No on CA Prop 8

[tongodeon]

I never thought that Sarah Palin would end up being my spokesperson against Proposition 8, but that was one aspect of the vice presidential debate that genuinely surprised me.

PALIN: ... no one would ever propose, not in a McCain-Palin administration, to do anything to prohibit, say, visitations in a hospital or contracts being signed, negotiated

Comments

[jwgh]

I thought Palin was being kind of disingenuous. Biden speaks of actively making sure that same-sex couples have the same rights as married couples, where Palin speaks of inactively not doing anything to prohibit same. Since legally non-married couples don't currently have those rights, the latter is much weaker than the former.

Also I thought this was odd: "But I also want to clarify, if there's any kind of suggestion at all from my answer that I would be anything but tolerant of adults in America choosing their partners, choosing relationships that they deem best for themselves, you know, I am tolerant and I have a very diverse family and group of friends ..." (at this point I thought she was going say something along the lines that some of her best friends are gay) "... and even within that group you would see some who may not agree with me on this issue, some very dear friends who don't agree with me on this issue." (Oh.)

[tongodeon]

Obviously Palin isn't as excited about granting homosexual couples full legal equality as Biden is. And that's OK - she doesn't have to be happy about it, she just has to do it.

I took her non-clarifying "clarification" as a variant of something I hear from racially intolerant people all the time. "The negroes are OK I guess, but I know some people who don't think so, and I still wouldn't want my daughter to marry one." She can have all the personal preferences she wants as long as she's not talking about actually depriving anyone of their legal rights.

Prop 8 deprives homosexuals of their legal rights, and the official position of even someone like Sarah Palin is to reluctantly and grudgingly oppose this.

[mountmccabe]

I don't think everyone is as close as you suggest, partially because I don't take Sarah Palin at her word. (Or, at least, I don't think she meant what she said how I would take what she said.)

I find it interesting that (from that wikipedia page you linked) John McCain supports Prop 8 and Barack Obama opposes it, even though he has said that he, personally, believes that marriage should be between a man and a woman. There is still a significant gulf between these two viewpoints.

A large part of it is, however, a semantic argument but I don't know that that helps matters much. Marriage is too loaded of a word; Christians have assimilated the practice and (many) act like they invented it.

[mountmccabe]

Also, as you may well be aware, Arizona voters actually went against a similar ballot prop in 2006, 107.

The language for 107 was, however, stronger:

"To preserve and protect marriage in this state, only a union between one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage by this state or its political subdivisions and no legal status for unmarried persons shall be created or recognized by this state or its political subdivisions that is similar to that of marriage."

So, basically, it failed because it entirely ruled out civil unions and domestic partnerships. The City of Tucson offers (and has since Dec 1, 2003) domestic partnerships which would have become unconstitutional had 107 passed.

They're trying again in 2008, with Prop 102. As far as I can tell this is 107 minus the stronger, bolded portion.

John McCain, of course, supports this. This is unsurprising because he even supported 107. Talking about it at the time he seemed to have an extremely nuanced position on the matter; while he wasn't against civil

[phlegm_noir]

PALIN: Your question to him was whether he supported gay marriage and my answer is the same as his and it is that I do not.

I hope your interpretation of Palin is right and mine is wrong, but I thought she was ignoring the question completely and saying "I do not [support gay marriage]." Whether she supports the full list of civil rights wasn't clear.

[kat89]

If this proposition fails, children will be taught as early as age 5 in public schools about gay marriage. Society will force us to accept it. I don't think that's ok :)

[tongodeon]

If this proposition fails, children will be taught as early as age 5 in public schools about gay marriage.

There is not one single word in the text of prop 8 about education. Proposition 8 has nothing to do with schools or children of any age.

Whether or not Prop 8 passes, children are currently prevented and will continue to be prevented from being taught about any kind of marriage (including gay marriage) because California law prohibits children from being taught anything related to health or family issues without parental permission.

Society will force us to accept it.I don't even know what this sentence means. If you told me "society will force us to eat a waffle" I would at least have a vague understanding of what that's about: a police officer shows up at your house one day with a lawyer, a waffle, and some paperwork. And he makes you eat the waffle. But how can anyone force you to "accept" anything? What does that even mean? How could anyone figure out that you don't accept gay marriage, let alone force you to change

kat89 your info is incorrect

[bradwillis]

kat89, I don't know you and you don't know me, so let me start by telling you a little about myself. I'm a friend of 'tongodeon'. I'm gay. I'm a volunteer for the No on 8 campaign. And for four years I worked in the California public school system in the city of South San Francisco

[elfwreck]

(Came here from a friend-of-a-friend link)

*blink*

There are currently same-sex marriages in California. Thousands of them. At what age do you think children should be told these exist?

In California, first cousins can marry, and some do. Sixteen year old girls can marry 45 year old men. At what age do you think children should be told they have these option?

I don't expect any of those details to be part of the standard kindergarten curriculum.

I suppose it's possible that a 5-year-old might see a gay couple at school, picking up their child, and say, "TEACHER!! Those two men kissed!" At which point, the teacher might say, "maybe they're married." Would you prefer children got used to the idea of unmarried people kissing each other in public?