Wednesday, July 06, 2011

Exemptions for bigotry? The same-sex marriage slippery slope

George Weigel, writing in National Review on the decision to ensconce same-sex "marriage" in law:
Before the ink was dry on Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s signature on New York’s new marriage law, the New York Times published an editorial decrying the “religious exemptions” that had been written into the marriage law at the last moment. Those exemptions do, in fact, undercut the logic of the entire redefinition of marriage in the New York law — can you imagine any other “exemption for bigotry” being granted, in any other case of what the law declares to be a fundamental right?
Just watch those religious exemptions go away. Fast.

8 comments:

KyCobb said...

Only if the state discriminates against gays can we truly be free. A very Orwellian argument.

Singring said...

What I find particularly entertaining about the NR article is that the author paints this totalitarian, depressing picture of a civil marriage as a precursor to a church marriage. He seems to be unaware that this the norm across most of Europe, for example, where it is completely accepted and just a normal part of becoming married.

Martin Cothran said...

Europe? Where they're "fornicating in the streets"?

KyCobb said...

Martin,

Laws prohibiting interracial marriages have been unconstitutional for 44 years. In accordance with this slippery slope argument, churches opposed to miscegenation should by now be barred from performing marriages. Are churches barred from discriminating against interracial couples who want to marry?

Thomas Aquinas said...

KyCobb:

Marriage is about gender not sexual orientation. A state that states that marriage is between a man and a woman does not bar gays from marrying. In fact, there has never been a sexual orientation test for marriage, ever.

As for interracial marriage bans, it is a flower of the Enlightenment and finds no place in common law. It reaches its height during the beginnings of the eugenics movement and its call for racial purity, something, by the way, embraced by many mainline Protestants, who could not move quick enough to find ways to get on the "science" bandwagon. If you look at the history of such bans--which were NEVER uniform in the U.S., with almost half of the original colonies NOT banning interracial marriage--they were motivated by the belief that because interracial marriages were real marriages, and such real marriages almost always result in mixed-race children, they should be banned. On the other hand, those that oppose same-sex "marriage" do not believe that such "marriages" are real marriages. So, according to their lights, they can't ban same-sex marriage in the same sense that they can't ban square circles. But they can try to prevent the state from pretending such things actually exist. So, those that support marriage believe, and I think correctly, that same-sex "marriage," because it is as much a fiction as "changing your gender" (a form of ghastly mutilation), if supported by the state puts the state in the position of teaching a grand falsehood.

Singring said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Singring said...

'A state that states that marriage is between a man and a woman does not bar gays from marrying. In fact, there has never been a sexual orientation test for marriage, ever.'

By your logic, Thomas, it would be perfectly alright and reasonable for a state to define marriage as marriage between a white man and a white woamn or a black man and a black woman, because that would not prevent whites or blacks from marrying, would it?

So - would you have opposed or do you still oppose interracial marriage?

But hey - let's take your logic even further. Let's say there's a state that defines marriage as between a man or woman and an animal (species is irrelevant - from bacteria to blue whale, anything goes). According to your idea of what constitutes a reasonable marriage law, that would be perfectly fine, because once again - no person would be barred from marrying.

So are you in favour of human/animal weddings? If not, why not?

'As for interracial marriage bans, it is a flower of the Enlightenment and finds no place in common law.'

Oh really?

Then how very strange that, according to you:

'... almost half of the original colonies [did] NOT [ban] interracial marriage...'

So half of the original colonies banned gay marriage - but that's somehow the fault of the Enlightenment? You learn something new every day.

'On the other hand, those that oppose same-sex "marriage" do not believe that such "marriages" are real marriages.'

Why not - what quality is inherent in every heterosexual marriage that cannot be fulfilled in a homosexual marriage?

KyCobb said...

Thomas,

Your post is not responsive to my question. The slippery slope argument is that the Catholic Church is going to be barred from performing marriages recognized by the state of New York because they won't perform same-sex marriages. If the slippery slope argument is valid, then churches opposed to miscegenation should by now have been banned from performing marriages, since state anti-miscegenation laws have been unconstitutional since 1967. Can you or Martin show me any evidence that churches which refuse to marry interracial couples have been barred from performing marriages recognized by the state?