Who said they are comparing their struggles only to those of Blacks?

okay.....


No, you said that being Black is a choice. I said that being Black by pigmentation is not a choice. I inherited genes from my parents that cause me to produce more melanin than what we consider white.

Being Black by cultural identification is a choice. Yes, one can be Black by "color", but one can choose to identify with a particular culture.

Your argument assumed that Black skin automatically equals Black culture. Or that is how I interpreted what you said.

Blacks had the right taken from them when they entered this country as slaves. They were not given the same and equal constitutional rights as a free (white) person. Blacks were being denied the right to be seen and treated as a human being in all aspects of living. Gays have not had the same treatment. Again, some people see homosexuality as a moral issue, not really a human / civil rights issue.

And, people can love who they want to. I just personally won't vote to allow gays to marry.

Same is true for everyone else. Just because a heterosexual couple lives together, they too are not treated as a married couple.

And, with racial hate crimes, it has become harder to prove. I mean, just look at the Jena-6.

Because as I've said, for me it is a moral issue, not a human rights issue. And, just as you think it is ridiculous to make a comparison to the Holocaust, I think it is ridiculous to make a comparison to the civil rights struggle of Blacks in this country.

Again, for me it is a moral issue, not a rights issue. But that is how I see it.

They are. That is the comaprison they keep bringing up as a justification for their cause. I'm just responding to what has been said / posted. Did you not see the picture KSigRC posted?

Because people have a funny way of letting their morals seep into laws. ;)

Of course I did. The fact that Separate-but-Equal is brought up indicates two things:

-- that the Civil Rights Movement is the most recent example of an American movement seeking equality for citizens, and

-- that the court decisions in cases such as legalized gay marriage and said that providing for civil unions was not sufficient relied heavily on the reasoning of cases that struck down the Separate-but-Equal.

But your question was:
So my question wasn't "who said they were comparing their struggle to the struggle of Blacks?"; it was "who said that they were comparing their struggle only to the struggle of Blacks?" The picture that KSigKid posted =/= the entirity of the discussions being had and comparisons being made on this issue.

Hands down, one of the best posts of the entire year. I love you, AGDee. :D

Honestly, I think part of it is the romanticism of the thing. Even if all the rights were exactly equal, it still wouldn't be enough. No one (of any orientation) wants to dream of that one day in the future that their little girl will grow up, put on a pretty white dress, and go get "partnered." It's the societal connotation that KSig mentioned (though I won't even touch the other stuff in that post :rolleyes:).

FYI, I'm neither gay nor a spokesperson for gay rights.

Gays are free to compare their plight to whomever they want - but in a situation where some are pretending that a "civil union" is the same thing as "marriage," I'm going to compare that to pretending that "separate facilities" is the same thing as "equal facilities" . . . since, in a literal sense, they're identical.

Oh - by the way . . . no one can convince you that marriage is a right? Look up the Supreme Court decisions that say just that, maybe? This isn't a religion or "me" thing - it's a legal thing. Obviously, you're free to disagree with the Court's decisions, and if that's the case then we'll just have to agree to disagree on some level - but I think that would help you understand where I'm coming from, and it would fully explain the connection to past events that have paved the way for others to gain rights as well.

It's a good thing.

ehh...I still think the connection is weak.

Because that is the reference that is continually brought up by their side.

It's really not. It's all you see because you're prejudiced.

I agree and agree;)

It's not being prejudiced, it's all I "see" because it is a historical aspect of me - where I come from. I see prejudices in a lot of places. I'm just more likely to speak up about Black history / culture because that is what I am a part of.

That Holocaust argument is really bothering me.

The Jews, Catholics, Homosexuals, Gypsies, etc., were all rounded up and persecuted. Not only them, but people who helped them, or liked them, sometimes people that were really only neighbors. Poles were persecuted, just by nature of being from Poland. Why does everyone forget this stuff?

Just because there are some logical fallacies involved in comparing separate but equal for Blacks/Whites, does not mean that it is not the most appropriate comparison to the Gay Marriage issue.

Unless the next step is not only to deny marriage rights, but then to round up all the Gays, friends of Gays, neighbors of Gays, people that know Gays, people that employ Gays, etc, then just to make a topper on it, people with red hair, and throw them in the gas chamber.

The two are not really comparable. Add on top of that that the Holocaust was a European experience (yes I know that many Americans were affected by it, but after the fact or they left before it happened), while the Black/White issue, as it's being discussed here, was an American experience.

Perhaps a closer comparison might lie in the Japanese internment camps. Except we're not rounding up every homosexual and making them live in camps because we're afraid of espionage.

I agree, this makes the most sense!

I think it's kind of funny that the pro-marriage camp feels that having MORE people getting married will ruin the institution. If you were really interested in making lifelong commitment a more well-adhered to cultural practice, wouldn't you be excited that more people were interested in monogamy? It's like having a bunch of people agree with you!

Not to mention the benefits of disease control that come from the encouragement of long-term monogamous relationships.

I had not thought about that, but now that you bring it up the public health interest in encouraging monogamy as a safe sex practice is fairly large.