Yesterday I came across this picture and posted it to Facebook:
Shortly thereafter, my friend Tim posted the following comment:
As is my custom, I’m taking a response that turned out to be rather long, and posting it to my blog for ease of reading. Tim, the rest of this is for you. :-)
First of all, I’d like to point out that that’s actually a great question. The problem is that it’s unfortunately based on a false premise. If I may, I’d like to deal with that part—the false premise—first.
Gay people have always had the right to marry. If an man and a woman walk into a courthouse and ask for a marriage license, their sexual orientation is never an issue. They can be straight, gay, bi, pan, or whatever other term they might choose to identify as—or any combination of the above. What matters is that marriage is defined as the union of a man and a woman, so the fact that they are a man and a woman is sufficient proof that they can logically be married.
Likewise, if two men walk into the same courthouse and ask for a marriage license, their sexual orientation is also a nonissue. Since marriage is the union of a man and a woman, the union of a man and a man does not meet that criterion. It doesn’t matter if both men are straight; they still can’t get married because two men cannot logically form a marriage. It has nothing to do with sexual preference; it has to do with the definition of a word.
The only way one can argue that the above scenarios create a situation of inequality for gays is if one argues that the definition of a straight person is someone who marries a person of the opposite sex, and the definition of a gay person is someone who wants to marry a person of the same sex. Unfortunately, this definition poses a significant problem for the marriage redefinition movement because it relegates homosexuality to being a choice. If whether or not someone be gay is wholly dependent upon the type of person he or she chooses to be with, then being gay does not constitute an immutable condition and thus cannot be subject to “equal rights” legislation. Conversely, if whether or not someone be gay is not dependent upon the type of person he or she chooses to be with, then the definition of marriage does not constitute an unequal condition because a gay person has just as much right to marry as a straight person does.
This is that major difference between the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s and the so-called Civil Rights movement of the 2010s. In the former, individuals were fighting for rights that others had but they did not. In the latter, individuals are fighting for new rights to be created for all. (For example, redefining marriage as including the union of a man and a man would give two straight men just as much right to enter into such a marriage as two gay men—which, as demonstrated, is exactly what we have now—unless, of course, being gay is a choice, in which case the entire argument disintegrates in a puff of logic.)
So, all that being said, let’s turn to your question: what is the quote referencing? In the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, people turned to the law to protect them. Where the law failed, they worked to change the law; and when the law failed to be enforced, they worked to vote out those who failed to enforce it. In the so-called Civil Rights movement of the 2010s, people are searching for any random judge who is sympathetic to their cause, then having their case tried in his or her jurisdiction so they can override the will of the people and force a new definition upon all of us.
Let’s imagine the following scenario: I am pulled over for doing 100 mph in a 55-mph zone. When I go to court, I plead “not guilty” because I define the word “mile” as “10,000 feet”, so I was really only doing 52.8 mph. Because I explicitly planned to do this in a jurisdiction where the judge will sympathize with my cause, the judge rules in my favor and forms a legal precedent. I then demand that everyone else accepts my definition of “mile” as equally valid to the other, established definition. which I enforce by starting a massive media campaign that labels anyone who disagrees with my definition as a hateful bigot who is out of touch with the needs of mays (a word I invented, meaning “people who prefer a ‘mile’ to be ‘10,000 feet’). After all, we can’t help that we prefer that definition; we were born that way, so everyone else has to abandon their definition of “mile” and accept our competing definition as the valid one.
Various nations, states, and municipalities then vote on legislation defining the world “mile” as 5,280 feet. Where the legislation passes, mays in the area go out and vandalize churches and temples whose members tend to espouse this definition. Several churches are burned to the ground, and one individual is caught on surveillance video planting a bomb at a rather large temple. The police are never able to break the code of silence surrounding his identity, despite the thousands of counts of attempted murder; no one will identify him because, after all, he’s a hero!
If anyone in a position of particular authority is found to espouse the traditional definition of “mile”, mays tell the media how horrible this person is and, if they can’t sue the individual, keep his name in the news while boycotting his organization, until he is finally fired for being a bigot (because, after all, anyone who believes a mile is 5,280 feet obviously hates those who believe otherwise). Police officers who pull over mays for doing 130 in a 70 are vilified in the press and lose their jobs and pensions; those whose children are run over by mays doing 45 in a school zone are told that they can’t complain, because that would infringe upon the rights of others.
Mays who use the metric system take upon themselves the name of “Spartans”, and those who can’t decide which system to use become “bidistincials.” Anyone who wonders if he or she might be may is labeled “questioning” and encouraged to explore those feelings, since that will further swell the numbers of the group. The group then invites vematies—a group of people who feel that the word “vegetable” should be redefined to include tomatoes—to join, thus creating the SMBVQ movement. (Most mays think vematies are fairly subhuman, but some vematies are also may, and after all, including them further increases their numbers.) Anyone who feels that any of these opinions are even slightly wrong—or even that those questioning their distinciality should consider the actual definition of the word “mile”—are, again, made out to be bigots.
As things start to go the mays’ way, other groups emerge claiming that they, too, deserve equal rights. One such group believes that a mile should be 20,000 feet, not just 10,000, and that their definition should also be included. People who maintain the true definition of “mile” point to this as evidence that no good can come of all this redefinition on the fly, but the SMBVQ movement dismisses these other groups as extremists whose beliefs don’t matter, since they’ll never pose any danger to respectable people. (Yes, that’s what people said about mays, just a few decades ago, but that’s different. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.)
My point in this analogy is that everything I’ve mentioned corresponds directly to the fight to redefine marriage. It’s not about equal rights, though obviously many people have been led to believe this; it’s about forcing everyone to believe the way they do, regardless of what or how valid others’ differing positions might be. Furthermore, redefining words on the fly strikes at the heart of American contractual law, which explicitly states that this is illegal. If we can redefine “marriage” over the strenuous objections of We the People, why redefine “mile”? How about “life”? “murder”? “rape”? “love”? “assault”? We are literally in the early stages of an Orwellian, Newspeak-driven dystopia, and it all comes back to a small minority of individuals in a coordinated and calculated effort to suppress freedom of thought and dissenting opinion.
That is why this is a “bully movement”, Tim, and if the United States Supreme Court reverses its judgment in Baker v. Nelson (1972), I would be completely unsurprised if it literally tears our nation apart and takes us into a second Civil War. And frankly, the only thing I find scarier than that possibility is the alternative: that We the People are already so complacent as to roll over and let the entire nation implode around us, instead of just the portion so enamored with ignorance that it attempts to suppress others’ ability to think.
Shortly thereafter, my friend Tim posted the following comment:
“Can you explain this quote to me? How is it Bullying to fight for the right for gay people to marry. Why should they not be allowed to express their love and devotion to each in the same manner that you and I can?”
As is my custom, I’m taking a response that turned out to be rather long, and posting it to my blog for ease of reading. Tim, the rest of this is for you. :-)
First of all, I’d like to point out that that’s actually a great question. The problem is that it’s unfortunately based on a false premise. If I may, I’d like to deal with that part—the false premise—first.
Gay people have always had the right to marry. If an man and a woman walk into a courthouse and ask for a marriage license, their sexual orientation is never an issue. They can be straight, gay, bi, pan, or whatever other term they might choose to identify as—or any combination of the above. What matters is that marriage is defined as the union of a man and a woman, so the fact that they are a man and a woman is sufficient proof that they can logically be married.
Likewise, if two men walk into the same courthouse and ask for a marriage license, their sexual orientation is also a nonissue. Since marriage is the union of a man and a woman, the union of a man and a man does not meet that criterion. It doesn’t matter if both men are straight; they still can’t get married because two men cannot logically form a marriage. It has nothing to do with sexual preference; it has to do with the definition of a word.
The only way one can argue that the above scenarios create a situation of inequality for gays is if one argues that the definition of a straight person is someone who marries a person of the opposite sex, and the definition of a gay person is someone who wants to marry a person of the same sex. Unfortunately, this definition poses a significant problem for the marriage redefinition movement because it relegates homosexuality to being a choice. If whether or not someone be gay is wholly dependent upon the type of person he or she chooses to be with, then being gay does not constitute an immutable condition and thus cannot be subject to “equal rights” legislation. Conversely, if whether or not someone be gay is not dependent upon the type of person he or she chooses to be with, then the definition of marriage does not constitute an unequal condition because a gay person has just as much right to marry as a straight person does.
This is that major difference between the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s and the so-called Civil Rights movement of the 2010s. In the former, individuals were fighting for rights that others had but they did not. In the latter, individuals are fighting for new rights to be created for all. (For example, redefining marriage as including the union of a man and a man would give two straight men just as much right to enter into such a marriage as two gay men—which, as demonstrated, is exactly what we have now—unless, of course, being gay is a choice, in which case the entire argument disintegrates in a puff of logic.)
So, all that being said, let’s turn to your question: what is the quote referencing? In the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, people turned to the law to protect them. Where the law failed, they worked to change the law; and when the law failed to be enforced, they worked to vote out those who failed to enforce it. In the so-called Civil Rights movement of the 2010s, people are searching for any random judge who is sympathetic to their cause, then having their case tried in his or her jurisdiction so they can override the will of the people and force a new definition upon all of us.
Let’s imagine the following scenario: I am pulled over for doing 100 mph in a 55-mph zone. When I go to court, I plead “not guilty” because I define the word “mile” as “10,000 feet”, so I was really only doing 52.8 mph. Because I explicitly planned to do this in a jurisdiction where the judge will sympathize with my cause, the judge rules in my favor and forms a legal precedent. I then demand that everyone else accepts my definition of “mile” as equally valid to the other, established definition. which I enforce by starting a massive media campaign that labels anyone who disagrees with my definition as a hateful bigot who is out of touch with the needs of mays (a word I invented, meaning “people who prefer a ‘mile’ to be ‘10,000 feet’). After all, we can’t help that we prefer that definition; we were born that way, so everyone else has to abandon their definition of “mile” and accept our competing definition as the valid one.
Various nations, states, and municipalities then vote on legislation defining the world “mile” as 5,280 feet. Where the legislation passes, mays in the area go out and vandalize churches and temples whose members tend to espouse this definition. Several churches are burned to the ground, and one individual is caught on surveillance video planting a bomb at a rather large temple. The police are never able to break the code of silence surrounding his identity, despite the thousands of counts of attempted murder; no one will identify him because, after all, he’s a hero!
If anyone in a position of particular authority is found to espouse the traditional definition of “mile”, mays tell the media how horrible this person is and, if they can’t sue the individual, keep his name in the news while boycotting his organization, until he is finally fired for being a bigot (because, after all, anyone who believes a mile is 5,280 feet obviously hates those who believe otherwise). Police officers who pull over mays for doing 130 in a 70 are vilified in the press and lose their jobs and pensions; those whose children are run over by mays doing 45 in a school zone are told that they can’t complain, because that would infringe upon the rights of others.
Mays who use the metric system take upon themselves the name of “Spartans”, and those who can’t decide which system to use become “bidistincials.” Anyone who wonders if he or she might be may is labeled “questioning” and encouraged to explore those feelings, since that will further swell the numbers of the group. The group then invites vematies—a group of people who feel that the word “vegetable” should be redefined to include tomatoes—to join, thus creating the SMBVQ movement. (Most mays think vematies are fairly subhuman, but some vematies are also may, and after all, including them further increases their numbers.) Anyone who feels that any of these opinions are even slightly wrong—or even that those questioning their distinciality should consider the actual definition of the word “mile”—are, again, made out to be bigots.
As things start to go the mays’ way, other groups emerge claiming that they, too, deserve equal rights. One such group believes that a mile should be 20,000 feet, not just 10,000, and that their definition should also be included. People who maintain the true definition of “mile” point to this as evidence that no good can come of all this redefinition on the fly, but the SMBVQ movement dismisses these other groups as extremists whose beliefs don’t matter, since they’ll never pose any danger to respectable people. (Yes, that’s what people said about mays, just a few decades ago, but that’s different. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.)
My point in this analogy is that everything I’ve mentioned corresponds directly to the fight to redefine marriage. It’s not about equal rights, though obviously many people have been led to believe this; it’s about forcing everyone to believe the way they do, regardless of what or how valid others’ differing positions might be. Furthermore, redefining words on the fly strikes at the heart of American contractual law, which explicitly states that this is illegal. If we can redefine “marriage” over the strenuous objections of We the People, why redefine “mile”? How about “life”? “murder”? “rape”? “love”? “assault”? We are literally in the early stages of an Orwellian, Newspeak-driven dystopia, and it all comes back to a small minority of individuals in a coordinated and calculated effort to suppress freedom of thought and dissenting opinion.
That is why this is a “bully movement”, Tim, and if the United States Supreme Court reverses its judgment in Baker v. Nelson (1972), I would be completely unsurprised if it literally tears our nation apart and takes us into a second Civil War. And frankly, the only thing I find scarier than that possibility is the alternative: that We the People are already so complacent as to roll over and let the entire nation implode around us, instead of just the portion so enamored with ignorance that it attempts to suppress others’ ability to think.
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