Utah's Gay Marriage Ban struck down

[paperview]

Apparently they will try anything. lol

They've pretty much tried everything...and have been systematically dismantled.

Claim: Same-Sex Couples Are Not Qualified To Marry Because They Cannot Procreate
Conservatives have long arbitrarily asserted that a limitation to man-woman unions is inherent in the very definition of “marriage,” suggesting that “same-sex marriage” is thus an oxymoron. Utah state officials offered their own variation of this claim, arguing that same-sex couples were not “qualified” to marry because they can not naturally reproduce with each other. Shelby observed that there are plenty of opposite-sex couples who cannot have children or choose not to, while at the same time there are over 3,000 same-sex couples already raising children in Utah. The state’s double standard played out humorously during oral arguments earlier this month, with Philip S. Lott representing Utah (transcript is abridged here):

THE COURT: Is it the state’s position that it would be constitutional, if the state chose to do so, to enact a regulation or law requiring that individuals who wish to marry submit to fertilization testing to prove that they’re capable of procreation? Is that constitutional? Because marriage — you’re relying on procreation as an essential characteristic of that union or that right? [...]

LOTT: I don’t believe it would be constitutional, also because there is Supreme Court precedent saying that the right to not procreate is a fundamental right. So the state would not do that and would not be able to do that. [...]

THE COURT: Before we leave that last hypothetical, let me pose it a different way and see if the answer is any different. Could the state of Utah constitutionally restrict marriage — deny marriage licenses say to post-menopausal women?

LOTT: I think the answer again is that the state’s interest in fostering procreation within certain parameters is not intended to exclude other relationships that potentially are going to involve raising a child. If you have a post-menopausal woman, she may not herself be able to have a child, but that doesn’t mean that she’s not going to have a grandchild that she may be in a position to need to raise or a niece or a nephew, and so the state’s interest is still present.

THE COURT: So is it something different than an individual’s actual ability to procreate? That’s not the fundamental characteristic? It’s the likelihood that the person may find themselves in the position of raising a child?

LOTT: Yes.

THE COURT: Okay. How are same-sex couples different in that respect?

LOTT: Well, a gay or lesbian person obviously can reproduce, but it’s not going to occur within a same-sex marriage. [...] The simple answer to that is that procreation is the difference. A same-sex couple is not going to produce children.

THE COURT: Okay, so post-menopausal women in the state of Utah do not have a constitutional right to marry, as an example, or people who by virtue of surgical operations or genetics or whatever reason — if they can’t procreate, there’s not a fundamental right to marry. That’s the state’s view about the defining difference between the fundamental right that the plaintiffs are seeking here and those that are recognized by the Supreme Court?

LOTT: No.

How A Federal Judge In Utah Adeptly Dismantled All Of The Arguments Against Marriage Equality

Niiiice.

 

[WillReadmore]

Because the amendment fails even on rational basis review, Shelby did not actually apply this consideration; he was simply making the point that he could have.

How A Federal Judge In Utah Adeptly Dismantled All Of The Arguments Against Marriage Equality

Yes.

I wonder how they would answer questions concerning the fact that a lesbian couple has, on average, a procreation advantage on hetero couples?

All such a couple needs is access to a fertility clinic - the use of which is considered well within norms today.

Hell, we don't even need the clinic. At home with a turkey baster (or sterilize syringe) works just great (as I can attest)

Good point - and my very best wishes to you.

 

[kaz]

Oh, I comprehend just fine. Damn activist judges forced an unwilling public to accept interracial marriage, right? See, perfect comprehension.

Again with the emotional appeal. Unfortunately there is no logic to it. I also don't care about government marriage. But judges following the Constitution are not "activist." Being gay does not change who you can marry. Being black in Virginia did change who you could marry. They are required as a point of law to follow the Constitution.

The 14th amendment does not grant equal access to privileges. It says you can use the water fountain everyone else can, it does not say that if you don't like water you're entitled to a beverage of your choosing. There is no basis for a judge to decree gay marriage.

There are those who can though, the legislature. Get off your lazy ass and convince people.

I also like the irony that you are the one who constantly argues that simple majority is ample justification for government to pummel the rich and pillage American business. Hey, majority vote. But when you don't get your way with the majority, you just go ask for a dictatorship to declare it for you. All hypocrisy in this comes from you and goes right back to you.

Civil rights should never be put to a majority vote. The concept is ludicrous on its face.

Here's what the judge said:

In Loving, Virginia argued that its anti-miscegenation laws did not discriminate based on race because the prohibition against mixed-race marriage applied equally to both white and black citizens. The Court found that “the fact of equal application does not immunize the statute from the very heavy burden of justification which the Fourteenth Amendment has traditionally required of state statutes drawn according to race.” Applying the same logic, the court finds that the fact of equal application to both men and women does not immunize Utah’s Amendment 3 from the heightened burden of justification that the Fourteenth Amendment requires of state laws drawn according to sex.

So no...just like those lazy interracial couples, I'm confident in the system of government set up to protect my rights. I'll let it work the way it is supposed to, thanks.

Begging the question

 

[Silhouette]

Begging the question

What question? If the incomplete self-made grouping of "LGBT" will pass as a comprehensive and complete class of deviant sexualists to qualify for the 14th? Or if the 14th's guarantee for protection but not privelege is the question? Or the question if marriage is a guarantee or a privelege needing qualifiers, like a driver's license?

 

[JohnA]

Some people are just born psychopaths, which leads them to become serial killers. The real question is whether there is a legitimate reason to infringe upon such a person.

Exactly, so the notion that gays should be allowed marriage licenses because they were born that way is a faulty argument. Individuals can be born with engrained proclivities that society does not have to accept.

GAYS are treated equally under THE LAW gays can marry a person of the opposite sex anytime what you want is the law changed if the law is changed and anybody can marry whom they want because


they LOVE them them incest will dominate

 

[KevinWestern]

GAYS are treated equally under THE LAW gays can marry a person of the opposite sex anytime what you want is the law changed if the law is changed and anybody can marry whom they want because


they LOVE them them incest will dominate

So you're saying that "incest will dominate" if people were to be allowed to marry anyone they please?

LOL.. what sort of backwards region of the USA do you come from? I know not a single person who would willingly subscribe to incest.

 

[Katzndogz]

The celebration over the imposition of same sex marriage in Utah might have been premature. Same sex marriage might be legal, but there is no one willing to perform the marriage ceremony. This is what happens when a law is arbitrarily imposed against the will of the people and assumed to be the will of the people.

Judges can impose the law, but can't stop the rebellion.

 

[KevinWestern]

The celebration over the imposition of same sex marriage in Utah might have been premature. Same sex marriage might be legal, but there is no one willing to perform the marriage ceremony. This is what happens when a law is arbitrarily imposed against the will of the people and assumed to be the will of the people.

Judges can impose the law, but can't stop the rebellion.

Private churches should never be forced to perform a gay marriage if they wish not to do so. It's their choice.

However, if you're an elected judge it's your job to uphold the law - not uphold your own personal feelings and opinions.

.

 

[JakeStarkey]

This is a lie: "but there is no one willing to perform the marriage ceremony."

More than 150 were performed late Friday afternoon and more are being done today.

 

[Asclepias]

GAYS are treated equally under THE LAW gays can marry a person of the opposite sex anytime what you want is the law changed if the law is changed and anybody can marry whom they want because


they LOVE them them incest will dominate

So you're saying that "incest will dominate" if people were to be allowed to marry anyone they please?

LOL.. what sort of backwards region of the USA do you come from? I know not a single person who would willingly subscribe to incest.

Its called projection. People that think incest and sex with minors will become legal if gay marriage is allowed are really just voicing their secret desires.

 

[KevinWestern]

GAYS are treated equally under THE LAW gays can marry a person of the opposite sex anytime what you want is the law changed if the law is changed and anybody can marry whom they want because


they LOVE them them incest will dominate

So you're saying that "incest will dominate" if people were to be allowed to marry anyone they please?

LOL.. what sort of backwards region of the USA do you come from? I know not a single person who would willingly subscribe to incest.

Its called projection. People that think incest and sex with minors will become legal if gay marriage is allowed are really just voicing their secret desires.

Well, too, I always argued that even if polygammy or incest were allowed it wouldn't matter much given that such an infinitely tiny portion of the population would actually want to practice it.

Incest because it's naturally disgusting to most folks and will produce children with birth defects and mental illnesses, & polygamy because most women don't like competing with 9 other wives for attention (ie it's a pretty complex setup, to say the least, and 99.99% of people don't want to deal with that).

For me, one wife is enough and I don't think I'm alone with that thought.


.

 

[Silhouette]

The celebration over the imposition of same sex marriage in Utah might have been premature. Same sex marriage might be legal, but there is no one willing to perform the marriage ceremony. This is what happens when a law is arbitrarily imposed against the will of the people and assumed to be the will of the people.

Judges can impose the law, but can't stop the rebellion.

Actually, in a democracy, the power of a single judge to eliminate the power of a state's constitutional provision is very much in question. And as to this action will be decided at the SCOTUS level within the year without question.

Remember that SCOTUS already said in DOMA/Windsor 2013 that gay marriage is only "allowed" "in some states" and that it believes a broad swath of people of any affected state have the protected right of consensus on the topic.

A single judge acting as a dictator is not a consensus. So there is going to be a little problem with that.

 

[Katzndogz]

This is a lie: "but there is no one willing to perform the marriage ceremony."

More than 150 were performed late Friday afternoon and more are being done today.

Then gays can line up behind whichever few are willing. And those who are willing, like everyone else, will face whatever public judgment the public decides to administer. As the gay gestapo is so happy to say, there's the court and the court of public opinion.

 

[kaz]

Begging the question

What question? If the incomplete self-made grouping of "LGBT" will pass as a comprehensive and complete class of deviant sexualists to qualify for the 14th? Or if the 14th's guarantee for protection but not privelege is the question? Or the question if marriage is a guarantee or a privelege needing qualifiers, like a driver's license?

Begging the question means that she was assuming the truth of her own position in her argument, it's a logical fallacy.

I have no issue with gays, my issue is with leftists and with government. I don't see any possible way that gay sex between two consenting adults affects me or is in any way bad. I was born straight, they were born gay. Why should someone force themselves to spend their lives unhappily in a straight relationship when there is a consenting gay who wants to be with them? On the other hand, don't think they need government to validate them or give them party favors like seawytch demands. Leftists are divisive and government is discriminatory, that is what I oppose.

 

[Seawytch]

Exactly, so the notion that gays should be allowed marriage licenses because they were born that way is a faulty argument. Individuals can be born with engrained proclivities that society does not have to accept.

GAYS are treated equally under THE LAW gays can marry a person of the opposite sex anytime what you want is the law changed if the law is changed and anybody can marry whom they want because


they LOVE them them incest will dominate

The judge in the Utah case already addressed that "argument".

"In Loving, Virginia argued that its anti-miscegenation laws did not discriminate based on race because the prohibition against mixed-race marriage applied equally to both white and black citizens. The Court found that “the fact of equal application does not immunize the statute from the very heavy burden of justification which the Fourteenth Amendment has traditionally required of state statutes drawn according to race.” Applying the same logic, the court finds that the fact of equal application to both men and women does not immunize Utah’s Amendment 3 from the heightened burden of justification that the Fourteenth Amendment requires of state laws drawn according to sex."

 

[Seawytch]

Begging the question

What question? If the incomplete self-made grouping of "LGBT" will pass as a comprehensive and complete class of deviant sexualists to qualify for the 14th? Or if the 14th's guarantee for protection but not privelege is the question? Or the question if marriage is a guarantee or a privelege needing qualifiers, like a driver's license?

Begging the question means that she was assuming the truth of her own position in her argument, it's a logical fallacy.

I have no issue with gays, my issue is with leftists and with government. I don't see any possible way that gay sex between two consenting adults affects me or is in any way bad. I was born straight, they were born gay. Why should someone force themselves to spend their lives unhappily in a straight relationship when there is a consenting gay who wants to be with them? On the other hand, don't think they need government to validate them or give them party favors like seawytch demands. Leftists are divisive and government is discriminatory, that is what I oppose.

Don't you mean "don't think they need government to validate them or give them party favors like I get"

 

[Silhouette]

I don't see any possible way that gay sex between two consenting adults affects me or is in any way bad. I was born straight, they were born gay. Why should someone force themselves to spend their lives unhappily in a straight relationship when there is a consenting gay who wants to be with them? On the other hand, don't think they need government to validate them or give them party favors like seawytch demands. Leftists are divisive and government is discriminatory, that is what I oppose.

The jury is leaning heavily on gay being an acquired behavior. We know we can teach permanent artificial sexual orientations to all other warm blooded species. Why would homo sapiens be the singular exception to the rule? And of the identical twin girls I knew raised by a lesbian pair. One grew up to become lesbian. The other grew up to become hetero and is happily married to a man and having kids. Then there's Anne Heche.

It isn't a question of whether or not mainstreaming gay behaviors affects YOU as YOU are already well grounded in your orientation. It's how it affects kids who are still experimenting with their sexuality. Particularly alarming is the sharp rise in HIV/AIDS cases in boys ages 13-29 just since the new gay-marriage-media blitz has started. This lines up perfectly with what we already know about all other warm blooded species: that artificial sexual orientation can be learned and fixated to anything under the sun other than a reproductive partner.

Here's an article that discusses how sexual preference is affected even in animals by social cues instead of innate instructions. Homo sapiens is the paramount example in the animal kingdom of a species that learns and fixates from social cues:

Conditioning and Sexual Behavior: A Review

http://www.pphp.concordia.ca/fac/pfaus/Pfaus-Kippin-Centeno(2001).pdf

Teaching kids through the vehicle of marriage that homosexuality & particularly the anal sex that is part and parcel of it on the male side of the coin, is a very potent and deadly social cue to be flaunting in front of them...as they line up to try out the new fad and march in a sharp upswing in numbers to an early and horrible grave.

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

Winston Churchill: I can explain it to you. I cannot comprehend it for you.

Oh, I comprehend just fine. Damn activist judges forced an unwilling public to accept interracial marriage, right? See, perfect comprehension.

Again with the emotional appeal. Unfortunately there is no logic to it. I also don't care about government marriage. But judges following the Constitution are not "activist." Being gay does not change who you can marry. Being black in Virginia did change who you could marry. They are required as a point of law to follow the Constitution.

The 14th amendment does not grant equal access to privileges. It says you can use the water fountain everyone else can, it does not say that if you don't like water you're entitled to a beverage of your choosing. There is no basis for a judge to decree gay marriage.

There are those who can though, the legislature. Get off your lazy ass and convince people.

I also like the irony that you are the one who constantly argues that simple majority is ample justification for government to pummel the rich and pillage American business. Hey, majority vote. But when you don't get your way with the majority, you just go ask for a dictatorship to declare it for you. All hypocrisy in this comes from you and goes right back to you.

Incorrect.

Marriage is a right and the law, where the Fourteenth Amendment compels the states to allow all persons access to the law.

 

[bodecea]

Apparently they will try anything. lol

They've pretty much tried everything...and have been systematically dismantled.

Claim: Same-Sex Couples Are Not Qualified To Marry Because They Cannot Procreate
Conservatives have long arbitrarily asserted that a limitation to man-woman unions is inherent in the very definition of “marriage,” suggesting that “same-sex marriage” is thus an oxymoron. Utah state officials offered their own variation of this claim, arguing that same-sex couples were not “qualified” to marry because they can not naturally reproduce with each other. Shelby observed that there are plenty of opposite-sex couples who cannot have children or choose not to, while at the same time there are over 3,000 same-sex couples already raising children in Utah. The state’s double standard played out humorously during oral arguments earlier this month, with Philip S. Lott representing Utah (transcript is abridged here):

THE COURT: Is it the state’s position that it would be constitutional, if the state chose to do so, to enact a regulation or law requiring that individuals who wish to marry submit to fertilization testing to prove that they’re capable of procreation? Is that constitutional? Because marriage — you’re relying on procreation as an essential characteristic of that union or that right? [...]

LOTT: I don’t believe it would be constitutional, also because there is Supreme Court precedent saying that the right to not procreate is a fundamental right. So the state would not do that and would not be able to do that. [...]

THE COURT: Before we leave that last hypothetical, let me pose it a different way and see if the answer is any different. Could the state of Utah constitutionally restrict marriage — deny marriage licenses say to post-menopausal women?

LOTT: I think the answer again is that the state’s interest in fostering procreation within certain parameters is not intended to exclude other relationships that potentially are going to involve raising a child. If you have a post-menopausal woman, she may not herself be able to have a child, but that doesn’t mean that she’s not going to have a grandchild that she may be in a position to need to raise or a niece or a nephew, and so the state’s interest is still present.

THE COURT: So is it something different than an individual’s actual ability to procreate? That’s not the fundamental characteristic? It’s the likelihood that the person may find themselves in the position of raising a child?

LOTT: Yes.

THE COURT: Okay. How are same-sex couples different in that respect?

LOTT: Well, a gay or lesbian person obviously can reproduce, but it’s not going to occur within a same-sex marriage. [...] The simple answer to that is that procreation is the difference. A same-sex couple is not going to produce children.

THE COURT: Okay, so post-menopausal women in the state of Utah do not have a constitutional right to marry, as an example, or people who by virtue of surgical operations or genetics or whatever reason — if they can’t procreate, there’s not a fundamental right to marry. That’s the state’s view about the defining difference between the fundamental right that the plaintiffs are seeking here and those that are recognized by the Supreme Court?

LOTT: No.

How A Federal Judge In Utah Adeptly Dismantled All Of The Arguments Against Marriage Equality

Niiiice.

Sounds like this Lott guy listened to a "coupling" lecture.

 

[bodecea]

Exactly, so the notion that gays should be allowed marriage licenses because they were born that way is a faulty argument. Individuals can be born with engrained proclivities that society does not have to accept.

GAYS are treated equally under THE LAW gays can marry a person of the opposite sex anytime what you want is the law changed if the law is changed and anybody can marry whom they want because


they LOVE them them incest will dominate

After WWII, in the Berlin sector, an American GI and a Soviet soldier were having a drink and a conversation. The American said, "America is the land of freedom. Under our law I can say 'President Truman is a son of a bitch' and I will not get arrested." The Soviet replied..."We too have same freedom. I can say 'President Truman is a son of a bitch' and I will not get arrested. Same freedom!"

Same as your argument.