9th Circuit Appeals Court affirms holding that CA gay marriage ban is unconstitutional

Religion is a protected class because of the history of religion.

I was just reading that homosexuality materialized out of nowhere a few years back. Is that true?

 

Religion is a protected class because of a history of religious discrimination, President Andrew Backwords Jackson. Funny how that distinction also fits homosexuals.

 

You want to go ahead and get a constitutional amendment like religion did, be my guest. That is a perfectly valid method.

 

There may have been one from the beginning, if gays weren't afraid of being stoned and otherwise murdered at the time.

 

All I know is that today my neighborhood went CRAZY.


http://www.10news.com/video/24516702/index.html

They were a block from my house. By 6:30, they had taken over 1 lane of traffic and stretched for 2-3 blocks.

 

Protected classes were not established by the First Amendment. In fact, the phrase "protected class" doesn't appear in the Constitution anywhere. Shame on you for not following our founding document!

 

Well, because you asked us to:

If that's true, then religion and creed, which are both only identifiable through behaviors, have to be tossed out as protected classes.

I understand it's difficult to respond to so many people at once, but I'd like to take a look at this statement, since it seems to be one of your main arguments:

Let's say it does. What are your criteria for distinguishing valid vs. invalid complaints of unequal treatment? I'm looking for something beyond "No gay marriage," here.

For your argument to have any relevance to the prop. 8 court case, you need to have a legal precedent, philosophy, or rationale behind the decision to dismiss same-sex couples' complaints that they are being treated unequally by the law.

Apparently, the pro-8 attorneys were not able to present such a rationale to the judge, and so they lost. If you want to succeed where they failed, you need to describe either A) how same-sex couples were not treated unequally by the law, or B) a compelling state interest for why an inequality existed.

 

I agree with him as well. I'd also add that marriage licenses were originally issued by the state in order to exclude certain people from marrying: rich people from marrying poor people, African Americans from marrying whites.

I'm all in favor of government issueing licenses for civil unions, and the requirement only being that the partners are consenting adults capable of entering a legal contract in the first place. Leave marriages up to the religious institutions. Some will choose to marry same-sex couples, others won't, and that's their prerogative based on their religious beliefs.

I don't need the government to tell me that I am my husband's wife. I only need the legal contract to tell me that I inherit his assets if something happens to him and that I have medical power of attorney if he needs it, and vice versa. That is really the only role government has in marriage, not defining it for the rest of us.

If believe that my friend and his partner who have been together for 12 years are "married," that's my prerogative. If someone else believes that they aren't because they are two men and can't reproduce a child, I'm interested in that person's stance on infertile couples and post menopausal couples marrying (or in a legal requirement that all married couples must have children), but again, that's that person's prerogative.

 

I like this response, because it's not at all clear to me why this "rights free for all" is something by which we should be threatened.

 

I'd like to observe something: For this to be overturned by the Court, they will need to rule in favor of a side that had its single witness demolished on the witness stand, and the other prepared witnesses canceled so that they were not likewise embarrassed. That one witness basically contradicted himself in his own testimony.

The Court overturning this would be like granting a Ph.D to someone who presented their "findings" on a couple poster boards with their information glued onto them, and not granting it to a candidate whose findings were well researched, brilliantly written and well defended.

They can do this, yes, but I think John Roberts is aware of how it will look to many and he knows that he'll need a massive amount of rationalization for it to have any kind of weight beyond the minimal legal kind.

 

I just briefly read some of the front page at 538, and Nate Silver and the vote-counters believe the Supreme Court has 3 confirmed to oppose this ruling (Scalia, Thomas, Alito) and 3 confirmed to uphold it (Sotomayor, Ginsburg, Breyer). Kennedy will probably be the swing vote, but there is the possibility of Kagan siding with the conservatives or Roberts siding with the liberals.

And this is a long-shot, but since Scalia himself admitted in legal opinion that Lawrence v. Texas paves the way to legalizing gay marriage, will even he feel somewhat pressured to support Judge Walker's ruling?

Brown v. Board of Education was a culturally/socially controversial decision, but for the Supreme Court it was a 9-0 ruling. Maybe not 9-0, but a clear majority? Republicans like the McCain women, the Bush women, the Cheney's, and others, support gay marriage. And there is the push to move closer towards libertarianism in the GOP right now. Who knows?

 

On the point about the "sanctity" of marriage (a common refrain for those opposed to gay marriage), I've thought about this over the past day: what about all those gay people over the years, afraid of coming out to be their true selves, who got married to keep up a lifestyle that was fake? Rock Hudson is an example, but there were (and perhaps still, sadly) many other men & woman like him. How are those marriages "sacred"? Also, a personal example: throughout my upbringing, I noticed that my parents never kissed. Not once. Nothing, not even a peck on the cheek. They've told each other 'I love you', or spent their anniversary doing something special. When I got to be older, I suspected that they either never really loved each other or the flames went out a while ago, but they wanted to keep the marriage alive for the sake of our family. I always thought they would end up getting divorced, sometime after my younger brother graduated high school. They did not (my brother having graduated high school in 2006).................the break up occurred in 2004 (beginning with a nasty verbal fight on the night of my 18th birthday), with the divorce being finalized earlier this year. My dad, in the years since the break up, has told me from time-to-time that he had thought about leaving the family late in the 80's (I was born in '86), but didn't because he didn't want me & my brother growing up without a dad. Fine, good, I appreciated that. However, with the realization of what he had said, combined with my own observations over the years about my parents relationship, I realized what a sham their marriage was. Not an easy thing to go through. But of course, marriage has always been sacred, right (before gay marriage was/will be allowed)? The legalization of gay marriage does nothing but add hope/joy to those want to take the chance with their partners, and does nothing to harm that same joy for heterosexuals.

Back-to-Back!: 2008-2009 & 2009-2010 L.A. Lakers: World Champions

 

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It could happen

 

Well, because eventually people will grant intrinsic rights to farm animals. Or... something.

Going back half a page to the posts about whether or not sexual orientation is a choice - I would take that argument one step further. From the language of the 14th Amendment, I don't think I see why it even matters whether it's a choice or not. Bogus argument on the part of gay marriage opponents.

 

Wasn't it already shown that Homosexuality was genetic and exists from birth?
Weren't there various studies?

BBC did a whole show on it here a couple of years ago with John Barrowman.

 

It doesn't matter whether or not it's a choice. Any sort of behavior I have a genetic predisposition towards, heterosexuality, homosexuality, pedophilia - the morality of the act is independent of it. If I'm attracted to someone else's wife, it doesn't matter. If I sleep with her, it's wrong. Yeah, I was born attracted to women - but it immaterial to the morality of the act. That's why it's a mistake for gay marriage proponents to say, "It's not a choice - I was born that way," because pedophiles can use that excuse too. It doesn't make what pedophiles do right.

No. Identical twins, when one is gay, the other has only a 50% chance of being gay. ( http://www.tim-taylor.com/papers/twin_studies/studies.html - the first one says one hundred percent, but both later studies say 50% )

This disproves any notion that it's purely genetic. Odds are there is a genetic component which increases the chance of being homosexual, but it's not solely genetic.

 

No, it's not entirely genetic. But as you and Dark Lady Mara both said, it doesn't matter whether or not it's a choice. And "morality" is only up to the government to enforce when the immoral choice impedes on someone else's right to life, liberty and property.

Allowing my best friend from high school to marry his partner of 12 years does not impede on anyone's life, liberty or property. It doesn't even impede on anyone's right to believe that the two of them are sinners and are going to burn in ****.

Pedophilia is illegal because a child cannot legally consent to a sexual relationship.

Adultery, which I would also agree is immoral, is not illegal. Bigamy is, but the law does not prohibit people from cheating on their spouses, or divorcing their spouses and subsequently marrying their adulterous lovers.

 

Not to start a philosophy debate, but there is no established moral theory I've heard of that concludes homosexual acts as being unethical.

 

Yeah, that's nonsense, OZK. The site to which you link is using data generated back in the early 20th century, and research standards have changed significantly (as has behavioral genetics). Here's what the more recent review articles have to say on genetics and human sexual orientation (available for all to peruse at PubMed; more data are available if we also include ethological studies in non-human model organisms):

 

It does matter because it is one factor in determining whether or not sexual orientation should be a federally protected class, such as race, sex, and age are. Then after that the Supreme court may decide (it doesn't have to) which level of scrutiny shall be applied by the lower courts when deciding cases that present constitutional questions covering the 5th and 14th amendments.

 

I just don't understand why the government has to be so involved in the first place. Why should a state be allowed to tell anyone who they can and can't marry? I mean, I suppose there are certain qualifications for marriage licenses--like how old someone has to be before they get married and stuff like that?

I just hope this doesn't turn on its head and become some government enforced thing that rather than banning gay marriage, forces religious institutions to marry gay couples. I'm not saying that's what is going to happen, I'm just saying I think the government needs to back off entirely.

 

Pillard and Bailey posit that genetic factors account for "at least half of the variance in sexual orientation". Rodríguez-Larralde and Paradisi were the only other ones you cited whose abstracts said they studied monozygotic twins. Unfortunately, my internet is not working very well at home and I don't know if my University has access to those full texts so I wasn't able to read the papers. However, nothing you cited contradicted my assertion that homosexuality is not purely genetic. Nothing contradicted the 50% figure I gave for monozygotic twins. I found an article (not scholarly) by a geneticist from Stanford who apparently also accepts the 50% figure for monozygotic twins. (http://www.thetech.org/genetics/ask.php?id=155).

I'm not saying it's not genetic at all. It's clearly heavily genetically influenced. However, when two people who are genotypically identical express different phenotypes concerning sexual orientation 50% of the time, it indicates that there are significant environmental factors in addition to genetic factors. Obviously, if there were no genetic factors then the chances of the other twin being homosexual would probably decrease dramatically.

Furthermore, the hormone environment can't be the only environmental factor because because monozygotic twins are in the womb at the same time. Quix, the data you presented does not contradict what I stated in the least. I did not say it was not genetic. I said it was not purely genetic. There are clearly strong environmental factors, in addition to genetic factors. I will, however, concede that my initial "no" may be interpreted by some to mean that I was saying, "No, there is no genetic component." I did agree that in all probability, there is a genetic component, although I denied that this was the sole factor. In fact, Mustanski et al. state, "molecular research has not yet produced compelling evidence for specific genes." Admittedly, Rodríguez and Paradisi's more recent study cited linkages between specific genes and homosexuality, they acknowledge that they need to be studied more closely.

The case of monozygotic twins demonstrates pretty conclusively that it is neither solely environmental nor solely genetic.

On the other hand, if you can show me a recent study comparing homosexuality in monozygotic twins that demonstrates a 100% or close to 100% correlation in sexuality, then I will quickly recant.

As for the morality, I was merely giving an example of an immoral sexual behavior and demonstrating that the genetics of th

 

Agreed 100 percent.