Jesus Hates Canada
Canada legalized same-sex marriage yesterday. What does this mean, specifically?
In Canada, the basis of marriage is: love.
Here in America, the basis of marriage is: an opposing set of genitals.
Wow. I am so glad that we're the ones invading other countries to spread our values...we've obviously put a lot of thought into them.
As long as we're making it totally arbitrary, let's go ahead and premise marriage upon belly-buttons. Outties can't marry Innies, period. I want a constitutional amendment on this one. Who's with me?
In Canada, the basis of marriage is: love.
Here in America, the basis of marriage is: an opposing set of genitals.
Wow. I am so glad that we're the ones invading other countries to spread our values...we've obviously put a lot of thought into them.
As long as we're making it totally arbitrary, let's go ahead and premise marriage upon belly-buttons. Outties can't marry Innies, period. I want a constitutional amendment on this one. Who's with me?
posted by Samwick @ 4:52 AM
8 Comments:
At 12:35 PM,
Christopher said…
To most Americans, Canada would be a bastion of liberalism and tolerance as evidenced by its legalising of homosexual marriage. However, the preceding public debate over it was extremely rancorous, with right-wing Christian fundamentalists groups vehemently opposing it.
Canada’s governing Liberal Party - the Canadian equivalent of the Democrats - which has governed for so many years, has done so only because it gets a huge chunk of its parliamentary seats in the French-speaking province of Quebec.
The Liberal Party therefore, knowing on which side its bread is buttered, always chooses a Quebecer as its leader. Hence all Canada's prime ministers over the last 38 years - excepting 3 who each lasted less than a year - have been from Quebec.
Absent Quebec, Canada would now have as prime minister, Steven Harper (who sort of looks like Rick Santoro) who is of the same ilk as a fundamentalist Republican, who supported the US invasion of Iraq, and opposed legalizing homosexual marriage.
To those fundamentalist Christian Americans who visit Canada and want to feel at home, you should concentrate your stay in western Canada, most of whose denizens will greet you as a blood-brother.
At 12:43 PM,
Samwick said…
I've heard that this decision could be over-ruled fairly easily by future governments, so you're right, this doesn't represent the viewpoint of every single Canadian.
It's just a relief to see that someone has the backbone to do what is right. I feel like I'm living in the twilight zone here. The gay community basically has very few places to congregate where I live...one of their hang-outs is burned to the ground and we're just pretending like everything is fine. Southerners are fucking sick.
Anyway, thanks for the thoughts, I pretty much always over-simplify things and it's nice to hear a more nuanced break down of the situation.
At 1:31 PM,
Sheryl said…
The issue is not the sanctity of love for the gay community. Love is not an issue that the state can regulate. The issue is equal protection under the law.
I found out the hard way that marriage is not about love. Living and committing yourself to someone you care about is about love. (And in fact, in my case I still love my ex, but could not live with him.)
But what marriage is about is property rights and community endorsement. If you have any doubts about this, try getting a divorce some time.
At 2:10 PM,
Sheryl said…
PS And in my case, I had to marry my ex in order to live with him because I could not have received a NZ residency permit without the marriage provision, so marrying each really was about being together.
At 10:29 PM,
Samwick said…
tee hee. It's true, I just needed some way to illustrate how insane the ban on gay marriage is. It's quite strange. But marriage is about a whole long list of things and I'm glad that gay and lesbian Canadians are locked out of an institution due to a odd religious belief.
At 11:38 PM,
Sheryl said…
It is actually ironic in that sense. You are right.
I still think the fundamental issue is equal protection under the law. Because property rights are not unimportant. Things like tax status or like Howard Dean mentioned, even hospital visitation rights can be affected. Whether a partner can receive social security benefits from your employment once you retire. Those are important issues.
Where I disagree with Dean is that I don't think we should be renaming things for gay couples just to make them easier for the religious right to swallow. Gay marriage is something that should be acceptable as it is.
At 12:51 AM,
Samwick said…
"I don't think we should be renaming things for gay couples just to make them easier for the religious right to swallow."
Well put. I think when we give folks any leeway with this issue we sort of legitimize their intolerance. If a country club put out a sign reading "whites only"...clearly that's discrimination. If homophobic Christians make an institution "straights only"...it's no different. It's childish and it needs to stop.
At 9:58 AM,
Sheryl said…
Like everything the question is method.
I think the bottom line to everything is cleaning up our electoral process, so that when sane people try to vote they are able to and it actually counts.
Cause while the left is trying to clean up the mess for all the zillions of ways the Republicans are destroying everything, the right is further concentrating its hold on the actual electoral process so that they can illegitimately ensure future victories. As long as they can manipulate elections, it doesn't matter what people think about anything.
Just tell black people that they are felons or that their registration was on the wrong card stock, and you have ensured Ohio and Florida, and that is all it takes. Then we get another 4 years of homophobia and bigotry, etc.
In New Zealand registration is like the draft. You reach 18, you are legally required to register. It's nationalized, so it's not like you can register in more than one place or have to re-register if you move. Or can be thrown off the rolls on technicalities. It's a legal right.
Now I can see advantages to a decentralized process in terms of having different voting machine vendors and multiple elections authorities, but there are probably ways to have the best of both worlds.
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