I liked how my off-the-cuff comment to this Jeff Wells’ thread about a potential Rick Santorum presidential candidacy being a sign that the GOP is essentially conceding the 2012 election to Obama (re: let the “true believer” with no real shot run and lose, regroup for the likely-open spot in 2016, tell the religious-right to please stand-down and zip-it for a change because “their guy” so clearly failed last time) so I’m reposting here. Slow news day:
“The thing is, The GOP isn’t REALLY as “split” on this stuff as it sometimes seems. Social-conservatism doesn’t fit with The Right’s professed ideal of anti-nanny-state “rugged individualism;” but the actual percentage of the “movement” – especially at the power-brokering level – that buys into it is tiny, and most of THEM are younger people and loner types.
By and large, it’s a movement chiefly of old white moneyed men (and those whose fortunes are tied in with the same) who prize economic liberty (re: “The Free Market”) above all else because it’s best for their business interests; and whether or not they “believe” in social-con ideals they SUPPORT them as policy because it’s also good for business: enforcing “live clean, marry young, move to burbs, pump out brats” as the ONE “good” standard of living is tailor-made to produce a booming population of prefab consumers; while social-liberalism doesn’t, at least not quite as effectively.
It’s also the case that even the ones who DO subscribe to some malformed version of Objectivism/Libertarianism only really see it in their own terms: The “Cowboy” ideal – emphasis on BOY: They’re all about the INDIVIDUAL FREEDOM!!! of adult white men to drive whatever car they want, build whatever size house they want, shoot whatever animal they want, etc… but that same freedom can’t POSSIBLY be extended to, say, WOMEN. Absurd! If women had the same level of Individual Freedom they did, who would stay at home and keep up the house so they’ll have TIME to go live the Cowboy Ideal!? If women were as free to not have children as men are, who will pump out the kids needed to replenish my menial-labor staff and consumer base!?”
Had it slipped into my mind at the time, I might’ve added my own emerging calculation that the entirety of humanity would improve immeasurably if we were all having a lot more sex (or whatever fires your engine, really) but a lot fewer children.
MOVIEBOB CENTRAL 
@ Ryan
How exactly was anything I said even remotely homophobic? Or is it just the fact that I disagree with you that makes me “obliquely homophobic”?
#1 I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this one. I don't see how specifically targeting people of certain religions can be anything other than religiously motivated, but I can kind'a see where you're coming from. I just disagree
“#2: I don't really understand what your problem with government recognition of marriage is…you make a lot of weird assertions about the FFandC clause that are simply untrue,”
Just for shits and giggles I looked up my own state of Connecticut's marriage laws. Sec. 46b-28a clearly says exactly what I've been saying. Connecticut will only recognize a marriage from another state “provided such marriage or relationship is not expressly prohibited by statute in this state” (and this is a state where same-sex marriage is legal). So, unless you can show me a federal court case where that's been overturned, it is the law as it exists now… or at least it is in Connecticut.
“I think your underlying idea is that culture and law should have no connection,”
Pretty much, yea. Because to allow the government to dictate culture is nothing short of tyranny. It's essentially saying that the people in power should force their own cultural morals and values on everyone else… I was given to understand that leftists were generally against that.
“Giving women the right to vote made people understand that women are capable of exercising political rights. Giving black people Civil Rights led to a significantly less racist society.”
The Southern states are pretty much exactly as racists as they have ever been, and the upper class is pretty much exactly as sexist and patriarchal as it's ever been.
(Ok, long story short on that last part… The argument I and many others have made is that sexism has always been a predominantly upper class issue and has been substantially less pronounced in the lower class when it existed at all. After all, a male poor peasant farmer and a female poor peasant farmer have always had more less the same rights and privileges… none. Woman's rights came up as an issue in the US pretty much the exact moment a middle class existed to notice the discrepancy.)
Minorities just have more legal recourse now, but culturally, nothing's really changed. If anything I'd say they're prefect examples of how disconnected the 2 really are from each other.
“Decriminalizing homosexuality led to a more sexually tolerant society.”
Homosexuality wasn't federally decriminalized until 2003, and only one state had decriminalized it before 1969. I'd say we became a more sexually tolerant society, and then decided afterward that we should decriminalize is.
“Um…because it's self-eviden”
That is the single most bullshit argument in existence. I really hope I don't have to explain why.
“common sense ought to make it clear to you why that might be”
Again? …Really? You're argument is that I must clearly already agree with you?
Let's just pretend for a moment that I'm a nihilist and I don't take anything for granted, ok?
“There are also lots of situations (military service, court cases, medical problems, death, inheritance, on and on) where the Government needs to know which people go with whom in order to know how to redistribute property and/or legal responsibilities and rights.”
Isn't that what wills are for? Should the government really have more of a say in this than the individual in question?
“Non-families do not deserve or need to confuse the issue.”
Why don't they? Why should they be second-class citizens?
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@ Jake
Awesome video. Describes my feelings nearly exactly.
“I think I understand you correctly, however, isn't it the same now? We don't ask the permission of the government to form relationships, state marriage just makes it official.”
Think of it this way: One can list their religion on a census as “Jedi” and they'll then be listed on census information as a Jedi… without the government actually recognizing Jedi as a religion. The government shouldn't “recognizing” a marriage so much as acknowledging it. The government shouldn't care about any issues of qualifications or criteria because it's not their place to decide if their was or was not a “legal” marriage… they only have to acknowledging it.
“Plus if you are suggesting to make it easier to get those benefits, won't their be all kinds of abuse.”
Oh my God! Then people might get privileges that would otherwise be arbitrarily withheld from them!
Like I said before, I'm against the whole thing existing in the first place. As far as I'm concerned, people getting any sort of marriages privileges at all is an abuse.
“though why they can't just have a ceremony and poof you're married, confuses me.”
Exactly my thoughts.
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Narf, you're awesome for believing the stuff you believe. That riff about sexism being only a problem for upper class people is truly bonkers (even the most cursory study of the American poor will reveal serious problems with male privilege, and that's just America – if you want to see really shocking lower class sexism, check out Kenya or Italy). And I know my arguments about family seem like non-arguments, but it's because I feel like I'm arguing with a dude who is saying that the sky is green, so it's a little difficult to get my head around it. I guess you're right that the interplay between law and culture is complex, but to argue that the South is exactly as racist as it's ever been is just ignorant – the South is WAY less racist than it has been in the past, and more importantly, so is the North. Why do you think Civil Rights leaders fought for legal changes? It isn't just the rights, it's the social change that having those rights brings about. As for families…well, I'm obviously not going to convince you, but the *reason* I'm sure of myself is that I understand family to be a particular kind of social unit that I want government to understand and respond to, and I think Gay families count. The oblique homophobia comes in when you take a group that is being denied rights they deserve and make it about your weird ideological crusade that very few people are likely to agree with, then get mad at Gay people for being so unenlightened that they just want the minimum necessary amount of social change to feel like equals. It lacks empathy, I suspect because for some reason you don't want to just line up behind a group that deserves (at a minimum) your political support.
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@ Ryan
“Narf, you're awesome for believing the stuff you believe.”
I don't know how to take that.
“That riff about sexism being only a problem for upper class people is truly bonkers”
If that were what I said, it would be. Expect what I did say was it was it's been a “predominantly upper class issue and has been substantially less pronounced in the lower class”. Yes, that's not always the case everywhere, every culture is different. But, that's generally the case, at least in western cultures.
“And I know my arguments about family seem like non-arguments, but it's because I feel like I'm arguing with a dude who is saying that the sky is green, so it's a little difficult to get my head around it.”
Well, when I said to “pretend” that I was a nihilist, I wasn't just being sarcastic… though, I don't know that “nihilist” is necessarily the best word to describe my philosophy, it's the most apt one I've found so far.
I don't feel that the idea of the “traditional family” is something worth legally defending in a modern, culturally diverse society. People should be free to define their family it however they want without government intervention.
“but to argue that the South is exactly as racist as it's ever been is just ignorant”
I imagine most African Americans living in the South would disagree.
“The oblique homophobia comes in when you take a group that is being denied rights they deserve and make it about your weird ideological crusade that very few people are likely to agree with, then get mad at Gay people for being so unenlightened that they just want the minimum necessary amount of social change to feel like equals.”
That's just untrue. I have always completely supported the right for same-sex marriage. I problem is that I see “legal” marriage as a completely broken system, and in a few years homosexuals will inevitably have all the same rights as heterosexuals but marriage will still be a broken system and no one will care anymore until the next big controversy. We should be trying to fix it now while people are paying attention and not just slapping a short term band-aid on it.
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@Ryan
How would that work? I would assume it would be on the tax form and not the census, since that's only every ten years? Would they have to go to the IRS so they could get joint tax returns and be acknowledged as a couple? I'm not 100% sure everyone has to file tax returns so would those people be barred from marrying.
What about child custody?
I actually want to support you're view, since I'm a libertarian, and am thus inclined to want zap government wherever possible, but I have to be convinced, and so far you're argument just sounds like semantics.
The only semi-convincing argument against gov marriage is that all those benefits could all be settled separately in court, but I got shot down in a forum for saying that, because, as they argued: 1. It would be redundant and there wouldn't be a point in doing it, and 2. If you had to get all those benefits separately, some cheaper lawyers might withhold that information from their poorer clients and the clients would be screwed.
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@Jake
“I actually want to support you're view“
I'm starting to think that the “your/you're” thing is not the innocent typo you claimed it was when you mixed up “there/their/they're” yesterday.
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@ Jake
I'm, just going to assume you meant to reply to me.
“How would that work?”
Well, the census thing was really just an example. My thinking would be you'd just walk into your city town hall and fill out a form, show some ID, and then you're done. Same thing as filling out a change of address or something like that.
Or, better yet, fill out a form on your city website.
“What about child custody?”
That's got fuck all to do with marriage now a days anyway. It follows biological parents or adopted parents.
“so far you're argument just sounds like semantics.”
Yea, I don't think I've ever had the opportunity to take the argument this far before, so it kind'a is.
“1. It would be redundant and there wouldn't be a point in doing it,”
I don't follow what you mean.
“2. If you had to get all those benefits separately, some cheaper lawyers might withhold that information from their poorer clients and the clients would be screwed.”
Which is essentially exactly how things are now.
The difference, of course, being that we live in the age of the internet and all such information should be easily available to anyone who can be bothered to do the research themselves.
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You're awesome because you believe in something (which I guess means you aren't a nihilist), and you can argue relatively well for it even though it's patent nonsense. The experience of sexism faced by, say, Nancy Pelosi vs. the experience of sexism faced by, say, any random member of the poor population of Kenya/Brazil/etc. is so vast that I can't help but think you have a really specific definition of “the upper class” and “the poor” in mind and are arguing out of provincial ignorance. Your nihilism is similar; it suggests you're good at thinking but don't have a ton of imagination or lived experience to draw on. But I really don't know you, so I can't judge; maybe you've met every sort of person and seen every sort of government for yourself and decided that it's all hooey, and if that's true, bless you but I still don't think your worldview has much to do with reality.
I get where you're coming from on marriage. I think you're wrong, but I don't think you can be convinced, because our big disagreement is pretty much the disagreement any liberal has with any libertarian, which is about whether governments have a right to do social engineering. I say yes, you say no, my people are responsible for civilization, your people are responsible for Somalia, but whatever.
And please do not let any of that suggest that I haven't found this both fascinating and enlightening.
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@ Ryan
“You're awesome because you believe in something (which I guess means you aren't a nihilist)”
Well, again, nihilism is a very broad area of philosophy and there's a lot of disagreement, especially among nihilist, as to exactly what it means. But, I tend to think that the whole “nihilists don't believe in anything” is a bit of a misinterpretation.
For instance, I could say that I think all moral codes are arbitrary cultural constructs and there's no way to objectively call any “right” or “wrong”. But, at the same time I can still have my own moral code… just that I acknowledge that it's in no way objectively “right” and is probably mostly arbitrary, but none the less is mine.
“because our big disagreement is pretty much the disagreement any liberal has with any libertarian,”
Yea, pretty much.
“your people are responsible for Somalia”
I'd say that people of similar philosophies to mine tend to be less involved in government and more in advancing art and culture. Admittedly, a complete disregard for status-qua is generally more beneficial there than in office.
“And please do not let any of that suggest that I haven't found this both fascinating and enlightening.”
Same here. 🙂
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I really like the idea that certain political philosophies are better for producing art than others even if they aren't good at producing good politics. That's the kind of thing that makes humanity wonderful. And I agree; if only the MLKs and Gandhis were allowed to write books and make movies, nobody would ever read or watch anything.
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I really like that people people can discuss tings without getting mad at each other. Credit where credit is due 🙂
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/jojjo
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