Senate RE: Homosexuality: Same-Sex Marriage & Legalization Outside US

Homophobia has nearly always been socially acceptable in Russia as best as I can recall.

Edit: Homosexuality was actually illegal in the USSR, for example:

Communism and homosexuality

TBH Russia's been experiencing something of a right shift with Putin in general. His grip on the country isn't quite as concrete as it was in his first term, but Russians crave familiarity, and for what's still a decisive slice of the country (40 years old or more) that's USSR-style social practices.

There was a big report on the news here about the law passing, and it was scary. There were interviews with a child psychiatrist who sat there claiming that the law was good since it would stop "normal" children from hearing about homosexuality, and becoming homosexuals themselves. She also continued with a long speech about how "real" homosexuals didn't mind this law, because they prefer to just stay inside and be isolated from the rest of the society. The people protesting aren't "real" homosexuals but have a load of mental problems.

Even more scary though were the pictures from the protests outside the Duma, where the LGBT people were standing peacefully, before they got assaulted by orthodox/conservative hooligans, and then the police came and arrested the LGBT people but not the people assaulting them.

Hoo boy, I see understatement escapes you. In addition, you're quite wrong about it "not having progressed" since the fall of the USSR; the power dynamic has shifted considerably in just the last few months.

2012-13 Russian protests There's still alot of right-wing fear mongering going on in that country, but that'll change as older people die off and people keep having kids. Putin and United Russia isn't popular with the generation equivalent to us, and I see no reason why that won't continue to be strengthened.

@Obi-Anne: I think I recall hearing about that. Truly horrible.

Russia lags behind the West in virtually every category, whether it's gay rights or life expectancy.

It was negative til last year; they started making more people than were dying last year.

Keeping with the 'outside the US' trend, although in a more positive direction, in France the National Assembly has passed (249-97) a bill that would establish same-sex marriage. Depending on how this settles out, it also looks like adoption for same-sex couples will be passed in the process.

According to the article, polls in France show that support for same-sex marriage is somewhere between 55 and 60%. I'd think the most relevant part of that, then, is that it does show that there isn't that much of a difference between the US and France, at least in the large scale statistics. The last several national polls in the US have had something like 50-55% of Americans supporting same-sex marriage.

I do think that should be fairly hopeful that, with same-sex marriage support increasing in the US and now in the majority, that we're reaching the spot that a true and meaningful redefinition of marriage can be carried out in the US to broaden the institution of marriage somewhere in the next few years. For the population as a whole, there's not too much of a difference between the US and France, say. The bigger obstacle now, it seems, is a combination of who is more likely to vote and structural differences between the US and France.

It's intellectually lazy, Hoth, that's what it is. I can think of two arguments for opposing same sex marriage that don't depend on the slippery slope, but I guess they're harder to sell than the arguments you cited because they don't inspire fear.
1. As was mentioned in the JCC (I think), any kid raised in a same-sex marriage may be bullied.
Of course, this is something we'd just need to pull through, and it wouldn't be as much of an issue after a generation, but the fact remains that it might be hard on the kid in question.
2. Got this from an Italian, an argument I hadn't heard before: many Western countries face declining population numbers. The last thing we'd want is to encourage people to stop procreating.
I'll leave the rebuttal of this argument to Jabba.

Honestly, I don't even see how that constitutes a slippery slope to deal with. That's like saying if you let people have pie for dessert, then other people would want cake or ice cream. Not only is the first thing nothing horrible, but the other things aren't bad, let alone horrible enough to get everyone worked up.

The one reason I think they are, generally, linked is because often the justification of same-sex marriage is "if they love each other, why's it matter?" And of course, at that point, I think that can then be applied to polygamy and incest as well. I just don't see the problem with doing so. "Consenting adults" seems to be the reasonable and rational line, to me. But if you use the "but love is love" sort of attitude, then it opens it to going further where that sort of logic can be applied. It sets that stage, if its intended to or not.

As I said, I got it from an Italian.

Seriously though, I'm pretty sure the kid ratio in married homosexual couples is - at least for now - lower than in heterosexual couples. This is not the rebuttal you're looking for.

Well, I'm not going to go on defending an argument that I don't support. Seeing how that worked so well in the Dunk It thread. But it's interesting to know that it's an argument that the Catholic Church propagates in Italy.

Yeah, that's basically one of the arguments they use against birth control as well. But, actually, aren't we kind of reaching critical mass as far as population goes? Some people are saying that in a few decades there will not be enough resources to support the growing population of the planet. People who say "we need to have more children" are really only basically saying "we can't let this other group of people outnumber us!"

I agree wholeheartedly.