Burning books - they have an ointment for that

I would think that people reading the book's described here, would probably be skirting perilously close to violating this Oregon law:

The statutes broadly take aim at practices of “luring” and “grooming” that expose minors to sexually explicit materials in the hopes of lowering their inhibitions against engaging in sexual conduct. The “furnishing” statute, Oregon Revised Statutes § 167.054 (“section 054”), criminalizes providing children under the age of thirteen with sexually explicit material. The “luring” statute, § 167.057 (“section 057”), criminalizes providing minors under the age of eighteen with visual, verbal, or narrative descriptions of sexual conduct for the purpose of sexually arousing the minor or the furnisher, or inducing the minor to engage in sexual conduct.

Thankfully, wiser heads have prevailed:

Appellants, a broad cross-section of booksellers; non-profit literary, legal, and health organizations; and a concerned grandmother (together, “Powell’s Books”), argue that these statutes violate the First Amendment. In particular, Powell’s Books claims, among other things, that the statutes are facially overbroad and criminalize a substantial amount of constitutionally protected speech. We agree.

Time for a divorce, indeed

Sometimes, doing what is fair or decent or even nice isn't what is right or proper. Sometimes, to do what is right, you have to look beyond your own prejudices and beliefs and micro-systems and look at the system from a macro level. bub

It's a testament to your ability to reason that you take a position antithetical (Position A) to your own actual position (Position B) because you believe that while Position B is the nice and fair outcome, you realize that Position A is proper under the circumstances.

Sometimes, many times even, Position A and Position B are the same position. Women and African Americans should have the right to vote. Legislation ensuring those rights fulfilled both the "fair" outcome that you root for (Position B) as well as the "proper" one (Position A).

On to the point of the post: I've often been at odds with myself because I strongly believe that the fair, nice and decent thing to do is to allow gay marriage. If its going to have to be a legislative action, then to that extent I strongly support legislation raising gay marriage to the level of hetero marriage.

On the other hand, I can't wrap my mind around how its a constitutional issue (though the courts don't seem to agree with me). As I see it, the constitution doesn't guarantee marriage at all. I don't see that anywhere in there. Nobody else does either, apparently, because its not argued as a point. I don't see the "victories" in the court cases as all that good a thing, because while Position A B wins, I fear Position B A loses. In the long run, Position B A is much more important. Every time Position A B irrationally wins over Position B A, the system becomes that much more contorted. Anyway, back to the issue at hand.

Rather than argue that gay marriage is constitutional in and of itself, people argue that the "equal protection" clause requires that a gay individual be allowed to marry another gay individual. But that "gay" man/woman already has the right to marry another woman/man, just like a heterosexual does. To me, extending it like that necassarily leads to all kinds of problems. Like, where do you stop the progression? What about bestiality? What about incest? What about pedophilia? What about polygomy.

While we are on the topic, what about polygomy? Because, under the above formulation (equal protection), I'm not sure how you argue against it. All the evidence (i.e. - divorce rate, broken marriages, cheating spouses) suggests that monogomy doesn't work that well. Its rare in nature (and apparently humans), as well. I'm actually OK with that outcome, but its still not an argument I'd make to reach that outcome (there is the Position A/B thing, see, it does all come around). And I used the easy example, because the arguments against polygomy are pretty weak. The harder core situations I mentioned above become very iffy using the equal protection logic. There is a group called NMBLA (or some such) that supports and promotes man-boy love. Its a lifestyle choice and natural, they argue. Aren't they entitled to equal protection?

That leads me to the point of my post: All this could be avoided if we divorced the state from the marriage business. As the article points out, if we didn't have "state sponsored" marriage, two individuals (or more) could sign a contract with whatever (probably mostly standardized) terms they agreed too, call it whatever they wanted, and be on their marry way. Call it marriage, call its a union, hell, call it a balzag (well, don't call it that).

Instead, we have small/minority two groups trying to push what they think the outcome should be onto the rest of us. One wants marriage limited, the other wants it to extend to gays (but, apparently not to polygomists, based on the legislation and court arguments). That's just two groups that currently have power trying to enforce their will.

There is a better way: remove the ability to "enforce" the will of anyone. Get the government out of the marriage business.

UPDATE: Think of the Position A/Position B thing like a tower. Sure, you can probably build a really tall tower quickly, but you want to make sure its on solid foundation and well built, otherwise it all comes tumbling down at the smallest shift in the ground. I'd rather forgo the really tall tower, and slowly build a well-built tower. It might take me years to get where you'll be in a couple months, but 10 years from now, my tower will be around; will yours?