Thread: If It's All The Same To You, Why Deny Others?

Obviously this issue runs DEEEP and I don't begin to pretend I think I have the answer.

It seems though there there are really two separate issues here.

1) Same sex couples legally joined in some sort of civil union or otherwise legal union receiving the same legal benefits and rights as hetero married couples. That part of the debate is straightforward.

2) This next issue is much more convoluted; same sex couples being considered by "society" to be on par, equal to, be equated with or no different from married hetero couples ethically, etc. Change the law, and eventually have "society" regard same sex "marriage" as OK. Approved of and validated by "society". Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems homosexuals as a group not only want issue #1, they also want issue #2. Am I wrong on this?

Years ago, I worked in a data processing center where the women who worked there listened to Dr. Laura. I had never heard her before that, and didn't listen to her after leaving that job. Long story short, there was a homosexual man that called up because he was very irritated that he had come out of the closet to his family, had introduced his family to his partner but his Mom would not allow he and his partner to stay overnight at the Mom's house during a major holiday. He acknowledged that his Mom affirmed her love for him but his issue was that his Mom did not accept his lifestyle. Dr. Laura just laid into the guy. "Accept your lifestyle? You're not going to make your mother accept your lifestyle, she doesn't have to accept your lifestyle"...etc. His big problem was that she didn't think his lifestyle was OK. He wanted her to think his lifestyle was OK and to approve of his lifestyle.

I think proponents for same sex marriage that say their issue is simply with issue #1 above are not being totally forthright in what they'd like to have changed or to what level.

Pardon my long winded rambling above. I thought about this some more on the way home from work. "Marriage" has a moral connotation. One definition of moral: "founded on the fundamental principles of right conduct rather than on legalities, enactment, or custom" from dictionary.com.

It seems to me that proponents of gay marriage are not only fighting for legal recognition of their union, unless I'm way off base, they're also fighting equally hard for their unions to be considered by society to be of "right conduct". We're half a generation away from that happening anyway; I think that's inevitable. I just don't understand why proponents of gay marriage aren't being more vocal about saying their goal is twofold: legal recognition and societal acceptance.

Chris L