The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

[joecct]

Because of the complexities of benefits and other economic by-products of marriage. Being a spouse confers all sorts of rights. As long as we're dealing with pairs that's fine. But if all the adults in Delaware announce they're a 500k-person group marriage, it breaks the system.

It has nothing to do with morality, if that's what you're asking.

Never did, though some of the liberals may have thought so, given my stances on other issues. I believe that given recent court rulings, the old societal definitions have been tossed in favor of consenting adults who love each other.

Good thing? Or bad thing? Time will judge.

[joecct]

My understanding is that the gubmint doesn't want one guy having 7 wives because that leads to 30 kids, which few people in the population can support. That puts them on the govt dole. Now one could argue if someone makes a pledge not to use govt resources, then should they be allowed to marry multiple wives? I say the answer is still no as you can't guarantee that will always be the case plus its most likely unhealthy to grow up in a household with that many siblings including many of the same age (see the Duggars!!! ).

They haven't gone after professional athletes, have they?

[Kepler]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

Atheists sure as heck don't approve of it. They're trying to get the government to establish their religion.

Absence of declarative statement does not equal declarative statement of absence.

[LynahFan]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

Hey looky - Texas forgot that the first amendment already exists.

What will they "allow" next? Freedom of the Press? Protection from unreasonable search?

[Kepler]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

This is a great piece.

Money shot:

In reality, however, there was a subterranean argument that actually is logical and makes perfect sense. It was never just about man-woman marriages. The tradition that is disappearing is the belief that marriage is a duty, especially for women. As Douthat argues, Americans are rejecting “the old rules, its own hopes of joy and happiness to chase.”

Douthat isn’t wrong on the facts, even if he’s wrong on his assessment of them. It’s true that women in modern society no longer feel like they have to be married to be granted entrance into adult society. Single women living by and supporting themselves is no longer considered scandalous. Marriage is, bit by bit, becoming more about a partnership between equals who choose each other for the purpose of love and happiness. Which means it’s becoming less about giving men control over women’s lives.

In this sense, Douthat isn’t wrong that “support for same-sex marriage and the decline of straight marital norms exist in a kind of feedback loop.” To accept same-sex marriage is to accept this modern idea that marriage is about love and partnership, instead of about dutiful procreation and female submission. Traditional gender roles where husbands rule over wives are disintegrating and that process is definitely helped along by these new laws allowing that marriage doesn’t have to be a gendered institution at all.

I finally understand the conservative wailing that gay marriage will "destroy heterosexual marriage." What it really means is, this reframes marriage as something other than the man's protection of and dominion over his wife and kids. That cinematic fantasy that underpins the conservative worldview has just been tossed out as obsolete. That must be truly threatening.

[DisplacedCornellian]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

Atheists sure as heck don't approve of it. They're trying to get the government to establish their religion.

You've taken it up to another level these days. I mean...you've gone to plaid. Kudos.

[joecct]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

Poly marriage could be legalized by a state legislature, but the courts have not ruled that there is a Constitutional right to poly marriage and I seriously doubt that they will within the next 50 years. The vast majority of people who support gay marriage do not support poly marriage, and that is a perfectly consistent, perfectly legal position. Pouting in the corner going, "but why? but why? but why?" just makes you look like a 3-year-old. Stop it.

You don't like me, and, frankly, I don't like you. But I have not put you on ignore - yet.

But let me ask you a question or two based on your post. You'd be OK with a legislative solution to poly as opposed to the courts? I seems you are staking out a position 180 degrees from your stated position on SSM. Or have I misinterpreted?

[Rover]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

They haven't gone after professional athletes, have they?

Hey, you can't legislate every eventuality.

[LynahFan]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

You don't like me, and, frankly, I don't like you. But I have not put you on ignore - yet.

But let me ask you a question or two based on your post. You'd be OK with a legislative solution to poly as opposed to the courts? I seems you are staking out a position 180 degrees from your stated position on SSM. Or have I misinterpreted?

You've misinterpreted. With respect to gay marriage, I was happy each time a state legislature approved gay marriage, just as I was happy when SCOTUS clarified that there is a fundamental right for it nationally. In other words, I would have been just as happy if all 50 legislatures approved it (plus Congress for the districts and territories) as with a SCOTS ruling. With respect to poly marriage, I would be *indifferent* (as opposed to happy) either way - so long as there are no extra benefits handed out to people in poly marriages and we aggressively enforce existing laws on rape, incest, coercion, and abuse. I just don't think there's a large enough proportion of the population that wants a poly arrangement for it to make a hill of beans of difference in the grand scheme of things.

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

This is a great piece.

Money shot:



I finally understand the conservative wailing that gay marriage will "destroy heterosexual marriage." What it really means is, this reframes marriage as something other than the man's protection of and dominion over his wife and kids. That cinematic fantasy that underpins the conservative worldview has just been tossed out as obsolete. That must be truly threatening.

That is a great quote and a great way to understand why so many people have struggled with this issue.

I would like to say that you are definitely not talking about me. I view myself as conservative but then again, I care way more about the fiscal issues than the social issues. I obviously feel more libertarian than anything and worked very hard in the republican party of minnesota to help Ron Paul. Although based on other things you've said, you probably think I'm a wacko just as much as the social conservatives...

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

Is THAT your plan for combating your unintentional celibacy?

Please Rover, the term for them is "incels".

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

This place is hopeless.

Not all. Plenty of them are tolerant, and plenty of them understand that though they have objections in a secular nation they don't get to enact their faith as law.

Behind the front line of noisy self-appointed martyrs, most Christians understand and approve of separation of church and state.

You're right. I blame that on reading too much Freerepublic. It's not good for the soul.

Some Christians need to learn that intolerance of their intolerance is neither hypocrisy, nor "persecution". Better?

Atheists sure as heck don't approve of it. They're trying to get the government to establish their religion.

Atheism and agnosticism are not religions. Try again.

[Kepler]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

I obviously feel more libertarian than anything and worked very hard in the republican party of minnesota to help Ron Paul. Although based on other things you've said, you probably think I'm a wacko just as much as the social conservatives...

Fiscal conservatives aren't wackjobs, they're just laboring under the misconception that because a car is designed to move forward it shouldn't also have brakes.

I actually think there's a bit of truth to the joke. To me, libertarianism is what comes of reading only one book (taking for granted that most libertarians have read many books, but all those books are the same book). Libertarians read Hazlitt or Rothbard or, if they're really smart, von Mises, and they notice the huge gap of thought between those authors and naive fiscal liberalism, and so they think they've ascended the mountain and are looking down on the liberals below mired in ignorance.

What they don't realize is behind them is another even steeper mountain, (that second road begins, delightfully ironically, with Hayek, who is utterly misunderstood by libertarians, and goes right through Adam Smith) and at the top of that mountain of knowledge one is back at liberalism, sophisticated this time. Conservatives continually assign the motives and thinking of naive liberals to sophisticated liberals, and thus never speak to the real issues.

But the smart ones get there eventually, this recovered fiscal conservative can promise you.

There is, of course, probably another mountain path in turn behind them, leading to some sort of anarcho-syndicalist temple where you sip tea with Noam Chomsky, but I haven't ascended that yet...

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

Fiscal conservatives aren't wackjobs, they're just laboring under the misconception that because a car is designed to move forward it shouldn't also have brakes.

Just because you believe a car should have brakes doesn't mean they should be used for the sake of being used.

[geezer]

Re: The Power of the SCOTUS Part VII - The Bedrock of the Republic!

This is a great piece.

Money shot:



I finally understand the conservative wailing that gay marriage will "destroy heterosexual marriage." What it really means is, this reframes marriage as something other than the man's protection of and dominion over his wife and kids. That cinematic fantasy that underpins the conservative worldview has just been tossed out as obsolete. That must be truly threatening.

I don't buy the bit about "female submission." It's probably true of a tiny fraction of society, but given that the whole "man's dominion" paradigm was left for dead at least a generation ago, I'd say most of the wailing is just a basic fear of dramatic/rapid change. The fear is of, "how will I be perceived and interact in this revamped society? Will others no longer see my commitment to wife and kids as a sacred thing?" Change is temporarily unsettling, but will settle quickly.