Homosexual marriage

[Insidious Rex]

Originally Posted by inked

We WANTSSSSSSSS IT !!!!! WE WANTS S S S S IT !!!!





Comparatively, that would add up to a mere 0.6% of the 209,125 marriages contracted in Spain during 2005. Of the total number of same-sex marriages, 923 were between males and 352 among females. ....

And what of the ones that do? I dont understand this argument. Its like saying because women have never been allowed to vote in the past when then when they are allowed to vote and not all of them do then we shouldnt allow them to vote. Not all heterosexuals want to marry either. Why dont we use this same argument against them marrying? I mean how incredibly irrelevant.

The fact is some do. Thats what we are talking about here. Not that some dont.

[Lizra]

Heh!

[inked]

The Boston Globe says "put up or be put out!" or something to that effect. Gotta love the equal application of the law, dontcha?! (Did I get the accent right?)

Gays at Globe told to marry or lose benefits
By Jesse Noyes
Saturday, July 8, 2006 - Updated: 11:09 AM EST

Memo to Boston Globe gay and lesbian Guild employees: Get married or lose your domestic partner benefits.

Globe staffers have been told that health and dental benefits for gay employees’ domestic partners are being discontinued. Gay couples who want to keep their benefits must marry by Jan. 1.

A memo sent to the Globe’s Boston Newspaper Guild members, and obtained by the Herald, states that Massachusetts gay Guild employees can extend their benefits to their partners only if they marry.

“An employee who currently covers a same-sex domestic partner as a dependent will have to marry his or her partner by Jan. 1 for the employee benefits coverage to continue at the employee rates,” the memo states.

The policy change at the Globe, which devotes extensive coverage to gay issues, opens a new can of worms in the Bay State as employers rethink their domestic partner benefits in the wake of the legalization of gay marriage in 2004.

Benefits for domestic partners were originally offered to gay employees because they couldn’t legally marry, said Ilene Robinson Sunshine, a lawyer at Sullivan & Worcester.

Now that gay marriage is legal in Massachusetts companies that offer benefits to gay employees’ partners risk hearing cries of discrimination from unmarried straight couples.

Such concerns played a role in the policy change at the Globe, said Steve Behenna, the newspaper’s compensation and benefits director.

The Globe does not extend benefits to live-in partners of its heterosexual employees. Like many companies, it offered benefits to partners of gay employees because marriage was not an option for them. Now that gay marriage is an option in Massachusetts, Behenna said the paper could be more susceptible to claims of discrimination.Paul Holtzman, an attorney specializing in employment law at Krokidas & Bluestein, said you can expect more local companies to change their policies.

“There is a trend towards doing what the Globe did,” he said. “A number of employers have taken the position that now that same-sex marriage is an option there is no longer a need to offer domestic partner benefits.”

As companies drop domestic partner benefits, gays who work in Boston but live in another state could be left in the lurch since they can’t legally marry, said Kevin Batt, an attorney who has handled gay marriage litigation.

Domestic partner benefits will continue for Globe employees who live in states where gay marriage is not recognized, Behenna said.

http://news.bostonherald.com/localRe...83&format=text

[Butterbeer]

Originally Posted by Lizra

Heh!

heh!!

*blows Kiss!*

[Count Comfect]

That's exactly what SHOULD happen. Good for the Globe.

[inked]

SALT LAKE CITY: No scientific basis for 'born gay' theory

By David Clarke Pruden
The Salt Lake Tribune
7/8/2006

Although the simple "born gay" theory has faded from the science scene, activists continue to misrepresent scientific findings. When you assert that individuals are born gay and cannot change, people naturally jump to the conclusion that same-sex marriage is the only rational choice for same-sex attracted individuals.

However, the innate-immutable theory of homosexuality has no basis in science. The simplistic biological theory has been dismissed by all of the researchers whose studies have been cited to support the notion that homosexuality is so deeply compelled by biology that it cannot change.

Let's examine the words of just one of those often incorrectly cited as providing evidence for a "gay gene." Simon LeVay notes, "It is important to stress what I didn't find. I did not prove that homosexuality was genetic, or find a cause for being gay. I didn't show that gay men were born that way, the most common mistake people make in interpreting my work."

A new research study by a University of Illinois team, which has screened the entire human genome, reported that there is no one gay gene. Writing in the journal Human Genetics, lead researcher Dr. Brian Mustanski noted that environmental factors were also likely to be involved.

Of the innate-immutable argument, Dr. Richard C. Friedman and Dr. Jennifer Downey, noted, "At clinical conferences one often hears . . . that homosexual orientation is fixed and unmodifiable. Neither assertion is true . . . The assertion that homosexuality is genetic is so reductionistic that it must be dismissed out of hand as a general principle of psychology."

And the fluidity of homosexual attractions is well-established. Dr. Ellen Schecter of the Fielding Institute studied women who had self-identified as lesbian for more than 10 years and who after age 30 were now in intimate relationships with men lasting a year or longer.

Even more prominent was the research by Robert Spitzer, the very psychiatrist who led the charge to remove homosexuality from the psychiatric manual. His study of 200 gay men and lesbian women who had undergone re-orientation therapy concluded: 44 percent of the women and 66 percent of the men had arrived at what he called "good heterosexual functioning" and 89 percent of the men and 95 percent of the women reported that they were bothered slightly or not at all by unwanted homosexual feelings.

Mainstream gay-affirming publications like The Advocate are changing their terminology to embrace the concept of fluid sexual attractions. Matt Foreman, of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, summarizes what the gay movement has done.

"We as a movement can take pride that we opened the door for young people to be much more fluid about sexuality, gender, gender roles, orientation and sexual behavior than any other generation in history. That's what the gay movement has contributed to society, and that's a tremendously good thing."

But is it? If the innate-immutable theory of homosexuality has no basis in science then why do so many activists still insist that individuals are born gay and cannot change? LeVay provided the answer.

He notes " . . . people who think that gays and lesbians are born that way are more likely to support gay rights."

This is not to say that anyone chooses homosexual attractions nor do most of us choose many of the other challenges we face in life, but we do choose how we respond.

---David Clarke Pruden is the executive director of Evergreen International, a nonprofit Latter-Day Saint organization that provides resources and educational services for same-sex attracted members.

[Elfhelm]

your point?

[Spock]

I think that article says that you aren't born gay, you become gay. IMO, we all change biologically as we age, perhaps it is something which is affected by BOTH nature and nurture as well as societal influences.

[The Gaffer]

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. What did they expect? A big pink section of DNA?

The article tells us little except that the anti-gay movement is very concerned with disproving the "gay gene" theory, which nobody believes anyway.

This is a good example of how they hope to influence the debate by redefining the terms of the discussion. Clearly, any genetic component in being gay poses a big problem to them, as many of them believe that man was made in the image of his creator etc etc.

[Elfhelm]

Am I any less queer if I choose it?

[Spock]

Wouldn't it be easier if they could blame it all on that fairy that is currently flying around in the car commercial.

Pink, DNA--great line.

[The Gaffer]

Agreed, even though I haven't seen the commercial of which you speak; however, it might help us to pay a bit more attention to the issue of equality.

[Elfhelm]

Of course, the inconsistent illogic is simply this:

With my left hand I will demand that only biology can determine behavior.

With my right hand I will insist on behavior that elevates man above the animals by supression of biological urges.

What?!?!?!

Which is it? Can't they see that these two ideas are opposites?

Of course they can. They just want to select whichever premise supports their argument today.

So if you say that all the other great apes have a diversity of sexual behaviors, they tell you that homo sapiens is above the other animals because we control our reproduction by choice.

But if you say that people have a right to choose how and when and where they use their reproductive apparati, they say that biological necessity is the only acceptable basis for sex.

In short, they choose whichever argument suits them on that occasion.

[Lizra]

"Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. What did they expect? A big pink section of DNA?

The article tells us little except that the anti-gay movement is very concerned with disproving the "gay gene" theory, which nobody believes anyway.

This is a good example of how they hope to influence the debate by redefining the terms of the discussion. Clearly, any genetic component in being gay poses a big problem to them, as many of them believe that man was made in the image of his creator etc etc."

Excellent post Gaffer! And I like the way these were your OWN words ....not just another lazy cut and paste job.
Of course there is a genetic componet to being gay....A BIG, FAT, HAIRY one!

[The Gaffer]

* hugs Liz *

[Butterbeer]

sounds good ... *hugs Liz too*

top notch gaffer!

yes ... Inked old chum ...less paste and more pink flowery DNA wall paper please!

[Lizra]

Thanks for the hugs gentlemen .....GREAT way to start off my morning....heh!

(Naughty Liz! I am now thinking of Emeril's line...."Let's kick it up a notch"! )

[The Gaffer]

* breaks out the swarfega *

Wait a minute, isn't it the middle of the night with you, or are you just an early riser, so to speak?

[Butterbeer]

anytime is good for some hugging bud! ...

the gals' just tuned in!

[Insidious Rex]

Supporters of same-sex marriage are also optimistic as they look forward to this fall's campaigns. "Attitudes are changing, as people come to see this as a civil rights issue," said Brad Luna, of the Human Rights Campaign. "All the indicators show Americans are moving in the direction of marriage equality."

Among other things, proponents of same-sex marriage think they have a chance this November, for the first time, to defeat a ban on a state ballot. A nonpartisan poll in Wisconsin last month showed voters evenly split on the issue, with 49 percent favoring such a ban and 48 percent opposed. Gov. Jim Doyle (D) and four former governors from both parties have come out against the amendment.

Polling in Arizona and Colorado also suggests fairly close divisions. But opponents of same-sex marriage note that polls usually understate the actual vote for such a ban.

Beyond that, efforts to put a ban on state ballots are starting to fall short, both in the legislatures and in citizens' initiatives. In eight states, including Maryland, Pennsylvania and West Virginia, proposals calling for a ballot referendum banning same-sex marriage failed to pass the legislature this year. In California and Florida, opponents of same-sex marriage were unable to collect enough signatures to put an initiative on the ballot this fall.

In Illinois, groups opposing same-sex marriage submitted 347,000 signatures for their ballot proposal, but volunteers who support the unions scrutinized every name and challenged so many that the State Board of Elections refused to certify the proposal. Opponents are appealing that ruling.

This from a Washington Post article today. Small signs but good signs. Other then Mass, most news about same sex marriage has been basically a ringing endorsement for our societies intolerance as a whole. Maybe that’s just beginning to slowly change now. Maybe not. Guess we'll see. My thinking is that as long as its JUST Massachusetts then people will just see that as an anomaly and a bunch of liberal wackos. But once a few more states fall, say some good heartland midwestern states like Wisconsin, well then people will suddenly see it in a different light. People will see it as that much more acceptable simply because its not the freak exception any more.