Aw, Republicans. Look what you made me do.
Last night's The Daily Show has inspired me to post a political opinion. I'm not prone to this, but hey, I guess you have to start somewhere.Jon Stewart's interview of Gov. Mike Huckabee can be seen here. It's most of the episode. The part that was so inspirational to me is the last segment, seen here. Jon Stewart brings up gay marriage. Huckabee does a piss-poor job of defending the social-conservative bigoted stance, which is understandable. What is really upsetting, however, is that Jon Stewart seemed to be validating Huckabee's religious undertones by arguing the biblical slant. Yes, he had some good points (polygamy anyone?), but I think using these arguments will hurt the cause in the long run.
Ahem. Our wonderful, long-surviving government claims to rely on a separation of church and state. Unfortunately, marriage is a religious institution that has been written into government policy, tax code, etc. This is causing a good deal of confusion.
Get. It. Outta There!
If Mike Huckabee wants to keep the word "marriage" then fine, you religious nut you, have it. Take it to your churches where marriage ceremonies are performed. But in this United States, ALL law-abiding citizens need to have the same rights. PERIOD. Of course, here I am referring to those rights of civil union, including tax benefits and adoption rights. It's as simple as separating "ordained by god" (which of course, isn't a right) from "accepted by law" (which of course, shouldn't be religiously biased).
This, to me, seems like a pretty obvious course of action. I would expect that there is nothing in the bible about hospital visiting rights or tax benes, and there is no special diction here for Huckabee to defend. So end of discussion, everybody is happy.
Okay maybe not everybody. I can see that raising kids/adoption is probably the root of all this hubub. Many people are dedicated to the traditional family structure and see the current legal definition of marriage as protecting that and the proverbial children. Well, nuts to you guys, your argument stinks. Traditional family structure sure doesn't guarantee a happy childhood, nor does non-traditional family structure guarantee a miserable one. Let me quote an amateur op ed I stumbled across:
"Adoption is not simply a smart alternative to parenting without stretch marks. It can take years and costs thousands of dollars to adopt a child, and the emotional price is often greater than the monetary one. People adopt because they love children, and because there are no shortage of children who are in need of a better life. No one fills out all that paperwork to undermine society, and yet some feel that’s exactly what will happen if we allow homosexuals to raise kids.
Parenting, whether it’s by adoption, foster care or nine months of pregnancy, follows a single goal: to raise good children and help give them a bright future. It has nothing to do with sexual orientation, and there is no evidence to suggest gay parents will raise an army of gay children. Straight parents seem to raise plenty of homosexual kids as it is, yet no one is condemning Dick Cheney’s fatherhood. These are not issues of family or children; these are issues of civil rights and fear, and they’re issues many thought ended in the 1960s."
In this regard I think Jon did a good job. There really is no counter-point for "a loving gay family with a financially secure background beats the hell out of Britney Spears and Kevin Federline any day of the week". Priceless.
Well, that's my ferocious 2 cents. I hope you enjoyed it.
In other news, the big presentation went surprisingly well and I am happily contemplating my next course of action. Watch out crabbies, I have experiments in mind...
posted by Amber @ 2:20 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home