Voltare
Posts: 841
Joined: 1/1/2004
From: Santiago, Chile
Status: offline
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I'll have a more complete response later, bu tthe first blush here...
A pivotal arguement revolves around creating laws in response to public health. The notion that same sex marriage isn't a public health threat, could be debunked by (and this is going to start a huge snit I know) data regarding the spread of AIDS. The perception that homosexuality is a direct and overwhelming contributor of the spread of the AIDS virus is actually supported by the Center for Disease Control statistics on the subject.
(source: http://www.avert.org/statsum.htm)
At the end of the December 2002, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported approximately 384, 906 persons in the United States living with AIDS.
Of these,
Of the 298,248 men (of 13 years or older) who were living with AIDS
57% were men who had sex with men (MSM),
23% were intravenous durg users (IDU)
10% were exposed through heterosexual contact
8% were both MSM and IDU
Of the 82,764 adult and adolescent women with AIDS,
61% were exposed through heterosexual contact
36% were exposed through intravenous drug use
What these numbers say, is that nearly sixty percent of HIV infections in men, were caused by male homosexual contact (aprox 165,000 case), and that over sixty per cent of HIV infections in women were caused by heterosexual contact (49,000 cases.) Statistically, if sixty percent of men acquire the disease through Male to Male contact, and sixty percent of women acquire the disease from contact with women, it would reason that 30,000 of the Female to Male infections were the direct result of Male to Male sexual contact - bringing the total cost to almost 250,000 cases of AIDS due to Male to Male contact. To bring this into perspective, this is more cases then people died in the Vietnam War (58,262) Korean War (54,246) Desert Storm (148) Iraq recently (904) and the (aprox) number of deaths from suicide in the past four years (120,000). Or, the number of murders committed in the US over the past 10 years.
My personal belief, is that same sex marriage should be the perview of the religious authorities that perform such ceremonies. I also personally believe that civil unions should be permitted to any couple that desires them. I only list the arguement because I -also- believe that just because I think this way, that the world should not revolve around my expectations. Morality of a society is greater then any one person. I think calling someone a supporter of hate for their religious or ideological beliefs is the worst form of hypocrisy - and born of hate as well. For any sort of civil dialouge, the goal should be to persuade. Telling someone that their point of view is nothing but hate does not persuade - it alienates.
Stephan
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http://www.vv3b.com/
"There is always some madness in love, but there is always some reason in madness." - F. Nietzsche
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RE: Defeat of constitutional amendment - 
Profile
). I hope enough people are outraged and elect representatives who will change the law on this. And I hope our next president will appoint judges who realize the importance of protecting civil liberties. 
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