Olbermann: Gay marriage is a question of love

P.S.  We shouldn't even be discussing religion here.  My fellow no on 8 friends…you can argue with people who quote the bible all you want, but it is pointless.  No Christian is going to change their mind by something you say.  The REAL ISSUE here is luckily our country's constitution doesn't say I have to be a follower of Jesus or any other religious figure.  However, it does say that everyone has the right to the pursuit of happiness.  Everyone, including Christians, should be saying NO to laws based on the bible, just as we would all vote no to a Muslim amendment stating all women should wear burkas when we go outside. 

One last thing, enough with saying gays are sexually deviant.  The last time I checked, we don't go around making sure heterosexuals are having only one type of sex.  If those of you shocked by gays having sex, you would be just as shocked then to discover what your heterosexual neighbors are up to.

blufish- although I agree mostly with what you said if we dont discuss religion here then where?  I would argue that it is these types of forums which allow the frank discussions that are needed.  It allows you to present your argument for your particular belief system where it will stand or fall on its merits. 

Are we now quoting the Declaration of Independence as the Constitution?? Life, Liberty, the Pursuit of Happiness is the opening to the Declaration of Independence sent to the King of England. When you make these arguments, how about taking the time to look something up.

You're right.  I'm sorry...it is in the declaration. you know....the historical document denouncing tyranny...the same document that was still so poignant and applicable in Lincoln's time that he quoted it when speaking out against slavery. He deemed these rights were not only for the white race.  It is still applicable today because these rights are not just for straight people either.  My point still stands.

"Everyone, including Christians, should be saying NO to laws based on the bible, just as we would all vote no to a Muslim amendment stating all women should wear burkas when we go outside. "

The Bible has been the vehicle for morality whether you like it or not.  Most of our culture and thus laws are influenced by the Christian majority.  Are you proposing that we axe laws that are based on the Ten Commandments?

The bible is a book of fairytales written by a bunch of men who lived thousands of years ago.  The main purpose of the book was so the high priests could maintain their peity and control of the common man.  While I personally believe that there really are a lot of good stories and lessons to be learned from the book, it's rediculous that a modern society such as ours would be so hung up on old news.  Basically it says try to be a good person and treat others how you would like to be treated.  Pretty much common sense stuff for anyone of at least average intelligence.  Oh yeah, and it says to make sure that you worship the imaginary space man in the sky.  If you don't, you'll be punished.  What a bunch of baloney.  Denying people who love one another the right to marry sounds like a sin to me if there ever was one.  I wish these bible thumping, morally correct, bigot christians would get off of there imagined high horse and get with the times.  You say that Jesus preaches about love yet all you preach about is prejudice and ignorance.  Here's some advice, go read a book that was written in this last century, learn how to be decent people who don't stick their nose in other peoples business, and instead of worrying about that splinter in your gay brethrens eye, pull the 2 X 4 out of your own a$$.

P.S. I apologize in advance as I'm sure I hit more than a couple of nerves but I really feel passionately about this issue and I had to let it out.  Please feel free to stone me or burn me at the stake or whatever it is you do these days.

P.P.S.  Excellent commentary as usual Keith, keep up the good fight.

Ian...I'm so glad you brought up the 10 commandments!  It doesn't say in the big 10 that gays shouldn't marry...it DOES say you should not commit adultery. Should we vote in a law that makes it illegal to cheat on a spouse and then get a divorce? or how about stoning our neighbors who work on sabbath day? we have no laws for that....so why so much effort by Christians to see that gays can't marry. I don't get it.

DanielC78... my sentiments exactly.  It's unfortunate that so many people still believe there's an all-powerful, all-knowing being watching over all of us, yet they see no conflict in him allowing things like the rape of babies.  Surely, an all-knowing God would be aware that someone is planning to rape the baby, and an all-powerful God could stop it from happening.  Right?  So does he allow it to happen because the baby somehow deserves it?  I don't get it.  Even if God existed, he wouldn't be worthy of my worship.

I'm conflicted over what bothers me more, the fact that most religious people know absolutely nothing about their religion and just ascribe to it whatever their personal beliefs happen to be, or the possibility that people might actually follow their religion word-for-word.  I guess I prefer the former, since that way we at least don't have public stonings for things like a wife disrespecting her husband.  And I don't have to sacrifice livestock on the altar at the local church so the priest won't have to get a job and pay for his own food.

Still, it's annoying to see so many "devout Christians" who have no idea what Christianity really is.  What did Jesus (supposedly) preach?  Give up your worldly possessions and devote your life to God; help those less fortunate than yourself; have brotherly love for everyone.  And what's the message so many "Christians" think they heard... "God hates fags."  *sigh*  Unfortunately, there's just no way to get through to people who are willfully ignorant.

One of my favorite quotes is from Gandhi.  He said, "I like your Christ.  I do not like your Christians.  They are so unlike your Christ."  Amen!

Thank You Melinda,

I wish ALL Christians thought as you do.  You speak as I believe Christ Led.

Best wishes

Melinda,

You have put into words what I have been thinking to write.

Thanks for doing it so well.

Leviticus 18:22, "Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination


Leviticus 20:13, "If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
"

Kirk, we know what the Bible says.  It's a collection of insane ramblings that might have been pertinent 2000-3000 years ago but is now irrelevant (or at least should be).

And don't quote the Bible at me unless you're willing to follow Mark 9:47.  "And if thy hand offends thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched."  Ever cut your own hand off because you used it to sin?  I didn't think so.  Don't pick and choose which parts of the Bible you want to oppress other people with.  ;-)

Wow, Scott.  I'm sorry you can't trust your heart.  I trust mine, and when I listen it's never steered me wrong.  And I've seen many people, supposedly led by their interpetation of writings that have been translated and re-translated, twisted and misrepresented by "spirtual leaders" do and say incredibly cruel and inhumane things to their fellow man.  God created your heart as well, Scott.  I think he expected you to use it.

Hold On, "NOT what our hearts tell us what love is, LUST comes from the heart"?Obviously, Scott, you need some therapy. Lust comes from our minds, not our hearts. God's design is that we be capable of loving. Love is a gift from God and he has left it up to us to decide how and when to share it. It is our decision to let love into our heart.  Love is a feeling not simply a reason for procreation. Love is uncontrolled by God and should not be controlled by mankind. For now, I have chosen to love my two cats.

Scott B-720566:

Hold on, the Bible tells us in Genesis chapter 2 that God made man then women out of man.

WOULD YOU PEOPLE KNOCK OFF YOUR RELIGIOUS FASCISM!! I don't believe in your god, I do not agree to allow you to dictate my spiritual beliefs, and, apologies to sincere believers of judeo-Christianity, I personally think that your religious stories are petty and bigoted, especially the Old Testament and those very provincial Apostles!

Just WHAT makes you think that you have been authorized to ENFORCE your beliefs on everyone else?!? Get that bloody beam out of your own eye!!!

Keith, I applaud your speaking in such beautiful words.  It was profoundly touching.

To Scott B & your comment about Sodom & Gomorrah...the interpretation of that verse in the Bible as being about homosexuality is false.  If you look at the Hebrew language of the Bible, Gods wrath on Sodom & Gomorrah was about serving false gods, forsaking God, and oppression.  The English "sodomite" was originally "kudash", which refers to pagan idolism, not homosexuality.

Also, the First Amendment to the Constitution is supposed to prevent laws being made respecting an established religion, generally thought of as the right to live in this country without religious persecution & the legal conception of separation of church and state.  Thomas Jefferson was rather clear on this point in his letter to the Danbury Baptists in 1802.

AND...this IS a civil rights issue.  When lawyers and churches are using the EXACT same language to fight same sex marriage that they used in 1967 to fight interracial marriage, it's a civil rights issue.  AND...when religious organizations & churches are giving MILLIONS of dollars (in such an economy no less...couldn't they find something better to do with those funds...like help your fellow man?) to fight same sex marriage, that makes it religious, which has NO BUSINESS being in the Constitution!  And by the way, marriage is not about God.  You can marriage in the most beautiful church ceremony, but if you don't file your piece of paper with the COURT, it's not legal & you don't get any of the benefits of marriage.  When marriage affects your taxes, it's got nothing to do with God. 

And "choosing" to be gay, or "choosing" to act on being gay?  You're kidding right?  Did you "choose" to be straight?  Could you have "chosen" to not act on being straight?  Could have honestly "chosen" to never talk to or touch or love another person? 

Great comment Scott!! Please tell Wayne:

"The heart is deceitful abobe all things and desparately wicked, who can know it." Jeremiah 17:9

Wayne should trust God, not his heart!

Well, there's your problem Philip (and Scott). God is IN my heart, evidently he only exists for you in that book you love to quote.

Silly people... there is no God.  Thousands of years ago, some people decided to try to explain how the world and humanity came to be.  They didn't understand how the natural world worked, so they figured there must be some supreme being that made everything.  Naturally, such a being should be held in awe, so they started to worship it.  That led to some of the smarter people realizing they could use this worship to control the thoughts, actions, and money of the masses (read Exodus).  They've had quite the scam going for the last 3500 years or so.

Quoting the Bible is irrelevant unless you can actually PROVE that God exists and that he sanctions the quote in all its myriad translations.  Since many translations contradict each other, that may be a stumbling block.  I could tell you that The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster says global warming is caused by the decrease in the number of pirates in the last two centuries.  Or that an email I received last year claimed that Bill Gates would give me thousands of dollars just for forwarding the message to all my friends.  The fact that it's written down somewhere does not make it true.

If the god of the JudeoChristianIslamic tradition actually existed, all he would have to do in order stop nearly all conflict in the world is reveal himself to everyone in the world and explain his true plan.  Surely an all-powerful and all-knowing being could do that without batting an eyelash, and who among us would choose not to follow God after having that kind of confirmation not just of his existence but of his plans and expectations.  Yet, God never reveals himself to me.  I wonder why...  Oh yeah, because he's a figment of your imagination.  Make your decisions and live your lives based on reality, not an ancient book of Jewish fairytales.

So very, very wrong.  Don't know where you're getting your "facts"; from a government standpoint marriage IS NOT a religious issue.  How absurd.  You can get a marriage license with no religious involvement or affiliation WHATSOEVER.  Either that or there's a lot of athiests who are under the impression they're married and really are not.  Please.  The religion aspect of marriage is optional. You're perfectly entitled to MAKE IT something of religious significance, but that's up to you.

And if you're tired of being called a bigot why do you make bigoted statements like "no gay person believes in God"?  YOUR INTERPETATION of God, perhaps.  But, like most bigots you decided "all" gay people are godless just because they don't see their spirituality in the same light as yours.  Or perhaps are something BESIDES Christian?

And 18,000 people were married LEGALLY before this "right" was revoked.  Those marriages are still legal.   So obviously something existed before and was taken away.  Get it?

So, Mr. Tired, when two people have a non religious wedding, is that NOT a marriage?  Also, regarding your comment that this could only be a civil rights issue if a group of people were allowed to participate in same sex marriage, since June Gays and Lesbians have been participating in same sex marriage, hence a CIVIL RIGHTS ISSUE.

i thought it was my two year wedding anniversary today. should i be worried that it's not? after all... we were married by a judge in an old hotel and there was no mention of your god anywhere in our ceremony...

To: Tired of being a bigot.

You said it, this is NOT about civil rights.  It's about putting the name "marriage" on same sex civil unions or domestic partnerships. If the door is open to same sex marriage because of civil rights, then you would be violating my civil rights if I can't marry the 10 women I am very much in love with.

Two points - you are right the Bible is not the Constitution, but the Constitution is also not the Bible.  Neither should be allowed as argument to amend the other.

Second, this is NOT a religious issue.  This is an issue of the nearly 1400 rights and responsibilities that are legally granted to persons entering into the civil contract of marriage. Denial of those rights to a minority of the voting and taxpaying citizenry was called the "tyranny of the majority" by those who founded this country.  Our judicial system was set up to serve as a check on this type of tyranny, just as it was set up to protect your right to openly hold your own religious beliefs.

Bob, I'm assuming that if you want to marry 10 women then you're statistically more likely to be a mormon, and if so, your magic undies will protect you from evil anyway, so what are you so worried about?

Your empty rhetoric a la Rick Santorum (who likened anything he disagreed with to the legalization of incest and animal rape) doesn't work in a thinking world, but then again, nobody on here seems to be accusing you of being intelligent.

The separation of church and state is well documented, and no one disputes that it is one of the founding principles of this nation.  My question is this, why do "Marriage Licenses" actually exist.  I fully agree that church and state should be separate, and therefore personally I believe that all legal contracts that are now "Marriage Licenses" should be called "Civil-Union Licenses."  Man/Woman, Man/Man, or Woman/Woman unions should be given the same LEGAL definition.  If people want to call it a marriage that is for them to decide.  There is NO, and I mean NO reason that the word marriage has a LEGAL definition, since (as has been stated at length by many people) it is a religious/moral belief that defines it for most people.

Please don't reply to this by saying that based on this people could marry chickens because they couldn't.  A legally recognized Civil Union, could be clearly defined as a union between to human beings. 

To put is simply, if the word "marriage" is removed from all legal documents, then there is no longer an issue.  This would separate church and state, the same way the founding fathers meant for it to be.

Agreed in full as in my own statement below. Quite right.

"Tired of being called a bigot"... if you're so tired of it, perhaps you should try not being one.  Just a thought.  The reason this IS a civil rights issue is because there are legal rights, privileges, and benefits provided by marriage, and those rights, privileges, and benefits are being denied to a specific minority group for no good reason.

And it would be grossly naive of you to believe that the Bible can't be amended.  It's been amended countless times throughout its existence.  If you need any proof of that, just go to your local book store and compare two different versions of the Bible.  If they don't conform word-for-word, then at least one of them has been amended.  I have three versions at home.  They are quite different from each other.

I believe I agree with you on one thing.  The word "marriage" should never have been used in any laws, because it has a long history as a religious ceremony.  I believe the states thought they were being smart by piggy-backing on that ceremony to provide legal rights, etc., to couples.  They were mistaken.  Your outrage should be directed toward that, not toward gays wanting the same thing you can have.  Instead of fighting to keep gays from marrying, fight to remove the word "marriage" from all laws.  Make civil unions the legal contract and marriages the religous ceremony, and ensure that they remain separate.  Either that or you can just accept the fact that the legal definition of marriage has no impact on your religious definition of marriage.

This is the one time Keith didn't yell. Did I see a different show?

Get over it.  You guys lost the election.  On the way out the door ask Jesus to take that hate you have inside of you and destroy it!  Have you not learned by now the dumb republican rhetoric has been exposed worldwide during this election?  Have you not realized stupidity is no longer in style, and god forbid it returns to power... you saw what happened when idiots run the country?  Self Destruction.  Go to Iraq you chicken hawk!

To Terry 635940:

Right on & well said. 

This is about putting the name "marriage" on same sex civil unions or domestic partnerships. If the door is open to same sex marriage because of civil rights, then you would be violating my civil rights if I can't marry the 10 women I am very much in love with.

Keith, the closet door is open, time to come out.

Oh, Bob. Apparently in addition to being stupid you assume that none of us can read, since you posted essentially the same comment twice in the span of one minute.

Is your BEST response to really just yell "F*G!" at Olbermann? God forbid he actually practice what you folks pretend to preach (tolerance, etc).

Civil marriage vs religious marriage are two different arenas.

Carol Washington, the problem in the term marriage is that with it comes over 1000 different benefits that civil unions don't have, most having to do with taxes and visitation rights, etc.

If a man can , get a man with child or a woman a woman , than i say OK change the law .

We are actually pretty close to being able to have two women produce a child.  The technology is not that far off.  Will woman-woman marriage be OK then?

Nevermind the fact that procreation is not the sine qua non of marriage?  That issue was decided when people on death row were allowed to marry, the elderly are allowed to marry and couples were no longer required to take fertility tests before marrying.

*chuckles softly* I can understand your way of thinking.  We could go beyond that though.  If you preach hatred then you should not be allowed to breed. 

It is truly sad that people who preach hatred can have children to continue their line of hatred. 

Reading comments from people who are too narrow minded to open their minds and hearts to others who are not just like them makes me realize even more how inhumane people truly are and how impossible it's going to be to ever build a country, let alone a world, where there is peace and prosperity among all, because there are always going to be people who feel others shouldn't have the same rights as them because of race/nationality/sexual orientation/sex/etc. 

So I presume you believe that the folks that continually protest abortion, put ballot measures up every election cycle and are chomping at the bit to overturn Roe V. Wade, despite the fact the majority of Americans are pro-choice are wrong because the votes haven't gone their way?  Because, my Pro-life friends, you can't have democracy and your cake too!

Oh, Wayne.. SNAP! Took the words right outta my mouth.

Leviticus 18:22, "Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination


Leviticus 20:13, "If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
"

One thing... God doesn't hate.  God IS Love.  You completely missed the point of the first part of John 8. I'm going to translate the verse into modern English so the whole thing is a bit easier to follow. Jesus was teaching some people at the temple, when some Pharisees brought in a woman who was having an affair.  They said "Hey Jesus, we found this woman committing adultery. Moses told us that we get to kill her [they're right, Leviticus 20:10], can we?  Please?"  Jesus then told them "If you've never done anything bad, sure, you can kill her." The Pharisees realized one by one that everyone has done something bad, and went to go do other things.  Since Jesus never did anything bad, soon it was just Him and the woman standing there.  Jesus said "None of them would condemn you?" to which the woman said "Nope".  Jesus replied, "I don't condemn you either.  Run along, and be good." What I get from that is not GO AND SIN NO MORE. I get a couple of things: First and foremost, everyone sins in one way or another; don't go pointing fingers when you have your own problems.  Second, you shouldn't take the Bible literally, the people who wrote the Old Testament were mean.

Where does it say in the Bible that marriage is between a man and a woman?  A lot of people quote Leviticus 18:22 (not lying with a man as one lies with a woman), which I find to be a ridiculous passage to quote for support.  Leviticus recommends against quite a few things, including the aforementioned having an affair, wearing a cashmere/silk (or cotton/poly if you're cheap) blend sweater (Leviticus 19:19), going to the salon for a trim (Leviticus 19:27), and eating calamari (Leviticus 11:10-12).  You don't get to pick and choose your favorite passages from the Bible and ignore the rest; believe in it fully, or don't believe in it at all.

i find it funny that god is continuely brought up when prop 8 is being discussed.

that whole 'seperation of church and state thing'... not working so well...

To Floridamom 1 :

Very well said.  This is about putting the name "marriage" on same sex civil unions or domestic partnerships. If the door is open to same sex marriage because of civil rights, then you would be violating my civil rights if I can't marry the 10 women I am very much in love with.

Oh, Bob - SNAP! You are such a rockstar. You only have one original thought so you just post it repeatedly (I've counted at least 3x so far). I bet you get the same self-satisfied grin on your face that McCain got every time he said the one decent soundbite he ever had (the one about Obama shoulda run against Bush 4 years ago) ..

I wonder if you, like him, have realized yet that when you constantly repeat the same zinger, especially when it's not an especially good/effective one, people rightfully begin to conclude that you have nothing substantive to say or the mental capacity to form a cogent argument of your own positions.

PS - PLEASE, for the love of 8th grade grammar, stop ending your sentences with prepositions.