The Gay Marriage Debate

Like I said, this one has me baffled, so I went looking around and found an excellent article in the LA Times by George Skelton documenting the debate in the California State Senate over the recent Gay Marriage Bill. Some highlights from the article.

…during a chat at the back of the Senate chamber with then-President Pro Tem Bill Lockyer.How do you feel about gay marriage? I asked."You know," he replied, "people have so many problems and life's so short, if letting gays 'marry' gives them some joy and happiness, why not? I say let them do it.

It made sense to me, but I wasn't ready to go there yet. Certainly, homosexual couples should be entitled to all the protections and privileges of heterosexuals — call it a "civil union" or "domestic partnership," a civil right or plain fairness. But calling it a "marriage" could devalue the institution in some minds, especially young people's, I thought.

Until the Senate debate.

Probably the speech that firmly clicked me into a "yeah, why not?" mode was by "Sen. Joe Simitian (D-Palo Alto). He talked about marriage "reinforcing traditional values: accountability, monogamy, commitment, the rule of law … "We should be encouraging that as a society, he asserted.

Sen. Gil Cedillo (D-Los Angeles) followed up: "Marriage is a phenomenal institution…. The glue of our society…. By extending it, we strengthen it, not threaten it…. "The threat to marriage today is poverty, discrimination, lack of healthcare … domestic abuse, child abuse."

As the compelling debate continued, I kept thinking about what Lockyer had said — and the people suffering in hurricane hell, the American soldiers being blown up, the gas price gougers. And I wondered why anybody should worry about what we call two people living together in a loving relationship.

There was a lot of talk about God.

My god doesn't fret about homosexuality, but clearly many people believe that theirs does.

My God doesn’t fret about homosexuality either and given all the problems in the world, I don’t understand why anyone would think theirs does.

Now, in the interest of fairness, some lowlights from the debate.

"I don't believe there's a member of this chamber who doesn't … know that [same-sex marriage] is not the right thing to do," said Sen. Dennis Hollingsworth (R-Murrieta). "I believe that knowledge comes from a higher power…. That higher power is also the higher power that created the institution of marriage."

Homosexuals have every right to enter into civil contracts, said Sen. Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks), "but can't you see that marriage is a fundamentally different institution? Marriage institutionally exists in nature by which we propagate our species and inculcate our young with values and standards….

Well, not really, there are lots of folks who, after their child bearing days are long over, marry for companionship. Should we ban all marriages between seniors because they won’t produce any children? And clearly NOT everyone in the chamber knew that Gay Marriage was wrong or does the distinguished gentlemen from Murrieta think these folks are lying when they say that it's a good thing?

As for the God angle, I’ll defer to Sen. Debra Bowen (D-Marina del Rey) who said "I don't think anyone should claim God as being on their side in this debate…. We are not here to discuss what churches, synagogues … believe about this."

Nice call Debra baby. The last time I looked the first amendment said something to the effect that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,” so why are these people mumbling about their god?

As far as I can tell the "God doesn't like it" agrument, since it applies to the god of a specific religion, is a violation of the 1st amendment establishment clause and the "it ain't going to produce kids" argument is a violation of the 14th amendment equal protection clause. So, you guys got any other reasons why it should be illegal? Because let me tell you, I don't buy either of those two.