I can understand youthful indiscretion and bad judgment. I hope that her Christianity moved her to repent of her onanistic exertions for the camera. Happily, I’m not the judge of that matter.

Conversely, if Ms. Prejean was NOT a minor when she performed for the camera, then she’s lying NOW. And she’s saying she’s a Christian NOW. If so, that’s a moral problem for her, because the Bible puts “bearing false witness” in the 10 Commandments, but sex tapes aren’t exactly black-letter law. Though Bill Clinton rationalized perjury saying “everyone lies about sex,” Ms. Prejean is held to a non-Clintonian standard.

If Ms. Prejean had the integrity of Socrates, she’d insist that she’s guilty of distributing child porn and she’d seek her own prosecution for that crime. Few moderns have the integrity of Socrates who accepted the hemlock thrust upon him and drank every drop.
.-= Steve Poling´s last blog ..Don’t pick on Gays =-.

I appreciate you and your comments. I am totally unaware of Cynthia’s history or its particulars, but it does point that any committed couple should be free to designation medical, property, etc, as they see fit. Above all else I’m a little “L” libertarian who supports that each individual has the right to control their property they way they see fit.

Hard to do now-a-days in the era of Kelo, delta smelts and threatened “net neutrality”.

Certainly, young people who are gay deserve our love and support. I’ve opened my home to a man I now call “son” and who calls me “mom”. I am very proud that #4 daughter was a founding member of her high school’s GSA.

I apologize if my stance at remaining emotionally detached lead anyone to believe I have no “empathy”. I just believe wherever possible that clarity and listening to what others actually say (and not what you feel they are saying) has to come from thinking not feeling.

Indeed, clarity over agreement.
.-= Darleen Click´s last blog ..Well, Obama did say “57 states” [Darleen Click] =-.

Cynthia, I do not think Darleen is a homophobe, or any kind of gay-hater. I really don’t. I think her argument has two components, and I don’t agree with either of them, but one is esoteric and has to do with male energy vs. female energy–and their effect on kids, developmentally (both are, theoretically, desirable in any child’s life; I don’t think that’s controversial–surely most SS couples with kids make sure that there are adults around of the other sex–honorary uncles and aunts, godparents, etc.). The other has to do with potential “unintended consequences” if society goes the gay marriage route vs. the civil union route–that is, the effects on churches and adoption agencies if legislation is not crafted carefully.

Certainly, the fact that Darleen sees gay couples as more fit for parenthood than single parents says something.

Darleen, I think we must respect Cynthia’s position as a widow who was deprived of the state’s acceptance of her partnership for the years that she and Margaret were together. I understand that society’s roadmap doesn’t depend on any one person’s well-being, but let us grant credit where credit is due, and be sensitive to the pain that this has brought into her life. There are areas where you and Cynthia may not agree, just as she and I do not agree on everything, and you and I do not on everything, but not everyone can intellectualize every single issue to the same degree.

Certainly, we all agree that young gays need more support and resources, and that the military’s current rule needs to be revised so that service members aren’t forced to live in the closet. That should be, I think, a beginning.

The rest, I think, can be sorted out state-by-state, as solutions to Darleen’s concerns develop–and I think it can be done in a way that is respectful of people in Cynthia’s situation. (For instance, I’d like to start by fixing the “Federal benefits” problem, which I see as more important than whether gay partnerships are called “marriage.” Triage, you know.)

Let’s breathe deep, ladies, and be kind to one another. That is the most important thing.
.-= Little Miss Attila / Joy McCann´s last blog ..Aw, Come On. =-.

Somehow my attempting to point out that I am FOR same-sex couples to have civil unions which would grant all the responsibilities and obligations as marriage [which is opposite sex] is not registering with you.

And you are not understanding my statement that men and women are not fungible.

Let me address the latter first. Men and women are fundamentally different. A difference that is biological and recognized by law. Hence, because the sexes are not fungible then there is a fundamental difference between a SS couple and an OS couple. That is not a judgement, that is just a recognition of reality. A table has four legs but it is not a cat.

Further, you seem eager to assume things I haven’t said. I think gays SHOULD be able to serve “openly” in the military under the same rules of non-fraternization, etc as straights. I would have thought my citation of how my father regarded gays under his command in the 1950′s for goodness sakes would have been a huge clue. As for adoption, I think SS couples can make great parents and should have the opportunity to adopt. HOWEVER, for any particular instance of public adoption there needs to be a heirarchy according to the needs of the child. IE. a child deserves first crack at a mom and a dad. Then SS couples. Then singles of any orientation. Private or religious institutionally directed adoptions do not enter into this discussion.

Fourth: Nothing is “pre-political.” That is just silly. Marriage has existed long before any political system. Indeed, the whole modern concept of “sexual orientation” and “gay” would make an ancient Greek or Roman blink in confusion. Sexual behavior in those societies had as much to do with declaration of class distinction as it did with any attraction. Let’s not get into the conceit that “modern” societies’ take on things has always existed. And marriage is similiar. IE in Roman times it was a private institution in order to secure a legitimate line of progeny. Disputes were still taken to government authorities to resolve. In our modern society, there is any number of public laws/statutes that give a default setting to relationships in order that all parties know the obligations, including the arbitrator. Landlord/tenant or inheritance. All has a “default” set of statutes that can only be superceded by individual contract (ie marriage and prenups). Look at any marriage statute on the books: one man/one woman of minimum age, outside a particular degree of consanguinity, both consenting. Do you see “love” in those statutes? Or sexual orientation? No.nope.nada. So any emotional appeal to “I have a right to marry the one I love” is a logical non-starter; because if “love” is the criteria, then no restriction on marriage can logically stand. Who are you to say that one man/two women can’t be just as in love as a SS couple?

NO reasonable person is demanding that gay (or even polyamorous) relationships be criminalized. Marriage is a public institution, like the military and not everyone will be able to meet the standards of joining.

Regarding the separation of church and state, the coalition fighting same-sex marriage equality is almost totally driven by a coalition of churches (Catholic, Mormon and black Protestant/Black Liberation Theology churches).

So? It was the religious who drove the abolition movement. It was the religious that drove the Civil Rights movement of the 1960′s. WHERE these people got their beliefs is immaterial. What are they asking? What is their behavior? Was it the Mormon church that published the names and addresses of contributors to the anti-Prop 8 movement and encouraged Mormons to get those people fired? To physically threaten them and their families?

Read the First Amendment again – religious people have rights to the public square.

the quest of homosexuals for equality is really a veiled attempt for some bad thing

Stop conflating equality with marriage. And not really “veiled” either. I’ll have to dig up the articles, but pre-prop 8 there were many SSM advocates who were quite open on how it was going to give them the ammunition to “finally” destroy religious organizations by having their tax exempt status stripped if they ever preached against homosexuality or refused to preform SS marriages. And you only have to look to Canada to see pastor convicted of violating human rights law for publically disagreeing with homosexuality.

Either sexual orientation is just an aspect of a person’s make up, or it is so utterly transformational that special rights, including stripping people who disagree with them of their constitutional rights, is called for.

Are you really interested in making sure SS couples have a body of law that codifies their relationship (because I am), or are you interested in using the law to punish anyone around you that dare disagree with your politics?
.-= Darleen Click´s last blog ..Of, By, and For the People [JHoward] =-.

Let me see if I understand you:

First: the thrust of your comment seems to be that that, (1), homosexuals really are not second-class citizens despite not having same-sex marriage equality and being blocked from serving openly in the military and from adopting children; and (2), the quest of homosexuals for equality is really a veiled attempt for some bad thing — I’m not sure what, perhaps the overthrow of capitalism — and must be stopped in order to prevent the bad thing.

Second: you totally missed my point about how one’s sex life is revealed in every aspect of one’s public life and did not connect with my point about empathy at all. So you really do not have the capacity for empathy. This is a big deficit. However, it is cruel to play catch with someone with no arms, so I will reframe my arguments for your intellect, which is the faculty you rely on to do the service of all the ones that you don’t have.

Third: “men and women are not fungible”? That is exactly why homosexuals seek marriage equality for same-sex partners — the right to marry an opposite sex partner means nothing to us. Without marriage equality, we do not have the 1,138 federal rights and privileges that the General Accounting Office told Congress are attached to the right to marry in its last report on the Defense of Marriage Act, to say nothing of the rights lost at the state and local levels.

Fourth: Nothing is “pre-political.”

Fifth: Regarding the separation of church and state, the coalition fighting same-sex marriage equality is almost totally driven by a coalition of churches (Catholic, Mormon and black Protestant/Black Liberation Theology churches). You may engage your fact-proof screen at full force, but the facts are that these religions are doing this to advance their own selfish goals of obtaining the maximum power and wealth for themselves by striking at anything and everything that does not lead to the maximum number of babies/followers being produced for them. What they have not been able to accomplish toward those ends through persuasion of their own followers, they seek to impose through the laws of the state.

Sixth: The rationales being offered by the religious organizations and their secular front groups now demean marriage by reducing it, as you state, to “a contractual relationship that society privilege[s] for matters of protection of children and inheritance.” Since everyone is going to die, it seems reasonable that gays ought to be allowed to have the same legal rights and privileges straights do to build a life together and on their passing, have their spouse have inheritance rights identical to those of a straight married couple. Regarding children, 20 percent of homosexual couples have children. Those children would benefit enormously from having another legal parent committed to them for life. It is a sweet little catch-22 that gays get barred from adopting the children that straight people have thrown away, then straights claim they don’t need equality because they don’t have children.

Seventh: The rationale against same-sex marriage equality now seems primarily to be that marriage is only for couples whose union is likely to produce children directly from the two persons involved. This is an insufficient reason for banning same-sex marriage equality weighed against the benefits it denies to same-sex couples — 1138 federal rights and privileges, uncounted state and local rights and privileges, and having to pay up to $500,000 more over a lifetime in taxes and legal services to obtain a status that still is far from equal to marriage — in addition to the socializing benefits and cost-savings to society of more people marrying.

BTW, the argument about marriage being for children is clearly bogus because there is no movement to bar from marriage straight couples who do not intend to have children or who cannot have children, or to dissolve the marriages of straight people who are past their child-bearing years. This is illogical.

Eighth: It shocks the conscience that one of the arguments against same-sex marriage is that not every gay or lesbian is obsequious enough to straight people when they are objecting to the all-encompassing slow-motion destruction that second-class citizenship brings down on their lives. Rather a large number of people are ungracious about being tormented and thwarted in their noblest aspirations. People who have consciences do right to others because of who THEY are and without regard to who or what the other person is, or whether they merit having right done by them. Only God is in a position to judge.

I have to get my father ready to go to the doctor, so that’s all for now.

Cynthia

If you could lose your friends, family, home or job because people find out about your committed sexual relationship, and a wedding ring announces it, then you would be aware that wedding rings announce your sex life, which is therefore not private.

With all due respect, people have been known to lose friends, family home or jobs for any number of things – including political and religious views. There are any number of obnoxious, crass, rude and frankly idiotic people in this world that we have to deal with on a daily basis. This has nothing to do with empathy. It has to do with thinking, not feeling. Sexual orientation just is. The more it is treated matter-of-factly, as nothing more special than color of eyes, then that’s the way most people will deal with it.

Honestly, this is a question I’ve asked [rhetorically, in my case] previously:

So, either gays are just like everyone else (good or bad, right or left, talented or schlubs) with that one difference, or are they some exotic, alien species that needs separate and celebrated parades, university studies, bodies of literature, law and, especially, politics.

Maybe it is because I’ve been in theater and music all my life, with gay friends and my daughters also with gay friends — even to my house being the hangout for teens and my #3 daughter’s BFF from high school who I love like crazy and I had him move in with us for six months because his mom threw him out of the house for being gay and I was raised by a ultra-conservative dad who not only had gay friends in (1940s) high school (notice that? conservative has nothing to do with being anti-gay), was foresquare against the Briggs initiative and as a Master Sgt in the Army (Korea) knew who were the gays in his unit but as long as they abided by the same rules as other soldiers, was unconcerned about it.

Don’t be appalled that I take a practical POV based on reality, not feelings. Men and women are not fungible.

When a certain political faction harasses and theatens people for believing that redefining marriage, then something a lot more than just providing legal privileges is afoot.

Marriage is pre-political. It has nothing to do with the separation of church state nor with the Constitution. It is a contractual relationship that society privilege for matters of protection of children and inheritance. Now, one can legitimately debate how the state privileges the institution, but has nothing to do with people being “second class” because they cannot avail themselves of it. The state doesn’t recognize polygamy, nor adults who want to marry who are family (brother/sister, mother/son, first cousins).

I’m not religious so I don’t harbor any special feelings for or against religious views, only behavior. Someone who believes I’m going to hell because [fill in blank] is welcome to their view. No skin off my nose. If they physically attack me, physically harass me, threaten my family or my employer because of their views THEN it becomes my issue. Sticks and stones.

It’s not Prejean who violated trust issues nor physically threatens people for view points. I support marriage remaining one man/one woman AND civil unions for same/sex couples because it is about reality.
.-= Darleen Click´s last blog ..Of, By, and For the People [JHoward] =-.

Thank you for visiting and your thoughtful comment.

Here’s the line in your post that I interpreted to mean you were calling Prejean brave, as in, if you dare to do something, you are brave: “Now, Carrie Prejean is a sweet, young thing who found herself in the middle of a media buzzsaw because she dared to be un-PC at a pageant.”

If you think Prejean’s remarks were innocuous and not cruel, I do not feel confident that you have the capacity for empathy that would enable you to understand my explanation.

If you could lose your friends, family, home or job because people find out about your committed sexual relationship, and a wedding ring announces it, then you would be aware that wedding rings announce your sex life, which is therefore not private. If you ever had to work to truly hide every iota of evidence of your sex life, including guarding all your conversation to avoid mentions of people or activities, like dating, that would give you away, then you would be aware how absolutely public straight people are about their sex lives in thousands of ways that they get to take for granted but gay people do not. You have no idea what a hell gays who live in the closet go through. I had to live that way until I was pushing 40 and it is torment and life-damaging in every way.

I am absolutely appalled at your inability to see a different point of view.

And I am going to have to go with the Prejean as the one who is responsible for all her troubles.

The second-class citizenship that is forced on homosexuals is a death of a thousand cuts. This means the people who like to position themselves as guardians of society’s morality for forcing a minority into second-class citizenship by virtue of their ability to hijack the apparatus of the state to impose their religious teachings on the general population in order to serve the greed and lust for power of their religion in violation of our Constitutional guarantee of separation of church and state are in actual fact cold and deliberate murderers. Prejean is their spokesperson. It is Prejean and the people she represents who are, in fact, the moral bankrupts.

Cynthia

Where did I say Prejean was “brave”? I didn’t. Please don’t read what I haven’t written. I said she was un-PC in that she made a rather innocuous statement that wasn’t anti-gay in the least about marriage. I don’t see what was “cruel” about her remarks.

And I have to disagree with your assertion that sex lives are not private. Wearing a wedding band or discussing (voluntarily) being on a date with someone is not discussing a sex life. Orientation is about sexual attraction, not sexual behavior.

And a person who would find someone talking about a date (as long as the conversation was a voluntary one) as “rubbing it in the face” of someone else indicates the issue is with the person being “offended”. It’s like a vegan being offended by overhearing a co-worker discussing a planned visit to a steak house. I would suggest someone feeling the vapors over hearing someone say “I went and saw UP with [opposite sex or same sex person]” needs serious psychological help.

That is entirely different then someone approaching another person and regaling them with tales involving fur-lined handcuffs, throbbing organs and batteries.

Has the “zero tolerance” mentality so corrupted our culture that it has fully burned out that area of our brains where “common sense” used to reside??

The personal is NOT the political and there is a difference between public and private behavior and men and women are fundamentally different.

The immoral, unethical scumbag in this instance is the ex-boyfriend. In another era he would deserve being horsewhipped. This was a breach of trust most foul and there is no excuse for it.

Prejean is a pretty young thing and not much more. She’s rather silly (like a lot of people who have doors opened for them because they are attractive) and her reach certainly exceed her grasp. But that doesn’t excuse the scorched earth tactics directed against her. Oh, I know why it was done. She’s the “warning”. Like that poor lady owner/manager of the restaurant in Los Angeles who gave $100 to Prop 8 and had her restaurant, workers and customers threatened and harassed.

Prejean may be a silly bint, but those people who are savaging her in order to silence others are morally bankrupt.
.-= Darleen Click´s last blog ..A Few Good People to Operate One Good Tyranny. [JHoward] =-.

Here’s an eloquent, reasonable Christian observation that sums it up nicely: http://wp.me/pChUJ-5C