North Carolina Passes Amendment Banning Same-sex Unions

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

If this was a tiny minority, laws wouldn't be passed to prevent marriage.

Marriage pre-dates Christianity, Islam and probably almost all current religions. They should not assume they have ownership of it. They have their views, which thankfully are not shared by all.

At no time in history has "marriage" meant anything other than "one man, one woman" even in cultures that allowed Polygamy the man contracted separate marriages with each wife and could dissolve each contract separately.

I will not claim to be an expert on all marriage law across time, but no culture I have studied allows for "marriage" between two people of the same gender - including the Christian cultures which allowed explicitly sexual same-gender unions.

This is why American marriage-law is so vague, it assumes that the gender question is not up for debate because it would not have occurred to American jurists 200 years ago that two men might even want to get married.

No, it's about forcing your own way of life on other people. It's about a complete lack of respect for other people.

In essence, it is the notion that "I know what works best and everyone else should behave like I do".

How is it any less of an imposition to change the definition of marriage to something some people don't agree with?

Lets not pretend this is a question of "freedom", this is about which social paradigm is dominant and which will be suppressed. Currently we have a highly individualistic paradigm in the ascendancy which values individual choice over corporate well being or communal structures.

That does not make it necessarily the right paradigm, just the one preferred by a general majority - though not a local majority in every case, as we see here.

[Fragony]

At no time in history has "marriage" meant anything other than "one man, one woman" even in cultures that allowed Polygamy the man contracted separate marriages with each wife and could dissolve each contract separately.

I will not claim to be an expert on all marriage law across time, but no culture I have studied allows for "marriage" between two people of the same gender - including the Christian cultures which allowed explicitly sexual same-gender unions.

This is why American marriage-law is so vague, it assumes that the gender question is not up for debate because it would not have occurred to American jurists 200 years ago that two men might even want to get married.



How is it any less of an imposition to change the definition of marriage to something some people don't agree with?

Lets not pretend this is a question of "freedom", this is about which social paradigm is dominant and which will be suppressed. Currently we have a highly individualistic paradigm in the ascendancy which values individual choice over corporate well being or communal structures.

That does not make it necessarily the right paradigm, just the one preferred by a general majority - though not a local majority in every case, as we see here.

Perfectly valid point. I don't agree with not allowing gays to marry (anymore) but I can understand the argumentation