Fox Nation Takes Another Shot At Stirring Up Anti-Gay Outrage
July 11, 2011 5:32 pm ET by Karen Famighetti
A headline on Fox Nation today claimed "Cambridge, MA set to Pay Gay Employees More Than Straight." The Fox Nation post excerpted an article from The Daily Mail, which has a similarly misleading headline. However, the Daily Mail article clearly explains that the city is offering gay employees a stipend to offset a federal tax that does not apply to straight employees.
This tax results from the Defense of Marriage Act and applies only to gay employees, who must pay to put their spouses on their employer-provided health insurance. The Cambridge stipend simply offsets this tax, making the income of gay employees equal to that of straight employees, who do not have to pay to include their spouses on their health plan.
Fox Nation regularly tries to incite anti-gay sentiment. This is one of the less subtle examples.
Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies! Fox lies!
"we molest murdered little girls and help their killers, just for a couple of bucks"
Idiot.
ONCE AGAIN LIBERALS ATTEMPT TO JUSTIFY REVERSE DESCRIMINATION.
"This is like taxing men less than women."
"Do men pay a tax that women do not have to?"
"Oh, then fix the tax law."
"That is precisely what they are doing here."
"Oh, then...REVERSE DISCRIMINATION."
Wow. This is beyond slow kid thinking here. This is actually lacking the ability to even think for yourself. You have my sympathy, hoosier.
In short, the tax is discriminatory. The stipend reverses a discriminatory policy -- it is not reverse discrimination to reverse discrimination.
What you're looking for is: married gay couple + stipend = straight married couple
gay couple union + stipend - tax < straight married couple
They aren't "unions" in Massachusetts.
Nice try.
It's very simple: stipend - tax = 0. Thus, with the stipend, gay couple = straight couple. Simple equality. Mr. Plow's math was right. Your doesn't say what you want it to, and even if it did, you'd still be wrong.
I'll write it out in more detail.
(gay married couple) -(pays DOMA tax) +(gets stipend to offset DOMA tax) -(pays tax on stipend) leaving them with less than (straight married couple) but as much less than they had before the stipend.
The stipend may equal the tax, but if the stipend is taxed as income, they are still coming up a little short because health insurance when provided by the employer is not taxed. (That's the reason why my husband's employer offers kicka$$ insurance - he considers it part of the compensation package, it's way to increase an employees compensation without increasing how much the government gets.)
Should read
"but NOT as much less than they had before the stipend."
Is that what you're trying to say.
At least one of you are smart enough to see what I wrote.
So... are you saying they should get an even bigger stipend then, to offset not just the added insurance cost, but also the [presumed] tax on the stipend itself? Because that's actually a reasonable position, if (I know you love those "ifs") the stipend is considered taxable income. Personally, I don't know if it's taxable or not, and the original Daily Mail article says nothing about that either way. If you have any factual information on that specific aspect of the stipend, I'd love to hear it, your aversion to providing evidence notwithstanding.
I do know that some earnings are not taxed. The share of my health care coverage that I have to pay myself is deducted from my check before taxes, i.e. it's not taxable income. It would only make sense for the stipend to be treated the same way, but I readily admit that I do not know if this is actually the case. Do you?
If they get the equalizing payment and then have to pay tax on it, then they aren't getting the equalizing payment.
See, that's simply not true, unless the stipend is being taxed at a rate of 100%, which would be absurd. If the stipend is equal to the additional health care tax paid by gay couples, but the stipend itself is also subject to taxation, then it wouldn't end up covering all of the fed tax it's meant to offset, but it would still cover most of it. If you're concerned about the value of the stipend being watered down through taxation, well, that effect could be offset by slightly increasing the stipend. In other words, if you're concerned about the stipend being reduced through taxation, you're arguing for a bigger stipend
You're really not very good at explaining yourself. You refuse to provide evidence and you base your arguments on a giant series of "what ifs." I have yet to see any evidence, from anyone, showing whether or not this stipend is, in fact, taxable. Considering that's the foundation of your whole screed, don't you think it would make sense to establish the fact first?
So... are you saying they should get an even bigger stipend then, to offset not just the added insurance cost, but also the [presumed] tax on the stipend itself? Because that's actually a reasonable position
...and we're still left with the question of whether or not the stipend is taxable. A lot of assumptions are being made about that, but I don't know. Do you?
Here's another one of your gems, from this very thread:
Black people don't have the choice of what color their skin is. Gay people choose to be gay. BIG difference, especially if you're talking the civil rights aspect of this. Since there are no civil rights, then you are completely mistaken in your comment.
See, this is why I didn't understand you on the subsidies, and why I don't think you make much sense on this subject in general. If you think there's no civil rights (i.e. equality) issue here, why on earth would you support any subsidy for gay couples at all? And yet you expect me to believe that you think they deserve a subsidy high enough to offset not just the fed. tax on gay couples' health benefits, but also the [assumed, not proven] tax liability of the subsidy itself. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but then, neither does the belief that homosexuality is a choice. I didn't choose to be straight, I just am. How 'bout you? Did you consider both, try 'em both out, weigh the pros and cons, and then make your "decision?" Oh right, I forgot - you don't answer questions.
Example: Lou Dobbs lied because some people disagree with him - while failing to acknowledge some people agree with him.
TYPICAL LIBERAL DOUBLE-STANDARD
Lou Dobbs never showed that he was right, nor have the people who were never mentioned who supposedly agree with him (if they even are around).
Apparently, everyone in the Army is smarter than you are.
Oh, that's not such a bad idea, actually - they could use that revenue to pay for an education campaign to teach people about the meaning of the word equality.
If that's what you are saying, I can agree with that.
Gay workers receive no financial benefit from that stipend. It simply prevents their families from being forced to pay extra for health insurance benefits.
Meaning they were paying more than straight people to begin with.
This attempts to level the playing field, are you saying this should not be so?
Unmarried couples of any orientation are all treated the same. This why gay people want the right to marry - it comes with quite a few legal benefits. Now that some states do recognize those marriages, more issues like this will arise until the rest of the country catches up.
Other than their difference in life choices as you put it, how are they actually so different as to be not automatically awarded such rights?
Civil unions will give them all the same legal rights they seek, yet they continue to force the matter and demand it be called 'marriage'. They know the religious implications of the word 'marriage' and I suspect that is why they do it. There seems to be a 'war' going on between gays and religion because religion doesn't accept homosexuality and gays want to be able to 'score a victory' over religion. That is my opinion on why they seek the word 'marriage' and why they are not actually seeking legal equality. An equality they could easily achieve (and they know it) if they simply allowed it to be called 'civil union'. As I've said before, I would vote for equality through 'civil unions' any day of the week, but not as 'marriage'.
There is no difference between homosexuals and heterosexuals other than the sexual choice they make. You are not given the tag homo or hetero until after you make that decision. Just like any other sexual choices made by everyone else. They are choices. They are demanding equality for their 'different' sexual choice but get upset if an even more different sexual choice is mentioned as deserving the same rights they demand because an even more different sexual choice is disgusting, even to them. And if 'legality' of a sexual preference is the only determiner of whether they are justified in rights sought, then the 'winds of change' are at work for other sexual preferences also. They say: "one day this will be legal in a nation that promotes equality for all sexual choices". They say: "one day this nation of promised freedoms will allow equality for more than the 2 most popular sexual choices". They say: "one day all sexual choices will be viewed as equal and all will enjoy the benefits given to only the most popular sexual choices".
But, as I've said, this is just my opinion.
Also you keep going back to pedophilia/bestiality even after it was explained to you WHY its considered wrong (the issue of consent). Being homosexual or heterosexual is not a "choice". A choice implies awareness. If you realized you had a choice after you made the decision than it is not a choice. Pedophilia and bestiality will never be seen as equal no longer than rape (what pedophilia and bestiality are) will be considered something good.
I have NEVER mentioned bestiality. But the issue of "consent" in pedophilia is only a simple law away. You've mentioned cultures that used that practice as if a normal habit. Ours doesn't now, but ours also excluded homosexuality for a while, too. What's your point? Since you already lost that discussion the last time you tried having it, you might want to just stay out of it this time too. Because remember what you say about bestiality and pedophilia the next time you read about any high school gay people having sex with someone older than them. That would make their relationship EXACTLY as you say pedophilia is --- immoral and illegal. Ooops, I'll bet you didn't see that one coming.
Sure, like there were consequences for Jim Crow laws even though they definitively violated the constitution and they were all allowed based on a technicality. To say that people will not be playing dumb to make sure gays are not treated right is not unprecedented.
Consent will stop becoming an issue when we let children vote. The reason having sex with children is considered rape is because they do not know what is happening (the same reason you can be arrested for rape for having sex with a mentally handicapped) nor have the legal authority to give consent.
Two things: One if they are in high school it can be considered legal depending on their age and state (the minimum age of consent in the US is 16) it may be legal but if its not, it would be STATUTORY RAPE, which can also be done by straight people and can be done simply by a 19 year old having sex with a 15 year old.
Second, considering the age range for a high school student, being attracted (the "-philia" in those words stands for "love", not sex) to teenagers (which a high school student is very likely to be) is not pedophilia, its ephebophilia.
I saw it coming half a world away.
And screw the Daily Mail. I hope it gets pulled down like News of the World.
I don't know what's more sad, that they think people will buy that, or that they actually do.
Wow, the pride in being gay must be incomprehensibly great for those who choose death over not being gay when they can no longer stand the abuse/discrimination.
It also means that, since this is a choice, people who advocate for "curing" gays of their "bad habit" (after all bad habits are also a matter of choice, we can pick them up and drop them, difficult though it may, when it really comes down to it,) and setting up institutions to cure people of the "gay habit" are legit too.
It's a very, very strange definition of "choice".
That happens all the time to straight and gay. Just because you feel sorry for a gay person doesn't give them special rights. I feel sorry for people who are into religious cults, but that doesn't give them special rights. Geez, we might as well give obese people special rights, they must endure "incomprehensibly great" discrimination and often choose suicide over weight loss. Well, let's give them special rights so others who may choose to be obese won't feel ostrisized by society.
That's right, it was an idle threat. I'm not as thin-skinned as some left-wingers are who 'report' every right-winger when they can't carry a conversation with. I fully understand your inability to comprehend what is being said and why you call me another poster's name.
I do understand his frustration.
Seriously, how do you rationalize people killing themselves over a choice? It makes no sense whatsoever. People get disowned by their families over this, resulting in great psychological trauma, but there's no way of changing the "choice" that was made.
Absolute, total lunacy. You can't explain it because it just doesn't work that way.
You are 100% totally correct. It IS totally lunacy to think people kill themselves over family/societal disaproval of lifestyle choices. It simply does not work that way. Being gay is SO at the top of that list. You act as though gay people are the only ones to commit suicide. How dishonest of you.
First off, you already admitted on this very thread that gay people kill themselves because of the discrimination:So when I say the exact same thing, that it happens, you dishonestly claim that I said something about gay people being the "only ones to commit suicide". Strawman. Deflection. Shamefully, embarrassingly weak.
Secondly, as so many homophobes are fond of pointing out, gay people make up a small percentage of the population. Obviously, that would make it highly unlikely that they would be at the top of any list about suicide, based on proportion alone. Besides that, the absence of it on those lists hardly constitutes proof that it doesn't happen.
Finally, suicide is not restricted to teenagers, and suicide is not the only bad thing that happens due to discrimination. I personally know of someone who is homeless because of his family's reaction. I myself used the word "disowned", so you can't pretend that you thought suicide was the only angle. The principle remains that people do not let their world get turned upside-down over a mere choice.
Grow some intestinal fortitude and defend your positions like an adult instead of a dishonest little punk. Thank you in advance.
What are you talking about? The reactions that gays experience are listed as #4 and #5 on that list. Are you blind or just want to argue a point you can't make? Why do you think I included that list? It is because it shows that the reactions gays experience are not exclusive to being gay. Your post insinuated that gays are the only ones who feel "disowned by their families".
Whether other people commit suicide for other feelings of being disowned has nothing to do with the question you were asked. Are you suggesting that people commit suicide because their families disapprove of them being straight? No? Then what is your point? How does it relate to whether gay people commit suicide or not?
You're still admitting that this happens because of reactions from others, anyway. The question then remains;why on Earth would anyone kill themselves instead of just choosing heterosexuality?
That is what's being discussed here. Suggesting that gay people are the only ones that feel disowned is not only something I didn't do, but it wouldn't have anything to do with what I'm asking you anyway. There's no reason you shouldn't understand this by now.
I was asking WHY would a gay person choose suicide over the simple choice (as you claim) of choosing not to be gay?
After all, if they are in the position of not being able to endure the discrimination and have before them only these 2 choices before them, suicide or not being gay, why do some people choose the former instead of the latter? To such people does it mean that their pride in their "choice of being gay" worth so much to them that they would choose death over not being gay?
Or perhaps the choice of not being gay isn't really available after all, and there's only one other choice left.
Sorry, I did not catch that.
deluded said: I was asking WHY would a gay person choose suicide over the simple choice (as you claim) of choosing not to be gay? ... if they are in the position of not being able to endure the discrimination and have before them only these 2 choices before them, suicide or not being gay, why do some people choose the former instead of the latter?
This I caught, though. I do not know why they make their choices. However, I used the links I provided to express that gays are not the only ones who experience hardships because of lifestyle choices they make. I'm not talking only about sexual choices, but some are ridiculed for fashion statements they make, some are ridiculed for personal hygiene choices they make, some are ridiculed for musical choices they make. The point I tried to make (in reply to your point) is that 'traumatic social disapproval' is not limited to homosexuality. Yes, it is included, but not limited to that. My point was that since they aren't the only ones who experience that disapproval then it shouldn't be expressed in a way where the assumption is that homosexuals ARE the only ones to experience that kind of disapproval.
You can repeat your strawman about homosexuals being the only ones to experience disapproval, but it's still a strawman. Nobody said anything like that, and you can't dispute that.
Sorry, I didn't realize you live a sheltered life in your mommy's basement. You should try to get out more and see what is actually happening in the world instead of staying less then 3ft from your computer.
Lame insults don't change any of that.
WHO in their freaking right mind would CHOOSE to be criticized, bad mouthed, belittled, humiliated, made fun of, maligned, accused of being a pedophile and MURDERED?
There is NO excuse for YOU being this bu** stupid about gay folks, none at all!!!
Apparently, all those teenagers (that I linked to) who commit suicide experience those EXACT same feelings. Only they kill themselves. Who are you going to blame for those deaths? Are you going to call ME "bu** stupid" for excusing their deaths? Should we give "special rights" to all those teenagers so they don't feel bad about themselves and won't commit suicide?
Choices are made. You or I don't like all consequences for the choices that are made, but they are choices just the same!
What 'rights' do heterosexuals have that gays don't have? Is there a 'right' to marriage? Like the 'right' to drive, perhaps?
In other words, nobody else has said that anyone other than gays are mistreated by society and you can't prove your statement.
No, he said that nobody said what you claimed they did, not that anyone made completely unnecessary comments specifying the opposite of your assumption.
Have you explained your reasoning for your interpretation yet? No? Then what johaely said about nobody saying what you insist they did would be unchallenged. Scroll up a little bit and back up what you say, since we're on the subject.
Teenagers? I responded to your claim " Black people don't have the choice of what color their skin is. Gay people choose to be gay, BIG difference", which I said was a stupid a** comment.
Do YOU honestly think people would CHOOSE to be Gay so they can face a possible lifetime of being criticized, bad mouthed, belittled, humiliated, made fun of, maligned, accused of being a pedophile and MURDERED?
Just another reason to love Cambridge.
Would you care to run your post through a spell-check? It might help, just a little.
Says the person starting their post with "dood"
Sin Pays
The stipend is for "Married" gays. They can produce Certificate of Marriage.
To spell it out for you: They are entitled to the stipend because they are married, NOT because they are gay.
Two final points - 1.) Public opinion has swung around and now a majority support recognition of gay marriage. 2.) Public opinion should never be the final determiner of civil rights. When a majority favored making interracial marriage illegal, that didn't mean it should be law. Nor should it have ever been allowed to determine whether gay couples should be allowed to marry.
1.) not at the voting booth
2.) It isn't. It is determined by whether you are 'born that way' or not. Since homosexuality is a choice there are no civil rights guarantee.
Is that the case Traveller?
Biological differences in gay men and lesbians[edit] PhysiologicalSome studies have found correlations between physiology of people and their sexuality. These studies provide evidence which they claim suggests that:
Gay men report, on an average, slightly longer and thicker penises than non-gay men.[51]
Gay men and straight women have, on average, equally proportioned brain hemispheres. Lesbian women and straight men have, on average, slightly larger right brain hemispheres.[52]
The VIP SCN nucleus of the hypothalamus is larger in men than in women, and larger in gay men than in heterosexual men.[53]
The average size of the INAH-3 in the brains of gay men is approximately the same size as INAH 3 in women, which is significantly smaller, and the cells more densely packed, than in heterosexual men's brains.[28]
The anterior commissure is larger in women than men and was reported to be larger in gay men than in non-gay men,[27] but a subsequent study found no such difference.[54]
Gay men's brains respond differently to fluoxetine, a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor.[55]
The functioning of the inner ear and the central auditory system in lesbians and bisexual women are more like the functional properties found in men than in non-gay women (the researchers argued this finding was consistent with the prenatal hormonal theory of sexual orientation).[56]
The suprachiasmatic nucleus was found by Swaab and Hopffman to be larger in gay men than in non-gay men,[57] the suprachiasmatic nucleus is also known to be larger in men than in women.[58]
The startle response (eyeblink following a loud sound) is similarly masculinized in lesbians and bisexual women.[59]
Gay and non-gay people's brains respond differently to two putative sex pheromones (AND, found in male armpit secretions, and EST, found in female urine).[24][60][61]
One region of the brain (amygdala) is more active in gay men than non-gay men when exposed to sexually arousing material.[62]
Finger length ratios between the index and ring fingers may be different between non-gay and lesbian women.[56][63][64][65][66][67]
Gay men and lesbians are significantly more likely to be left-handed or ambidextrous than non-gay men and women;[68][69][70] Simon LeVay argues that because "[h]and preference is observable before birth[71]... [t]he observation of increased non-right-handness in gay people is therefore consistent with the idea that sexual orientation is influenced by prenatal processes," perhaps heredity.[28]
A study of 50 gay men found 23% had counterclockwise hair whirl, as opposed to 8% in the general population. This may correlate with left-handedness.[72]
Gay men have increased ridge density in the fingerprints on their left thumbs and pinkies.[72]
Length of limbs and hands of gay men is smaller compared to height than the general population, but only among white men.[72]
Your text to link here...
Wikipedia is lazy, but so is your "argument"
Major differences in traits bear explaining. A physical trend that is three times more prevalent in gay people than in straight people is simply not consistent with the idea that people choose homosexuality, because the odds are ridiculously low that so many hundreds of thousands or millions of people would just happen to "choose" one way over the other.
If it was really a choice, then physiological differences would be negligible.
So, they've found the "recessive genes" that cause all heterosexuals to be heterosexual and not homosexual? That's interesting. If I had said something like that I would have be demanded to bring proof of my claim. Will you?
I didn't claim anything, even if you were cogent in expressing what that claim would be. I'm just shooting down your idiotic post. Your failure to address my points, as always, shows that your argument remains idiotic.
It's not as simple as one or several genes. During fetal development, the changes governing sexuality are incredibly complex. If you look at the research, you'll see that human sexual gender is not, and never has been, a clear delineation between male and female. There is a continuum, weighted heavily toward the ends. Given this fact, which is obviously biological, why is it so hard to accept the reality that human sexual persuasion follows a similar continuum?
Accepting homosexuality on a societal level requires two criteria, as far as I'm concerned;an understanding that it's natural, and you've aptly demonstrated the fallacious nature of arguments against that idea, and harmlessness. Whether or not pedophilia has a genetic cause, it can not, and will not be accepted because it is harmful.
So don't get too carried away with your victory dance there.
Hmm, amazing how easily such a hated sexual choice becomes the actions of your favorite sexual choice.
Those facts make your final sentence mean even less than it does on its face.
Yeah, lots of people just love being discriminated against by a bunch of self-righteous bigoted a-holes, so they choose to be gay. Sure, that makes sense.
Only a Republican could come to that conclusion and side with discrimination.
That will be great news for the gay community in about 2000 years.
Gays? They've fought for their rights to marry, but still haven't got it. Why then are straight couples, who never had to fight for such rights at all, in possession of such a right in the first place?
Considering the nature of a right, shouldn't they be equally awarded to anyone and everyone?
If you're really determined to have a lack of empathy for people, you'll believe anything that justifies it.
If this is the argument you are making, then the right to marriage should not be given to straight couples either.
After all if being gay is a lifestyle choice, and as you've argued in another thread, the same could be said about all the other deviant sexual preferences out there, then it simply follows that being straight is also a lifestyle choice since it is simply another form of sexual preference (it is the OPPOSITE form of sexual preference from being gay). In other words if you believe that gay people choose to be gay (and to remain gay), you also have to believe that straight choose to be straight (and to remain straight).
That being the case, let's look at what you've defined as "special rights". The right in focus here is marriage, for gays you seem to believe that such a right should not be awarded to gays because it is "special". However it is already being awarded to straight couples.
This leads us to something of a dilemma. If marriage can be considered a special right to gays, why can't it also be considered a special right to straight people? After all, you've argued how sexual preference (ALL forms of it) are merely a result of choice. So straight people are in no way different from gays other than the fact that they made a different choice within the same spectrum.
A special right cannot possibly be considered special to one group of people but not to another group of people if the delimitations between them are not shown to exist, because then that would make them essentially of the same group. In this case, that delimitation (lifestyle choice) is shown to not exist since BOTH groups (straight and gay) are making lifestyle choices in deciding whether they are straight or gay.
To sum up the argument from the definitional perspective you have put forward:
Being gay (or straight or any other sexual preference or combination of) is a lifestyle choice.
We should not be awarding special rights for lifestyle choices that people make.
Marriage is a special right.
Conclusion: We should not award the right to marry to anyone gay, straight or having ANY form of sexual preference or combinations thereof.
Why are straight people given the right to marry then?
What needs to be considered here is that marriage serves a purpose not just for legalities but also for stabilizing family units. And since heterosexual couples do procreate, they have the historical advantage in this arena.
If homosexuality was a choice, then there would be ramifications of that. The flip side of the argument about how traumatic it is for a gay person to be shunned by their family is that it's not easy for the family either. Such parents aren't very deserving of sympathy, as reality would have it, but under the premise that homosexuality is a choice, it's quite a different matter. Under those conditions, people would be claiming that they were naturally gay, while putting their families through hell on a whim. That borders on the sociopathic, honestly. This is one of the things that makes the argument so ludicrous, of course.
Bearing all this in mind, if homosexuality was really a choice, then marriages would still serve a purpose for straight couples, while society would owe absolutely nothing to gay people whatsoever. There would be no basis for claiming any sort of rights at all.
I'm not even sure if we can look at things such as rights on the basis of functionality though.
If we do, then such rights should rightly also be taken away on the same basis, meaning that a married couple who do not fulfill the "functionality" of marriage by either not procreating or not being able to create a stable family (dysfunctional family?) should have their rights removed from them by a legal body regardless of their opinions.
And the proportions are important also. If 90% of people are partnering with the opposite sex, then the remaining 10% who are (supposedly) intentionally creating controversy and discord through their "choice" can't blame anyone for not giving them the time of day.
I would also say that the concept of functionality doesn't mean that specific failures of that should have their rights removed. The general purpose would still be there. Many people fail in their first marriage, and succeed on the second try (often to the same person), so I'm not sure how removing rights would work in that sort of situation and why it should be done. If you have a child with someone, for instance, and you want to remarry the other parent, you can't? What good does that do? Would it stay with every person forever? So the dumb kids that get married at 18 and divorced at 20 are both unable to marry anyone else for the rest of their lives? It seems like either too draconian or too much effort breaking down rules for every possible situation to justify the concept.
It's even worse for the procreation aspect. Would there be a time limit, or what? Society would remove the legal binding of marriage simply because a man or woman was incapable of producing children, even if they tried? That would be insanely unfair, and it could rarely be proven that people were not making a good-faith effort. These concepts seem far too arbitrary to enforce, even if the concept that the right to marriage "should" be removed based on functionality makes sense in theory. This is why the general functionality would serve as the basis for rights.
As I said, I like the spirit behind what you're saying, because I know you're trying to turn Traveller's arguments back around on him. I just don't think it works based on the circumstances.
I think there are rights OF marriage, not TO marry(iage). In which case you make a compelling argument. I guess you would need to address the issue of 'separation of church and state' that is found in the framework of our national laws. Since marriage is historically a religious event. When we find that issue of 'separation of church and state' we will have the answer to your questions. And that answer would probably be there should be no special rights given for married people. If there was phrase like that in our national laws, and not just a letter written to a Baptist group which expresses the need to avoid religion being the decision making entity such as it was (is) in England.
However, it all would hinge on finding and properly interpreting that phrase. I understand that phrase is why God is no longer allowed to be mentioned in public schools but I've never understood the reasoning behind it from the reasons given by those who support that stance. Since "In God We Trust" is still on the money made in America. And is the national motto.
It should also be made clear that religions make themselves part of important life events for a reason. It contributes to continued participation in the church. There may be a religious ceremony for naming a child, for example, but filing your child's name with a birth certificate is still done on a secular level. So of course religion connected itself to marriage, but it's still a legal contract.
And "In God We Trust" was established in the 1950's, I believe. It has nothing to do with the Founding Fathers. You're bringing up an example of a violation of the separation of church and state in order to question the principle.
...am I paying you "more", really?
Why should they have to pay more, anyway, choice or not? Insurance can make the difference between stability and bankruptcy. What are you going to say, "don't get insured if you think it's unfair" and then "well, you should have bought the insurance" when something bad happens?
In essense, what you're saying is that if an athiest group didn't have to pay a certain tax for insurance but a Christian group did, then you would have no problem with the government paying the Christian group more so they won't feel cheated by having less income to buy insurance with?
Unless there's some reason for those two groups being taxed differently, and I don't know what that reason would be, then of course I'd be fine with the government leveling out the field. Why would you ask? You yourself said you agreed that gay couples should get more money to make up for any taxes on the stipend, so there's no difference there. The only reason I can think you're asking is to suggest that homosexuality is a choice by comparing it to religious preference. If that's what you're doing, then it's not going to work. The principle would apply to any unfair taxation whether the basis of it was a choice or not.
But what's the problem anyway? Either both things are illegal or they're both legal as you describe it, so why even bother with it? The corrections would create the same situation.
Would that theory be the same as their goal of getting "marriage" rights? Since with civil union rights 'they end up getting the same rights' they seek instead of using the word "marriage"?
Sure seems to me that it would be so much easier for them to go after civil union rights that get the same rights as marriage does. Especially since NO state has been able to get "marriage" rights to pass any election process. It's too bad they don't go after those civil union rights because I'm one of those far-right Christian nut-cases who would vote FOR civil union rights but NOT marriage rights.
But I guess they're not really interested in "the whole idea", huh? they simply want to claim a word that religion already has a firm grip on.
Everybody needs insurance. Cambridge might not be "telling" them to get insurance, but life is.