The highest court of the state of Maryland has recently joined New York and Washington State in ruling that because same-gendered people can't procreate they can not be married in the same way that opposite-gendered people can.
Reading between the lines it seems straight people who have the corresponding slot A and tab B are automatically entitled to the approximately 1,400 Federal and state benefits that accrue with state-sponsored marriage.
I always thought that paying taxes made one a citizen.
Odd, that even though I have no children, I'm still required to pay school taxes. Additionally, I pay a sales tax to help pay for municipal structures such as sports arenas that I will never use, my gasoline taxes are used to pave roads which I'll never drive on, and my library taxes will pay for books which I'll never read.
And now--at least in Maryland, New York and Washington-- I have to pony up with a wife and child in order to be a REAL citizen? Paying taxes isn't enough?
I'm glad these anti-gay judicial decisions are finally exposing the hypocrisy of our so-called civil society where the First Amendment defense of the separation of secular and sacred is being ignored and willfully convoluted in order to perpetuate the ideas of religious supremacy, the power of the penis, and the submissiveness of the vagina.
Since when was being the father or mother of a child necessary to prove one's citizenship? Is that really the case?
Don't we all know married straights that have never had biological children? Are their marriages in danger of being repudiated in those states that have ruled procreation as a necessary possibility for a complete marriage? Are childless marriages breaking the law? Doesn't this suggestion smell strongly of Nazism and other totalitarian creeds such as one-child China?
As our American society devolves into a seriously reality-adverse gulag of religiously based proscriptions against equality, and as the "demos" is removed from Democracy and replaced with "theos", I've written a proposed bill that someone like Trent "gays have kleptomania" Lott, Larry "I'm not gay" Craig, David "diaper" Vitter, or Jim "no gays in my family" Inhofe will take up on the floor of Congress.
If I were a god-fearing, bible-banging GOP straight man truly interested in the precepts of the great creator who knows all things and requires the institution of marriage to be solely and soulfully about procreation I would legislate for the following policy to be instituted.
A provisional license would be issued following a medical examination to determine the gender and procreative viability of the man and woman applying.
Should one applicant fail this examination in either part no license from the state would be allowed. In addition the failing partner would be required to register on a publicly available website to insure against fraud and redundancy.
Opposite-gendered married couples that do not procreate within three years of their marriage will have that marriage annulled.
If a procreative impediment, other than self-induced conditions, develops after the issuance of the provisional license as well as after the issuance of the final license, the marriage would be allowed to continue.
Should there be a stillbirth or death within one year of the birth of a living child, an extension of one year would allow for each subsequent stillbirth or early death. Such extensions would continue until the natural menopausal advancement occurs with the woman. The man is considered to be fertile for life.
As the balance scale of Lady Justice is replaced with a cudgel, and her blindfold exchanged with binoculars it would do for us all, gay or straight, to reassess just what makes a civil society.