I hope someone tests this in court

Texas' gay marriage ban may have banned all marriages.

A Sampling of Anti-Gay Marriage Ads

The Huffington Post has put together a nice little sampling of anti-gay marriage ads. Over and over you hear "it's not hate" and "it's not bigotry". The ads are full of encapsulated little concrete reasons for why you should oppose gay marriage. There are references to statistics and studies, none of which is dwelled on much. The ads invariably return to the idea of "doing what's right". The language and imagery really give me the impression that the ads are preaching to the converted.

Two things going on here. First, the ads are intended to offer concrete (often economic) justifications why gay marriage should be stopped. Second, the ads appeal to the motivations of the motivated, the reasons why the viewers rage so strongly against gays getting all married. This part seems to be heavily encrypted, but the motivations seem to range somewhere between "it's wrong" to "it's disgusting".

What strikes me most here is the stark disconnect between the justifications and the motivations. Usually both aren't so clearly displayed, but I think it's this same disconnect that makes select Teabaggers so inarticulate. See also the state's rights arguments made in defense of slavery in America.

The ads, I believe, are intended to provide alternate ammunition to people whose primary reasons are at best personal and irrelevant (and at worst; very, very mean). It seems to me that if you make your point using canned statistics, while keeping your real convictions to yourself, then maybe you're not entirely on the correct side of the argument.

I don't mean to use only examples opposed to my own alignment (Neutral Good). I'm sure there are cases of the Secular Left doing this as well. I just can't think of any, possibly because it's rarer, but more likely because this sort of thing is harder to see when you're doing it yourself.

link via @shortpacked


UPDATE: Guilty! I saw this picture:


from this article and immediately started trying to think up reasons why the war in Iraq is a bad idea, just so that little girl wouldn't have to say goodbye to her dad. I'm no better than those racist and homophobic bigots, rhetorically speaking. I hang my head in shame.

Satan used Perez Hilton to ask Miss California about gay marriage!

I was going to leave poor Miss California alone. Until this:

Prejean: . . . I felt as though Satan was trying to tempt me in asking me this question. And then God was in my head and in my heart saying, "Do not compromise this. You need to stand up for me and you need to share with all these people . . . you need to witness to them and you need to show that you're not willing to compromise that for this title of Miss USA."

Childhood: shat on

Since this weekend was evidently about destroying more of our childhood...

I think I was talking to someone here about the Orson Scott Card rant against gay marriage, which pretty much ruined every happy memory I had of reading his books as a kid. So here's some infuriating, head-exploding examples of his propaganda/fear mongering, "logic", and bigotry, in that order:

"Already in several states, there are textbooks for children in the earliest grades that show 'gay marriages' as normal. How long do you think it will be before such textbooks become mandatory -- and parents have no way to opt out of having their children taught from them?"

"If a court declared that from now on, 'blind' and 'sighted' would be synonyms, would that mean that it would be safe for blind people to drive cars?"

"With 'gay marriage,' the last shreds of meaning will be stripped away from marriage, with homosexuals finishing what faithless, selfish heterosexuals have begun."

My childhood hero is fucking dead to me.



On a happier note, I'm not even a parent and I found this to be an awesome alternative to the horribleness we watched on Sunday!

Both via GeekDad