Chick-fil-A PR goes Rogue

We - and most of the rest of the world - live in a society in which marriage has historically, for a mixture of moral and practical civic reasons, been encouraged and protected by a wide variety of benefits other people have already listed. Heterosexual couples have the "right" to marriage licenses for the same reason they have the "right" to get a license to drive a car or open a business. If you need the basic social civics of this explained further, I am honestly not sure where to go. The question is phrased in an obtuse fashion and I have no idea what point you're trying to make with it.

Gay people would like the right to get a marriage license in every state, much like they have the right to try to get a driver's license. Some people think they should not be allowed to do this because, in addition to moral objections based in their interpretation of religious scripture (and some people who just don't like teh gais), it is outside the historical norms of marriage in America as it's been legally codified. Some people think they should be allowed to do this because their relationships are worth equal treatment and recognition, and the way we've historically codified marriage should be broadened to recognize these unions.

This is the gay marriage debate in as simple terms as I know how to explain it, as written as I would explain it to an alien unfamiliar with the coupling practices of our strange, blue, oxygen-breathing planet.

 

Explain what that means?
What are you insinuating? In that piece I am critical of people who do certain things
in the name of being "Christian." People that want to legislate their neighbor and not love them.
Like people who want abortion illegal but do not want to help a pregnant
teenager that doesn't see other options. That piece actually demonstrates
that I try to be fair and criticize both sides when warranted. Maybe instead
of insinuating, you could just come out and say what you're getting at?
Still waiting for anything substantive from you, LongTimeListener, et al.
You guys are long on obfuscation and name calling, very short on actual debate...

 

Guys, you need to understand that jaydaum is crazy. Not "ah you're crazy," but take-your-meds, mom-worries-about-you-every-day crazy. He's an Internet ranter who just loves having an audience anywhere he can find one. And to get that audience he will be very hannityesque in creating questions that aren't questions. In this case he is arguing that sexual orientation isn't a protected class like race, creed, gender or disability, leaving aside that those groups themselves weren't protected classes (except creed) until people decided to protect them.

You won't win, you will only get dragged further into the muck.

 

What exactly is "obtuse" about the question,
Why does anybody have a right to a state issued marriage license?

Maybe you, and "the rest of the world" should take a look at current marriage law/statistics.
For starters, I wouldn't invoke "the rest of the world" because much of the rest of the world
doesn't need/want a government issued license. Secondly, heterosexual people are getting
married less and less and when they do, their marriage ends in divorce more and more.
FWIW, I am not even against gay marriage or civil unions. You want "gay marriage,"
you can have it. You can also have "gay divorce" and "gay child support."

I've simply been asking how anyone has a right to a marriage license and I guess the
answer is "because I think so! You idiot!"

 

OK, you're crazy. And you are right. At least as far as State actions are concerned. The 14th A. of the Constitution provides that "no state shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of its laws." So whenever a state law treats people differently based on some classification or membership in some group, there is a question whether it violates equal protection. In most cases, though, it's really easy for a legislature to get away with classifications - all that needs to be shown is some rational basis that could explain the different treatment. The Supreme Court provides more protection to what it callls "suspect classes" - race, national origin, religion - in which case they apply strict scrutiny and it is much harder for a state to defend its laws. I do not believe that sex or sexual orientation have been held to be suspect classes for purposes of a due process analysis. Back when I was but a child, there was a movement to get an Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution ratified which would have extended protection from discrimination to women but not enough (I don't know how many, if any, for that matter) states ratified the amendment.

In addition to the constitutional protection from state discriminatory classification, there are federal and state laws that prohibit various types of discrimanatory actions by private citizens. These laws sometimes do include sexual orientation - such as the law that the wedding photographers in New Mexico ran up against. These laws are enacted because of lots of people who are crazy like M.C. and think that there shouldn't be any discrimination against anybody even if it isn't in the constitution.

 

And folks, this is LongTimeListener's craven, intellectually dishonest go to move.
He peddles in ad hominem and when gets called on to actually back up a single
accusation, he piously says, "I won't lower myself." Feel free to go back through past threads
and see him in action. He can't make arguments, he only calls names and then runs
and hides. I'll let readers decide if I am crazy or a ranter or whatnot. I welcome
a rigorous exchange of ideas, unfortunately, ShortTime has never provided me with any...

 

http://www.chattanoogan.com/2008/4/18/126156/What-Should-We-Do-With-The-Word.aspx

For a person to be described as "Christian" in 2008 is to simultaneously be described as everything and nothing at all.

That's who you're arguing with, folks.

 

I'm not sure what you are trying to prove with this besides that you can use google. Bravo!
Here's the whole thing that you and Stitch apparently think is so relevant to this discussion.

Friday, April 18, 2008
For a person to be described as a "Christian" in 2008 is to be simultaneously described as everything and nothing at all. The term "Christian" may mean this or that but it is in danger of having its meaning nothing, or worse, meaning all the wrong things. The term itself is perfectly clear and profound in its denotation. It is the connotations of the word "Christian" that concern me. The decidedly negative accretions that have metastasized in the very root of the word have unfortunately forced what is true and noble and mysterious out of the word and onto the margin.So what does it mean to be a Christian?

Is it the "Christian" prostituting Christ in their television ministry, stealing money from the poor and the sick that are desperate enough to try to buy a miracle?

Is it the "Christian" who seems uninterested and unable to see Christ in the face of the poor and the hungry and the homeless?

Is it the dear sweet "Christian" old ladies with their mean pinched faces, gossiping about the "sinners" in their midst, unmoved to try to help them?

Is it the "Christian" reveling in his hatred of the "sinner" and hoping for that "sinner" to be an object of God's wrath and not a recipient of God's grace and mercy?

Is it the "Christian" festooned with "Christian" t-shirts and necklaces and WWJD bracelets and "Christian" bumper stickers, indifferent to the manner in which they are trivializing and commodifying Christ with their "Christian" coffee mugs? Got Jesus?

Is it the "Christian" isolating himself from the culture he is called to redeem who will insolate himself from all that "worldliness" and so only engages "Christian" books and music and sports leagues and "Christian" schools?

And what of the "Christian" whose version of the Kingdom of God is to elect all the right politicians to legislate their neighbor instead of doing the difficult work of loving their neighbor?

And what of the "Christian" who can barely fight back his smile as he reads of tsunamis and hurricanes and turmoil in the Middle East in his morning paper, thrilled at these signs that the apocalypse is upon us and it is time to be raptured out of here?

And what of the "Christian" caught in the dreamy swoon of his love affair with the fetus and the stem cell but who is indifferent to the pregnant teenage girl and the diseased patient?

And lastly, what of the "Christian" fighting all the wrong battles, expending energy and efforts trying to put "Christ" back into Christmas but who is unwilling to take up the challenge to put "Christ" back into their Christianity?

I am curious about the future of the word Christian. It seems it can only gain back its former usefulness if we are willing to excavate the layers of anti-intellectualism, American consumerism, the layers of end times hysteria, the thick strata of reactionary cultural isolation and compassionless self interest. Can we peal all of this away and discover again the 1st century Galilean? Can we allow Christ to redeem the word "Christian" as we allow him to redeem us? Otherwise, we might need to jettison the word altogether.

 

Wow, Stitch and LongTime... you guys really schooled me!

Now show how that is relevant to the discussion at hand [Stitch]
and show how this demonstrates that I am crazy [LongTime].

I can't wait....

 

The question is obtuse because it's indistinct and you seem to be angling for something beyond what the actual question asks for.

Why do couples in America have the right to obtain marriage licenses?

Because they do. Seriously. I have no answer beyond this. Why can't I stroll down to Target and shop-lift? Because it's illegal and I can't. There are practical and ethical reasons why I can't but, "Why do business owners have the right not to have their stuff stolen?" is not the way to get at them. Because...they have that right and it's legally protected, and they just do.

The answer actually is, "Because that's how marriage works in our society, and every heterosexual couple can obtain this if they so choose, and this right is legally codified in statute and precedent."

I don't think any answer beyond this is possible, unless the answer you're looking for is something different entirely.

I'm being over-literal, but the obtuse quality of the question rests in its literalness.

I mean, are you seriously debating the idea that heterosexual couples have the right to get a marriage license, and do you somehow think this doesn't grant very real legal protections in many areas of their lives? That they also have the right not to, or might get divorced one day after they've exercised this right, really isn't the point. I'm not a gun owner, but I've got the legal right to go get one if I want to (not trying to start a gun control debate, I can go get a basic handgun pretty much anywhere, subject to varying regulations). I have a right to drive if I can obtain licensure, which I've had since I was legally elligible to get it when I was 16. There are no air-quotes around my ability to do these things, they are not obscure moral constructs that are open to interpretation. They are legal, protected rights in American society - and many other places - and I am honestly perplexed by the idea that marriage isn't a civic right. It just...is.

I certainly don't think the right to get married in a particular chruch is a right but (a) a marriage license isn't a religious document, it's a civil government one and (b) that was not the obtuse question in...question.

 

That will at least serve as a start J-School. I guess what I am getting at is this:
I haven't read anything yet that convinces me that ANYBODY has a "right" to a marriage license.
They are there and available from the state if you want one for personal or financial reasons.
There are certain requirements to get one. If those requirements need to be changed,
let's have the public discourse, lobby, vote and live with the results. I'm not sure that
this state-issued-marriage-license-discrimination against a same-sex couple belongs
in the same context as blacks being chattel; which is where it has been for 20 pages of thread.

And people saying things like "nobody should be discriminated against for anything,"
while that is well-intentioned and rhetorically powerful perhaps, it don't really amount to much
beyond sentimentality.

 

You haven't yet made a point, so I don't really see that you're capable of a "rigorous exchange of ideas." Rather, you've done just what LTL suggested: Noted that federal law does not yet protect gays and lesbians against discrimination under the standard of "strict scrutiny," as it does for blacks, or even "heightened scrutiny" as has been the case for women since the 1970s. So fucking what? That's part of the reason it's becoming a larger and larger civil rights issue.

As I noted above, no fewer than five federal courts have ruled Rule 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act to be unconstitutional under the equal protections clause and the Justice Department has stopped defending DOM Rule 3, too, believes it is unconstitutional. The Justice Department, in fact, in abandoning its defense of the Rule 3, suggested that federal courts should begin to consider discrimination against gays and lesbians under "heightened scrutiny" standards. The Supreme Court will eventually rule.