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Prop. 8 and stuff like that
Like most of my friends-list, I'm deeply disappointed (although not entirely surprised) that California's Proposition 8 seems to have passed. Yes, there are absentee and provisional ballots yet to be counted, but the current margin is half a million votes, a gap which is extremely unlikely to be made up.
As I see it, the Left has approached this whole thing wrong: "let's see if we can force morality and decency down the throats of the Religious Right." Which makes it your morality-and-decency against my morality-and-decency, with no room for compromise; whichever one is slightly more popular will win, and the other will lose. We shouldn't be surprised if "leave things as they have been all of our lives, and our parents' lives, and so on back a few thousand years" wins that contest; the remarkable thing is that it's only slightly more popular.
Apparent digression (but not really):
I've sometimes marveled at how the Corporate Republican Party apparently won't rest while any semblance of nature and wilderness, any non-renewable natural resource, remains un-developed: they feel compelled to destroy beautiful things as fast as possible before the Democrats get back into power and protect them again. They'll steal places that should be held in sacred trust for all people and all time, and despoil them for their own corporate profit, because they don't respect those places.
Now let's switch political backgrounds. I've sometimes marveled at how the Perverted Democratic Party apparently won't rest while any symbol of wholesomeness and morality remains un-polluted: they feel compelled to destroy beautiful things as fast as possible before the Republicans get back into power and protect them again. They'll steal words and institutions that should be held in sacred trust for all people and all time, and despoil them for their own perverted kicks, because they don't respect those words and institutions.
It's the exact same emotional response, and it explains why the Religious Right has been not only fighting this tooth and nail but getting a reasonable amount of support from the mainstream. (I can of course come up with all sorts of rational arguments that the two situations are not analogous, but rationality isn't relevant here.)
If we want to drive a wedge between the Religious Right and the "mainstream" on this issue, I think a much better answer is to separate church and state: let each religion apply its own definition of "marriage", and have government no longer perform or recognize marriages at all. If you want to be married in the eyes of God, have a marriage ceremony in the church of your choice. If you want your commitment to be recognized by the State, have a civil union according to the State's rules. If you want both, have both. Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, and unto God that which is God's.
(BTW, there's nothing wrong with the State authorizing a clergyperson to perform a civil union at the same time as a marriage, more or less as they do now: the words "By the power vested in me by the State of XYZ, I now pronounce you husband and wife" would simply become "By the power vested in me by the State of XYZ, I now pronounce you united.")
This way we're not "attacking" anybody's deeply-held notion of marriage, nor forcing anyone to "accept" marriages that they sincerely believe are immoral or at least unnatural. Whatever you believe marriage is, you're welcome to join a church that believes the same thing, and God bless you for it. Just don't expect the government to give any special recognition to your church's (or any other church's) notion of marriage. The State will develop and apply its own standards for "legally binding personal commitment between competent adults," according to the State's legitimate interests.
Of course, it would take a while to figure out what are the State's legitimate interests in recognizing personal commitments between competent adults. I don't see any obvious justification for a male/female criterion... or a "having sex" criterion... or an "only two" criterion....
As I see it, the Left has approached this whole thing wrong: "let's see if we can force morality and decency down the throats of the Religious Right." Which makes it your morality-and-decency against my morality-and-decency, with no room for compromise; whichever one is slightly more popular will win, and the other will lose. We shouldn't be surprised if "leave things as they have been all of our lives, and our parents' lives, and so on back a few thousand years" wins that contest; the remarkable thing is that it's only slightly more popular.
Apparent digression (but not really):
I've sometimes marveled at how the Corporate Republican Party apparently won't rest while any semblance of nature and wilderness, any non-renewable natural resource, remains un-developed: they feel compelled to destroy beautiful things as fast as possible before the Democrats get back into power and protect them again. They'll steal places that should be held in sacred trust for all people and all time, and despoil them for their own corporate profit, because they don't respect those places.
Now let's switch political backgrounds. I've sometimes marveled at how the Perverted Democratic Party apparently won't rest while any symbol of wholesomeness and morality remains un-polluted: they feel compelled to destroy beautiful things as fast as possible before the Republicans get back into power and protect them again. They'll steal words and institutions that should be held in sacred trust for all people and all time, and despoil them for their own perverted kicks, because they don't respect those words and institutions.
It's the exact same emotional response, and it explains why the Religious Right has been not only fighting this tooth and nail but getting a reasonable amount of support from the mainstream. (I can of course come up with all sorts of rational arguments that the two situations are not analogous, but rationality isn't relevant here.)
If we want to drive a wedge between the Religious Right and the "mainstream" on this issue, I think a much better answer is to separate church and state: let each religion apply its own definition of "marriage", and have government no longer perform or recognize marriages at all. If you want to be married in the eyes of God, have a marriage ceremony in the church of your choice. If you want your commitment to be recognized by the State, have a civil union according to the State's rules. If you want both, have both. Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, and unto God that which is God's.
(BTW, there's nothing wrong with the State authorizing a clergyperson to perform a civil union at the same time as a marriage, more or less as they do now: the words "By the power vested in me by the State of XYZ, I now pronounce you husband and wife" would simply become "By the power vested in me by the State of XYZ, I now pronounce you united.")
This way we're not "attacking" anybody's deeply-held notion of marriage, nor forcing anyone to "accept" marriages that they sincerely believe are immoral or at least unnatural. Whatever you believe marriage is, you're welcome to join a church that believes the same thing, and God bless you for it. Just don't expect the government to give any special recognition to your church's (or any other church's) notion of marriage. The State will develop and apply its own standards for "legally binding personal commitment between competent adults," according to the State's legitimate interests.
Of course, it would take a while to figure out what are the State's legitimate interests in recognizing personal commitments between competent adults. I don't see any obvious justification for a male/female criterion... or a "having sex" criterion... or an "only two" criterion....
no subject
Quite likely, on the reasoning that by ceasing to legally recognize marriage, we're removing one of the reasons for people to get married, hence reducing the number of people who do it, which only somebody who hates marriage would do. But that's a risky argument, since it begs the question "if the main/only reason somebody is getting married is for legal recognition, why should they pretend it's a religious ritual? And if not, then they'll still want to do it even without the State getting involved."
We would need to sell it, from the beginning, as a move towards freedom of religion: no longer will the State tell you who can and can't get married, nor whom else you should recognize as married; that will now be a matter of your personal conscience and faith.
I don't want clerics to be able to perform civil unions simultaneously with religious marriages, as they do now.
That was my initial impulse too, but I don't see what harm would arise if the person officiating at a marriage happened to be the same person officiating at a civil union, and those things happened to take place at the same venue and time. I guess your argument is that having even the slightest confusion between the two will lead people back down the slippery slope towards religions trying to influence the State.