Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1966654)

But seriously it does seem like that is how the conversation is going.

This country is so ahead of us because they allow gays to do this, or they allow gays to do that.

Unless I live in said country I really don't know whether they are truly ahead of us or not.

Originally Posted by KSig RC (Post 1966815)

Right, but I think you'll live a happier and fuller life if you take things on face value - read those lines simply as "they're way ahead of us in terms of giving gay people the legal rights afforded to everybody else in terms of marriage" (which is demonstrably and unarguably true) and not as some ringing endorsement of Argentina as a queer Mecca.

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1966727)

It would have to be a written and oral.

Oral Test for Men

1) What is going on in this scenario.

Female spouse: "Let me tell you what happened with my day, first I get in the car, before I can get the car started good, my co-worker calls me to tell me that Rhonda, you know who Rhonda is...remember that b!tch that works three cubes down from me, man I hate her always walking around like she run something and don't even get me started on what she was wearing yesterday and blah blah...."

LOL I can't even finish the scenario I've already zoned out.

Originally Posted by pshsx1 (Post 1966844)

I was expecting this to go another direction.

Then I realized that this is the test for heterosexuals... OOPS. :o

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1966572)

**Sideline comment**

Why should we care what other countries are doing?

Also some would not agree that because other countries are doing it, they are ahead of US.

Originally Posted by Drolefille (Post 1966847)

And you don't have to care about what happens outside of our country, but plenty of people do, because it directly affects human beings and indirectly affects us.

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1966862)

Does it indirectly affect us?

Many things have happened in this world that hasn't caused most people to blink.

Expound.

Originally Posted by Drolefille (Post 1966882)

It does, just using this topic, the more common same sex marriage is in the rest of the world the more "normal" it becomes and the more pressure is placed on our society to change. Our peception by the world at large changes too, and though some may not care about it, it does affect us.

And though we may not be able to know or follow everything that happens, I believe that being informed is preferable to being ignorant. I just read a story about domestic workers in the UK being treated essentially as slaves by employers withholding passports and paying pittances if anything. It's not a happy story by any means, but I feel I only gain by being informed. The US is too insular at times, IMO.

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1966862)

Does it indirectly affect us?

Many things have happened in this world that hasn't caused most people to blink.

Expound.

Originally Posted by DrPhil (Post 1966888)

That's like saying "if a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it, does it still make a sound?"

People get ideas from a number of sources including international trends. The very fact that some people know what the global trends are regarding homosexuality and homosexual unions can shape the perception of norms and values in this society. That can change the laws in this society if the dominant majority deems it nonthreatening to remove the stigma of homosexual union. It is not an overnight process but there are a lot of things that no longer make people blink in America that used to make people cry and lynch. Those domestic changes were not isolated from global dynamics. That is even moreso the case now in this global economy and increasingly "global society."

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1966841)

Untrue and spoken like somebody who's never been on the other side of discrimination.

Originally Posted by DrPhil (Post 1966935)

Bluphire, you're either easily convinced or you weren't as married (no pun intended) to the "why does it matter" side of the issue as you initially portrayed you were. LOL. :)

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1967175)

No I wasn't. It was a sideline comment. More so meant to separate those who are blindly passionate about a topic and those who are approaching it from a logical/rational Point of View.

Originally Posted by KSig RC (Post 1967071)

Wait . . . what? I was making fun of your preferential (and likely incorrect) application of a global principal to an innocuous sentence - here's a synopsis of what happened:

POSTER: "Other nations adopted gay marriage much sooner than we did."
YOU: "BUT YOU CAN'T PROVE HOMOSEXUALS ARE BETTER OFF THERE AS A RESULT!"

I mean . . . you're arguing a point nobody made. That's all I was saying, duder. Feel free to rage against the machine though.



Now, at what point do you think I said "Live your life at face-value alone, free of a critical eye"? Honestly, nobody made ANY argument that Argentina is a "greater nation" than the US or that they were miles ahead in gay rights as a whole - just that they did the marriage thing first. Ahead. In temporal terms. While you should look at society, social norms, etc. with a critical eye, sometimes it's ok to view a throw-away sentence for what it's worth, and your blood pressure might even drop.

Words have meaning. And understanding that meaning literally doesn't kill people "all the time" at all.



Yes, they get away with genocide because message board posters say things like "well, the ethnic minorities got water from Clinton - they were way ahead." That's how Darfur happened, totally.

It's kind of ironic that you're oversimplifying after accusing me of gross oversimplification.

Let's try again, though - things that are demonstrably true: other nations are ahead of the United States in terms of adopting marriage rights for homosexuals.

Things that are not demonstrably true: Rwanda happened because people assumed small advances in marriage rights for a minority indicated a larger trend, so folks looked the other way while millions were murdered.

Occam's Razor. For real.

EDIT: After re-reading, this might come off as harsh and I really don't mean it to be (happy hour wins again) - I feel what you're saying, but think about what you're accusing me of here, and realize exactly how limited my point (and the original point) really is, and I think you'll see that you're a bit beyond the pale.

Originally Posted by AOII Angel (Post 1966345)

Don't forget that the central and south American countries are ahead of us, too.

Originally Posted by Drolefille (Post 1967179)

Cannot one be both rational and passionate? ;)

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1967180)

My question was specifically for those who actually DID say other countries are so ahead of us. Go back and actually read those previous before I made my sideline comment. Don't summarize.

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1967180)

Proof 1:

"POSTER: "Other nations adopted gay marriage much sooner than we did."
YOU: "BUT YOU CAN'T PROVE HOMOSEXUALS ARE BETTER OFF THERE AS A RESULT!"

My question was specifically for those who actually DID say other countries are so ahead of us. Go back and actually read those previous before I made my sideline comment. Don't summarize.

I accuse you of oversimplification because you asked me to simplify. (You know the infamous, I would live a happier life if I accept things at face-value.) That is what got the more so harsher response from me. It's like patting me on the top of my head and telling me "There, there, don't worry about things like that it will make your head explode.

So I do want to know the intent behind being ahead. That's where we get into issues a law to me does not denote ahead.

:)

Originally Posted by AOII Angel (Post 1967227)

I stand by my post...Those countries are ahead of us in acceptance of gay marriage. It is official. Ta Da.

Originally Posted by preciousjeni (Post 1967230)

I'm confused about how that's controversial. If these countries did it before us, then by definition, they are ahead of us.

Originally Posted by KSig RC (Post 1967234)

It's not controversial - it's the closest thing to QED that we've had around here since 2002.

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1967331)

Not every conversation or comment is meant to be taken as part of the whole, just opinions on that said thing.

Originally Posted by KSig RC (Post 1967385)

This seems quite contrary to your previous stance, but I actually somewhat agree.



It means the countries put said law on the books before the good ol' US of A - additionally, there was a subtext that others wish the US would catch up and put a similar law on the books.

In terms of "what does it mean" it means two things, and only two things:

1 - The law is on the books.
2 - It would not be unprecedented for the US to enact national legislation, as other nations already have.



Of course not.

Homosexuality is really the last bastion of legal discrimination left in the United States - that is to say, while discrimination exists for other minorities, legislation to discriminate against one group really only exists for gays and lesbians. For that reason, it's important to remove the legal barriers - that's really a "first" step of sorts.

Until the legal barriers are removed, you're fighting uphill against the mechanism of law - and equality in the eyes of the law is not true equality, but the latter cannot exist without the former. Cannot. By definition.



I think I've addressed this fully (see above), but positive steps are still positive steps, and there appears to be no long-term downside to eliminating anti-gay-marriage legislation.

It's going to take literally thousands of similar small victories, but that doesn't mean each victory isn't important, right?

So rather than assuming everybody is taking down the banners and starting to clean up because, gosh, all the work is done here, maybe you should take the Occam's Razor approach and take the statements as they were explicitly said: other countries got there ahead of us.

Originally Posted by Kevin (Post 1967397)

The only way I could see Congress being able to force the marriage issue is via the spending power.. maybe.. as the denial of funds would have to be related to the subject of the bill and I don't know what that would or could be.

KSig suggests that Congress could do something, but how? I always figured marriage and the family were pretty clearly 10th Amendment subjects.

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1967405)

Everything you wrote above what I bolded is an answer I would love to hear. Why? Because it gives more insight and information.

Originally Posted by BluPhire (Post 1967405)

Why should I?

I wanted some responses to gauge why people feel other countries are ahead. Is it because they have it on the book, or do they have other information like political results of gay marriage after the law, social effects after the fact. That's why I said it on the sideline. Just something to throw out there and see what bites.

Originally Posted by KSig RC (Post 1967428)

That's fair - it seemed you were being a bit more . . . I guess confrontational (or perhaps presumptive) but that might be me misunderstanding posts on a message board.



What's the simplest answer to allowing homosexuals equal opportunity to participate in marriages, then?

Originally Posted by KSig RC (Post 1967426)

I short-handed a LOT to make the larger point - I'm not entirely sure that there is really any way to guarantee gay marriage at a national level (other than striking down anti-gay-marriage bans from states in the courts), but I'm not a Constitutional scholar of any sort.

The larger point is still just that other nations allow gay marriage, not that Argentina's model is or should be identical to ours (because that would be, well, impossible).