The Inside Assyria Discussion Forum #5

=> Gay Marriage to the Rescue!

Gay Marriage to the Rescue!

Posted by pancho (Moderator) - Saturday, May 9 2009, 20:37:39 (CEST)
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...the entire subject of gay marriage is fascinating. In recent months there seems to be a sea-change in attitudes here in America. Maine is the most recent convert...along with Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Iowa and one or two others...maybe now California will finally do the right thing. The issue is rightly being defined as a question of equal civil rights...morality has nothing to do with it. I think it's immoral for the State to execute anyone...but it's legal all the same.

A condition placed by the Maine legislature on the bill legalizing same-sex marriage tells us a lot. The Right demanded that no Churches should ever be forced to perform gay marriages. On the one hand this seems irrelevant, since no gay couple has expressed any desire to be blessed by a church union...and no one expects America to become a country that forces any religious group to do anything...especially not violate their own rules, by blessing gay marriages. But maybe the Church people are thinking way ahead....to a day when people will want to know why the government, which is we the people, are giving tax breaks to organizations which discriminate.

The Boy Scouts offer a good example. They were sued because they refuse to take openly gay youngsters. They won in court because they are a private organization and can choose who they allow to join and ,yes as surprising as it seems, they can discriminate against children they don't like because of their sexual orientation. But there were consequences...for one thing San Francisco, refused to allow the Boy Scouts to moor their motor launch for free at a city dock....and other such privileges were canceled...the reason being that these concessions were made on behalf of all us through our government agencies and we did not want to support any group which discriminates...if they want to go that route..if they are allowed to do such things because they are "private"...then let them be ALL private and pay, just as the rest of us private people do.

Churches are tax-exempt...and they receive other freebies based on there so-called "good works". The government, or the people, will never punish any Church outright for refusing equal treatment to Gay parrishioners ...not even a Christian "hater", such as myself, would want such a thing...BUT...it would be punishing US, those of us who support all equal rights for everybody, to force us to pay the taxes the Churches don't.

There may come a day when a Gay couple will sue a Church for refusing them equal treatment...I hope so. On that day the resolution will be, "if you want to discriminate based on sex, or any other reason, you can do so, but you lose your tax benefits, which come gratis through ALL the citizens, including Gay ones, who should NOT be forced to pay the fair share of a group that discriminates against them.

That may be what is behind much of this Right-wing angst over Gay marriage...they may lose their tax status if they insist on teaching that God hates Gays, or any variation of that.

Thank God for Gay marriage.....it may win us back some civil rights.

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