Sex with ducks

[pasithea]

Swiped this link from ff00ff

I love these musicians. Heard a couple of their other songs but this one is kind of over the top.

And now, because I've heard the same nonsense from right-wingers about how gay marriage will lead to people marrying animals, a short comment.

Sure! Let's go for it! Just as soon as a horse is able to recite their wedding vows and pick up a pen and legibly sign their name, why shouldn't they be allowed to marry?

Oh gee. Ya'know. I'm thinking that whole leads to marrying animals thing may be obviously ridiculous. Hmm.

Gay marriage also doesn't lead to adults marrying children for the same reason that children can't get credit cards, drive a car, run a corporation, join the military, etc. They might be capable of signing, but they lack the sophistication to understand the full ramifications of their actions. Yes, I'll grant you that this is also true of many adults, but we give adults nearly 20 years of buffer.

The animal one is really just mindbendingly stupid though. I mean seriously. Do you think for a second that if animals could sign legal contracts that cows wouldn't have sued the holy fuck out of McDonalds by now?

Can we be done with this discussion now. I read the bible cover to cover. Nowhere in it is there a commandment that says, "Thou shalt be really really stupid."

Comments

[enochsmiles.livejournal.com]

I do think they're right, that gay marriage opens the door to polygamous marriage. As it should. Personally I think governments have no business granting marriage licenses at all. That's religion. Civil unions from the civil servants, marriages from the religion of one's choice, and contracts between whoever and how many ever consenting and competent adults.

The thing that gets me is that I don't see how this would change anything as far as society is concerned. Gays and lesbians already live committed-for-life relationships. A smaller minority already lives in greater-than-two "marriage" households. The only change that legal recognition of these ways of life would bring would be the rights that are restricted to "legally married" parties, and denying those rights is an intrusion of religion upon the state.

(Belgium already treats things this way, though they're still stuck on the two-people-only civil unions from the government. But marriage is an inherently religious/spiritual concept, and while I will still see it as a victory if gay marriage is legalized, if polygamous marriage is legalized, I'd much rather see governments stop granting marriage licenses or performing marriage ceremonies.

However it's resolved, it needs to be an equal legal action for everyone regardless of who they wish to commit to. (I'm okay with religions deciding who can and can't marry in their faith; people can pick their own religions. It's far harder to pick your own country.)

[cortezopossum.livejournal.com]

I've kind thought along the same lines. All of the arguments I see for 'gay marriage' could EQUALLY APPLY to polygamous marriage but whenever I've brought it up a lot of people backpedal and bring up arguments based on tradition and arbitrary standards such as, "But marriage is 'traditionally' between 'TWO' people!" and "OMG slippery slope argument".

Then I get people who argue against polygamy via economic arguments such as the added difficulty in working out taxes, property ownership, custody, and prenuptial situations -- which has nothing to do with the basic concept of whether polygamous marriage should be legal or not.

[cortezopossum.livejournal.com]

I do definitely draw some lines at "no marriage with children" ... Children simply aren't mentally and/or physically mature enough to commit to sexual relationships and there has to be some kind of lower limit cutoff. Setting a minimum age (like we do now) is easy and fair enough (although some may argue for some kind of 'psychological & physical test of maturity' ... that might work too but I'd think it would be too prone to racism or other forms of discrimination).

I also draw the line at "no marriage with animals" ... at least until such time you could grant citizenship and human rights to an animal (e.g. one with genetically engineered intelligence).

[maradydd.livejournal.com]

*nodnod* The legal notion of competence (which is why adults can sign contracts and children can't) applies equally to children and animals; two or more consenting adults can be competent to contract marriage, whereas children and animals cannot. So the dividing line is very bright indeed, and the slippery slope argument is shown to be a fallacy.

[dv-girl.livejournal.com]

The thing is, either marriage ought to be a wholly religious affair that confers absolutely no state privilege or it should be strictly business and follow the same rules as joint businesses, corporations, etc.

We have a fairly clearly defined set of rules for who can and cannot enter into legal contracts. There are very few people in present society who would tolerate a legal definition which said that one of the partners in a joint venture could not be black or could not be female, etc. Marriage is the one exception and I assert that in our society, marriage in its present form is ONLY a legal document and has nothing to do with religion.

You could almost think of it as an application with a skinnable interface. the mechanism doesn't change. A marriage grants a set of permissions and applications. The skin is whether it's a simple civil affair, a full-blown over the top performance, christian, jewish, buddhist, etc. Those skins may have their own restrictions but they are not integral to the underlying application. Including gay marriage in that underlying mechanism does not break it in any way. Gays just become another skin.

Poly relationships would probably require a different mechanism that would be more akin to a corporation because you need to deal with aspects of people leaving/entering the relationship and property management rights for assets, children, etc. Legally, polygamy is a significantly more complex device. However, there are many models present in current law which could be used to model it.