Utterly Meaningless

Not to point out the obvious, but there would still be unhappy folk, namely those who desire to enforce their will upon others. That they would not have to pay from their own pocket to subsidize this or any other “deviant” behavior seems to consistently and completely fly over their heads like a catapulted corpse, in direct measure to their personal loathing for whatever the behavior in question may be; which in people of this persuasion, translates into a crazed certainty that someone, somewhere, is doing it RIGHT NOW and must be stopped at all costs.

No argument, moral or utilitarian, can sway coercion. The only thing a bully understands is force.

add a few more words to your definition and I’m right there with you, Daryl.
It should read “two (or more) people ABOVE THE AGE OF CONSENT…etc”
🙂

We’re talking contracts here so the age was implied. Sorry for the confusion.

A license, whether it be a marriage license, a dog license, or a license to practice medicine implies obligation and responsibility, not rights and entitlements. The government has no place in ratifying sexual or lifestyle choices, and the government cannot validate declarations of love or any other emotion. The only legitimate place for licensure in marriage is to ensure that husbands and wives are responsible to each other, and more importantly, to their children.
Marriage means different things to different folks. For some it is a sacred covenant ordained by God, for others it is a permission slip to have state sanctioned and socially approved sexual relations (many feel this view is now obsolete), for others it is nothing more than an at-will contract. Still others look at is as the cornerstone of the family. The gay and lesbian community seem to look at it as a way of forcing the government, and thereby society at large, to validate their sexual and lifestyle choices. When government and church were intertwined, and the church could set moral requirements while the government enforced law and fiat, the definitions could be harmonized, but with the fallacious idea that the First Ammendment requires a separation of church and state, that harmony has been lost. To someone who views marriage as a sacred ordinance and the cornerstone of their family, even their purpose in life, allowing homosexuals to ‘marry’ is to profane the basic tenets of life itself. From this point of view, the conservative Christian (or conservative Mormon) feels that he is the one being bullied and having his lifestyle invalidated.
The problem actually goes much deeper than just the issuance of a marriage license. Our society now feels that sexual acts that result in procreation are allowable outside of marriage such that the obligations of marriage do not apply to many parents, while simeultaneously the idea of ‘no fault’ divorce allows one member of a married couple to abrogate her/his obligations to the other, split the family fortunes, take the kids and still have the other half of the marriage on the hook for child support, etc. completely destroying the idea that marriage is a ‘contract.’ These two trends have made the idea of a civil marriage almost meaningless.
Now, I don’t believe that the ‘majority’ should tell two people what they can or cannot do behind closed doors, I do believe that the majority can and should decide whether or not to validate such a decision when it is made public. The larger than normal election turn out and the result of the vote in the last election make it pretty clear that the majority of those who care to vote prefer not to validate homosexual relationships.

You raise an interesting question. How do the conservative Mormons down near the AZ/UT border view gay marriage? Since they are the second step on the slippery slope to bestiality, and all.

Oh, dear.

First off, the Church ended the practice of polygamy because the federal government was prepared to jail a good chunk of the adult male membership, and confiscate all church properties everywhere.

script...g/od/1

“The Lord has told me to ask the Latter-day Saints a question, and He also told me that if they would listen to what I said to them and answer the question put to them, by the Spirit and power of God, they would all answer alike, and they would all believe alike with regard to this matter.

The question is this: Which is the wisest course for the Latter-day Saints to pursue — to continue to attempt to practice plural marriage, with the laws of the nation against it and the opposition of sixty millions of people, and at the cost of the confiscation and loss of all the Temples, and the stopping of all the ordinances therein, both for the living and the dead, and the imprisonment of the First Presidency and Twelve and the heads of families in the Church, and the confiscation of personal property of the people (all of which of themselves would stop the practice); or, after doing and suffering what we have through our adherence to this principle to cease the practice and submit to the law, and through doing so leave the Prophets, Apostles and fathers at home, so that they can instruct the people and attend to the duties of the Church, and also leave the Temples in the hands of the Saints, so that they can attend to the ordinances of the Gospel, both for the living and the dead?

[…]

But I want to say this: I should have let all the temples go out of our hands; I should have gone to prison myself, and let every other man go there, had not the God of heaven commanded me to do what I did do; and when the hour came that I was commanded to do that, it was all clear to me. I went before the Lord, and I wrote what the Lord told me to write. . . .”

As to what modern-day LDS folks think, I’d direct you to Times & Seasons blog, as well as their links (under “The Bloggernacle” on the sidebar). Searches for specific topics ought to include the locally used acronym “SSM”.

If you are interested in the so-called “Mormon fundamentalists,” or more specifically the polygamists in Utah, I can’t help you, as they aren’t members of my church, and do not profess, testify to, or obey the doctrines and principles that I do.

Well, it was the polygamists in Southern UT that got David Bass all riled up. Or, more specifically, the ACLU’s defense of them.

I’m not particularly interested in polygamy. What interests me is why the majority (for the LDS that was the federal government) feels a need to dictate the marriage and sexual practices of others.

Wilford Woodruff was a smart man. Some battles aren’t worth fighting. In fact, it’s similar to the German homeschoolers. The men there were correct to fight for their rights. They were correct to refuse to pay the fines. But now the government is threatening to take their children away. The men ought to declare victory and pay the fines.

Thanks for the quote.