The President of The United States has come out in favor of Marriage Equality.
This is the big one – second only to the killing of Bin Laden in terms of “things Obama will be remembered for.” It’s been widely assumed that he supported equality all along, but was holding back on outright support in order to not anger certain voting-blocs (churchgoing African-Americans/Latinos and Catholic-descended blue-collar Union laborers mainly) known to be reflexively-Democrat voters but socially conservative. Whether this was planned via Biden’s “trial-balloon” admission of support or whether that really was a “gaffe” that forced the President’s hand is for the pundits to decide.
I am a supporter of same-sex marriage and the President overall, so this is pretty elating… but I won’t lie and say I’m not a little bit worried. I was with everyone else in assuming Obama was trying to feign the middle-ground until after the election, and I was always fine with it – politics for grownups are about results, not idealism – because I’d rather have him fake-right, win and give me four more years of progressive judicial nominations (the most important thing ANY president can do long-term) than be “true” and lose, saddling me with 4 to 8 years of backwards-looking right-wing governance. So yeah, I’m happy… but I hope he knows what he’s doing.
If nothing else, this is the clearest signal yet that the Democrats “get” what the GOP has “gotten” for a year now, that with neither party having the kind of record you can really “run” on, this is going to be a base-versus-base election – re: “swing voters” are being written off in favor of “who can fire up turnout among the already-decided base.” This is the gauntlet being thrown and the notion of “changing minds” being back-burnered – it’s Culture War time: Thinkers versus Believers, Red versus Blue, Past versus Future, Backwards versus Forwards, Regression versus Evolution, Reason versus “It’s In The Magic Book.”
I’m excited. I enjoy the relative-clarity of times like these; and it’ll be a rare pleasure to actually vote for a candidate instead of just for his likely-politicies (or “against” the other guy.) I just hope there actually are enough Good Guys to win…
MOVIEBOB CENTRAL 
I think there is an issue relating to same-sex marriage that a lot of people don't consider, or have never thought about.
The major reason that Christians give for opposing same-sex marriage is that it devalues the notion of “traditional marriage”, and they are correct.
In a Christian marriage the husband is considered above the wife. There is all many of scripture pertaining to this, in fact the Bible pretty much treats the act of marriage as an exchange of goods between the father of the bride and the groom. The marriage vows and the act of the bride's father “giver her away” still allude to this. While many Christians may not treat their marriages this way, and things have definitely softened from how they were in the past, it is still pretty implicit.
With that in mind, consider a marriage between two members of the same sex. Here you essentially have a marriage of two equals. Once you've set a precedent for that, how long will it be before people are expecting heterosexual marriage to also become a marriage of equals? That's what they mean when they talk about an erosion of the traditions of marriage.
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@Thorbs
Despite the old joke, people are not actually angry that gays “discovered a loophole” to traditional marriage. Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favor of ending traditional institutions, but your post just doesn't make a lot of sense.
The opposition to gay marriage has little to do with trying to continue the subjugation of women. This is not some huge conspiracy run by evil overlords (unless you are drinking the Andrea Dworkin kool-aid and you think every social construct is a form of rape or some such nonsensical bullshit).
Using strawmen to make a caricature of your opposition does nothing to help you counter their actual points, and “gay marriage prevents us from enslaving women” is not one of those points.
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@biomechanical923
Oh, I'm not argueing that most Christians think this way, I'm pretty sure it'd only be a small minority. But I do believe it's the way some religious leaders think. Otherwise the line about gay marriage eroding the foundations of “traditional marriage” really makes little sense.
I also don't think it can be considered a strawman when the Christian-Right really is advocating against women's rights at the same time as opposing gay marriage. I may be wrong in linking the two, but I'm certainly not misrepresenting the Christian-Right's treatment of women.
As for the evil overlords schtick… I rather think you're constructing strawmen of your own there.
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You are not The Good Guys. You are just guys. You are not more important than your fellow citizens, you are not superior to them and you should not lead them any more than they should lead you.
Thinkers versus Believers? Both sides have their fringe wackos. The Republicans could easily place a contingent of secular hard-working small business owners against a minority of lazy Gaia-worshiping Democrats and then you'll see the Thinker vs Believer dichotomy gets turned around unpleasantly.
Past versus Future? The more vocal progressives (not all!) hold the Rousseau-ean Noble-Savage as their Ideal. They fawn over the Na'vi and block industry at almost every turn. Only the worst of both political parties wish to return to some idealized past but the better groups of each side see a promising future.
Regression versus Evolution? Surely you understand that evolution is not teleological, right? And perhaps mistaking that it is betrays just as faulty a belief as intelligent design?
My overall point is that both sides have their faults. You are not The Good Guys and you will not save us.
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http://www.garyjohnson2012.com/gary-johnson-criticizes-obama-for-throwing-gay-marriage-to-the-states
May 10, 2012, New York, NY – Libertarian nominee for President and former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson today said he’s “disappointed” with President Obama’s position on gay marriage. Obama told ABC Wednesday he would let each individual state decide the gay marriage question instead of seeking federal protection of the right to marry. Johnson noted that more than 30 states already ban same sex marriage in one way or another.
In a statement, Johnson said, “Instead of insisting on equality as a U.S. Constitutional guarantee, the President has thrown this question back to the states. When the smoke clears, Gay Americans will realize the President’s words have gained them nothing today, and that millions of Americans in most states will continue to be denied true marriage equality . I guess the President is still more worried about losing Ohio, Colorado, North Carolina and Virginia than he is in doing the right thing. What is the President saying — that he would eat a piece of cake at a gay wedding if the state the happy couple lives in allows it ?. Where is the leadership? While I commend him for supporting the concept of gay marriage equality, I am profoundly disappointed in the President.”
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@Jakob
I doubt any of us would argue that all Democrats are good, and all Republicans are bad. I would certainly agree there is good and bad on both sides.
However, at the moment it certainly seems to be the case that the more extreme members of the Republican party are holding the reins. The good is becoming increasingly hard to see behind the worst stereotypes of the Republican party that are leading the charge. Even if I believed they could do a better job of handling the economy than Obama, I wouldn't want to risk the untold damage they could do to education, science funding and civil rights.
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Delete my comment if you want for being “repetitive”, Bobby, but this bears stating again because it is the truth.
Obama says marriage equality is a states rights issue. Gary Johnson says it's a matter of national importance. Therefore, you must admit that Johnson has a more progressive stance on gay rights than Obama does.
Face it, Bob; Johnson is LEAGUES better than Obama in almost every aspect. You want a more progressive America? Vote Johnson, vote Libertarian.
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I don't see why this stuff is a big deal to either side. Obama goes fromn not supporting gay marriage to not supporting gay marriage at a federal level, but at a state level.
It's word gymnastics at best, pandering at worst. It does nothing but stir up the extremes (which you can see a microcosm of right here on this very blog), rather than try to solve the issue at hand.
In short, it does what this president usually does, divide and elvate tensions.
As for gay marriage itself, as someone who has lived in predominantly “red” or “purple{” states (but also spent a significasnt time in California, my birth state and thus have seen the differences) – MOST peopple who are against gay marriage don't want the government forcing churches to perform gay marriages but don't give a flying fuck about what the government does with it. I therefore have to agree with Megabyte on this one – remove marriage as a governmental thing – leave it as a religious rite (as opposed to right, haha I made a funny), and leave the governmental form as civil unions or whatever other happy term people want that acts as a governmental license of any two individuals to be considered together governmentally that comes with any riughts associated with doing so. The action of marriage would be left as a religious deal, and the act of civil unions would act as a governmental deal.
The reason this does not happen is the extreme crazies opn both sides want to metephorically piss on eachother. TYhe extreme right want to keep gays from being govenrmentally recognized because TEH GAYS ARE TEH EVALS. Where the extremes on the other side, incensed to extremes by the other extremes (and ironically through their actions making more right wing extremes which then makes more left wing extremes creating an annoying self perpetuating cycle of annoyance) actually DO want to force churches to perform gay marriages.
Don't believe me? Then why do gay rights advocates send gay couples all glammed up into a church demanding a wedding if the issue is about rights? To those of us caught somewhere in the middle it is – to the ever growing cycle of extremes its about a pissing match, which is the only real reason this hasn't been solved yet.
To note: I AM NOT saying all people who support gay marriage are extremes, nor all who oppose it are. Those who are more interested in arguing with eachother rather than finding a way to make everyone happy (which there is a fairly easy way to at leeas tmake MSOT people happy), are the people I am talking about.
*exhale* I hope that all makes some degree of sense.
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@ James
If Johnson thinks that gays rights is a national issue, then I don't think he's much of a Libertarian
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@Laserkid
Because a lot of people, both gay and straight, are dumb as shit, and they literally think that a church is where you get officially married, and because they can't make as much of a scene if they just went to the county and filed for a marriage license.
On the other hand, it's a little known fact that state employees have the right to refuse performing any services that may violate their own code of ethics.
I've seen states where gay marriage is legal, but a county clerk refuses to approve any marriage license applications because he said it's against his personal ethics.
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@biomechanical923:
“If Johnson thinks that gays rights is a national issue, then I don't think he's much of a Libertarian”
Any real libertarian would tell you individual rights trump state rights every time.
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@biomechanical923
“Because a lot of people, both gay and straight, are dumb as shit, and they literally think that a church is where you get officially married, and because they can't make as much of a scene if they just went to the county and filed for a marriage license.”
And this is EXACTLY why I put out the plan I did. Hell I had this argument with a friend, and when I told him this difference, he explained to me how this wasn't the case for him and he was only allowed to marry in a church when he just wanted a non-religious one. He didn't like being told he was screwed by the JOP, and started to get nasty at about that point since he “believed the church was at fault.” I wish I was kidding. Looking at this, I really can't see gay marriage being allowed WITHOUT a name change for the legal term of marriage without seeing someone shortly after trying to sue to make a church that doesn't believe in it have a gay marriage. Their reason will be because “well it's the same term, so it must be the same” and still going for it after being proven wrong because “well I believe it so it must be true even though you proved it's false.” This mindset exists, and is frighteningly common… and is exactly what Im trying to counter.
Add to this the extremes on both sides of the spectrum and HOLY SHIT! Lazer is right about them, who would of course, latch onto this like a 2 year old who stumbled on the halloween candy stash with as much of a fit if their side loses/doesn't get far enough on a win. Really.. the plan I put up would be to use a little brain power and preserve everyone's rights from the psycho extremes that seem to dominate politics today. (And they are FUCKING MENTAL!)
“I've seen states where gay marriage is legal, but a county clerk refuses to approve any marriage license applications because he said it's against his personal ethics.”
And THAT should not be allowed. Applying the exact same set of rules I would to private (or any organization), I would be telling this guy that if he doesn't like the way his boss wants things done (like marriage licenses for gay couples) he can quit and find another job.
But perhaps here, where the boss is the government, it should go even further. After all, unlike churches (or any other organization just about) where we can choose to be a member or not, we have no choice but to have THIS government as our government as CITIZENS OF THE US (and state we are in). That means their rules have be held to much higher scrutiny… the guy who refuses to enforce the laws he has been charged to should seriously either quit, and/or face felony charges.
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This could either do two things.
1). Mr. Obama receives massive support from the LGBT community/Gay rights sympathizers and beats out Mr. Romney, because the people who were going to be pissed off by this weren't going to vote for him anyway.
2). Southern Rednecks who were not going to vote in the elections PERIOD now have a reason to vote for Mr. Romney.
Please let it be the former, and please let the governments of the world endorse Mr. Obama for this!
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“Delete my comment if you want for being “repetitive”, Bobby, but this bears stating again because it is the truth.
Obama says marriage equality is a states rights issue. Gary Johnson says it's a matter of national importance. Therefore, you must admit that Johnson has a more progressive stance on gay rights than Obama does.
Face it, Bob; Johnson is LEAGUES better than Obama in almost every aspect. You want a more progressive America? Vote Johnson, vote Libertarian.”
@James or Jimmy if I want to be passive aggressive.
The reason that people are making a big deal of out this announcement is that B.O. was the first sitting president to openly support gay marriage. Bob nor is anyone else saying his is the first politician or candidate to have this stance. Nor did anyone say that B.O. is the most progressive person, simply that this is a step towards the right direction. Bob also didn't say that he supported the presidents decision to leave it up to states rights or anything about how feels about Gary Johnson.
Your outrage seems to be made up of false arguments or assumptions that you have made up.
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