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Don’t be swayed by scare tactics

Published 10:50am Monday, July 2, 2012
Comments

I’ve heard these arguments come up quite frequently in response to marriage equality lately:

• It’s against God’s plan.

• It’s unnatural.

• They come from the dregs of society.

• It will lead to incest, bestiality and polygamy.

• They’re free to marry, just like anyone else.

• It will lead to the breakdown of society.

• They can’t procreate.

• The Founding Fathers wouldn’t have approved.

• It will degrade traditional marriage.

• Laws against it have never been declared unconstitutional.

• They suffer higher rates of disease.

• It’s detrimental to their children.

Sound familiar? I’m sure you’ve all heard them, too. Quite possibly many of you have spouted them or used them in arguments. Except in this case, every single one of those points are arguments against interracial marriage, listed in court rulings throughout the country spanning 1948-1967. We now see the scare tactics from opponents of interracial marriage as just that — scare tactics. Not a single point has come to fruition, and we look back in shame at that era.

Don’t let Minnesota 2012 become the new Virginia 1967.

 

Lisa Semple

Hayward

Comments
  1. Scott Bute July 2, 2012 at 3:24 pm <Link>

    Lisa, can we try comparing apples to apples here? Those who support traditional marriage are asking that the people of Minnesota be given a chance to vote on whether our current law should be protected in the state Constitution. This is not about bigotry, homophobia or racism. People who support marriage as it was designed are doing so based on thousands of years of lived experience across all religions and cultures. Marriage should be about what children need not what adults want. Men and women are different. Each has something to offer a child that the other cannot. This is called the complimentarity of the sexes. When done as it was designed by the Creator, it works. How arrogant to think that in 2012, we the “enlightened ones” could reverse it by judicial or legislative fiat.

  2. Lisa Semple July 2, 2012 at 8:24 pm <Link>

    Scott, gay members of our society can already parent; your argument is invalid. “That’s the way it’s always been” is also not an argument. I ask you again, for the 3rd time, why Christians think they have a monopoly on morals?

  3. Scott Bute July 3, 2012 at 10:23 am <Link>

    Just because you can “parent” does not mean that it is legal for same sex couples to be “married” in Minnesota. Christians DO NOT have a monopoly on morals. Have you ever heard of Natural Law? Every single human being has it written on their hearts so that even if one has not heard of the Gospel or the Ten Commandments, he or she can know by reason what is right and wrong. Faith and reason go hand in hand. Also, you did not answer my question in making your argument about comparing interracial marriages to same sex “marriage”. No where does my faith teach me that it is wrong for opposite sex couples from different races to marry. However, this does not extend to same sex couples because it is not theologically possible for them to be married.

  4. Lisa Semple July 3, 2012 at 11:21 am <Link>

    Homosexuality is well-documented in over 500 different species. I don’t care if gay marriage is “theologically” possible, what matters is that it should be “civilly” possible – that’s why you go to the court house for your marriage license, not your church. You claim your faith doesn’t teach you homosexuality is wrong, yet you keep dragging it into the argument.

  5. Scott Bute July 5, 2012 at 5:22 pm <Link>

    My faith teaches that same sex attraction, though unnatural, is not a sin. It is the acting on the same sex attraction that is always wrong. Lisa, we are just going to have to agree to disagree on this issue. As much as you try to find ways around it, you cannot diss the Author of Marriage (Almighty God) from marriage. The civil law got into marriage precisely because they saw it as a good for the raising of children. How children are raised in a home affects all of society for good or bad. Now, some would try to change the state’s original intent by getting into who can marry who for whatever reason. If same sex marriage becomes universal in our country then what is to stop folks from marrying a relative, an animal, or recently I saw where a woman “married” herself! Thanks Lisa for the spirited debate. I promise to keep you in my prayers. God love you!

  6. Lisa Semple July 5, 2012 at 6:16 pm <Link>

    Sorry, just gotta comment on your last points – you can’t marry your sibling for health reasons (genetics), and last I heard animals were unable to enter into legally binding contracts (see point 4 in my original letter). And once again, children have nothing to do with the issue at hand as they are already being raised in single parent and same sex parent households (see point 12). I still have yet to see you put forth a justifiable reason for limiting same-sex marriage that is not rooted in theology. But thanks for trying!