In my prior post, I argued that the primary argument for why same-sex marriage should be legalized–“it is discriminatory to tell consenting adults who love each other that they cannot get married”–is fatally flawed. On the logic of this argument, virtually any kind of marriage could be justified, including polygamous marriage and incestuous marriage.
In one of the comments on my prior post, there was a link to a fantastic video of Ryan Anderson speaking for the Heritage Foundation. He makes precisely this point and utterly dismantles the argument that denial of same-sex marriage is discrimination.
What is particularly stunning is that the man asking the question in the video is totally unaware of the inconsistency of his argument. Indeed, he just talks in circles, unable to provide a coherent answer to the very simple question of why homosexuals should be granted special rights, but not polygamous or incestuous couples.
When you listen to this exchange, it becomes excruciatingly clear that the debate over same-sex marriage in this country is not being decided (by most people) on the basis of reason or logic. But on the basis of emotion and cultural pressure.
This video is short (4 minutes) and worth a careful listen:
Mike Gantt says
The questioner’s behavior would be pitiable if it only represented his own views. I say this because he continued repeating his question as if he did not hear or did not understand anything Ryan Anderson was saying in his response. Watching it makes you cringe in embarrassment for the questioner; you could wish for his sake that someone had just destroyed this video clip so that no one would see him act like this. However, the situation is more dire than this because the questioner is actually a representative sample of the shallow but highly-emotional thinking of same-sex “marriage” proponents across the country. I literally fear for our democracy that public opinion has shifted to support for SS”M” with no more reasoning than this questioner has demonstrated. It’s hard to argue that the country has not lost its mind.
Grant says
Mike, I believe that he simply does not care.
I think he has the faculties to hear and understand the answers given, but they are not what he wanted to hear, so he disregarded then and tried again. Did we see the same in Dr. Kruger’s previous post, where “Philmonomer” kept asking basically the same thing of various people, despite being answered a few times, in the comments? It was hard to even ascertain from what perspective Philmonomer was asking those questions.
I also think that you’re right to fear for democracy. Given the trend in society, there are many who would rather sympathise with the questioner and cringe that Mr. Anderson didn’t just say what the questioner (and they) want to hear. I’m reminded of hearing someone describe democracy as “the tyranny of the 51%”.
Ted Weis (@TedWeis) says
Years ago I received a most honest reply when I asked an advocate of same sex mirage, “If we allow gender to be redefined in marriage, what is the compelling reason to not allow the redefinition of number, age, etc.?” The advocate replied, “We’re just not there yet.”
Mike Gantt says
That sounds enigmatic. What do you think he meant by it?
Bob says
Homophobia has lost in the Marketplace of Ideas.