Topic: European Court: Homosexual marriage is NOT a "human right"

[IronDioPriest]

Gay marriage is not a 'human right': European ruling torpedoes Coalition stance

Same-sex marriages are not a human right, European judges have ruled.

Their decision shreds the claim by ministers that gay marriage is a universal human right and that same-sex couples have a right to marry because their mutual commitment is just as strong as that of husbands and wives.

The ruling was made by judges of the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg following a case involving a lesbian couple in a civil partnership who complained the French courts would not allow them to adopt a child as a couple.

The ruling also says that if gay couples are allowed to marry, any church that offers weddings will be guilty of discrimination if it declines to marry same-sex couples.

It means that if MPs legislate for same-sex marriage, the Coalition’s promise that churches will not be compelled to conduct the weddings will be worthless.

The ruling comes just days after the Government published a consultation paper which promised marriage to same-sex couples and made clear that Britain is only catching up with other countries.

Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone said: ‘Put simply, it’s not right that a couple who love each other and want to formalise a commitment to each other should be denied the right to marry.’

However, the Strasbourg judges ruled that because the French couple were civil partners, they did not have the rights of married people, who in France have the sole right to adopt a child as a couple.

They declared: ‘The European Convention on Human Rights does not require member states’ governments to grant same-sex couples access to marriage.’

The judges added that couples who are not married do not enjoy the same status as those who are.

‘With regard to married couples, the court considers that in view of the social, personal, and legal consequences of marriage, the applicants’ legal situation could not be said to be comparable to that of married couples.’

The French civil partners, Valerie Gas and Nathalie Dubois, tried to secure marriage rights under clauses that prevent discrimination and protect privacy and family life.

But the Strasbourg judges said there had been no discrimination against them because they were lesbians.

Lawyers said the decisions transformed the impact of David Cameron’s planned same-sex marriage law.

Neil Addison, a specialist in discrimination law, said: ‘Once same-sex marriage has been legalised then the partners to such a marriage are entitled to exactly the same rights as partners in a heterosexual marriage.

This means that if same-sex marriage is legalised in the UK it will be illegal for the Government to prevent such marriages happening in religious premises.’

The Government’s consultation paper also said that no church would have to conduct gay weddings. It said there would be different legal categories of civil and religious marriage and same-sex couples would not be allowed religious marriages.

But Church of England lawyers have already warned that if same-sex marriage goes ahead, then equality law is likely to force churches to fall into line and perform the wedding ceremonies.

The Strasbourg ruling won praise from campaigners against same-sex marriage.

Norman Wells, of the Family Education Trust, said: ‘For too long campaigners have been using the language of rights in an attempt to add moral force to what are nothing more than personal desires.

‘In many cases they have bypassed the democratic process and succeeded in imposing their views on the rest of the population by force of law.

‘We are seeing the same principle at work in the Government’s sham of a consultation on same-sex marriage.’

He added: ‘The ruling from the ECHR will embolden those whose concerns about same-sex marriage and adoption are not inspired by personal hatred and animosity, but by a genuine concern for the well-being of children and the welfare of society.

‘Instead of rushing to legislate without seriously considering the views of the electorate, the Government should be encouraging a measured public debate on the nature and meaning of marriage.’

The Stonewall pressure group called for same-sex couples to be allowed religious weddings if churches agreed.

It added: ‘The vitriol seen in statements by many political and religious figures, particularly some senior clerics, in advance of this consultation demonstrates the persistence of deeply worrying prejudice towards gay people.’

[Libertas]

Norman Wells, of the Family Education Trust, said: ‘For too long campaigners have been using the language of rights in an attempt to add moral force to what are nothing more than personal desires.

Yes!

‘In many cases they have bypassed the democratic process and succeeded in imposing their views on the rest of the population by force of law.

It is what they do!  Glad to see it got shoved back into their face here!

He added: ‘The ruling from the ECHR will embolden those whose concerns about same-sex marriage and adoption are not inspired by personal hatred and animosity, but by a genuine concern for the well-being of children and the welfare of society.

Amen!

 

Now, if we can only have this same interpretation here!

[Weisshaupt]

I should be able to marry my 1st cousin too! I am being discriminated against!
Why can the gay community not wrap their head around the fact that they are not denied a right to marry. They can marry under the same terms as the rest of us. A heterosexual man can't marry another man either.  The problem is their preference, not the law.

Yes I think there should be an institution, separate from marriage, designed for the needs of homosexual couples. Marriage is mostly defined as a series of obligations to your spouse.. it confers very few benefits, and from what I have seen of the behavior of the gay community, the vast majority do not want such obligations. They reject a separate contract because they simply aren't interested in having a contact- they want to poke their fingers in the eyes of those who disapprove. They want to try and force others to accept them, and to be seen as "normal", (which, by the definition of that word, they are not) . And since they can't actually force people to accept them, they seek the power of government to compel people to act like they do.  

[Libertas]

Plus, if we cave into their demands for forced acceptance then it opens the door for bestiality, pedophilia, pederasty and all manner of deviant sociopaths!

Just say HELL NO to that noise!

[Alphabet Soup]

Pandora and I have been going round~n~round with the libs at the Chatham site over homo "marriage". There are two core arguments that the left props up:

1. Homos are being denied their "rights". When challenged to recite which specific constitutional right they are being denied they invariably defer to the "right to happiness" mentioned in the DOI.

2. "What are you afraid of?" This emotion-based argument turns logic on its head by demanding that you provide proof of your injury should homos be allowed to marry.

There's a subtext to their second argument and that opens the door for them to hurl dismissive insults of homophobia (and worse).

I pretty much spoiled the debate by application of illustrating the absurd by being absurd. I remarked about the positive benefit of a degeneration to homo marriage by being able to marry my Corvette. Pandora smartly capped that with a reference to a leftist who married a building, thus demolishing the potential argument that "our side is being absurd".

But rust never sleeps and leftists never give up trying to destroy things, so they'll be back.

[Pandora]

*sigh*

This issue out of Britain is a topic on my local forum, too.  (eta:  Oh!  There ya go; Soup got to it sooner!)

One response to my calm reasoning reads:  "May your burning hatred of homosexuals keep you warm at night."

The plain fact is, in the West, the requirements for marriage are just three:  select a person of the opposite sex, of legal age, who is not a close blood relative.  Period.  Almost anyone can meet them; homosexuals simply want the definition rewritten to suit their preferences.

The person who wrote the above insult would prefer to see government totally out of the marriage business, and berates "supposedly" small-government Conservatives for violating their own principles.  I would agree, on a Federal level, if we weren't looking at a potential imposition of gay "marriage" from that level; if it's there from whence it may come, it is there it must be stopped.  Marriage as we know it existed before laws formalizing the institution, which, IMO, is the proper and rightful order of things as regards lawmaking.  What the "insulter" can't wrap her mind around is that it is not Conservatives who are asking the government to intrude, it is the gayz and their supporters.

These disgusting, degenerated Leftists have been working for decades to destroy Western civilization; the traditional nuclear family is a main building block of a stable society and I can see how their handiwork has already badly damaged it.  All one need do is look at the degree of societal disintegration in "the Black community" to take a lesson.

Gay "marriage" is not going to repair the damage already done by no-fault divorce and the increase in out-of-wedlock births; it will put the final nail in the coffin.

[Alphabet Soup]

You noticed how I tripped up simple-simon the Pi-man? Marriage was a religious institution long before it was a social or legal institution. If we "take government out of the marriage business" (an impossibility BTW) the church would be the only legally controlling authority - which is the LAST thing these bozos want to see happen.

Simple-simon lamely tries a "we'll create our own church" dodge, but realized that he/she/it was only tightening the snare and so went to the insult instead. Their "arguments" can't stand the scrutiny of daylight so they contort logic (a favorite pastime for the left) by claiming that it is us who hypocritically wants more gubmint intrusion.

[Sectionhand]

We need to look for prevention of homosexuality just as we look to prevent every other birth defect which can be genetically traced .

[Pandora]

We need to look for prevention of homosexuality just as we look to prevent every other birth defect which can be genetically traced .

It will never be found for several reasons, one of which is "they" won't look for it, if it exists.

Tammy Bruce openly claims she chose lesbianism.

[Weisshaupt]

We need to look for prevention of homosexuality just as we look to prevent every other birth defect which can be genetically traced .

It will never be found for several reasons, one of which is "they" won't look for it, if it exists.

Tammy Bruce openly claims she chose lesbianism.

There is nothing so scary to me as what "they" will do when "they" control the genome, even if "they" ends up being a free and democratic populace.  Look at what "they" choose to watch on TV.  Gattaca is a nightmare.
Gattaca - Movie Trailer
 

[Libertas]

Hey, that's just Sanger's utopia, they want that Weisshaupt!

[IronDioPriest]

Just saw Gattica for the first time a few nights ago. It's just a matter of degree and time.

Information of a personal nature is increasingly being used against people. Demographic census info used to choose winners and losers; medical records compiled statistically and used to formulate medicare and medicaid policy; credit card purchases used to gather and produce marketing data; shopping habits and preferences tracked; prospective employers demanding access to facebook, twitter, private emails; Black Boxes in cars tracking and storing your speed, braking, accelleration, etc.

There is no reason to believe that if the human genome is decoded to a degree that it is easily accessible and usable by government or those with resources to pay for the info, that it will not be used, to the utmost degree and harm to the individual.

[LadyVirginia]

Are these the kind of European judges that Kagan and Ginsburg like?


 

I didn't think so.

[Magnum]

I feel this is one of the best articles I have read on this topic................... written by Dennis Prager.

(maybe the European judges get it)

Same-Sex Marriage and the Insignificance of Men and Women

"The left passionately supports the most remarkable and radical change in modern social history -- the redefinition of marriage from male-female to include male-male and female-female.

Marriage is the building block of society. Changing its nature will therefore change society. Among other things, same-sex marriage means that because sex (now called "gender") no longer matters for society's most important institution, it no longer matters in general.

Men and women as distinct entities no longer have significance. Which is exactly what the cultural left and the gay rights movement advocate -- even though the vast majority of Americans who support same-sex marriage do not realize that this is what they are supporting. Most Americans who support same-sex marriage feel (and "feel" is the crucial verb here, as the change to same-sex marriage is much more felt than thought through) that gays should have the right to marry a member of their own sex. It is perceived as unfair to gays that they cannot do so. And that is true. It is unfair to gays.

But the price paid for eliminating this unfairness is enormous: It is the end of marriage as every society has known it. And it is more than that. It is the end of any significance to gender. Men and women are now declared interchangeable. That is why, as I noted in a recent column -- the "T" has been added to "GLB:" "Transgendered" has been added to "Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual." "T" does not represent transsexuals -- people who choose to change their sex. No one is arguing against such people. "Transgendered" refers to people who are members of one sex and who wish to publicly act as if they are members of the other sex, e.g., men wearing women's clothing in public. The transgendered who publicly act out are living the cultural Left's primary agenda: rendering gender insignificant. Your sex is what you feel it is; and if you feel both, you are both. Gender doesn't matter.

That is why Judge Walker and his supporters dismiss the argument that, all things being equal, it is better for children to be raised by a married man and woman than by two men or two women. If Walker or GLBT activists and their supporters admitted that children need a mother and father, they would be affirming that there is great significance to the differences between men and women.

They reject that. Instead, they and Walker offer studies that purport to prove that it makes no difference whether or not a child has parents of both sexes. These academic studies are as unserious as all those academic studies of a generation ago that "proved" that boys do not prefer to play with trucks and soldiers but would be just as happy to play with dolls and tea sets, and that girls do not prefer dolls and tea sets but would be just as happy to play with trucks and soldiers.

These newer "studies" of same-sex parents are as valid as the earlier propaganda in the guise of scientific studies. Like the boy-girl studies, these were conducted by academics with agendas: the denial of male-female differences and the promotion of same-sex marriage. That many Americans believe these studies -- studies that are in any case based on a small number of same-sex couples raising a small number of children, during a short amount of time (a couple of decades), based on the researchers' own notions of what a healthy and successful young person is -- only proves how effectively colleges and graduate schools have succeeded in teaching a generation of Americans not to think critically but to accept "studies" in place of common sense.

Ask anyone who supports same-sex marriage this: Do you believe that a mother has something unique to give to a child that no father can give and that a father has something unique to give a child that no mother can give?

One has to assume that most people -- including supporters of same-sex marriage -- would respond in the affirmative. How, then, can they support same-sex marriage? The left's trinity -- compassion, fairness and equality -- is one reason. And "studies" and "facts" are another.

That is exactly how so many college graduates came to believe that boys would be happy with tea sets, and girls would be happy with trucks -- compassion, fairness, equality and "studies." That is also how many Americans, including a judge who overturned a state's constitutional amendment, have come to believe that never having a mother or never having a father makes absolutely no difference to a child.

And if mothers and fathers are interchangeable, men as men and women as women lose their significance."



 

[Pandora]

Magnum, good to "see" you.  And you brought Dennis Prager's piece.  Okay, let's discuss, but first, FAIR WARNING:  I do not like Prager; he is a right liberal, and so I admit to bias and my argument is not with you.  Mostly.

This:

Most Americans feel that ...... gays should have the right to marry a member of their own sex. It is perceived as unfair to gays that they cannot do so. And that is true. It is unfair to gays.

One:  I don't care about fair; I care about just.  I am a small, light woman.  Is it "unfair" that I could not play basketball, and on a men's team?  No.  It just is because I could not meet the basic requirements.  Should I have been allowed to participate in an effort to achieve "fair" for me, every man on my team would have paid a penalty for that = un"fair" to them.

Two:  I do argue against transsexuals AND transgenders.  Although I pity them, they are disordered and have spread their disorder society-wide.  Defense for either adds to the argument that "gender" doesn't matter.

Generally speaking, as to the idea that "gender" doesn't matter, being a social construct and all, the one young man's case that I remember, who was born male but some physical misfortune led to the doctors advising his parents to raise him as a female, always felt "wrong" and upon discovering the truth, attempted a reconstruct to live male and ended up a suicide.

His "wrong" was right because his DNA was the Truth.

[Magnum]

Good to see you too Pandora. No problems if you do not care for Prager, I happen to greatly admire him and believe he has great wisdom. But that is my opnion.

I happen to be a born again believer who believes the Bible is the inherent word of God and I tend to agrue this issue very simply. God calls homosexuality an abomination therefore it is and abomination.  In Romans 1 Paul writes Men "suppress the truth in unrighteousness" (v. 18).  They exchanged "the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator" (v. 25).  Next, "God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity..." (v. 24).  They "exchanged the natural [sexual] function for that which is unnatural (v. 26).  Therefore, the wrath of God rightly falls on them (v. 18); they are without excuse (v. 20).

This text is a crystal clear condemnation of homosexuality by the Apostle Paul in the middle of his most brilliant discourse on general revelation.

Regarding the same-sex behavior itself, here are the specific words Paul uses:  a lust of the heart, an impurity and dishonoring to the body (v. 24); a degrading passion that's unnatural (v. 29); an indecent act and an error (v. 27); not proper and the product of a depraved mind (v. 28).

According to Paul, homosexual behavior is evidence of active, persistent rebellion against one's Creator.  Verse 32 shows it's rooted in direct, willful, aggressive sedition against God--true of all so-called Christians who are defending their own homosexuality.  God's response is explicit:  "They are without excuse" (v. 20).

My problems comes when I try to agrue my position on homosexuality without using the Bible.

IMHO Dennis Prager gives a good non Biblical answer regarding same sex marrige.

One:  I don't care about fair; I care about just.  I am a small, light woman.  Is it "unfair" that I could not play basketball, and on a men's team?  No.  It just is because I could not meet the basic requirements.  Should I have been allowed to participate in an effort to achieve "fair" for me, every man on my team would have paid a penalty for that = un"fair" to them.

I could not agree with you more! I believe what Dennis is trying to say is even though it maybe unfair to gays that they cannot marry each other the price paid by society is so enormous that it will forever change and severely damage our society if gays are allowed to marry each other. So tough luck to them.

Two:  I do argue against transsexuals AND transgenders.  Although I pity them, they are disordered and have spread their disorder society-wide.  Defense for either adds to the argument that "gender" doesn't matter.

My opinion on this......... I believe it is sick and these people need help. I like you believe it is a disorder. I know as a Born Again Believer I am to be nice and kind to others as possible and I have meet some he/shes a few times in my life. Recently at a engagement party I dialoged with a transgender couple. I was nice and very respectful to them as my wife told me afterwards but what can you say it is very hard not to be repulsed and I blame the churches for either keeping quite on this issue or worse accepting of this disorder. If the churches would do as God shows us though His Holy Word we would not have to be dealing with such abhorrent issues.

Great to talk to you Pandora I hope things are going well with you and the Gunsmith.

God Richest Blessings to You,

I going for some ZZZ's 4:00 comes early.................

[Pandora]

Good talking with you as well, Magnum.  Gunsmith and I are well and thank you for the good wishes.

I hope you slept well.

See you 'round the place.

[IronDioPriest]

...I do not like Prager; he is a right liberal...

I'm curious as to why you view Prager that way. I'm not asking so I can pounce, I just haven't ever viewed him that way, and I wonder what your reasons are.

I usually associate Prager with the right-most of social conservatives, and when I have heard him talk fiscal politics or constitutional government, I've never noticed him taking particularly liberal positions.

[Pandora]

I don't listen to Prager, IDP; I read him and of him and I do not like what I read.

"Unfair to gays" that they can't "marry", is just one of many issues on which I disagree with him.

[IronDioPriest]

I don't listen to Prager, IDP; I read him and of him and I do not like what I read.

"Unfair to gays" that they can't "marry", is just one of many issues on which I disagree with him.

I read that to mean that fairness or unfairness are irrelevant, and the question is larger than what is fair. He's saying OK, it's unfair, but so what? That's my take anyway.

I don't listen to him much anymore because he's on at the same time as Rush. But I've thought for a long time that on the cultural front, there's nobody wiser or more clear than Prager. YMMV