Exactly how does Prop 8 PROTECT marriage?
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"Fidelity": Don't Divorce... from Courage Campaign on Vimeo.
I'm not seeing a lot of protection going on from Prop 8. Threatening, invalidating, cheapening, limiting, preventing, those things Prop 8 has accomplished. But not protection. Not by a long shot.
Murder, theft, fraud, rape, assault, all of those crimes come back to those basic rights. Then we get to politeness laws, ones that make it easier to live in a society of so many: traffic laws, public drunkenness, noise ordinances, etc, which sometimes carry a jail time consequence but mostly carry fines. Things like sodomy laws, anti-gay laws, anti-polygamy laws, and their ilk are attempts to legislate morality according to the morals of some (but not all) religions. Those, in my opinion, have no place on the books. As I've said before, I don't care if a dude is buggering the brains out of five men and eight women, as long as it's all consensual. If it's not, it's the *rape* that should be illegal, not the orgy.
I think part of the debate over drug offenses is whether or not they truly violate any part of "life, liberty and pursuit of happiness", since subsequent crimes about/under the influence of drugs (beatings, robberies, manslaughter, etc) are already considered offenses.
But, as you point out, that is where *I* draw the line. Others draw the line based on their Bibles, which usually say that a whole fuck of a lot more should be illegal than I do. Personally, I don't think the Bible should have any influence in lawmaking, as that violates the "no advancing or inhibiting religion" prong of the Lemon Test regarding separation of church and state. If we need a text to guide us, we have the Declaration of Independence.
As I've said, I see nothing wrong with individuals imposing strict rules from their Bibles upon themselves and/or their private organizations. I'm cool with the Amish and the Mennonites. Restricted enrollment and employment in private religious schools is fine by me - it's not fair, but they don't have to be. I take issue with individuals trying to impose strict rules from their Bibles on everyone else through establishing state or federal legislation. That crosses the line. Not just my line, the Supreme Court's line. The separation of church and state line.
Certainly, our government isn't perfect at promoting equality despite the cries of the hysterical majority, nor is it always awesome at respecting the separation of church and state. DOMA is a fucking travesty and should be repealed. "Don't ask, don't tell" is the same. But, Obama has stated that he'll pursue ending "don't ask, don't tell", and DOMA is being challenged. It's our slow and imperfect system, and maybe I'm just naive enough to expect it to eventually work in favor of equality and the ideals it began with.
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