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Monday, October 22, 2012

Debunking the Top Five Garbage Arguments Against Marriage Equality

Posted by on Mon, Oct 22, 2012 at 6:00 AM

In this one video from Preserve Marriage Washington, you can find all five of the most common garbage arguments that opponents of marriage equality have been putting forward this election season. Let's go through them! (With a lot of assistance from marriagefactcheck.com.)

GARBAGE ARGUMENT #1: What's the problem? Washington State already treats everyone equally. Remember back in 2009, when voters approved "Everything but Marriage"? That law gives same-sex couples every single right of marriage, so the gays already have full equality here and there's really no need to redefine marriage.

ACTUALLY, in a number of states that have had "Everything but Marriage" laws for longer than we have, studies have shown that this kind of separate but equal arrangement is—wait for it—not equal. It's confusing to have two different ways of referring to marriage, and that has real consequences for real people. In emergencies, same-sex couples in these states have had trouble getting to see their partners in hospital rooms. (Want a Washington State example of this? Read Charlene Strong's account right here.) And, children of gay and lesbian couples, as well as the couples themselves, experience psychological harm from living with an inferior, not-quite-marriage. (Don't believe it? Ask Harvard.) Gay and lesbian couples are not treated equally under the law in Washington State right now, and that's why we need to offer them the same rights and responsibilities straight couples already enjoy—nothing more, nothing less.

GARBAGE ARGUMENT #2: Think about the children! Because really, the best place for kids is with a mother and a father. Studies show!

ACTUALLY, if you were to go and read through just about every serious study ever done on gay parenting—and hey, look, these two masochists did exactly that in 2010—you would find, as they did, that "current claims that children need both a mother and father are spurious… At this point no research supports the widely held conviction that the gender of parents matters for child well-being.” Yes, yes, it's possible to find "studies" that say gay parents are terrible parents—but, um.

GARBAGE ARGUMENT #3: This thing is gonna force Washington State elementary school teachers to start telling my children about gay marriage in schools. I heard this happened in Massachusetts, and that courts there said parents don't have to be notified about these publicly-subsidized gay marriage teach-ins, and aren't allowed to opt their kids out. Scary!

ACTUALLY, when people talk about what happened in Massachusetts, they're talking about just two instances of parents getting upset about goings on at school. Yes, both instances involved kids being exposed to books that explore non-traditional families. But, setting this marriage issue aside, it's well established in American law that you can't force a school to stop teaching things you feel are contrary to your religious beliefs. Also, we don't live in the theocracy. Also, Washington's same-sex marriage law doesn't say anything about anyone having to teach anything in public schools.

GARBAGE ARGUMENT #4: I heard that in Boston and Washington, D.C., Catholic Charities were forced to stop offering adoption services after same-sex marriage was legalized—just because they didn't want to have to give babies to the gays. That's crazy.

ACTUALLY, that is crazy, because Catholic Charities in Boston were giving babies to the gays well before that state ever legalized same-sex marriage. Chatholic Charities, at the urging of the Vatican, later stopped offering adoptions altogether in Boston and D.C.—which is a great example of how religious groups have the freedom to do (or not do) whatever it is they want to do (or not do). One caveat to this: If you're a religious group that's living off government money, you may be forced by the government to comply with certain anti-discrimination laws as a condition of using that government money. Thems the rules. Don't like the rules? Get off the government dole.

GARBAGE ARGUMENT #5: Think of the florists! Our beloved florists and other small businesses in the great State of Washington are going to be forced to do things they don't want to do—just like those inkeepers in Vermont who had to pay $30,000 for turning away a couple that wanted to get gay married.

ACTUALLY, the punitive damages originally sought by that couple amounted to $1. Later, the innkeepers decided to pay $30,000 to settle the matter. But that was their choice. In any case, you already aren't allowed to discriminate against gay and lesbian couples in Washington State. Here's the law. Also, weren't you just arguing (see GARBAGE ARGUMENT #1) that you want gay and lesbian couples to be treated equally under the law, and that it's so great that gays and lesbians already have totally equal rights in Washington State? So why do you want florists to be able to discriminate against gay couples? Maybe get back to me on that one?

 

Comments (24) RSS

Oldest First Unregistered On Registered On Add a comment
Chef Thunder 1
Thanks for doing this Eli hope people share widely
Posted by Chef Thunder on October 22, 2012 at 7:05 AM
2
sorry Eli,

your blah blah blah notwithstanding it is a good video.

thanks for gining it wider play.
Posted by Preserve Marriage Washington on October 22, 2012 at 7:19 AM
3
Jesus that video is rough. Someone put in a lot of time to wrap discrimination up in some stick figure flash nonsense. This is one step away from "are the blacks in your public schools? Are the jews in your neighborhood?"
Posted by Bluur on October 22, 2012 at 7:39 AM
4
An old argument, but one that bears repeating: If you want to insure that chilren are raised by their biological mothers and fathers, you would be doing more to achieve that goal if you put your energy into making sure that heterosexual couples don't divorce! There are a lot more straight couples than gay couples, and with the divorce rate approaching 50% in many places, keeping the married men and women together is going to have a lot more impact than preventing same-sex couples from marrying. Especially when you consider that (a) GLBT people are somewhere between 3-10% of the population (b) Many of them don't want to get married, (c) many of the ones who do get want to get married don't want children, and (d) many--if not most--of the ones who do want children won't be able to have bio-kids, anyway, so they'll be adopting kids who have been given away by their biological, presumably straight parents. Arguments about protecting the interests of children who should be with their *real* biological parents are a subset of a subset of a subset. Want to make sure that kids are raised by both of their bio-parents? Encourage straight people to get married, and discourage straight people from getting divorced.-
Posted by Clayton on October 22, 2012 at 7:58 AM
dangerousgift 5
That garageband loop playing in the background will be stuck in my head all day
Posted by dangerousgift on October 22, 2012 at 7:59 AM
BoyfriendoftheYear 6
Can someone please recreate this with verbatim, except swapping 'interracial' for 'same-sex'? Because that's what I hear when I watch this and I can't help but think that if others heard it, too, they'd see how ridiculous/hateful this really is.
Posted by BoyfriendoftheYear on October 22, 2012 at 8:15 AM
7
4

you're behind the times, C

and it's way worse than you think....

most kids today are born to women who never were (or ever will be) married to their fathers.

Posted by that, plus you're so full of shit... on October 22, 2012 at 8:19 AM
8
@7 - Thank you so much for taking what must have been a considerable amount of time to so eruditely explain your position ("Burn the whores!" it sounds like?). You've changed a lot of hearts and minds on slog today.

Well done.
Posted by barfy cute on October 22, 2012 at 8:29 AM
9
I have a hard time believing there's even one bigoted florist out there who doesn't want to cater to the gay wedding market.
Posted by originalcinner on October 22, 2012 at 8:32 AM
10
@7 Actually, in a majority of cases (about 59%) a child's parents are married to each other at the time the child is born. Learn to Google before you Troll, you'll sound less leotarded that way.
Posted by Ken Mehlman on October 22, 2012 at 8:34 AM
Pick1 11
@6 Watch this video all the way to the end.

He does it well.
Posted by Pick1 on October 22, 2012 at 8:36 AM
12
8

out-of-wed child birth/rearing is a serious social problem and the biggest contributor to child poverty, abuse and neglect.

your snark will no doubt improve the lives of thousands of otherwise hopeless children.
Posted by hi8o0tysgf on October 22, 2012 at 8:49 AM
13
@12 And so will your, and all of our comments on Slog! Just another really good point.
Posted by barfy cute on October 22, 2012 at 9:25 AM
venomlash 14
@12: Being born out of wedlock is "the biggest contributor to child poverty, abuse and neglect"?
That's funny, I would have thought that being born to poor parents would be.
Posted by venomlash on October 22, 2012 at 9:29 AM
15
@7, 12
If out-of-wedlock births to presumably heterosexual women is a huge threat to the well-being of children, I repeat my original arguement: it would be far more effective to encourage straight people to get (and remain) married than it is to prevent gay people from marrying.

And where gay people adopt children of (presumably straight, presumably unmarried) women, allowing those gay couples to get marries so they can provide the protections of marriage to those legally adopted children would also seem to be in the best interests of the children.
Posted by Clayton on October 22, 2012 at 11:57 AM
very bad homo 16
@12 How many gay people are responsible for out of wedlock births? What does this have to do with gay marriage?
Posted by very bad homo on October 22, 2012 at 12:34 PM
17
15

your original argument was:

"If you want to insure that chilren are raised by their biological mothers and fathers, you would be doing more to achieve that goal if you put your energy into making sure that heterosexual couples don't divorce!"
Posted by D.I.V.O.R.C.E. on October 22, 2012 at 12:51 PM
18
14

what is even funnier is that having kids outside of marriage is what puts most adults into poverty.
Posted by the laughs never end on October 22, 2012 at 12:54 PM
19
16

we give up.

how many?

what?
Posted by wait while we grab a pencil.... on October 22, 2012 at 12:55 PM
20
@17--
If you had read my post @4 thoroughly, you would have seen that it concluded with: "Want to make sure that kids are raised by both of their bio-parents? Encourage straight people to get married, and discourage straight people from getting divorced."

But I guess my original post was longer than your attention span. My apologies for challenging you to rise to unreachable heights.

As to your comment that "what is even funnier is that having kids outside of marriage is what puts most adults into poverty," I would repeat: put your efforts into encouraging heterosexual couples to get married, not into preventing gay couples from getting married. You'll be doing far more good for children in the long run, and you'll be reaching greater numbers of them, too.
Posted by Clayton on October 22, 2012 at 1:44 PM
venomlash 21
@18: [citation needed]
HA HA HA, OH WOW.
Posted by venomlash on October 22, 2012 at 2:11 PM
very bad homo 22
@19 Zero.
Posted by very bad homo on October 22, 2012 at 4:03 PM
TreGibbs 23
I'd like to find out who the VO woman is in this ad and ask her a few questions...
Posted by TreGibbs on October 22, 2012 at 5:04 PM
24
Approve R-74.

"this kind of separate but equal arrangement is—wait for it—not equal [...] And, children of gay and lesbian couples, as well as the couples themselves, experience psychological harm from living with an inferior, not-quite-marriage."

I could not peruse all 79 pages of Harvard's study; are they saying that Civil Unions are worse than nothing, or just bad compared to actual equality?
Posted by Loving Case on October 23, 2012 at 1:33 PM

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