14 July 2004

Been reading about the Amendment to the Constitution debate going on... and although you didn't ask, I thought I would tell you what I think of the issue.

I am not for "Gay Marriage."

Marriage is basically a heterosexual institution and giving non-heterosexuals access, will not make them heterosexual, nor will it make them more accepted.

Marriage has too many religious connotations even though at it's beginning it was largely an issue of State. Marriages in church at first only occurred in arranged marriages between established houses or royal families, for political reasons. Commoners did not need nor ask for a church ceremony to live with their chosen and declare him or her their spouse. "Common" marriages in church are a relatively recent phenomenon (3-400 years), when the commoners started copying the upper classes. ("Common law wives and husbands" were standard issue for most of our collective history).

I do believe that any citizen of a democratic republic should have the right to associate themselves in partnership with whomever they like (of consenting legal age, as is the case with marriage today) and that there should be no legal difference, financial benefit/deficit, nor question of legitimacy or lack thereof between unions of heteros or homos.

Democracy is where the rights of the minority are protected by the majority (well, at least by the Constitution), NOT where the majority forces the minority to be and act like them.

As long as I am not harming anyone else in my actions, as long as my desire to legally join myself to someone else (of the same sex) is an integral part of my pursuit of my own personal happinness (dites fulfillment) (is in line with my own personal world view) and is a part of my religious beliefs (which I am guaranteed to practice free of coersion and free from any State Religion), I have the legal right to any benefits thereof that any other citizen has and their acceptance/understanding or lack thereof is completely and utterly irrelevant to my fundamental rights.

Local and State governments can and do legislate "morality," but the Constitution does not, and what is does do is guarantee my rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happinness, even if what I have the right to do is unpopular with others. That's why the Constitution exists.

Sean