The Religious Right
I’ve spoken out against the intolerant atheists on more than one occasion. This may lead one to think that I side with the Religious Right.
That would be an incorrect assumption. Both the Liberals and the Conservatives, at this point in American politics, are collectivist. They both want to impose morality on the individual. To describe either side as “laissez faire” would be dishonest.
Nowhere is this more evident than in the Conservative opposition to gay marriage. By what right does anybody have to employ the force of the government to prevent gay people from marrying? I’m not gay, and I don’t particularly think marriage is a brilliant idea either. But it’s none of my business who marries whom.
Not only do we not have the right to prevent gay marriage, but the very prevention of it is a violation of their rights.
Yes, I am aware that it is not just the Religious Right that opposes gay marriage. Many non-theistic people oppose gay marriage. Even in Japan, which is almost entirely Buddhist in name and agnostic in practice, opposition to gay marriage is strong. (Gay couples here go to Australia to marry, and the marriages are not recognized in Japan.)
So if not religion, what is the root cause of this intolerance? I think it’s obvious that the collectivism of democracy itself is the cause. When a majority is thought to have a moral authority, by mere virtue of its numbers, the inevitable result is the denial of individual liberty.
The table needs to be cleared. All laws need to be re-examined, and if they do not meet the criteria of actual necessity to prevent physical harm, then they are abusive laws.
The US, and governments in general, have a long history of imposing majority morality on the minority. Prohibition, anti-pornography laws, censorship, etc.
As I said in my last post, morality is not a proper foundation for legislation. The social contract ought to serve that purpose, and the nature of the social contract itself would deny the legitimacy of many of our current, morality based laws.
February 5th, 2008 at 2:51 am
You could also look at history and see whenever the majority’s morality is forced, by law, on others more often then not more problems arise as a result within that society. The laws based in the majority’s morality, which are trying to fix a “problem”, lead to the creation of more “problems.” It’s an idiotic cycle that seems to have no end. I agree all laws should be re-examined, but I wonder if this is to idealistic. It seems hard to believe this could ever happen.
February 5th, 2008 at 8:33 am
I think this is the same way they treated the idea of democracy back in the day of Hobbes. I don’t think there will be peace - true, lasting peace - until political thought evolves to the next stage.
Just my .02
February 5th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
Yea you’re probably right & I think in a similar fashion. I guess it’s just hard to anticipate that evolution of political thought taking place, when current thought seems so far removed from where it needs to go.
February 5th, 2008 at 3:49 pm
John Scott for President, 2012.
February 6th, 2008 at 12:29 am
we need to form the individualist party & raise lots-o-cash.
February 6th, 2008 at 9:56 am
I appoint thee National Director in Charge of Money Raising.
February 8th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
For starters I think we open up a bag of worm to let gays marry. Let’s start with those just looking to get certain government benefits (tax breaks, welfare, list goes on) and simply get the paper in the courthouse to get the cuts. Now, looking further, it’s already been said time and time again that marriage is between 1 man and 1 woman. If gays can get married, can a guy and his dog, a man and 5 wives…where do you draw the line.
I’m of the firm belief that the marriage should be looked upon as a religious joining, otherwise, what is it? If the only reason you are attaching the ‘married’ label to your relationship is to get benefits, then NO, you shouldn’t be allowed to be married unless it is 1 man and 1 woman. Maybe they should move to Sodom to be recognized as a couple and get gay benefits.
February 9th, 2008 at 12:47 am
A guy should only be allowed to marry his dog if it exhibits near-human type
characteristics. I know a chap whose dog could vocalise the word “sausages”
on command.
February 9th, 2008 at 2:06 pm
cldnails,
Your spiel about gays marrying to take advantage of welfare benefits and tax
breaks sounds mean, small minded and prejudiced. Why would they be any
more likely than hetero’s to marry for these reasons?
Limiting the partnership contract to two persons of whatever gender looks like
the most acceptable option, given that it conforms to the current model of the
law that applies to hetero’s and that no one is really asking for the legal right
to marry a football team, pet hamster or whatever. Multiple relationships can
and are pursued outside marriage by those of an unfaithful or liberated
persuasion but that is entirely their own business and falls outside the scope of
what is being proposed.
Move to Sodom, huh. You’re sarcastic reference to a Biblical myth that depicts
God viewing gays in a negative light shows that you obviously attach some
credence to the story. I don’t buy it really. A supernatural being with the power
to create the whole universe would not spend his time obsessing over what a
few puny humans do with their dicks in private and visiting his divine version of
Shock and Awe on them. The idea just beggars belief, like the rest of the Bible.
I think the story is more founded in the morbid hygeine fixation of the Jews
who wrote it than anything else.
If God ever really was in the habit of employing his divine WMD’s to target
minority groups, why did he stop doing so? Why isn’t he interrupting Elton John
concerts with awesome displays of destructive firepower during “Benny and the
Jets” as a way of indicating his displeasure at the bewigged muso’s sexual
orientation? Why is there no Biblical acknowledgement of lesbianism? With his
all encompassing knowledge of human nature God would surely have foreseen
their emergence as a minority group worth persecuting and made the
occasional scathing reference or two. Are they okay to proceed with their man
free lifestyle choice or do we have to wait for Bible two to rule on that one?
The lack of a mention seems an odd oversight. Consistency is the least one
would expect from a divine dictator with an all consuming interest in controlling
and directing every aspect of human behaviour. Is he afraid to open himself up
to criticism from our more tolerant society by resuming the
wrath display or does he simply not exist?
More to the point, should our laws and customs be forever determined by this
rubbish or are we big enough to allow change based on how people really
behave and the diverse and individual ways in which they wish to live their
lives?
February 11th, 2008 at 3:05 am
February 11th, 2008 at 2:24 pm
As regards the religious component of the marriage contract: in the absence
of faiths that are comfortable with the idea of homosexuality, there’s nothing
preventing gays from inventing their own religions to sanction their unions.
Mormonism, Raelism and Scientology are all examples of faiths that have been
manufactured by some enterprising upstart to fill new gaps in the market for
irrational beliefs. In a couple of thousand years they will all probably have
millions of adherents and be accorded the same respect as the Big Three
I don’t see any reason why some innovative young gay shouldn’t claim to have
unearthed a couple of golden dildo’s inscribed with ancient texts setting out the
tenets of a new religion. These texts could reveal for instance that the supreme
being is actually a supernatural transvestite who calls himself Jane [although
his real name is Frank].
If the desires and claims of the gay community were framed in this way as
emanating from deeply held religious faith, the movers and shakers in the
political world might be forced to take them more seriously.