Now they claim civil unions go against nature?

[csziggy]

Using Biology, Not Religion, to Argue Against Same-Sex Marriage
Patricia and Wesley Galloway could not have children of their own. Yet for them, the essence of marriage is rooted in procreation.

“It takes a man and a woman to create children and thus create a family,” Mrs. Galloway, 60, told a legislative panel in Connecticut last year as it was considering a bill to legalize same-sex marriage.

<snip>

While they are Christians, the Galloways say they refuse to use religion to defend their view of marriage because it just muddies things. And they insist they are accepting of everyone, regardless of sexual orientation.

By protecting heterosexual marriage, what “we’re trying to do is protect the foundation of society,” Mrs. Galloway, a volunteer worker from Trumbull, Conn., said in a telephone interview on Saturday.

“Everyone who disagrees is automatically labeled a right-wing bigot,” she said.

Her husband added, “How can you be a bigot when you’re looking out for society as a whole?”
More - http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/12/nyregion/12marriage.html?em

By their logic, their marriage should have been annulled when it was clear they could not have children!

And I have news for them, in "nature" some species have bands of all males that spend their lives as a group or in pairs; some species have female family groups that only allow one unrelated male for procreation. In fact, in animal behavior there is every variation of sexual combination you can imagine. "Human nature" just comes up with our own terms and variations and justification.

[Tikki]

1. Marriage should be about a loving, lasting commitment....

Nowhere does it say there should be or has to be children.

If aunt Bessie should marry a kind man who wants to spend the rest of
his life with her...everyone would think it wonderful that she will
have someone to look out for and someone to look out for her
even though they both are in their 50's.

How is that any different than Uncle Fred and his life partner Joe
finally being able to protect each other within the laws of marriage.

Tikki

[csziggy]

20. Yes, my husband and I made a commitment to live our lives together

Despite my insistence on never having children. We've had 31 years together and plan on another 30 years or more. Not having children has not changed our feelings for each other and I strongly suspect that it has not made a difference in anyone else's lives. :sarcasm:

When I was a child my great-aunt made a life and planned a house with a life long companion who happened to be female. I was too young to have any clue about their full relationship and back then that was something no one talked about. But when it came to her companion's final days, my great-aunt dedicated her time to care for her friend of many years. I have a strong suspicion that if they could have made a more formal declaration of their relationship, they would have. That great-aunt has always been a life model for me since she stayed strong and independent but caring until she was in her late 70s.

[SoCalNative]

2. What a bunch of ignorant losers.

Do they not see the irony in that using procreation as a basis for marriage, THEY should not be allowed to be married?

[BlueJazz]

3. Yep.."Saving Society" ??.....Oh...yeah...They act like if same sex marriage is allowed...

...EVERYBODY will start doing it and then...God Knows ..What will happen ??

Geez...What a pair of illogical fools. :)

PS..Welcome to DU. :)

[Odin2005]

13. They'll just pull out Thomas Aquinas's BS arguments

It's essentially the same BS reasoning about marriage the RCC uses to argue against birth control.

[iamahaingttta]

4. Maybe it's time to build a new "foundation of society..."

...rather than simply "protecting" the old one.

[soothsayer]

5. Where do they come down on hetero divorce rates

[Stellabella]

6. Do they live in houses? Own television sets? Get shots against

the flu, tetanus, measles?

All of those things are not natural, but man made.

And a bigot is defined as someone who restricts the rights of another group based on prejudice. Bigots cannot be 'looking out for society as a whole' if they are repressing one part of that society.

The Galloways: bigots. And stupid.

[RadicalTexan]

7. People who think science is bullshit are not allowed to comment on "nature"

to my mind.

[shadowknows69]

8. So, my wife and I just have a license to breed?

SInce we chose not to are they going to revoke it?

[dana_b]

16. good point!

by their logic, you and your wife have no purpose in being married. That is of it's about raising and protecting children, right??

[Jamastiene]

9. Talk about hypocrisy!!!

"Patricia and Wesley Galloway could not have children of their own. Yet for them, the essence of marriage is rooted in procreation."

Those two need to buy some damn mirrors.

[EFerrari]

18. These are probably the same people that argue against evolution.

So twisted!

[MrScorpio]

10. They're now promoting this argument since the courts are striking them down

It's a great way to identify the bigots

[pitohui]

11. well heterosexual marriage goes against nature, that's kinda the point

we are primates, in a state of nature, the alpha male would be trying to control a bunch of females he'd *'d and the females would be slipping off to get some comfort/fun from the nice nerd chimps behind their backs, at least that's what we observe w. chimps, then the alpha male would come back and eat the baby if he figured it wasn't his after all

people who want to play the nature card probably never get out in nature except to get drunk and shoot randomly at what they hope to be the legal game of the moment, hello dick cheney? did someone call your name?

[Odin2005]

12. Ugh. This is the "Is-Ought" or "Appeal to Nature" fallacy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Is-ought_problem

Ethical statements, statements about what one "ought" to do or what "ought" to happen cannot be logically derived from statements about facts. Such arguments are essentially a kind of appeal to common cultural prejudices, treating current social facts as part of the "natural order of things."

[Fleshdancer]

14. Goes against nature?? Like birth control pills and condoms?

How sad does your marriage have to be if you only see it as a way to procreate? I bring more than my womb to my marriage and my husband would still be my husband regardless of his sperm count.

This argument takes the love and choice out of marriage.

on edit: just want to go on record as saying that homosexuality does not go against nature.

[BluRay01]

15. Society, and certainly modern, urban society, goes against nature...

On the other hand, homosexuality and bisexuality *are* nature for some people, as stated in the OP. To me, society at its best should encourage development of strong, stable families--biological families and the ones we make for ourselves. How is society better off if there is a group of people who are told, "You can't make a family with the person you love because your family portrait doesn't look like mine"? It's ridiculous. An interesting thing in the link is this Mr. Galloway saying he "didn't know how was supposed to behave as a man" because he was raised by women. I haven't really discussed that point with anyone and don't know how others tend to feel about this, but my feeling is that gender roles aren't all that important...certainly they aren't nearly as important as having a loving and stable home. People should behave as people, and the way that a person treats others shouldn't have anything to do with gender.

Looking out for society as a whole? Not exactly. Trying to make everyone's family look exactly like theirs? That's what it looks like to me. Sure sounds like they're right-wing bigots.

[Bluebear]

17. So if Mrs. Galloway is widowed, she must never be allowed to remarry, since she is 60

Since she cannot produce babies, she has no business being married. :crazy:

[anonymous171]

19. Same thing happened with the anti-feminists.

First it was "God created man first, women second. Therefore man has dominion over woman." After a while, when people stopped believing that, they switched over to "man is biologically superior to woman in every way."