Active Users:625 Time:18/05/2026 01:32:05 PM
No, most people don't do that. Reasoning from cognitive biases and anecdotes is much more common. Dreaded Anomaly Send a noteboard - 30/06/2011 12:18:40 AM
No, nobody's rights should be up to anyone else, unfortunately they have to be, for those of us who support democracy, the reason we entrust it to a majority is we distrust them less than the minority or the individual. We also enshrine personal rights whenever possible inside a document that requires prolonged super-majorities to change, so some kneejerk reaction from the populace doesn't either eradicate them or invent new ones.


Often, gay rights are already implied by a consistent reading of such documents, as many judges have remarked over the past few years. Judge Vaughn Walker, who issued the decision overturning Proposition 8 in California, noted that limiting marriage to one man, one woman constitutes gender discrimination as well as sexual orientation discrimination, and beyond that, it is rooted in conventional ideas about gender roles which we have supposedly progressed beyond as a society.

Beg Pardon, you're the one who used the word 'forcing' and did it in regard to the majority. I am no more fond of the tyranny of the majority than you, but I'm also not fond of the tyranny of the minority either. And history is generally full of a lot more apparently wise and reasonable people who engaged in tyranny because they thought they knew what was best for the lowly masses than it was off frothing megalomaniac monsters who ruled on whim and spouted of cliche villain line, history just tends to rename the former as the latter when the next self-righteous bastard cuts their head off and declares themselves wise and benevolent, taken as a whole I prefer to take a whole bunch of ordinary people, sit them down and let both sides explain their POV, and then ask them what to do, it tends to work better, frankly I trust them to act morally more than I do politicians.


Forcing through the system, not down people's throats. (I really don't know how the rest of this relates even tangentially to the issue at hand.)
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New York Senate approves same-sex marriage - 25/06/2011 03:47:43 AM 1423 Views
Good. *NM* - 25/06/2011 07:40:52 AM 469 Views
Re: Federalism is so fucking slow. *NM* - 25/06/2011 02:47:11 PM 302 Views
I'm actually not opposed to this. - 25/06/2011 03:48:32 PM 714 Views
Makes sense to me. - 25/06/2011 04:00:07 PM 942 Views
I'm not sure why there was even any need for such explicit protection. - 25/06/2011 04:04:47 PM 704 Views
There are two reasons, depending on ones position on the issue. - 25/06/2011 06:04:27 PM 753 Views
Meh, you never know. - 26/06/2011 12:58:37 AM 852 Views
so in your only Catholics are really married? - 26/06/2011 12:04:07 AM 723 Views
Church Doctrine. - 26/06/2011 12:57:39 AM 839 Views
That is simply not true - 26/06/2011 08:20:59 AM 791 Views
Yes it is. - 26/06/2011 05:14:29 PM 781 Views
That's patently wrong in that Orthodox weddings are explicitly recognized by the Church. - 26/06/2011 02:42:00 PM 736 Views
Yeah okay... - 26/06/2011 05:16:05 PM 767 Views
Are you sure about this? - 30/06/2011 04:47:57 PM 640 Views
Dragonsoul is wrong - 01/07/2011 09:21:43 AM 786 Views
Glad to hear it. *NM* - 25/06/2011 04:05:15 PM 288 Views
Seems fine to me - 25/06/2011 05:44:30 PM 713 Views
Voting on civil rights constitutes tyranny of the majority, not legitimate democracy. - 25/06/2011 09:37:28 PM 830 Views
Direct democracy is the only true democracy. *NM* - 26/06/2011 01:01:26 AM 306 Views
Sometimes it is grand not being a True Scottsman *NM* - 26/06/2011 08:21:49 AM 298 Views
Re: Voting on civil rights constitutes tyranny of the majority, not legitimate democracy. - 26/06/2011 03:11:06 AM 781 Views
Good luck telling that to the deeply religious right. - 26/06/2011 03:20:04 AM 701 Views
I am a deeply religious member of the right, and I tell them that all the time *NM* - 26/06/2011 03:30:14 AM 305 Views
Then you're a rare person. *NM* - 26/06/2011 03:36:11 AM 312 Views
After a number of years of gay marriage - 26/06/2011 06:57:07 AM 676 Views
That's more or less true of virtually everything, not a great example - 26/06/2011 07:09:03 AM 712 Views
People shouldn't turn their own religion and/or opinion into law - 28/06/2011 07:33:48 PM 685 Views
I don't recall mentioning religion beyond confirming that I was religious - 28/06/2011 08:22:51 PM 752 Views
I admit I wasn't replying to you directly - 29/06/2011 07:20:10 AM 698 Views
I think you should give this subject a bit more thought - 29/06/2011 02:16:04 PM 748 Views
I'll address the bulk of this later - 29/06/2011 07:58:48 PM 627 Views
Believing things without strong supporting evidence is not rational. - 30/06/2011 12:11:33 AM 835 Views
Requiring different degrees of proof for things isn't particularly rational - 30/06/2011 01:14:44 PM 898 Views
I require the same standard of evidence to be confident in anything. - 30/06/2011 07:43:51 PM 1298 Views
Re: I require the same standard of evidence to be confident in anything. - 30/06/2011 08:59:00 PM 898 Views
Re: I require the same standard of evidence to be confident in anything. - 30/06/2011 09:47:30 PM 1165 Views
We're gonna have to pick this up another time - 01/07/2011 04:37:25 AM 724 Views
No, I used the word irrational to mean that it's not rational. - 30/06/2011 09:12:19 PM 738 Views
Fair Enough - 01/07/2011 04:32:44 AM 776 Views
Btw, in case you were wondering, I do like you - 01/07/2011 02:17:42 PM 780 Views
Re: Voting on civil rights constitutes tyranny of the majority, not legitimate democracy. - 26/06/2011 10:38:56 PM 894 Views
I think you should give your fellow citizens a bit more trust and respect - 27/06/2011 05:41:52 PM 673 Views
I'm all for occasionally forcing stuff down people's throats... - 28/06/2011 11:44:12 AM 693 Views
My expectations are guided by psychology and history. - 28/06/2011 07:08:06 PM 791 Views
That's good to know, most of us do that, though we usually just call it common sense and experience - 28/06/2011 08:55:23 PM 822 Views
No, most people don't do that. Reasoning from cognitive biases and anecdotes is much more common. - 30/06/2011 12:18:40 AM 728 Views
Perhaps, you seem to be claiming not do that yourself though - 30/06/2011 01:40:57 PM 828 Views
Empire State Building was lit up in rainbow colors, looked cool *NM* - 25/06/2011 08:21:03 PM 326 Views
Good. *NM* - 25/06/2011 11:41:30 PM 293 Views
So, fifth time is a charm? - 26/06/2011 06:38:26 AM 814 Views

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