an AC, you ignored also).
your explanation of the demise by "our lessened support for it" does not make sense to me -- the "lessened support" is part of the demise, it thus can not be the reason;
A part of the decline can most certanly be a cause for further decline. These are called feedback loops.
I shall allow myself to take foolish comfort in the '+5 Interesting' rating of my original posting -- as close to "being crowned a king of a tropical island" as it gets;
Hmmm, here you reference an episode of the Simpsons [the link is a post in this thread you responded to] with monkey butlers, yet claim ignorance to what is meant by them. Interesting.
I'm sorry, if I was unable to respond to all of your (and your ACs') arguments -- it would require much more writing than I am willing to afford to convincing two people...seek consolation in the remarkable agreeability (and individuality:-) of the ACs;
I appreciate the sentiment, but I don't feel any need for consolation. I'm very thankful of your time and platform as mentioned in the grandparent post. I accept your appology, and will simply be left to wonder what response you could have crafted, long or short, that could have possibly reconciled your contradictory position. But that is a little matter as this excersize has given me more confidence in my position.
Take solace as you feel neccisary, but you've been wrong an embarassingly large portion of your assertions. That should be disconcerting. That deficiency is seperate to ignorance and ambiguity in the cause you are advocate (re: arguement by mantra/chanting) referenced in the grandparent post, which should be disconserting also.
Perhaps you overingratiated the slashocratic support of the +5 interesting score. Such pride may be the reason for your folley. For there are four posters who have not gotten answers from you, me included. Perchance that should have proven a more clear and dire indicator than the moderation.
(by the way, if this is too verbose for you, I just read an AC's response which is much more succint. You may wish to read it.)
Your right, and even after I said that I noted it is not even self-consistent. It still suffers from the origional (and oft repeated) contradiction that his plan is in the best interests of child rearing. Thank you for correcting me on that.
While I'm noting things you have refused to address, (boy arguement is must be easy for you when you don't ever intend to support your ideas. Again this is nothing new or clever.)
From another AC, (italics are your words they are responding to)
Why should a wife of three years have automatic power of attorney of her husband, while a girlfriend of ten years does not have such power over her loving and loved boyfriend?"
Because a marriage is a legal contract that grants exactly such a privilege. I have known my parents since I was born, and I love them dearly, but I don't have power of attorney over them.
From another AC,
However - and this is an important flaw in your theory - the goverment doesn't define what is appropriate child-rearing any more than it defines a loving couple (referring to your discussions below.) Far too many foster parents, and parents on welfare, do the bare minimum required to not be chareged with neglect. Yes the are techically rearing children, so they get their money to spend on crack or booze or whatever they want.
That mirrors what another AC said,
So you find marriage unimportant (due in large part to your restrictive redefinition of it, no doubt) and so we should trust you to save it?
And this mirrors my point (That you've also not addressed) that foster-parenting is far inferior to marriage as an institution for rearing children. If as a government you were interested in child rearing you'd be more interested in endorsing, recognising and supporting marriage than foster-parenting. Yet you conclude the opposite on undisclosed grounds.
Another post that could be one of the previous AC's,
Society's interest in marriage is not child-rearing. Society already has a relationship defined that addresses child-rearing: the parent-child relationship. Marriage is not merely a redundancy society was too stupid to notice until Mi pointed it out.
Only worrying about who should be responsible for child rearing after the child is already here is closing the barn door after the horse has left. Society is not equally treated by a couple who knows they will take care of their child and a couple who only decides whether to care for a child after the child is born.
Marriage as the foundation for a family and potential for child bearing and raising (as its always been understood to be by the people making and sustaining the laws we have) is just the interest you are speaking to. As you said, "My idea is that it is the child-rearing by a couple... that is important to the Society."
These questions have still been unanswered,
This is rather confusing then. Are you saying that couples that have children should be subsidized? How?
What about childless couples that want children? Should they be subsidized? How? And why?
Oh and this certainly should have been addressed in your woefully (and stratigically) ambigious plan.
But be warned, one of the most heinous acts I've ever been privy to was a mother who demanded her 14 year old daughter get pregnant so they could increase their welfare income! Any step you or others take to encouraging this type of behaviour by only giving money to child bearers will meet with stiff opposition from myself and others on grounds entirely different than we have presented so far.
You dodged these questions also that could have helped give definition to your plan,
In your plan you would maybe have a birth certificate? Maybe you have a parent-to child bond registry? Hmm, this might be re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic again.
As how would you handle people that simply lose interest in r
I'll catagorize your post into three categories. Terribly convenient, I might start doing it with all of them.
Off topic triviality/wacko nonsense...
[Clergy Confidentiality] seems to be the creation of states, rather than coming from the Constitution...
State does not need, nor can support [individuality] any more than Gravity.
Being passionate about a subject of discussion is even worse, than going grocery shopping being hungry...
Unsupported Monkey Butler fantasies...
[A marriage license is an official state-issued document and is required to access the marriage contract and all the benefits and responsibilities enumerated therein.] Exactly the practice I'm advocating be abolished -- while leaving the drivers licenses alone.
I remain of the opinion, that marriage should belong to the unregulated parts of life...
Things from the last post you failed to address...
What "powers of attorney" are you talking about here. And don't keep flinging these mokey butler lines at me out of your rear-end, mmkay? Give me a real law.
So [Mi's] limited, sheltered, and myopic view of the world the state has no interest in diplomas or marriage licenses or individuality and due to [Mi's] ignorance the state should abandon laws supporting those interests. A pathetically weak and self-serving argument.
Indeed, you present an arguement you seem unwilling to support, other than by chanting it over and over again. Sure its self-consistent but ignorance usually is (what you don't know won't hurt you kind of thing). In fact the further you get from reality the easier a fantasy is to be "self-consistent". You've hit on nothing clever here.
And yes, you do intend to do marriage much harm. That you say you do not simply contradicts what you intend to do with marriage, another point from previous posts that you also have not addressed.
What I meant was, that this State does not specify what... benefits come with [religion].
You've simply covered one factual error with another. What I can't believe is that you say that in the same post you quote, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;". Freedom is a very important benefit, and marks it specifically for special consideration in legal matters. Other benefits include tax-exemption and tax deduction for people contributing to it.
That religion, like free speach, is left for the courts to define is inconsequential to the debate since you are advocating each couple decides what marriage is and not advocating courts to define it.
No one can use religion to avoid testifying in court,
You have never heard of Clergy Confidentiality? It means that a clergy is never required by law to testify something that was told him/her for penance.
it does not entitle to powers of attorney
What "powers of attorney" are you talking about here. And don't keep flinging these mokey butler lines at me out of your rear-end, mmkay? Give me a real law. So far you've so incedulously botched up constitutional and state law that I really can't take much you say any more.
Interesting. To you, expressing individuality is none of the states business. It seems the founding fathers thought the expression of individuality was of the utmost importance for the state to recognize!
Care to provide a reference?
Happy to ablige. Guess where this comes from...
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
I am talking about legal recognition.
A better paragraph defining individuality and the legal recognition of it, I have not found. And allow me to head you off at the pass here, the Declaration of independance was most certainly a legal document. It was the document declaring our status from England as independant.
Volumes of legislation, governments, and legal theory have been written from the seed of just that one paragraph. You better believe individuality was defined, recognized and considered special by the Founding Fathers.
And can you knock it off with all your post-hoc definitions here? You've done it with "subsidy", "marriage" itself, now "recognition" and "special". If you don't know what a word means get a dictionary.
The Driver's License is an official State-issued document and is required to access public roadways.
A marriage license is an official state-issued document and is required to access the marriage contract and all the benefits and responsibilities enumerated therin... Next!
A diploma -- thanks for a good example -- may be issued by a private enterprise and is not legally required for anything.
You are attempting to support your thesis here by erroneous facts once again. Academic credentials (including but not limited to a diploma) are required by
This state does not recognize religion as anything special. Did the founding fathers "tear down" Religion with the 1st Amendment?
Either you are trying to change the subject or you are trying to equate this with what you feel the state should also do with marriage. The former is a weak tactic, I won't devote any more than an acknowledgement to it. The latter is an interesting notion, but aren't really showing that you understand how the state treats religion.
How is, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" not recognizing religion as anything special? I mean don't you think that if they didn't think it was special they wouldn't have named it at all? Freedom of speech is mentioned too with simular verbage, was that nothing special to them also?
Feel free to re-read this AC's post on marriage to see just how, to him, forming a family in his and his wife's image is an expression of their individuality.
Exactly: his and his wife's. This is not State's business...
Interesting. To you, expressing individuality is none of the states business. It seems the founding fathers thought the expression of individuality was of the utmost importance for the state to recognize!
You are welcome to your beliefs, but if I may say, your 0/2 on this one. Neither statement describes why the state should have no interest in marriage, and neither seem to be in accord with the facts.
And you don't even try to speak to the reasons provided that the state should take interest in marriage. Like monkey butlers these assertions just *are* and suit no porpose other than fulfilling your fantasies on life.
You did try to support your position a few times, and that was good. There we were able to engage in real discussion. Pity you choose to abandon it again with chanting of your mantra. I mean really, I give you facts about how the state reveres religion and protects it and you simply quip back, "This state does not recognize religion as anything special."
Now look, I do appreciate what you are trying to do here. I appreciate that to you, you've found an equitable comprimise that should stop the fighting, at least in the capitol buildings in the 50 states of the US. But marriage is too valuable to me and to the state to simply be the casualty here.
Marriage is not an oppressive institution, it is not like slavary or despotism. Why should it be banished from state recognition when it hasn't done anything wrong? And quite honestly, your proposal won't stop the fighting, it will just give it a new name.
I also appreciate that to you, if we let marriage just mean whatever people want, that should mean everyone has the freedom to do with marriage as they please. To you this seems like expanding the capacity of marriage, not limiting it. But that does not work in institutions meant to instil social responsibility. Imagion what would happen if we let people call define for themselves what a drivers license was! Imagion what would happen if we let people define just what a diploma is for themselves!
When it gets down to it, marriage is a standard. Its the best way we know how (as you've said yourself) to raise children. It asks for representation from both sexes, how more fair can you get? The UN doesn't give Spain's vote to Russia, it asks for equal representation. So does Congress (based on different metrics of course).
It is the epitome, it is the standard. And the state who has an interest in individuality of both marriage partners and the children produced (with or without marriage) should contiue to hold it up as the standard.
Are you admitting, the Marriage -- an institution predating all forms of government -- will not survive being no longer recognized by the State?
No, and you can quote me. You're gaming with scope and scale here and your results are *sigh* contradictory to your thesis.
A state that quits regognizing marriage has torn it down within the states pervue. That should be evident. To say that does not tear down the institution of marriage is a contradiction whithin the narrow blinders of state perspective.
But you did jump in scope hoping to save from contradiction by suggesting marriage then survives inspite of the states actions (an interesting approach). This particular fantasy may not be so far from reality.
Marriage survives only in the people that still understand what marriage is out the scope of the state. Those confusing marriage with foster-parenting (becuase the state has conflated them as you have advocated) also see marriage is un-neccissary and torn down (re: Sweden).
Those that have value in marriage become beneficiaries of the scientifically proven results in socially and physically healthier children (i.e. more productive). Meanwhile others that find marriages social responsibility to be too constricting take the actions of the state as endorcment of more free natured foster-parenting approach. And their children turn out like foster children (more of a social burden), and as shown in scientific studies less likely to marry.
So in this we see your contradiction. And while to the wise marriage's survival proves its fitness through experiment of social darwinism, you advocate that this should mean, "Marriage is not particularly useful (nor gratifying) to the State...recognizing only the potential to procreate is foolishness."
Perhaps you should read this to see more of why your advocacy is harmful to marriage. If that is not enough, perhaps you could do me a favor and acknowledge the AC's perspective on the logical fallacy you are peddling here.
Contradiction between what and what?
If this isn't turning a blind eye wishing it will go away, I don't know what is. If I say I stab myself through the heart and die, but I am not doing myself any harm that is a contradiction.
For your contradiction (again using your words and spelled out again lest I used too many words above)...
The Society has interest in higher quantity and quality of children.
Throughout history, societies rewarded Marriage because it -- almost inevitably -- resulted in children, who were then (almost always) raised to the best of their parents' abilities.
The only reason Marriage remains beneficial to Society is the better quality of the children -- all other qualities of it, that you allude to, benefit the partners themselves.
Marriage is not particularly useful (nor gratifying) to the State.
But then you are not very different from people, who insist Religion would improve people's lives -- and cut the State's costs, and should thus be recognized and supported by the State.
Religion is recognized and supported by the State (prayers start every session of congress and every Supreme Court sitting, references to God and prayer everywhere on government buildings, money, etc...). Its protected from the state by the first Ammendment, allow me to quote...
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;
Religions are recognized by the state, and even today there are laws governing just what a religion is and how it gets recognized for benefits such as tax-exemption, etc... If I support my religion with my money, the government deducts that from my gross income and saves me from paying taxes on that money.
And for the reasons you enumerate I do support bot
And you are taking it far too seriously (and too verbously) for the forum, on which we meet.
Fantastic, now you simply patronize me. Look, you can have all the fantasies you want, but peddle them in novellas, not politics. Do an Ayn Rand and make up just any Utopic society and just becuase you are particular to your own ideas, grant it every great consequence through authorship. But it will only inspire people who have less, not more, grounding in reality than yourself.
I'm not suggesting to "tear down marriage". I'm suggesting, the State stops recognizing it as anything special whatsoever
I can't parse this, its a direct contradiction. Its the same direct contradiction I've pointed out time and time again. You haven't unraveled the contradiction, no not even an attempt. All I see is re-iteration, as if I don't yet understand what you are saying.
Foster Care program may, indeed, be a step in that direction.
This just continues to reverberate the contradiction. From what we know of Foster care we can say definitively it is a step toward weakening child support and marriage. Wait, I said that before... Yep just checked. Once again you refuse to discuss and simply keep chanting your fantasy like a mantra hoping its shear simplicity will soothe your pride and dull your senses.
Marriage is being "torn down" by vast increases in productivity, while still being supported by tradition and, indeed, religion -- as your facts about Sweden examplify.
The facts about Sweden exemplify that removing child rearing from marriage, through liberal interpretation of soclialistic values (welfare and state contrived equality) tears down marriage. I do not see the benign attribute "productivity" as being a factor at all. Nor is Sweden considered a very productive state. As was pointed out in the article, they have an unusually high percentage of citizens employed by the state.
As far as the author is concerned, prosperity (somewhat related to productivity) simply means we can pay the social cost --for now. And becuase we think we can pay the social cost we contiue to borrow against our childrens future as marriage is undermined by people who wish to re-make it into what ever they want to be. Read it again, its exactly what he says.
And I'll tell you something else. This is a freebie. Even your overly simplistic and self-gratifying interpretation supports my thesis that marriage itself is not weakening, just our support of it. Marriage still has all the value and capability it ever had, people just wish to find other ways around it that aren't so restrictive. That they may be more able to pay (or in this case have the state pay) the cost of their actions in a more prosperous society, but it does not diminish the capacity that marriage has to avoid those costs. Nor can "money" or "productivity" fully make up the difference as people choose to be more selfish with their lives, hoping the state will pick up the tab.
I just see [marriages] diminishment as an objective fact of life.
And Lisa's rock does keep away tigers.
All I am calling for, is for State to recognize, that it has no inherent interest in Marriage itself -- only in the better and and bigger new generations.
I've said it enough times already...
And every time you say it, it is just as absurd a contradiction as the first.
In fact, I'm noticing the more I point it out as a contradiction the more you ignore what I say (or at least you do not speak to it) and wishfully re-iterate your stance as if maybe the 100th or 151st time you say it will make it true.
Its a monkey butler fantasy, directly conflicting with reality. Good day, chant to yourself simplistic fantasies while you console yourself in the corner. Replying is always an option.
A marriage provides a contract that both sides sign and enter into, leaving a great paper trail easy and convenient for states to record and file.
Most of the details of this contract are only discovered much later on, when/if things go sour. In my plan, people will be welcome to sign whatever contracts they want -- explicitly. The simplest "cookie cutter" ones to be available in bridal shops and in Staples.
Well I can tell you aren't taking this seriously any more. At least I can't see someone saying that and expecting to be taken seriously. Lets segway to cartoon for a bit since you've lightened up the mood. What you said reminds me of what Bart did in this scenario...
BART: What's everyone's problem? I'm glad we're stranded! It'll be just like the Swiss Family Robinson, only with more cursing! We're gonna live like kings! Damn, hell, as kings!
As "Under the Sea" plays, a fantasy sequence is imagined with the kids living in a wonderful tree settlement. Martin takes a shower. Wendell uses a water slide. Sherri and Terri drive a bamboo and grass car. Ralph pigs out on food and a monkey butler brings Nelson a drink. Back to reality.
BART: And every night the monkey butlers will regale us with jungle stories.
NELSON: How many monkey butlers will there be?
BART: One at first. But he'll train others.
All the kids marvel at such a great future. Bart climbs down from the rock.
Allowing people to write whatever they want as a contract, and selling them at Staples does not address anything but story line. You say they are raising kids, just like in Bart's fantasy there are monkey butlers. But you say nothing more about how it comes into being than "The simplest 'cookie cutter' ones to be available in bridal shops and in Staples," much like Bart says, "One at first. But he'll train others."
So how do people become child rearers? You say a contract, but how? Really its insulting that you wish to tear down marriage chasing after a fantasy, its even more insulting that you expect me to buy into this fantasy. Just how does "anything they want it to be" establish a precondition here?
And you don't even address its striking simularity to foster-parenting, a system already in use today and far inferior to marriage. I imagine your little frolic here is becuase you are looking for an easy out of a position once thought "insightful" but is now just fantasy. Take the jester's escape, thats at least entertaining.
Marriage is not as important as it used to be for the survival of the partners nor of their children. This is the objective reasons of the diminished importance of it. That's my hypothesis, and the rising divorce rate supports it.
Hmmm, allow me to defer this time to Lisa Simpson for a response...
Lisa: By your reasoning, I could say that this rock keeps away tigers.
Homer: How does the rock work? Lisa: Well, you don't see any tigers around, do you? Homer: Lisa, Daddy would like to buy your rock.
For a much more interesting and insightful commentary on the rising divorce rate (and why homosexual marriage is a solution like putting a bullet through a starving man's head cures his hunger) I offer this. You don't neccissarily disagree with this author mind you, but at least he is grounded in reality.
The Nordic family pattern--including gay marriage--is spreading across Europe. And by looking closely at it we can answer the key empirical question underlying the gay marriage debate. Will same-sex marriage undermine the institution of marriage? It already has.
More precisely, it has further undermined the institution. The separation of marriage from parenthood was incr
In the US, a heterosexual couple with a child genetically related to only one parent is not exactly rare.
In the US a child genetically related to only one parent is extremely rare.
On what basis do you conclude "extremely rare"?
Um, the basis you provided. Perhaps your problem is as simple as you do not know the meaning of "genetically related"?
[A]ssuming homosexuals know correctly that they cannot change their sexual orientation is not a strong position.
Nor would it be for hypochondriacs (the other example provided). Moving on...
Answer #1 says a person who was born without an arm cannot ask society to make good that arm. Answer #2 says a person cannot be treated differently than others by the state without just cause.
Exactly, you say that a handicap is not a reason for compensation but while handicapped people are getting compensated lets give it to everyone.
You don't see the contradiction in that? Then where is my social security disability check and why are you not asking the government to give it to me?
In this same-gender debate you are not arguing that handicapped couples should not get married you are asking that homosexual couples be grated marriage and the same compensations given infertile couples. Thats not arguing that against social security disability checks, so where is mine?
No, if you don't mind me saying that is absolute absurdity. Sure you believe that way, but it to me is absurdity. I like the system as it is. I like how society tries to compensate for handicaps. It provides assistence to the blind to help them be self-sufficient. It helps the deaf to hear and be productive members of society. It helps the infertilebecome loving parents. The state gets the benefit of increased productivity and expression of individuality. These are all good things.
Then allow me to try again. I am reluctant to comment on what is natural...What do you call artificial insemination?
Did you really mean to write that? No really, did you? If you are going to muddy up the water in your retreat, you need to use less contrasting phrases than, "what is natural?" and "what do you call artificial insimination?"
Again you haven't answered the question, and you aren't even doing a good job of obscuring the question. Please answer the question, and address the contradiction of your answers to number #1 and #2.
And I've referred the author of the 800lb gorilla to this conversation to respond to your comments (if the author wishes to).
So you'd grant marriage to two heterosexuals who explicitly tell you they don't want children,
Why should I trust the two heterosexuals? Would you trust a person buying a gun who said "I promise I'll never use it".
deny them to two homosexuals who tell you they want children, and still claim it's about the children?
Marriage is not a "them" so I'll infer that you mean children here too. So if homosexuals really wanted to have children, if they really knew the value of marriage, if they felt just a tenth of what I described they would (I say unequivicably) crawl on their hands and knees to find someone of the opposite sex to accomplish it with. Becuase they would know without a doubt that they would need someone of the opposite sex. Its not a luxury, its not an accessory its a "neccessity".
You equate a relationship between an optimal homosexual couple and a handicapped heterosexual couple, and you say "treating each person equally before the law... is common sense to lawful societies." Its like saying if I'm lazy I can work as much as a blind person, so gimme my social security disability check. Or your example applies here too, "This is as silly as saying other government employees who want a raise are marginalizing your sacrifices and patriotism to your country because you are willing to serve at the lower pay."
is genetic relationship a pre-requisite for family?
Clearly it is 'a' pre-requisite but not 'the' prerequisite.
If so, why is adoption legal?
Because it is 'a' pre-requisite but not 'the' prerequisite.
In the US, a heterosexual couple with a child genetically related to only one parent is not exactly rare.
In the US a child genetically related to only one parent is extremely rare. This is true for the whole length and breadth of homosapien history.
In the absence of proof, I defer to what the general homosexual population claims, which is that they do not choose their sexual orientation.
In the face of proof you have simply reverted to a self-fulfilling sample. Think about it; those who think they cannot change have not and are in your sampling and those that think they can change have and are therefore not in your sampling.
A recent study has shown that hypocondriacs are also treatable, but a large portion of them simply walk out of the office when its suggested to them that their condition is only in their mind. You see how a simular sampling for "true hypocondriacs" could easily skew one to believe it is not changeable.
As far as your answers,
Answer #1 conflicts with #2, to wit "I simply don't feel that everybody deserves to be born equal in every way," yet you say, "From all appearances homosexuals [need] equal treatment."
Also answer #3 does not answer the question. It is only on the same topic by a generous stretch of the imagination.
I also feel that you haven't answered the question: what is the difference between two married homosexuals and two married heterosexuals who do not want or cannot have children?
You are right, I haven't and will rectify that immediately.
Allow me to quote someone else who I quoted before in a journal entry of mine...
Same-sex marriage proponents typically try to excuse their removal of children from the marriage equation with some variant of these two counter arguments:
1) Not all heterosexual couples can bear children
2) Through intervention by a third party, a member of a same-sex union *can* have a child.
The problem with those attempts are...
1) Through what intrusive, all knowing crystal ball will we determine who truly cannot have children and who can? I personally know of many examples of couples who were thought to be infertile who later found themselves pregnant. One couple I know persued every possible infertility treatment. When all hope was exhausted they stopped trying to have children themselves and turned to adoption. In the very same month when they finalized their adoption of a beautiful baby girl, they discovered that the wife was pregnant. Another example includes a couple who had decided not to have children. The woman's tubes had been tied many years prior to her finding out she was pregnant.
2) The fact that there are other avenues for reproductivity is merely argument that society should take an interest in those other avenues, and in reality, it does. The fact remains that the same-sex union itself did not result in offspring and so society's interest in that union is considerably reduced.
The State and I cannot ignore the responsibility of what my wife and I can create. My marriage is a commitment to my spouse, but even more relevant to the state it is a commitment to my children. Barring death, I will be there for my children even after they are capable of caring for themselves and their own children.
Same-sex partners want to marginalize the commitment to my children with a definition of marriage as simply an acknowledgement that my wife and I love each other. Inviting government to take an interest in my feelings for my wife opens up a Pandora's box of unprecedented government intrusiveness. The fact that governm
If she had moved in with a man, she can marry him. There are probably very few states that would not recognize this marriage, if any. On the other hand, very few states would recognize her gay marriage,
In neither case would the new husband or wife(?) be recognized as the child's family.
Based on this example alone, it should be clear that the opponents to gay marriage don't actually have a problem with the constitution of the family or the depths of relationships, but with the fact that they are gay.
So the child is really orthoganal to the point you were making as a childless woman or a woman with a child is treated the same. And a child is treated the same whether or not the woman chooses to shack up with a new male or female.
The only variable that seems to make a determination is that she shacks up with a man or woman after "discovering" she is gay (although I say she probably could stay married also, which for the reasons of her daughter would be the true "family" choice).
I singled out "discovering" in quotes as that seems to imply that homosexuality is a condition out of her control precluding her from a heterosexual relationship. If I am wrong let me know, it will be important later.
A heterosexual couple who cannot or will not have children can get married. A heterosexual couple who cannot have children can have a child with the help of a sperm or egg donor. None of these marriages and families are legally any different from the "normal" family.
So why must gay marriages be illegal? Why is the marriage of two infertile people legal? In fact, societies actively celebrate the marriage of very old people as fairytale endings. Why aren't their marriages illegal as well?
Actually, one of these is not like the other. Allow me to represent the differences with some questions. Three questions to be exact...
1) Do you feel that the handicapped should be compensated to help restore that which we deem naturally would be theirs?
2) Do you feel that homosexuality is a handicap?
3) Do you feel that having children is a natural capacity of a homosexual union and/or a heterosexual union (assuming none of the members are handicapped)?
We'll get to older couples next, if you are still interested.
I want all "subsidies" currently afforded to married couples to instead be provided to couples raising children -- own or adopted.
Again, an interesting perspective. You misunderstood "subsidy", and that is alright. Note that I did define exactly what I meant by subsidy in the link in my sig, and it is entirely different than what you now refer to as a subsidy.
What you are saying sounds more like a priviledge. And as the AC below has pointed out, priviledges enumerated to a contract, not a relationship. I think you'll have more problems defining the "couples raising children" than just older couples, or dead children couples. A marriage provides a contract that both sides sign and enter into, leaving a great paper trail easy and convinient for states to record and file.
And notice that states decide just what the marriage contract that is, and what priviledges are granted to it, not religions. In your plan you would maybe have a birth certificate? Maybe you have a parent-to child bond registry? Hmm, this might be re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic again.
As how would you handle people that simply lose interest in raising children? In fact, to be honest the more I learn about your plan the more it sounds like something that we have already --The Foster Care program. Children are passed to whomever is interested in raising children, and they are rewarded both monitarily and with priviledges. The program is even open to homosexual couples in many states.
It is also shown as be a less advantageous condition than marriage and adoption as well. I'd hate to see it become the norm (which if I'm not misunderstanding I think you are advocating).
To me marriage seems to be something more, and the research seems to bear this out. The state and its citizenry can still get just as much out of marriage as they ever could. And I submit that the streangth and value in marriage has not diminished over time, just our support of and value of it. To me your observations would support that conclusion.
Its not what is neccisary for a family, but what is optimal for a family.
It's not completely clear to me what you mean by "it"
The antecendent of "it" in this case is simply the relevant perspective, or solvable question.
are you saying that a family where a child is genetically related only to a mother or father (i.e., remarried), or not at all (i.e., adopted), are "suboptimal" families?
Technically, a child is always genetically related to a mother and father. And that isn't always what we'd call a family. As circumstance such as illegitimacy or divorce most certainly dissolve what was or should have been a family.
In contrast a situation like an unwanted child given up to adoption provides the child the capacity to belong to a family. That at least mitigates the social cost that the child pays for his/her parents mistake, and I think warrants state facilitation.
Also a family where one of the parents dies creates a burden, but we do not say that death dissolves a family tie as divorce does. That family was and is still in tact.
Then lastly, as you say we recognize genetic relation as a family bond and support (even encourage) a parent to raise their own child. This is also a noble interest I support the state in assisting.
(but not gay marriages)?
I see the goals of homosexual and heterosexual recognition of the state to be two different things that are mutually incompatible.
Slashdot Mirror
You don't think that they're entitled to marriage or respect.
Absolutely not true. They can get married! I've never said otherwise. What they cannot do is take a social institution as valuable as marriage and simply re-make it in their image. We have laws protecting us from oppression like that.
The rest of your comment is typical verbal abuse, insult and intimidation. Definitely not befitting a educated enlightened soul like yourself.
Great. You call me a bigot and pretending to be educated to boot.
I didn't say I have a problem with homosexuals, I said (in so many words) people like you give them a bad name.
i think the parent got mixed up and meant to say that to your point 2
Quite possibly. While the source based nature of the distro is often hearalded, the refreshing touches were things like; named (not numbered) runlevels, dependancies you can put directly in the init.d scripts, emerges way of letting you specify which configuration files get over-written during an update (not very great all the time), ramdisk for certain time-critical temporary files, etc...
i find the debian way of doing it is much more efficient... but then, the last distro i used was LFS... and it takes a hellova lotta time to maintain!!
A Debianite of good repute, came into #gentoo in the early days of its popularity and declared, "nice little distro, should mature into something good someday, but its pretty crappy now becuase it doesn't conform to the FHS." Drobbins (or one of the other top people) simply replied, "FHS compliance and good distro are not the same thing".
While o-o's complaints were shown to not really be FHS non-compliance I appreciated the moral I took away from that as do it the best way you can first then worry about comprimise afterward.
I dunno, I still wish Gentoo had a "make World".
(yes there is rmerge -e, but that doesn't have the same litterary value)
Hey, you are talking to a person who is running AFPL-Ghostscript, XFree4.4 and the one true gsview. Your speaking to the choir.
Just make the check out to "Cash".
*COUGH* FreeBSD
That old hat is a refreshing outlook on a distribution? Surely you jest. Its a good outlook, don't get me wrong. But I don't know that I'd call it refreshing.
So? my apps will go 5% faster if I bother to wait 5000% more during the install?
You get some kick out of spending good money on hardware, and then running software on it that uses nothing more than what could have been done with a 386?
Its true that one will probably never recover the clock-cycles used to compile a distro with the spead that the optomization brings. But then again, just how many spare clock cycles does your computer have? Chances are even while typing your post into IE your computer is using only 2% of its clock cycles. Think of all the clock cycles you wasted while sleeping last night.
Those times you really need speed (games, heavy computation, etc...), it really pays for itself.
Its well enough. It goes to show that talent is something you cannot fake, not even with a committee. When I saw Gentoo three things really stood out for me,
1) It was a truely refreshing outlook on a distribution
2) It is source based
3) I was free from being unwitting pawn in the software binary release freedom debate
When I ran and got to know Gentoo I saw genius was at work, the light nimble free-floating kind of genius unencumbered by committee. Much of that was DRobbins shining through (as shown by his technical writings of frontier Linux applications for IBM.)
I will be sad to see him go, but to me it looked as if his inspiration was diluted by so many faces long ago. Don't get me wrong Gentoo is still my favorite and I run it exclusively at home. I think its gained much from Seemant and the others. But you just have to admire sometimes what individual talent can do on its own.
It is a much clearer example of your contradiction. It is where you admited you knew of the Simpsons reference even though you said you were not aware of any TV show.
Also there wasn't even a need to look elsewhere for meaning, it was sufficiently defined at the time. The Simpson's use of the "Monkey Butler" was to describe the delusion of the ignorant, where nature was somehow a servant to ones self-centeredness. Its reference every time after that was to mark where you used a simular device. The most glaring example (which you continue to press through an appeal to your own proclaimed sincerity), "what I'm proposing will do no harm to marriage or the State". You have presented no evidence to back up such a claim, and simply ignored evidence discrediting your claim.
Instead of answering a direct question, you blame me for not seeing the answers myself. How convenient...
You are the one who admits you didn't see the answers when you said, "I fail to see any legitimate interest, the State may possibly have in Marriage other than (possibly) as a conduit to procuring new generations." As I said previously, "That may be true, but that isn't my fault or the fault of any of the AC's who have posted in this thread. (Re: Lack of imagionation fallacy)."
Indeed, the answers have been provided via hyperlink time and time again in this thread --as well as stated explicitly. Other state interests in marriage include health, longevity, and increased productivity even in childless couples (and benefits that do nt seem to be apperent in same-sex unions). In fact, the AC you started to in the begining said that also, to your apperently deaf ears.
The main foil of the arguement from ignorance when another reader has seen just what you turned a blind eye toward, thus exposing your ignorance as willful. Such an excercize is left for the reader lest I be accused of stacking the deck or forumulating "pre-made responses". Others read that link, apperently you did not. And now you are left looking pretty foolish.
And either way, even if the state only cared about child rearing, saying that marriages are of no worth until there is a child is like saying gun safety laws are of no use until the bullet is heading towards someones head. Preperation for child-birth is beneficial, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
I have not been dishonest, but you have proved to fulfill this AC's prophecy...
As all things, a marriage has pluses and minuses. It helps partners in life and in raising children, while holding them together and responsible for each other and forcing them into compromises for the sake of staying with each other. As productivity grows, the partners don't need as much help in life and in raising children (where they are also often aided by the state), so they are not willing to sacrifice as much for their marriage. This -- to me -- explains the growing divorce rate, and I submit, that my view is a lot better explained than the rock/tiger thing. The divorce rate is kept down a little by tradition and religion -- not unlike how the horses are still used for transportation because of people's affection for them. When OnLawn cited Sweden -- with its lower influence of religion and higher divorce rate -- it played right into my argument. Swedes' productivity may be lower, but their generous welfare state makes child rearing easy -- intentionally or not, Swedes made Marriage even less important to people. Note, that I did not express my judgement of this. Personally, I like horses very much.
All your analogy to horses says is that you think marriage antiquated. However horses were antiquated by the refining of the internal combustion engine. I see no such institution that has simularly antiquited marriage.
The closest device you mention as antiquating marriage is productivity. Productivity does not raise children, provide for children or take responsibility for children.
Also you say that productivity means couples do not need as much resources in raising children, yet the benefits (unnamed) you wish to cut are for people without children.
Also a much more direct line can be drawn between "partners don't need as much help in life and in raising children (where they are also often aided by the state), so they are not willing to sacrifice as much for their marriage," as that is a product of the state welfare not requiring marriage. Productivity in and of itself has nothing to do with it except provide a means to pay for the state welfare (As mentioned in the Sweden Essay). And as you are against the paternalizing of government, you would then be apposed to the institution that is (as you put it) negating the need for marriage.
And none of this even counters my observation that marriage is just as potent, useful and valuable to the individual and the state as ever.
Funny, you said you knew of no TV show I could be referring to --not that you didn't know what it meant. Lets look at that quote again...
Moving on...
I read them as quoted by OnLawn, my respect for whom, although diminished, is still a lot higher, than for someone, who cares not and/or dares to speak under so much as a SlashDot alias
Awww, your respect for me has diminished and you think AC's are less-than-humans. Can I play this elitist game too? Maybe I should start a policy of not reading posts from people with a slashdot number higher than 10000. No, don't worry I won;t. The fact is, your attacking the messenger not the messege. He could have posted as CmdrTaco or OogTheCaveMan for all I care, its the argument that counts.
What I meant was simply to observe, the Marriage is diminishing. You seem to blame me and my views for the diminishment,
You meant no such thing, and you are hardly just an observer in this. You chanted about replacing marriage in the state with a foster-care like program.
I find his language offensive (increasingly so, compared to the initial posts)
It accurately described your position, that is all. You have learned (as many do) that there are plenty of rudeness you can perpetrate on someone and get away with it if you couch it in a polite tone. You're not really all the clever to have discovered that. I've responded to your rudeness anyway, and now you say I'm the rude one?
I fail to see any legitimate interest, the State may possibly have in Marriage other than (possibly) as a conduit to procuring new generations.
That may be true, but that isn't my fault or the fault of any of the AC's who have posted in this thread. (Re: Lack of imagionation fallacy).
there are no words "marriage", "spouse", "wife", "husband" in the Constitution nor in any of the Ammendments.
Another trivial fact, but at least this one is accurate. Marriage, spouse, wife, husband are all mentioned in every law in every state in the union, and many state constitutions.
And contraception negates the interest the state has in marriage like rubber bullets negates the need for gun laws.
Trying to preserve Marriage for the sake of Marriage is foolish.
I agree. Preserving marriage for the sake of the citizenry and what marriage can provide them, the state, and the future is the reason to preserve marriage.
Justifying such attempts by Marriage's "imposition of social responsibility" is a paternalistic trampling on personal liberties at worst, and social engineering at best.
Oh, I see. You are a part of the growing "no more grups!" movement. (Re: Miri)
If that is how you see things than your conflict is with authority, not marriage. Marriage is not slavery, its a voluntary institution that anyone can choose to enter in or not enter in.
All, I am proposing is for the State to shift focus. Leave the meaning of Marriage to individuals. What may concern the law is not "are you married?" but "do you raise children together?".
I agree, the meaning of marriage should be left to individuals. It should be left to the states to define legislatively and popularly. What you've failed (time and time again) to address is just how the state knows, "do you raise children together[?]" especially if everyone gets to define that for themselves.
If this sounds like a mere deck-reshuffling -- than why are you objecting so loudly?
That the analogy was benign in nature was a contravance of being told as the best case y
I don't usually read AC-comments -- I browse at 2
:-) of the ACs;
That is uninteresting and, frankly, trivial. You've read them now and continue to ignore them, and that is the most relevant fact speaking of your position.
I "hold self-evident" [marriage's] relative demise and explain it by improved economics;
Technically you correlation more than causality (as the parable of Lisa's rock dictates). The small amount of explanation you provided was eclipsed in depth, resolution and research by the essay provided (which although was not an AC, you ignored also).
your explanation of the demise by "our lessened support for it" does not make sense to me -- the "lessened support" is part of the demise, it thus can not be the reason;
A part of the decline can most certanly be a cause for further decline. These are called feedback loops.
I shall allow myself to take foolish comfort in the '+5 Interesting' rating of my original posting -- as close to "being crowned a king of a tropical island" as it gets;
Hmmm, here you reference an episode of the Simpsons [the link is a post in this thread you responded to] with monkey butlers, yet claim ignorance to what is meant by them. Interesting.
I'm sorry, if I was unable to respond to all of your (and your ACs') arguments -- it would require much more writing than I am willing to afford to convincing two people...seek consolation in the remarkable agreeability (and individuality
I appreciate the sentiment, but I don't feel any need for consolation. I'm very thankful of your time and platform as mentioned in the grandparent post. I accept your appology, and will simply be left to wonder what response you could have crafted, long or short, that could have possibly reconciled your contradictory position. But that is a little matter as this excersize has given me more confidence in my position.
Take solace as you feel neccisary, but you've been wrong an embarassingly large portion of your assertions. That should be disconcerting. That deficiency is seperate to ignorance and ambiguity in the cause you are advocate (re: arguement by mantra/chanting) referenced in the grandparent post, which should be disconserting also.
Perhaps you overingratiated the slashocratic support of the +5 interesting score. Such pride may be the reason for your folley. For there are four posters who have not gotten answers from you, me included. Perchance that should have proven a more clear and dire indicator than the moderation.
(by the way, if this is too verbose for you, I just read an AC's response which is much more succint. You may wish to read it.)
Your right, and even after I said that I noted it is not even self-consistent. It still suffers from the origional (and oft repeated) contradiction that his plan is in the best interests of child rearing. Thank you for correcting me on that.
From another AC, (italics are your words they are responding to)
From another AC,
That mirrors what another AC said,
And this mirrors my point (That you've also not addressed) that foster-parenting is far inferior to marriage as an institution for rearing children. If as a government you were interested in child rearing you'd be more interested in endorsing, recognising and supporting marriage than foster-parenting. Yet you conclude the opposite on undisclosed grounds.
Another post that could be one of the previous AC's,
These questions have still been unanswered,
Oh and this certainly should have been addressed in your woefully (and stratigically) ambigious plan.
You dodged these questions also that could have helped give definition to your plan,
Off topic triviality/wacko nonsense...
Unsupported Monkey Butler fantasies...
Things from the last post you failed to address...
Indeed, you present an arguement you seem unwilling to support, other than by chanting it over and over again. Sure its self-consistent but ignorance usually is (what you don't know won't hurt you kind of thing). In fact the further you get from reality the easier a fantasy is to be "self-consistent". You've hit on nothing clever here.
And yes, you do intend to do marriage much harm. That you say you do not simply contradicts what you intend to do with marriage, another point from previous posts that you also have not addressed.
You've simply covered one factual error with another. What I can't believe is that you say that in the same post you quote, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;". Freedom is a very important benefit, and marks it specifically for special consideration in legal matters. Other benefits include tax-exemption and tax deduction for people contributing to it.
That religion, like free speach, is left for the courts to define is inconsequential to the debate since you are advocating each couple decides what marriage is and not advocating courts to define it.
No one can use religion to avoid testifying in court,
You have never heard of Clergy Confidentiality? It means that a clergy is never required by law to testify something that was told him/her for penance.
it does not entitle to powers of attorney
What "powers of attorney" are you talking about here. And don't keep flinging these mokey butler lines at me out of your rear-end, mmkay? Give me a real law. So far you've so incedulously botched up constitutional and state law that I really can't take much you say any more.
Happy to ablige. Guess where this comes from...
I am talking about legal recognition.
A better paragraph defining individuality and the legal recognition of it, I have not found. And allow me to head you off at the pass here, the Declaration of independance was most certainly a legal document. It was the document declaring our status from England as independant.
Volumes of legislation, governments, and legal theory have been written from the seed of just that one paragraph. You better believe individuality was defined, recognized and considered special by the Founding Fathers.
And can you knock it off with all your post-hoc definitions here? You've done it with "subsidy", "marriage" itself, now "recognition" and "special". If you don't know what a word means get a dictionary.
The Driver's License is an official State-issued document and is required to access public roadways.
A marriage license is an official state-issued document and is required to access the marriage contract and all the benefits and responsibilities enumerated therin... Next!
A diploma -- thanks for a good example -- may be issued by a private enterprise and is not legally required for anything.
You are attempting to support your thesis here by erroneous facts once again. Academic credentials (including but not limited to a diploma) are required by
How is, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" not recognizing religion as anything special? I mean don't you think that if they didn't think it was special they wouldn't have named it at all? Freedom of speech is mentioned too with simular verbage, was that nothing special to them also?
Interesting. To you, expressing individuality is none of the states business. It seems the founding fathers thought the expression of individuality was of the utmost importance for the state to recognize!You are welcome to your beliefs, but if I may say, your 0/2 on this one. Neither statement describes why the state should have no interest in marriage, and neither seem to be in accord with the facts. And you don't even try to speak to the reasons provided that the state should take interest in marriage. Like monkey butlers these assertions just *are* and suit no porpose other than fulfilling your fantasies on life.
You did try to support your position a few times, and that was good. There we were able to engage in real discussion. Pity you choose to abandon it again with chanting of your mantra. I mean really, I give you facts about how the state reveres religion and protects it and you simply quip back, "This state does not recognize religion as anything special."
Now look, I do appreciate what you are trying to do here. I appreciate that to you, you've found an equitable comprimise that should stop the fighting, at least in the capitol buildings in the 50 states of the US. But marriage is too valuable to me and to the state to simply be the casualty here.
Marriage is not an oppressive institution, it is not like slavary or despotism. Why should it be banished from state recognition when it hasn't done anything wrong? And quite honestly, your proposal won't stop the fighting, it will just give it a new name.
I also appreciate that to you, if we let marriage just mean whatever people want, that should mean everyone has the freedom to do with marriage as they please. To you this seems like expanding the capacity of marriage, not limiting it. But that does not work in institutions meant to instil social responsibility. Imagion what would happen if we let people call define for themselves what a drivers license was! Imagion what would happen if we let people define just what a diploma is for themselves!
When it gets down to it, marriage is a standard. Its the best way we know how (as you've said yourself) to raise children. It asks for representation from both sexes, how more fair can you get? The UN doesn't give Spain's vote to Russia, it asks for equal representation. So does Congress (based on different metrics of course).
It is the epitome, it is the standard. And the state who has an interest in individuality of both marriage partners and the children produced (with or without marriage) should contiue to hold it up as the standard.
No, and you can quote me. You're gaming with scope and scale here and your results are *sigh* contradictory to your thesis.
A state that quits regognizing marriage has torn it down within the states pervue. That should be evident. To say that does not tear down the institution of marriage is a contradiction whithin the narrow blinders of state perspective.
But you did jump in scope hoping to save from contradiction by suggesting marriage then survives inspite of the states actions (an interesting approach). This particular fantasy may not be so far from reality.
Marriage survives only in the people that still understand what marriage is out the scope of the state. Those confusing marriage with foster-parenting (becuase the state has conflated them as you have advocated) also see marriage is un-neccissary and torn down (re: Sweden).
Those that have value in marriage become beneficiaries of the scientifically proven results in socially and physically healthier children (i.e. more productive). Meanwhile others that find marriages social responsibility to be too constricting take the actions of the state as endorcment of more free natured foster-parenting approach. And their children turn out like foster children (more of a social burden), and as shown in scientific studies less likely to marry.
So in this we see your contradiction. And while to the wise marriage's survival proves its fitness through experiment of social darwinism, you advocate that this should mean, "Marriage is not particularly useful (nor gratifying) to the State...recognizing only the potential to procreate is foolishness."
Perhaps you should read this to see more of why your advocacy is harmful to marriage. If that is not enough, perhaps you could do me a favor and acknowledge the AC's perspective on the logical fallacy you are peddling here.
Contradiction between what and what?
If this isn't turning a blind eye wishing it will go away, I don't know what is. If I say I stab myself through the heart and die, but I am not doing myself any harm that is a contradiction.
For your contradiction (again using your words and spelled out again lest I used too many words above)...
But then you are not very different from people, who insist Religion would improve people's lives -- and cut the State's costs, and should thus be recognized and supported by the State.
Religion is recognized and supported by the State (prayers start every session of congress and every Supreme Court sitting, references to God and prayer everywhere on government buildings, money, etc...). Its protected from the state by the first Ammendment, allow me to quote...
Religions are recognized by the state, and even today there are laws governing just what a religion is and how it gets recognized for benefits such as tax-exemption, etc... If I support my religion with my money, the government deducts that from my gross income and saves me from paying taxes on that money.
And for the reasons you enumerate I do support bot
And you are taking it far too seriously (and too verbously) for the forum, on which we meet.
Fantastic, now you simply patronize me. Look, you can have all the fantasies you want, but peddle them in novellas, not politics. Do an Ayn Rand and make up just any Utopic society and just becuase you are particular to your own ideas, grant it every great consequence through authorship. But it will only inspire people who have less, not more, grounding in reality than yourself.
I'm not suggesting to "tear down marriage". I'm suggesting, the State stops recognizing it as anything special whatsoever
I can't parse this, its a direct contradiction. Its the same direct contradiction I've pointed out time and time again. You haven't unraveled the contradiction, no not even an attempt. All I see is re-iteration, as if I don't yet understand what you are saying.
Foster Care program may, indeed, be a step in that direction.
This just continues to reverberate the contradiction. From what we know of Foster care we can say definitively it is a step toward weakening child support and marriage. Wait, I said that before... Yep just checked. Once again you refuse to discuss and simply keep chanting your fantasy like a mantra hoping its shear simplicity will soothe your pride and dull your senses.
Marriage is being "torn down" by vast increases in productivity, while still being supported by tradition and, indeed, religion -- as your facts about Sweden examplify.
The facts about Sweden exemplify that removing child rearing from marriage, through liberal interpretation of soclialistic values (welfare and state contrived equality) tears down marriage. I do not see the benign attribute "productivity" as being a factor at all. Nor is Sweden considered a very productive state. As was pointed out in the article, they have an unusually high percentage of citizens employed by the state.
As far as the author is concerned, prosperity (somewhat related to productivity) simply means we can pay the social cost --for now. And becuase we think we can pay the social cost we contiue to borrow against our childrens future as marriage is undermined by people who wish to re-make it into what ever they want to be. Read it again, its exactly what he says.
And I'll tell you something else. This is a freebie. Even your overly simplistic and self-gratifying interpretation supports my thesis that marriage itself is not weakening, just our support of it. Marriage still has all the value and capability it ever had, people just wish to find other ways around it that aren't so restrictive. That they may be more able to pay (or in this case have the state pay) the cost of their actions in a more prosperous society, but it does not diminish the capacity that marriage has to avoid those costs. Nor can "money" or "productivity" fully make up the difference as people choose to be more selfish with their lives, hoping the state will pick up the tab.
I just see [marriages] diminishment as an objective fact of life.
And Lisa's rock does keep away tigers.
All I am calling for, is for State to recognize, that it has no inherent interest in Marriage itself -- only in the better and and bigger new generations.
I've said it enough times already...
And every time you say it, it is just as absurd a contradiction as the first.
In fact, I'm noticing the more I point it out as a contradiction the more you ignore what I say (or at least you do not speak to it) and wishfully re-iterate your stance as if maybe the 100th or 151st time you say it will make it true.
Its a monkey butler fantasy, directly conflicting with reality. Good day, chant to yourself simplistic fantasies while you console yourself in the corner. Replying is always an option.
Well I can tell you aren't taking this seriously any more. At least I can't see someone saying that and expecting to be taken seriously. Lets segway to cartoon for a bit since you've lightened up the mood. What you said reminds me of what Bart did in this scenario...
Allowing people to write whatever they want as a contract, and selling them at Staples does not address anything but story line. You say they are raising kids, just like in Bart's fantasy there are monkey butlers. But you say nothing more about how it comes into being than "The simplest 'cookie cutter' ones to be available in bridal shops and in Staples," much like Bart says, "One at first. But he'll train others."
So how do people become child rearers? You say a contract, but how? Really its insulting that you wish to tear down marriage chasing after a fantasy, its even more insulting that you expect me to buy into this fantasy. Just how does "anything they want it to be" establish a precondition here?
And you don't even address its striking simularity to foster-parenting, a system already in use today and far inferior to marriage. I imagine your little frolic here is becuase you are looking for an easy out of a position once thought "insightful" but is now just fantasy. Take the jester's escape, thats at least entertaining.
Marriage is not as important as it used to be for the survival of the partners nor of their children. This is the objective reasons of the diminished importance of it. That's my hypothesis, and the rising divorce rate supports it.
Hmmm, allow me to defer this time to Lisa Simpson for a response...
For a much more interesting and insightful commentary on the rising divorce rate (and why homosexual marriage is a solution like putting a bullet through a starving man's head cures his hunger) I offer this. You don't neccissarily disagree with this author mind you, but at least he is grounded in reality.
On what basis do you conclude "extremely rare"?
... is common sense to lawful societies." Its like saying if I'm lazy I can work as much as a blind person, so gimme my social security disability check. Or your example applies here too, "This is as silly as saying other government employees who want a raise are marginalizing your sacrifices and patriotism to your country because you are willing to serve at the lower pay."
Um, the basis you provided. Perhaps your problem is as simple as you do not know the meaning of "genetically related"?
[A]ssuming homosexuals know correctly that they cannot change their sexual orientation is not a strong position.
Nor would it be for hypochondriacs (the other example provided). Moving on...
Answer #1 says a person who was born without an arm cannot ask society to make good that arm. Answer #2 says a person cannot be treated differently than others by the state without just cause.
Exactly, you say that a handicap is not a reason for compensation but while handicapped people are getting compensated lets give it to everyone.
You don't see the contradiction in that? Then where is my social security disability check and why are you not asking the government to give it to me?
In this same-gender debate you are not arguing that handicapped couples should not get married you are asking that homosexual couples be grated marriage and the same compensations given infertile couples. Thats not arguing that against social security disability checks, so where is mine?
No, if you don't mind me saying that is absolute absurdity. Sure you believe that way, but it to me is absurdity. I like the system as it is. I like how society tries to compensate for handicaps. It provides assistence to the blind to help them be self-sufficient. It helps the deaf to hear and be productive members of society. It helps the infertilebecome loving parents. The state gets the benefit of increased productivity and expression of individuality. These are all good things.
Then allow me to try again. I am reluctant to comment on what is natural...What do you call artificial insemination?
Did you really mean to write that? No really, did you? If you are going to muddy up the water in your retreat, you need to use less contrasting phrases than, "what is natural?" and "what do you call artificial insimination?"
Again you haven't answered the question, and you aren't even doing a good job of obscuring the question. Please answer the question, and address the contradiction of your answers to number #1 and #2.
And I've referred the author of the 800lb gorilla to this conversation to respond to your comments (if the author wishes to).
So you'd grant marriage to two heterosexuals who explicitly tell you they don't want children,
Why should I trust the two heterosexuals? Would you trust a person buying a gun who said "I promise I'll never use it".
deny them to two homosexuals who tell you they want children, and still claim it's about the children?
Marriage is not a "them" so I'll infer that you mean children here too. So if homosexuals really wanted to have children, if they really knew the value of marriage, if they felt just a tenth of what I described they would (I say unequivicably) crawl on their hands and knees to find someone of the opposite sex to accomplish it with. Becuase they would know without a doubt that they would need someone of the opposite sex. Its not a luxury, its not an accessory its a "neccessity".
You equate a relationship between an optimal homosexual couple and a handicapped heterosexual couple, and you say "treating each person equally before the law
Oh, and if
Clearly it is 'a' pre-requisite but not 'the' prerequisite.
If so, why is adoption legal?
Because it is 'a' pre-requisite but not 'the' prerequisite.
In the US, a heterosexual couple with a child genetically related to only one parent is not exactly rare.
In the US a child genetically related to only one parent is extremely rare. This is true for the whole length and breadth of homosapien history.
In the absence of proof, I defer to what the general homosexual population claims, which is that they do not choose their sexual orientation.
In the face of proof you have simply reverted to a self-fulfilling sample. Think about it; those who think they cannot change have not and are in your sampling and those that think they can change have and are therefore not in your sampling.
A recent study has shown that hypocondriacs are also treatable, but a large portion of them simply walk out of the office when its suggested to them that their condition is only in their mind. You see how a simular sampling for "true hypocondriacs" could easily skew one to believe it is not changeable.
As far as your answers,
Answer #1 conflicts with #2, to wit "I simply don't feel that everybody deserves to be born equal in every way," yet you say, "From all appearances homosexuals [need] equal treatment."
Also answer #3 does not answer the question. It is only on the same topic by a generous stretch of the imagination.
I also feel that you haven't answered the question: what is the difference between two married homosexuals and two married heterosexuals who do not want or cannot have children?
You are right, I haven't and will rectify that immediately.
Allow me to quote someone else who I quoted before in a journal entry of mine...
If she had moved in with a man, she can marry him. There are probably very few states that would not recognize this marriage, if any. On the other hand, very few states would recognize her gay marriage,
In neither case would the new husband or wife(?) be recognized as the child's family.
Based on this example alone, it should be clear that the opponents to gay marriage don't actually have a problem with the constitution of the family or the depths of relationships, but with the fact that they are gay.
So the child is really orthoganal to the point you were making as a childless woman or a woman with a child is treated the same. And a child is treated the same whether or not the woman chooses to shack up with a new male or female.
The only variable that seems to make a determination is that she shacks up with a man or woman after "discovering" she is gay (although I say she probably could stay married also, which for the reasons of her daughter would be the true "family" choice).
I singled out "discovering" in quotes as that seems to imply that homosexuality is a condition out of her control precluding her from a heterosexual relationship. If I am wrong let me know, it will be important later.
A heterosexual couple who cannot or will not have children can get married. A heterosexual couple who cannot have children can have a child with the help of a sperm or egg donor. None of these marriages and families are legally any different from the "normal" family.
So why must gay marriages be illegal? Why is the marriage of two infertile people legal? In fact, societies actively celebrate the marriage of very old people as fairytale endings. Why aren't their marriages illegal as well?
Actually, one of these is not like the other. Allow me to represent the differences with some questions. Three questions to be exact...
1) Do you feel that the handicapped should be compensated to help restore that which we deem naturally would be theirs?
2) Do you feel that homosexuality is a handicap?
3) Do you feel that having children is a natural capacity of a homosexual union and/or a heterosexual union (assuming none of the members are handicapped)?
We'll get to older couples next, if you are still interested.
I want all "subsidies" currently afforded to married couples to instead be provided to couples raising children -- own or adopted.
Again, an interesting perspective. You misunderstood "subsidy", and that is alright. Note that I did define exactly what I meant by subsidy in the link in my sig, and it is entirely different than what you now refer to as a subsidy.
What you are saying sounds more like a priviledge. And as the AC below has pointed out, priviledges enumerated to a contract, not a relationship. I think you'll have more problems defining the "couples raising children" than just older couples, or dead children couples. A marriage provides a contract that both sides sign and enter into, leaving a great paper trail easy and convinient for states to record and file.
And notice that states decide just what the marriage contract that is, and what priviledges are granted to it, not religions. In your plan you would maybe have a birth certificate? Maybe you have a parent-to child bond registry? Hmm, this might be re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic again.
As how would you handle people that simply lose interest in raising children? In fact, to be honest the more I learn about your plan the more it sounds like something that we have already --The Foster Care program. Children are passed to whomever is interested in raising children, and they are rewarded both monitarily and with priviledges. The program is even open to homosexual couples in many states.
It is also shown as be a less advantageous condition than marriage and adoption as well. I'd hate to see it become the norm (which if I'm not misunderstanding I think you are advocating).
To me marriage seems to be something more, and the research seems to bear this out. The state and its citizenry can still get just as much out of marriage as they ever could. And I submit that the streangth and value in marriage has not diminished over time, just our support of and value of it. To me your observations would support that conclusion.
It's not completely clear to me what you mean by "it"
The antecendent of "it" in this case is simply the relevant perspective, or solvable question.
are you saying that a family where a child is genetically related only to a mother or father (i.e., remarried), or not at all (i.e., adopted), are "suboptimal" families?
Technically, a child is always genetically related to a mother and father. And that isn't always what we'd call a family. As circumstance such as illegitimacy or divorce most certainly dissolve what was or should have been a family.
In contrast a situation like an unwanted child given up to adoption provides the child the capacity to belong to a family. That at least mitigates the social cost that the child pays for his/her parents mistake, and I think warrants state facilitation.
Also a family where one of the parents dies creates a burden, but we do not say that death dissolves a family tie as divorce does. That family was and is still in tact.
Then lastly, as you say we recognize genetic relation as a family bond and support (even encourage) a parent to raise their own child. This is also a noble interest I support the state in assisting.
(but not gay marriages)?
I see the goals of homosexual and heterosexual recognition of the state to be two different things that are mutually incompatible.