4 ms·

So, you would deny marriage rights to a heterosexual couple who are infertile and unable to have children?

• throwanem 10y ago
  No, I would hesitate to extend marriage rights to an entire class of people, of all of whom the same is true.
  • throwaway-hn123 10y ago
    Why extend marriage rights to the class of people who are infertile? I don't get why you're giving that class of people special privileges.
    • throwanem 10y ago
      I'm looking to find a balance between the interests of the state and those of its individual citizens. In a heterogeneous society, which all societies to some extent are, this is a complex question. To oversimplify it benefits no one. And do you really want to equate homosexuality and infertility, which for all intents and purposes is a medical disorder? Is that where you want this conversation to go? It's not where I want this conversation to go. My sexuality is not a medical disorder.
      • tanderson92 10y ago
        I don't believe the intent was to call your sexuality a disorder, it was to demonstrate the dangers of applying rights by class instead of universally.
        • throwanem 10y ago
          There's a difference between applying rights and inventing them. The latter is certainly worth doing when it's warranted, but it also strikes me as worth setting a very high standard for doing so, because in a state constituted as ours is, to create a new right instantly overrides broad swaths of existing law and precedent. Such potentially dangerous actions should not be contemplated except in a case where their absence perpetuates a harm so grievous and unjust that nothing less will do. As I've argued at length in this thread and the comments I've linked therein, I don't think it's reasonable to consider that standard met here.
      • throwaway-hn123 10y ago
        All I'm doing is examining the inconsistencies in your position. You seem to think the ability to reproduce is important, except for heterosexual couples, where it doesn't matter.
  • bbctol 10y ago
    So you would ban post-menopausal women from getting married. Understood.
    • throwanem 10y ago
      Again: no. I'm not sure what value you find in attempting to mischaracterize my argument by assuming results which do not follow from anything I have actually said.
      • bbctol 10y ago
        I'm sorry: you would hesitate to extend marriage rights to post-menopausal women.
        • throwanem 10y ago
          Did the status quo not already include such a right, this would be a meaningful point to raise. As it does, and we are in fact discussing heterosexual vs. homosexual marriage, I don't really see what you're getting at with it.
          • scott_s 10y ago
            You're saying you want to not allow X because of Y. When others point out that making Y the criteria allows disallows A, B and C, you argue those points away as not important; you still want to allow A, B and C. That's basically special pleading. My conclusion - and I assume the conclusion of the people arguing with you - is that Y can't be your real reason for disallowing X.
            • throwanem 10y ago
              I'm arguing that this change to the status quo (ante), of heterosexual specificity in marriage, was not warranted. To support that argument, I'm explaining why that status quo has value which is reduced, rather than increased, by permitting marriage among homosexual couples as well. As I've tried, perhaps unsuccessfully, to point out, this isn't the same as arguing that permission to marry should be contingent upon procreative capacity. I can see how it might come across that way, from a starting perspective of weighing one vast change to the status quo vs. another such vast change, and I think I've failed adequately to clarify that I'm approaching the question instead from a perspective of weighing one vast change to the status quo vs. no such vast change. It's a different question.