Do you approve your president/prime minister?

[Joelcool7]

fordy said:

Joelcool7 said:

Ummm that mix-up was one of the cornerstones of your argument. If Marriage is not a right then how are gays entitled to it, why if its not a right did the definition need to be changed?

I'll counter that. What gives the government the right to give benefits to a select group of the community? Would you be for government giving, for instance, Asians exclusive tax cuts? Marriage may not be a right, but being treated as equal is. Are you for a government that does one thing for one group and another for another group?

Joelcool7 said:

Umm the Government forcing pastor's to marry gay couples and civil servents is a view being forced on them. Marrying only straight couples is practicing their religion and forcing them to go against their beliefs and marry gay couples is persecution and forcing the Government's view on the pastors and civil servents. You also make a good point.

You'll find that most modern governments take a neutral stance on religion. They're damned either way because religious zealous claim Atheism as a religion, when in fact, atheists don't follow beliefs based on a higher power.

Joelcool7 said:

You see when most of these civil servents signed up for marriage liscenses and such gay marriage was not legal, marrying gays was not part of their job description. Would I forbid the company from switching the pigs? No however forcing that Muslim employee to cut up pigs against his religious belief with the threat of being fired if he did not, that is definatly not okay.

Then what would you do? You cannot switch him to other meats, the religion calls for no touching of surfaces stained with swine blood. A decision must be made...

Joelcool7 said:

Its one thing to legalize gay marriage, but to then force that belief on everyone else in the country is persecution. I don't know how you can think its okay to walk up to a pastor or civil servent and then force them against their will to marry you. Like I said their are plenty of civil servents and pastors who would gladly marry a gay couple so why do the gays have to force other pastors.

You're making it sound like pastors will be hunted down and pelted with rocks if they don't marry gays. Pastors have the freedom to choose their line of work. If the work does not suit them, they're free to leave and practise their religion elsewhere. Nobody is forcing anything onto anyone.

I would be okay with a few Pastors exempt from same-sex marriage, but unless you can guarantee that all Pastors don't turn in that direction (which you can't), then the exemption argument is completely moot.

Ummm according to my studies in highschool about marriage laws the reason benefits were given to married couples was to promote family growth and encourage husbands and wives to reproduce and have families. Many of these benefits are to encourage property purchases or help with family planning. I know my mom and dad had help thanks to these benefits before they divorced.

So should those benefits be offered to gay couples? No they shouldn't gay couples can't reproduce or create a family. Helping them out financially to encourage them to found families is stupid and makes no sense. These breaks were intended to help grow families and the community and giving these benefits to gays does not benefit society at all. Unless maybe the gay couple adopts.

But here's the fact, Stephen Harper talked about giving gays these benefits under a civil Union. So this argument makes no sense even If I don't think gays should get these benefits they were going to anyways just under the name union instead of marriage. Again equal treatment!

How is Athiesm not a religion? They have as much faith in their beliefs as anyone from any religion. They may not believe in a God but Athiest church's are popping up and Athiest missionaries are going out. Agnostics and Athiests are doing things like putting signs on busses saying their probably is no God. Buddhists don't believe in God, yet they are classified as a religious belief. Any organised group that believes in a creator whether intelligent or a big bang or what ever other theory is a religion. You can't escape the fact that what you believe is a faith based belief in a creator or lifestyle. Some will say "Well we believe in scientific fact meaning we don't have faith and aren't a religion" but I have yet to see a single scientific fact that proves how the earth was made, all that exists are theories and hypothesis that may or may not be based on Scientific fact. Fact is you have faith in the unseen and unproven.

As for the job description changing. Its not the employee's fault that the employer made a decision that violates the employees religious rights. The employer should find a job that doesn't require the employee to violate his beliefs. Their is a reason these things are called rights. A huge example is in Canada when their is a religious holiday you are entitled to the day off if you practice that religion. If you hire someone with a religious viewpoint then you as the employer need to respect and accomodate that religion. To do other wise is discrimination or persecution.

As for pastor's being hunted down. They actually were, a group of like 50 gay rights activists picketed my church after the pastor refused to marry the gay couple. They said horrible things and tried to block traffic into the church. They yelled at us and even spit at some congregants who came out to give them coffee and donuts. Fact is spit is assualt and picketing a church because a pastor stands up for his constitutional rights is totally wrong.

You can try to come up with as many arguments as you want but nothing is going to change the fact that marriage is not a right. Its not an equality issue either. You can argue longer and longer but just because you'd like something to be fact doesn't make it so!