I was going to comment on the most recent post over at Quodlibets, but I decided to post here instead. I've written about gay marriage, and my befuddlement over objects to it before, but I feel like talking about it again. Maybe it's because I'm getting married in four days.
She links to this article in the Daily Californian. The author basically says he just doesn't understand the argument against gay marriage. I'm so happy to see this getting some print. I feel like every article about gay marriage assumes that the arguments against it are understood, or at least are not worth discussing. I've yet to read anything anywhere that explains what it is that makes people believe that gay marriage is wrong. The only thing I have ever heard is that it is a religious issue. Which, while I don't agree, I understand that some religions believe that homosexuality is wrong. What I don't understand is why religious beliefs are guiding our laws.
If anyone has any argument against gay marriage that has nothing to do with religion, I would really like to hear it, because I just don't get it. Like the author of the article I linked to, I am usually pretty good at understanding my opposition's arguments - it's the best way to win an argument - but this? This I just don't get. Email me if you do: recordstorerita (at) hotmail (dot) com.
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Thursday, August 09, 2007
96% Feminist
| You Are 96% Feminist |
 You are a total feminist. This doesn't mean you're a man hater (in fact, you may be a man). You just think that men and women should be treated equally. It's a simple idea but somehow complicated for the world to put into action. |
Friday, May 25, 2007
The View
So, I have been watching The View every once in a while when I’m home and supposed to be working on papers for school. I am completely and totally fascinated by the interactions between the hosts.
I love that Elizabeth stands up to Rosie and argues with her. I think it is really interesting to hear someone who strongly agrees with Republicans argue their points. I don’t happen to agree with her, but I think Rosie is also a little too far to the left. But what I love is the way they argue.
All of the women on the view know that Rosie is a lighting rod for criticism, and Rosie, I think, enjoys that. You can see the other women just waiting for this season to be over, so that they can get back to what the show used to be. But you can also see that they are annoyed with her, and I think she knows it. Because these debates between Rosie and Elizabeth always include something about how Rosie is portrayed in the media. The most recent debate – from the May 23rd show – has them arguing about President Bush.
Joy Behar starts the conversation with a list of things that Bush has done in his presidency. Al Gore and Jimmy Carter have recently come out saying that Bush is doing a terrible job, and Joy wants to know why he’s still in office. [I have to say that while the way Bush got into the White House is something of a sham, he did win the election in ’04. The democrats screwed up and couldn’t find a candidate who could defeat Bush. We can’t get him out because, though he has screwed up mightily, he hasn’t done anything worthy of impeachment. We shouldn’t have gotten into this war, but we’re in it, and we can’t pull out now. It would be immoral to go into a country, throw it into chaos, and not help get that country back on its feet. ANYWAY] Elizabeth has something to say, of course, and Rosie interrupts.
For Rosie, this whole thing is not about her lefty beliefs versus Elizabeth’s righty beliefs. It’s that she thinks Elizabeth doesn’t like her. Someone on Fox news said that Rosie think that our troops are terrorists. When that was brought up on the show, Elizabeth said “why don’t you take this opportunity to explain what you meant.” Rosie took that as an insult. She thinks Elizabeth should have defended her. Now, what she said was something along the lines of – innocent people are dying in Iraq every day, so who are the terrorists? I think she meant to imply that our government, who sent the troops over there, is treading dangerously close to being just like the terrorists. But, she never clarifies that on the show. I think she could have made a valid point, but instead of explaining herself and discussing what she intended to get across, she focuses on how Elizabeth should have defended her. Elizabeth is trying to say that what Rosie said was a little ambiguous and, while she realizes that Rosie isn’t accusing our troops of terrorism, she can see how people might have misinterpreted it. Rosie can’t believe Elizabeth is siding with the crazy republicans. They’re supposed to be friends, and Elizabeth should have supported her. Personally, I love watching Elizabeth try to talk over Rosie (which I think is impossible) and I love watching Joy attempt to mediate and bring it back to the issue at hand. You can see her thinking “I’m supposed to be the loud-mouthed broad on this show.”
Now I’m off to watch today’s show, which will hopefully have more arguing fun.
You can watch the May 23rd argument on You Tube here.
Edited to add: Just to be clear, I consider "loud-mouthed broad" to be a pretty high compliment. Joy Behar is a great comedian and has performed in the Vagina Monologues (as have I) which makes me like her a lot. She's very smart, and I think adds a lot to The View. I recently discovered that she started out as a High School English teacher, which makes me like her even more.
Also, today's show had no arguments. They cut the intro / chat portion significantly, I guess so they'd have time to do all of the many summer cooking demonstrations. It kind of sucked.
I love that Elizabeth stands up to Rosie and argues with her. I think it is really interesting to hear someone who strongly agrees with Republicans argue their points. I don’t happen to agree with her, but I think Rosie is also a little too far to the left. But what I love is the way they argue.
All of the women on the view know that Rosie is a lighting rod for criticism, and Rosie, I think, enjoys that. You can see the other women just waiting for this season to be over, so that they can get back to what the show used to be. But you can also see that they are annoyed with her, and I think she knows it. Because these debates between Rosie and Elizabeth always include something about how Rosie is portrayed in the media. The most recent debate – from the May 23rd show – has them arguing about President Bush.
Joy Behar starts the conversation with a list of things that Bush has done in his presidency. Al Gore and Jimmy Carter have recently come out saying that Bush is doing a terrible job, and Joy wants to know why he’s still in office. [I have to say that while the way Bush got into the White House is something of a sham, he did win the election in ’04. The democrats screwed up and couldn’t find a candidate who could defeat Bush. We can’t get him out because, though he has screwed up mightily, he hasn’t done anything worthy of impeachment. We shouldn’t have gotten into this war, but we’re in it, and we can’t pull out now. It would be immoral to go into a country, throw it into chaos, and not help get that country back on its feet. ANYWAY] Elizabeth has something to say, of course, and Rosie interrupts.
For Rosie, this whole thing is not about her lefty beliefs versus Elizabeth’s righty beliefs. It’s that she thinks Elizabeth doesn’t like her. Someone on Fox news said that Rosie think that our troops are terrorists. When that was brought up on the show, Elizabeth said “why don’t you take this opportunity to explain what you meant.” Rosie took that as an insult. She thinks Elizabeth should have defended her. Now, what she said was something along the lines of – innocent people are dying in Iraq every day, so who are the terrorists? I think she meant to imply that our government, who sent the troops over there, is treading dangerously close to being just like the terrorists. But, she never clarifies that on the show. I think she could have made a valid point, but instead of explaining herself and discussing what she intended to get across, she focuses on how Elizabeth should have defended her. Elizabeth is trying to say that what Rosie said was a little ambiguous and, while she realizes that Rosie isn’t accusing our troops of terrorism, she can see how people might have misinterpreted it. Rosie can’t believe Elizabeth is siding with the crazy republicans. They’re supposed to be friends, and Elizabeth should have supported her. Personally, I love watching Elizabeth try to talk over Rosie (which I think is impossible) and I love watching Joy attempt to mediate and bring it back to the issue at hand. You can see her thinking “I’m supposed to be the loud-mouthed broad on this show.”
Now I’m off to watch today’s show, which will hopefully have more arguing fun.
You can watch the May 23rd argument on You Tube here.
Edited to add: Just to be clear, I consider "loud-mouthed broad" to be a pretty high compliment. Joy Behar is a great comedian and has performed in the Vagina Monologues (as have I) which makes me like her a lot. She's very smart, and I think adds a lot to The View. I recently discovered that she started out as a High School English teacher, which makes me like her even more.
Also, today's show had no arguments. They cut the intro / chat portion significantly, I guess so they'd have time to do all of the many summer cooking demonstrations. It kind of sucked.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
What Are You So Worried About?
What is the deal with homophobia? Honestly. I really don't understand what the problem is with allowing gay/lesbian/etc couples to marry.
This has been talked about all over the blogosphere, and I don't know that I have anything really of substance to add to the conversation, but I'm so confused.
Bitch PhD has a lovely entry on it here
And there are some other good points here (that's a really nice blog, by the way, that I should list in my links, but I haven't gotten around to it yet.)
This is an interesting tactic. I guess one of the reasons against a same-sex union is that they can't produce children. So, this is an interesting extrapolation of that conceit.
But what REALLY got me worked up this morning was this.
The Indiana Senate has passed an amendment clarifying that marriage is between one man and one woman. It has to pass the legislature and then the good people of Indiana will vote on it in the 2008 election.
I just don't get it. What are people afraid of? How can loving someone be wrong? Why do they care? What does it matter if I choose to love one man or two? Or a man and a woman? Why can't I declare them to be my family in a legal sense? Why is it that my relationship with Mr is A-OK but two women who love each other and want to dedicate their lives to each other are wrong? I don't see how being able to legally choose who is your family - and thereby who benefits from your health insurance, who can make decision about your health, who can raise your children - is any of the court's business. I've yet to hear an argument that makes sense.
I would really like to hear, honestly, what is so fucking scary about same-sex marriage. Or plural marriage, or whatever. Now, I know that plural marriage carries a whole lot of other taboos and most of these measures are directed at same-sex couples, but they are stipulating ONE man and ONE woman. Bigamy does have the potential for people (usually women) to get taken advantage of. However, so does lots of other socially-acceptable relationships.
I like to think that we live in a society where people are respected as people regardless of their religion, race, or sexual orientation. It frustrates me so much to see that we haven't come that far as a society after all.
If anyone out there has a logical explanation for me, I would really like to hear it. I don't think I have a ton of regular readers, but if you do feel inspired to comment or start a discussion, please keep it nice. I want to know your thoughts about the issue, not how you think I'm going to hell for thinking it is ok for people to love whomever they love.
This has been talked about all over the blogosphere, and I don't know that I have anything really of substance to add to the conversation, but I'm so confused.
Bitch PhD has a lovely entry on it here
And there are some other good points here (that's a really nice blog, by the way, that I should list in my links, but I haven't gotten around to it yet.)
This is an interesting tactic. I guess one of the reasons against a same-sex union is that they can't produce children. So, this is an interesting extrapolation of that conceit.
But what REALLY got me worked up this morning was this.
The Indiana Senate has passed an amendment clarifying that marriage is between one man and one woman. It has to pass the legislature and then the good people of Indiana will vote on it in the 2008 election.
I just don't get it. What are people afraid of? How can loving someone be wrong? Why do they care? What does it matter if I choose to love one man or two? Or a man and a woman? Why can't I declare them to be my family in a legal sense? Why is it that my relationship with Mr is A-OK but two women who love each other and want to dedicate their lives to each other are wrong? I don't see how being able to legally choose who is your family - and thereby who benefits from your health insurance, who can make decision about your health, who can raise your children - is any of the court's business. I've yet to hear an argument that makes sense.
I would really like to hear, honestly, what is so fucking scary about same-sex marriage. Or plural marriage, or whatever. Now, I know that plural marriage carries a whole lot of other taboos and most of these measures are directed at same-sex couples, but they are stipulating ONE man and ONE woman. Bigamy does have the potential for people (usually women) to get taken advantage of. However, so does lots of other socially-acceptable relationships.
I like to think that we live in a society where people are respected as people regardless of their religion, race, or sexual orientation. It frustrates me so much to see that we haven't come that far as a society after all.
If anyone out there has a logical explanation for me, I would really like to hear it. I don't think I have a ton of regular readers, but if you do feel inspired to comment or start a discussion, please keep it nice. I want to know your thoughts about the issue, not how you think I'm going to hell for thinking it is ok for people to love whomever they love.
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