[Vision2020] Re: The definitive bottom line on "gay marriage"......

[Chasuk]

On 5/19/06, ToeKneeTime at aol.com <ToeKneeTime at aol.com> wrote:

> Marriage has always been a profound and binding social contract.  To allow
> anyone to marry when they have no need to do so, when the contract was not
> initially conceived with them in mind, would be to lower the uniqueness of
> marriage to the point of irrelevancy.

I know you probably believe everything that you wrote in the paragraph
above.  For you, it is undoubtedly true.  That's the problem, from my
perspective.  Your answer, although sincere, reads like an excuse
instead of a reason, a justification instead of ratiocination.

Democracy is wonderful.  It currently extends to those with property
and those without property, to men as well as to women, to Caucasians
as well as to non-Caucasians.  Today, it is nearly all-encompassing,
but that wasn't true until modern times.  In these modern times,
democracy needs to be extended to include even more of those men and
women whom our Founding Fathers were happy to marginalize.

I understand that change is frightening and that it can leave one
feeling insecure.  However, I am not in sympathy with those who use
fear of change to curtail progress.

Britney Spears was married for 55 hours in a publicity stunt.  Mickey
Rooney has been married eight times.  Zsa Zsa Gabor has been married
nine times.  Elizabeth Taylor has been married eight times to seven
husbands.  I agree that marriage is a profound and binding social
contract (I've been married to the same woman for 25 years), but I
also believe that the law should be blind.  What's allowed for Mickey
and Zsa Zsa should be allowed for all citizens.

> If we allow those engaged in unnatural and unhealthy pairings to marry, what
> would prevent someone from demanding the right to marry their sister or
> their cocker spaniel?

Slippery slope arguments are always sloppy.  They have been
effectively refuted so frequently that I will just provide a link to
one of the more able refutations.

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/slippery-slope.html

Cheers,

Chas