I always put same-sex “marriage” in irony quotes because it’s an absurdity, a joke. In reality, there is no such thing.
Yet so-called same-sex “marriage” is “legal” here in California, and in Massachusetts and New York. Out here, the foolishness was “legalized” in May by an anti-constitutional edict of the state Supreme Court. Our Nov. 4 ballot includes an initiative, Proposition 8, that would amend the California Constitution to ban the absurdity.
I’ve written about this before. But it’s worth going over the matter again in support of Prop. 8.
As my starting point, I’ll look at yesterday’s editorial opposing Prop. 8 by The Orange County Register, where I worked for 19 years. I agree with them that marriage should be removed from the purview of the government and returned to where it was until the recent centuries, with families and religion.
As they write:
In an ideal world, the state would have little or no role in defining or regulating so intimate a relationship as marriage. However, the state has inserted itself into all too many aspects of our private lives.
Given that about 50% of marriages fail, it’s absurd for government to keep “regulating” marriage.
But it’s also outrageous that the government, this organ of immense coercion, forces on us a redefinition of marriage. What it is doing here isn’t just a legal absurdity, but a full-blown assault on yet another area of our lives, this time something that is the essence of the sanctity and privacy of the family.
The Register maintains:
Legal recognition of same-sex marriage does not require those who have a moral objection to homosexuality or homosexual marriage to recognize or approve of it.
Yes, it does. It’s in the tax forms the government forces me to fill out. It’s pushed on us incessantly by politicians, the media, and the powerful entertainment industry. If I ever get married, I’ll have to go to the government to fill out the forms that no longer say “groom,” in my case, but “Partner A” or “Partner B.” Let me emphasize: Under current law, I have no choice. I am forced to subscribe to this absurdity.
The Reg says:
It does not require ministers who have doctrinal or moral objections to perform or bless such marriages.
But will public officials who object to this absurdity be allowed to avoid implementing it? No.
Brainwashing children
The Reg:
And it does not require schools to teach that there is “no difference” between man-woman and same-sex marriages.
Yes it does. Just a year ago, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger — who opposes Prop. 8 — signed into law SB777, which changes Section 200 of the California Education Code to read:
200. It is the policy of the State of California to afford all persons in public schools, regardless of their disability, gender, nationality, race or ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, or any other characteristic that is contained in the definition of hate crimes set forth in Section 422.55 of the Penal Code, equal rights and opportunities in the educational institutions of the state. The purpose of this chapter is to prohibit acts that are contrary to that policy and to provide remedies therefor. [Bold face added.]
With same-sex “marriage” now “legal,” that means, according to SB777, that teaching there is a difference between man-woman marriage and same-sex “marriage” is a hate crime.
The Register’s 2000 position
Despite my calls for them to do so, The Register still hasn’t explained to its readers why they changed their position on this issue from 2000, when they (and I) supported a similar initiative, Prop. 22.
As they put it in 2000:
The ultimate question in Prop. 22 is whether the definition of what constitutes a marriage should remain as it always has been, or whether the door can be opened to same-sex marriages - and by extension to any other sort of arrangements that people might devise.
Fast-forward to 2008, and this is the reasoning behind the new position — basically, it’s the opposite of the 2000 position:
Proponents of Prop. 8 argue that it simply restores “what human history has understood it [marriage]to be.” But marriage has not been a static institution. At one time wives were treated as chattel and had no property rights of their own. Interracial marriage was once banned in California, but that law was overturned as recently as 1948 on similar equal-protection grounds.
This is wrong historically. Whatever marriage was in the past, it always involved persons of the opposite sex. It might have been one man and 50 women, or even incest as among the royal family in ancient Egypt. But, until our recent times of absurdity, it always was between one sex and the other, never between those of the same sex.
It certainly was wrong, for example, for California law to ban interracial marriage. But such marriages, whether banned or legal, always involved a man and a woman.
Let’s go further. The Register writes, “But marriage has not been a static institution.” So does that mean the next step could be approving incestuous marriages? Where does the “dynamic” redefinition of legal marriage end? Will marriage be redefined, as the Register itself warned in 2000, to mean “any other sort of arrangements that people might devise”?
The Register writes:
As our understanding of equal protection has evolved and expanded and as an increasing number of same-sex couples have expressed a desire to make lifelong commitments to one another – incidentally, promoting societal stability and reducing promiscuity – it has become clear that equal protection should be extended to same-sex couples.
A different view comes from Justin Raimondo, an “out” homosexual, libertarian, and editor of Antiwar.com, one of my favorite Web sites. He writes in opposition to same-sex “marriage” being imposed by the government:
Which brings us to the central argument against gay marriage, which is that it is based on a heterosexual model of sexual and emotional relationships, one that just doesn’t fit the gay lifestyle. The whole idea of getting gays hitched is derivative of the central error of egalitarianism, the counterintuitive conception of human beings as being “equal” and, therefore, interchangeable—and therefore one-size-fits-all. Egalitarianism isn’t really a political ideology: it’s a religion, one quite capable of withstanding a sustained assault of clear evidence to the contrary….
With gay marriage comes the inevitable gay divorce—and, believe you me, it’s going to be ugly. If gay activists think that marriage is going to somehow legitimize homosexuality in the eyes of Middle America, then they have yet to imagine the new hit “reality tv” show, “Gay Divorce Court,” which will make the heterosexual version seem like a Sunday School picnic. Indeed, I predict that, given the nature of the male animal, the gay male divorce rate will soon outstrip the rate of new gay male marriages. Gay marriage—in the gay male community, that is—is prone to self-abolition….
The very phrase “gay marriage” is an oxymoron. Homosexuality, after all, is really all about the avoidance of marriage – and the responsibility of raising a family. It is the embrace of sensuality for its own sake, as an instrument of pure pleasure rather than procreation. Do gay guys really want to give up what is most attractive – to males, at any rate – about their recreational activities, the tremendous sense of freedom it implies?
Today’s gay activists are embarked on what is truly a futile mission, to make homosexuality seem “natural.”
Libertarians vs. same-sex “marriage”
Raimondo also is pertinent on why libertarians ought to oppose the government forcing us to accept legal same-sex “marriage”:
A true libertarian position on gay marriage is very simple: libertarians seek to prevent the incursion of the State into private affairs. This means that any libertarian worthy of the name must oppose “legalizing” the very real marriages that do exist in the gay community, albeit not in a form most “straights” would find either familiar or acceptable.
The State, after all, has already made a strenuous and largely successful effort to regulate and intervene in the natural life of families, as well as the relations between women and men—the advent of gay marriage would mean extending the reach of the State over the private lives of individuals. Surely no libertarian could agree to such a thing, and would certainly do everything to oppose it.
Yet all sorts of alleged “libertarians” and fellow travelers simply assume that support for gay marriage—and, indeed, for the homosexual lifestyle—is a central principle of libertarianism. It simply isn’t so.
Conclusion
The Register and I agree that we should get government out of our lives, especially marriages, as much as possible. Then it does not follow that the government should be allowed to redefine marriage, on the whim of four state Supreme Court barrators, into something it never has been and — in a metaphysical sense — never can be.
The 4-3 decision also means that one vote decided the matter. That means just one person was the deciding factor in imposing this tyranny — over language, morals, and family — over 37 million Californians. This is the very definition of totalitarianism.
The tyrannical California Supreme Court needs to be rebuked over its statist attempt to redefine something that should not even be in its purview: marriage.
Vote Yes on Prop. 8.
The 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution supposedly abolished slavery in America.
Dr. Fleming includes a useful discussion of the difference between a democracy and a republic, which I will leave to the print edition because our state flag says we are the “
But the earthquake struck 
Anything else really is a joke, like in the classic comedy “Some Like it Hot.” Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon dress up like girls to avoid the mob — but they both want Marilyn (who wouldn’t?).
As Nietzsche 
The Register has adopted Sartre’s existentialist philosophy of the absurd. About.com 
Wikipedia 
As Groucho 
Posts
