I've already expressed my opinion on same-sex marriage: there's nothing wrong with it. But my opinion isn't the issue.
The people of California are complaining that the majority spoke and Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker didn't listen, that the judge overturned a law that the majority of California wants and that's not fair.
Except, it is fair. That's what the judge (and the government in general) is there for.
The government's job is to uphold the rights of its citizens, including minorities. The majority of people used to be against treating blacks equally and allowing interracial marriage. But when the majority wants to take away the rights of a minority of citizens, that's when the government steps in and says, "No." That's one of the responsibilities of the American government: to ensure equality.
Usually, the majority wins. That's how democracy works. That's how officials are elected. That's how laws are chosen. But when the majority wants to impose its religious beliefs on others, when the majority wants to take away others' rights, that's when our elected officials step in.
That's why we have a government of people instead of a machine that just does whatever the majority demands. History has shown that the majority isn't always right.
Monday, August 9, 2010
Friday, August 6, 2010
Proposition 8 - The Government Screws Up Some More
Where did this idea that allowing same-sex couples to marry would destroy the institution of marriage come from? It's ridiculous. Allowing two people of the same gender to marry doesn't invalidate the marriage of a heterosexual couple.
If two people of the same gender love each other, they should be allowed to marry, and that marriage should be respected just like any other. All the time we see loveless marriages between men and women; I think those devalue marriage more than anything.
According to What is Prop 8?, there are other consequences to losing Proposition 8. I think the government is sticking its foot in this too far and needs to back off.
Schools should not be teaching children about marriage. Marriage, outside of the government stuff like taxes and health-care coverage, is something for parents to teach their children. And parents should always be allowed to excuse their children from sex education.
Religions shouldn't be forced to accept gay marriage if they don't want to. I don't agree with the Pope's bigoted anti-gay speeches, but that's Roman Catholicism. People can choose what religion they belong to, so anyone who disagrees with a religion's beliefs can go elsewhere for their spiritual needs.
The US is all about separating Church and State. That's a big deal here. So stepping in and telling religions they have to accept gay marriage is all kinds of wrong. If a Church doesn't want to host a wedding ceremony for a gay couple, then the couple can find somewhere else to get married.
In time, hopefully, religions will come to see that gay people aren't the end of the world. But forcing that to happen sooner rather than later is not the government's job.
Allowing couples, regardless of gender, to get married is the government's job. Allowing gays and heterosexuals access to tax credits, health care, and other Benefits of Marriage is important. Making sure banks and hospitals and insurance companies and employers don't discriminate against same-sex couples is the government's job. But the morality of marriage is the territory of religion, and it's something for parents, not schools, to teach their children.
As for a same-sex couple adopting children... I have one qualm about this issue. If, for example, two men adopt a girl, I think for the most part they could do a fine job of raising her. But when she starts having girl problems, when she hits puberty and has issues with her menstrual cycle, neither of the two people raising her have actual life experience to share with her. When two women adopt a boy, and he has problems with spontaneous erections or nocturnal emissions, those two women don't have life experience to share with him.
But I'm not in a homosexual relationship, I've never raised children, and so I don't know how a same-sex couple would or should handle such situations. That's just the one problem I see with having a child.
So, I think the government should legalize same-sex marriage, but I don't think it should step in where religion is concerned. I don't think schools should be including the morality of marriage, same-sex or otherwise, in their curriculums.
Wasn't the whole point of the United States of America to protect its people without taking away their freedom? Isn't freedom of religion one of America's valued rights? And isn't the issue of the morality of sex and marriage religious domain?
The government seems determined to either go too far or do nothing at all.
If two people of the same gender love each other, they should be allowed to marry, and that marriage should be respected just like any other. All the time we see loveless marriages between men and women; I think those devalue marriage more than anything.
According to What is Prop 8?, there are other consequences to losing Proposition 8. I think the government is sticking its foot in this too far and needs to back off.
Schools should not be teaching children about marriage. Marriage, outside of the government stuff like taxes and health-care coverage, is something for parents to teach their children. And parents should always be allowed to excuse their children from sex education.
Religions shouldn't be forced to accept gay marriage if they don't want to. I don't agree with the Pope's bigoted anti-gay speeches, but that's Roman Catholicism. People can choose what religion they belong to, so anyone who disagrees with a religion's beliefs can go elsewhere for their spiritual needs.
The US is all about separating Church and State. That's a big deal here. So stepping in and telling religions they have to accept gay marriage is all kinds of wrong. If a Church doesn't want to host a wedding ceremony for a gay couple, then the couple can find somewhere else to get married.
In time, hopefully, religions will come to see that gay people aren't the end of the world. But forcing that to happen sooner rather than later is not the government's job.
Allowing couples, regardless of gender, to get married is the government's job. Allowing gays and heterosexuals access to tax credits, health care, and other Benefits of Marriage is important. Making sure banks and hospitals and insurance companies and employers don't discriminate against same-sex couples is the government's job. But the morality of marriage is the territory of religion, and it's something for parents, not schools, to teach their children.
As for a same-sex couple adopting children... I have one qualm about this issue. If, for example, two men adopt a girl, I think for the most part they could do a fine job of raising her. But when she starts having girl problems, when she hits puberty and has issues with her menstrual cycle, neither of the two people raising her have actual life experience to share with her. When two women adopt a boy, and he has problems with spontaneous erections or nocturnal emissions, those two women don't have life experience to share with him.
But I'm not in a homosexual relationship, I've never raised children, and so I don't know how a same-sex couple would or should handle such situations. That's just the one problem I see with having a child.
So, I think the government should legalize same-sex marriage, but I don't think it should step in where religion is concerned. I don't think schools should be including the morality of marriage, same-sex or otherwise, in their curriculums.
Wasn't the whole point of the United States of America to protect its people without taking away their freedom? Isn't freedom of religion one of America's valued rights? And isn't the issue of the morality of sex and marriage religious domain?
The government seems determined to either go too far or do nothing at all.
Collected Links:
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Losers in the BP Oil Spill
I kept meaning to write about the BP Oil incident, but I was more interested in watching the news and learning about what was going on. After 30 days, I was baffled by how oil could still be pumping out into the Gulf of Mexico. Then it was 60 days. Then 80 days. If you had told me on day 1 that it would take 86 days to fix that leak, I would've told you, "No way, our government isn't that incompetent."
I should have known better.
Now that oil has stopped gushing out, the media is moving away from the oil spill. I keep hearing the headline, "Where did all the oil go?" This suggests to people that the oil is all cleaned up and everything is okay, but the oil isn't cleaned up and everything is definitely not okay.
If you want to find oil, go to Louisiana's marshes. Once oil gets into the wetlands, it's there to stay. That's not good for people or the wildlife.
The other issue is employment. Lots of people are still out of jobs. The problem is exacerbated by the moratorium on deep-water drilling.
Do I think the moratorium is necessary? I don't know. I'm truly conflicted on this one. On the one hand, people need jobs, they need income, and they need the oil companies to not say, "Bah, it's not worth it" and take their business elsewhere. On the other hand, if another rig explodes and we end up with more oil pouring into the Gulf of Mexico, then we've just committed an egregious and foreseeable error that can be called 'making the same mistake twice.'
The problem is that this whole mess never should have gotten this far. We shouldn't have to choose between jobs and another possible oil spill. There were supposed to be all these roadblocks and fail safes. What happened to those?
Well, first there's BP. They should've been practicing "Safety Always." They weren't. Bad decisions were made by many people, from the 'keep on drilling' to the 'we turned the alarm off to prevent false alarms.' BP also lied about having a back-up plan in case of an emergency. Papers state that they're committed to saving the walruses in the Gulf. You know, the walruses that aren't there.
It's not just BP, either. Lots of oil companies have the same exact back-up plans as BP… word-for-word, walruses and everything. Shouldn't this have caught the MMS's eye?
This brings me to my second point: the MMS. We all know that big business takes shortcuts at the risk of employees and the environment. We know that oil is a dangerous business. That's why the we created the MMS. They're supposed to keep an eye on the oil companies, make sure they have worst-case scenario plans, make sure the scientific studies are completed, make sure all safety standards are adhered to. Did the MMS do any of that? Not really. Instead, they were friends with people in the oil companies. They couldn't police their friends! ...Isn't that like the definition of a conflict of interests?
So yeah, the government screwed up big time. And they try to divert attention away from that fact by holding interrogations where they ask questions they knew wouldn't be answered. They posture and they yell and they try to prove that they're actively doing something. If they really wanted to impress Americans, the senators would be out in the Gulf helping to clean up the spill. Watching them congregate in an air-conditioned room in DC to lecture BP's CEO is a disappointing display. Stop wasting time. Concentrate on cleaning up the spill first.
In some ways, the government screwed up more than BP. After all, the government realizes that the oil companies need to be closely monitored to prevent incidents like this. But they didn't follow through. 'Oh, you say it's unlikely an oil spill will occur in the Gulf? Go ahead and drill. We don't need scientific studies. We don't need proof.' Yeah, great policy.
So yes, the government made a mistake by not enforcing regulations. BP made a mistake by ignoring safety standards. And the government made another mistake through inaction: BP said, "Everything's okay," and the President said, "Oh, okay," and even when it was clear that nothing was okay the President still didn't act.
On day 62 of the Gulf oil spill (June 20), Louisiana designated a statewide date of prayer. Things were just getting worse and worse, and they wanted God's help with this crisis. On the Daily Show, Jon Stewart responded:
That's right, there were so many obstacles that should have prevented this from happening, no one should have to ask, "Sandbars or oil? Jobs or possible oil?" Because there are no good answers to these questions. At the end of every road is a dead end and a sign saying "You Lose."
We all lose.
I should have known better.
Now that oil has stopped gushing out, the media is moving away from the oil spill. I keep hearing the headline, "Where did all the oil go?" This suggests to people that the oil is all cleaned up and everything is okay, but the oil isn't cleaned up and everything is definitely not okay.
If you want to find oil, go to Louisiana's marshes. Once oil gets into the wetlands, it's there to stay. That's not good for people or the wildlife.
The other issue is employment. Lots of people are still out of jobs. The problem is exacerbated by the moratorium on deep-water drilling.
Do I think the moratorium is necessary? I don't know. I'm truly conflicted on this one. On the one hand, people need jobs, they need income, and they need the oil companies to not say, "Bah, it's not worth it" and take their business elsewhere. On the other hand, if another rig explodes and we end up with more oil pouring into the Gulf of Mexico, then we've just committed an egregious and foreseeable error that can be called 'making the same mistake twice.'
The problem is that this whole mess never should have gotten this far. We shouldn't have to choose between jobs and another possible oil spill. There were supposed to be all these roadblocks and fail safes. What happened to those?
Well, first there's BP. They should've been practicing "Safety Always." They weren't. Bad decisions were made by many people, from the 'keep on drilling' to the 'we turned the alarm off to prevent false alarms.' BP also lied about having a back-up plan in case of an emergency. Papers state that they're committed to saving the walruses in the Gulf. You know, the walruses that aren't there.
It's not just BP, either. Lots of oil companies have the same exact back-up plans as BP… word-for-word, walruses and everything. Shouldn't this have caught the MMS's eye?
This brings me to my second point: the MMS. We all know that big business takes shortcuts at the risk of employees and the environment. We know that oil is a dangerous business. That's why the we created the MMS. They're supposed to keep an eye on the oil companies, make sure they have worst-case scenario plans, make sure the scientific studies are completed, make sure all safety standards are adhered to. Did the MMS do any of that? Not really. Instead, they were friends with people in the oil companies. They couldn't police their friends! ...Isn't that like the definition of a conflict of interests?
So yeah, the government screwed up big time. And they try to divert attention away from that fact by holding interrogations where they ask questions they knew wouldn't be answered. They posture and they yell and they try to prove that they're actively doing something. If they really wanted to impress Americans, the senators would be out in the Gulf helping to clean up the spill. Watching them congregate in an air-conditioned room in DC to lecture BP's CEO is a disappointing display. Stop wasting time. Concentrate on cleaning up the spill first.
In some ways, the government screwed up more than BP. After all, the government realizes that the oil companies need to be closely monitored to prevent incidents like this. But they didn't follow through. 'Oh, you say it's unlikely an oil spill will occur in the Gulf? Go ahead and drill. We don't need scientific studies. We don't need proof.' Yeah, great policy.
So yes, the government made a mistake by not enforcing regulations. BP made a mistake by ignoring safety standards. And the government made another mistake through inaction: BP said, "Everything's okay," and the President said, "Oh, okay," and even when it was clear that nothing was okay the President still didn't act.
On day 62 of the Gulf oil spill (June 20), Louisiana designated a statewide date of prayer. Things were just getting worse and worse, and they wanted God's help with this crisis. On the Daily Show, Jon Stewart responded:
Apparently, in Louisiana mortals only get sixty days to solve problems. After that, f—k it, let's call God. … You know, actually, the oil is under a mile of seawater and another two and a half miles of solid sediment earth, so I think God's done enough to prevent these spills.
Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
That's right, there were so many obstacles that should have prevented this from happening, no one should have to ask, "Sandbars or oil? Jobs or possible oil?" Because there are no good answers to these questions. At the end of every road is a dead end and a sign saying "You Lose."
We all lose.
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