Category Archives: Same-Sex Relationships

Too Much DIVERSITY!

April 8, 2014

Clearly, humanity has its challenges.

Wars are brutal evidence of the little daily wars we have with each other. Fists and guns are the human “problem-solver”…when gossip, slander and insult brew like yeast into full-fledged conflict.

When the 60’s arrived, college campuses were the local battle zone, a parallel universe to the war raging in Vietnam. “PEACE, man! Make love not war!” Peace ethics, though, are never that easy to realize. Peace-loving students rampaged off campuses…into the streets…mobs breaking windows, stealing merchandise, vandalizing cars and throwing bricks at the police.

Every age faces the human struggle to “get along.” But today, at least, we are supposed to be a kinder and gentler age.

We agree that war is caused because we hate each other. And we must hate each other because we don’t understand each other. Maybe…peace will be achieved when we truly understand…and appreciate each other…in all our differences…in all our diversity.

Years ago, even as mere children, we knew that the many different kinds of people…different languages, cultures, skin colors…we needed to work to get along. Maybe, back then, we knew it. But today we have codified it. We are no longer simply different. We are DIVERSE.

Diversity Training is where the end of World War III begins. We will hold hands, look oh, so lovingly into the eyes of people who are different than we, play little diversity games, and appreciate everyone’s diversity.

War will end because hate will disappear. And if it doesn’t, we will label it a hate crime. Hate will be illegal.

Sounds simple. Why didn’t mankind think of this before?

Sounds simple? George Orwell needs to update Animal Farm.

All diversity is equal. But some diversity is more equal than other diversity.

Witness the banishment of Mozilla’s CEO Brendan Eich. His $1000 donation during the 2008 California political battle to define marriage was deemed civilly criminal. Eich’s crime? He violated the rules of the diversity game.

Diversity goes like this. There is a list of the good diversity. If you are on the good list, you can hold the trump card of Hate. Anyone who tees you off is guilty. They have dishonored your right to be diverse. And that’s because they hate you. And if they hate you, they will have to pay. After all…diversity has to stand for something…doesn’t it?

Well, that depends. Because there is such a thing as bad diversity. Too much diversity. After all, there has to be a line in the ground somewhere. Doesn’t there? Good on this side…bad on that. Good, gays. Bad, Eich.

With all our diversity seminars, holding hands and singing Kumbaya, you would think it possible to love someone like Branden Eich because of his diversity. But that’s just too much to ask. There has to be a limit to all good things…and this is it. The diversity of Eich and his Ilke just can’t be tolerated. Off with their heads!

Gays, secure in the cocoon of their diversity, are free to pull out all stops in their attacks on fellow citizens who merely disagree with gays on the definition of marriage. Thank goodness these battles don’t involve guns and knives.

Has anyone taken the time to notice that each human being is a diversity of one – like snowflakes? DNA simply screams diversity.

Diversity of race, culture and gender will naturally provide diversity of opinions. Does anyone remember the right to free speech? Does anyone remember the reason this was placed in the Bill of Rights? To protect diversity of thought and speech? Ya think?

You can’t be too careful these days. The diversity police are out. They’ll track you down. They have a list of the good guys, and if you’re not on it…you’re goin’ down!

After all, there is such a thing as too much Diversity!

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Marriage Redefined

April 8, 2013

Jane Jimenez

Poor Jeremy Irons. Poor, poor Jeremy.

He asked a basic question arising from the demands of same-sex couples to get the same tax breaks as married couples. He asked a tax question…if we’re going to change the law so that people don’t have to pay inheritance tax…how can I get myself in on the deal?

In an interview with the Huffington Post, the 64-year-old actor said he doesn’t have an opinion either way on gay marriage, but he then asked, “could a father not marry his son?” Later, after attacks by angry liberals, he tried to ameliorate the impact of his comment by claiming it was just a playful jest.

You can tell that Irons tapped into a very real and very raw nerve. Just look at the outrage and listen to the invectives spewed at him across the tabloids and on news shows.

Just when everyone was shouting “equality,” Jeremy pointed out that “equality” is being measured by the “dollars and cents of tax breaks.” If gay activists think that Jeremy is the only one working with the financial inquisitiveness of a CPA…they have another think coming.

When the Post interviewer objected on the grounds of incest, Irons argued by referring to the gender issues being ignore. “[I]ncest is there to protect us from inbreeding, but men don’t breed.” Coming back to the core issue at hand, Irons piqued the public by asking if he were to marry his son…would it allow him to pass on his estate to his son without being taxed?

The gays have been “outed” in the truest sense. For, most of the “debate” about gay marriage has been a diversionary tactic to redirect our sympathies to the emotional pain of gay people. In truth, the underlying drive for same-sex equity is driven by money. If there were no financial gains to be had, the crowds at the Supreme Court would dwindle to a trickle.

In a key case at the Supreme Court, 83-year-old Manhattan resident Edith Windsor sued Uncle Sam because she was made to pay estate taxes after the death of her wife, Thea Spyer, that heterosexual widows would not have had to pay. This case represents the core financial element of claiming marriage for same-sex relationships.

So why the tax breaks? The government is never shy about collecting taxes. Tax breaks and marriage certificates mattered from the day they were created because legislators recognized the social benefit of stabilizing the lives of families for the sake of their children…all accruing to the benefit of our civilization. Tax breaks mattered because children mattered.

If we continue to deconstruct the institution of traditional marriage between men and women, then we have trouble identifying where to offer our social support for the benefit of children. We have spent the past fifty years questioning the value of men and women, married with families, and toying with the idea that this isn’t important to us. Same-sex marriage is just grabbing at the coattails of the cultural revolution.

Jeremy is asking the obvious question. If marriage is not limited to one man and one woman, then what are the limits? And if taxes are at stake…why stop with a marriage of two people? If we are in charge of defining marriage to “anything we want it to be,” then all options should be on the table.

Tax experts are expert at maximizing tax breaks. That is why Nevada and Delaware do a booming business as the states of preference for incorporating businesses in all fifty states. That is why off-shore accounts are favored for large sums of cash. And that is why out-sourcing your corporate call center to India or Ireland makes financial sense.

Supposedly, equality means my marriage is equal to yours, even if I am not married to one person of the opposite sex. So…can we extend “equality” even further? Is there any justification for limiting the definition of marriage to two people?

Why not group marriage? This is customary in some Muslim countries…one man with multiple wives. Why not?

Why not the “other kind” of group marriage? Why not permit one woman to be married to multiple men? We already approve of multiple sexual partners for women. Why not marry all of them?

Why not inter-family marriages? Could a brother marry a sister? We have ruled out the need to plan for children inside of a marriage. We have multiple methods of avoiding and getting rid of children. So genetic issues do not have to be an issue here. A brother and sister? Why not?

Jeremy’s off-the-cuff question is just one more in the list? Why not a parent and child in marriage?

Why not two friends? We don’t have to prove our bedroom habits in court; we don’t have to be gay lovers. We can just be two friends with wonderful retirement plans. Voila. Married, we do not pay inheritance taxes. We receive our spouse’s retirement in total, every single penny of it. Even if we are not gay. We can still get married. Why not?

What about a marriage club? If someone has an inheritance exceeding one million dollars, they can join our “group marriage club.” We will all inherit from everyone.

Don’t think these questions can predict reality? Think again. Fifty years ago, who would have thought that men could marry men? Social changers have learned to bypass public wisdom and to press their claims in court…and if we entertain the redefinition of marriage, these questions will all wind their way into our social fabric, one legal challenge at a time.

If we are going to change the definition of marriage, what are the outside boundaries? What makes two gay women or men more privileged than any other combination of human beings who claim their “right” to be married?

If we are talking about marriage equality…we already have that. Any man can marry any woman, one at a time. Society allows the privilege of spousal inheritance as a benefit to those who are open to the possibility of children as the natural consequence of married love between a man and a woman. It is as simple as that.

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April 1, 2013: Marriage Defined

March 15, 2013: All Things Being Equal

Marriage Defined

April 1, 2013

The evil that is in the world almost always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence if they lack understanding. ~~Albert Camus

Jane Jimenez

From the beginning of time, there has been a special relationship between men and women. From the beginning of time, this special relationship has produced children and families. And from the beginning of time, culture has acknowledged the special value that this relationship between men and women has for creating healthy families and building civilization.

Obvious? Of course. Without any need for explanation, the average person recognizes that we are speaking of marriage. Thus has been the definition of marriage since the beginning of time… the special union of a man and woman through which we create and nurture children for the survival of our civilization.

This being true, it is surprising…and unfortunate…that the discussion of the issue of same-sex marriage has been characterized as a debate between those who have compassion and those who hate decent gay people and want to deny them their rights.

Researching the issue of marriage on the Internet, most headlines use the word Equality to frame the debate. It is rare to find a writer that discusses marriage as a matter of Definition. And by ignoring the definition, we ignore the very heart of the matter.

The definition of marriage is not arbitrary. Biology does matter. Marriage is based on the created distinctions of man and woman. It is based on the importance of fathers and mothers for the children who come into their lives. The marital institution has provided for fathers and mothers, helping them in the roles of protecting, teaching and guiding children into adulthood.

On websites and in papers, discussion of same-sex marriage gives a brief nod to children and families. But, when stripped to essentials, the key focus in the bid for redefining marriage is money. How do gay people in relationships maximize their financial benefits of two incomes, two retirement plans and two inheritances?

Same-sex marriage proponents may be well-intentioned. But they will find that their generosity in redefining marriage as a mere business construction will have long-lasting results for our children. “Equality” as applied to marriage in the current debate is simply a strategic tool, useful for winning by infusing the debate with an emotional accusation. If someone opposes same-sex marriage, they will be accused of being mean and hateful and bigoted.

If same-sex marriage is legally accepted, the term “equality” will ultimately be redirected from financial equality to gender equality. Gender is barely acknowledged at this point in the battle for same-sex marriage. But the ultimate goal of the most strident same-sex proponents is to declare an equality that does not exist. When the last chips fall, these same-sex advocates will insist that every person in the culture must agree that men and women are “the same.”

Men and women, mothers and fathers, no longer will be celebrated for their separate and unique qualities. They will be considered interchangeable units in the family. At the very moment that we are now coming to acknowledge the negative results of absent fathers in families, we will lose our ability to address this as a valid social concern. Our culture will no longer have any ability to deal with the biological differences that are significant in raising children.

Mothers and fathers have unique and distinctive gender qualities that help their children develop healthy self-images. But it won’t matter. And the courts will once again be the venue for this battle.

Already, those in education have seen the fall-out of a culture that no longer values families built through the bonds of men and women who commit to each other in marriage.

Sex educators bristle at the notion that boys and girls look at the sexual act through a different lens.
For these educators, it is “offensive” to suggest that male and females have different biological and emotional needs related to sex and relationships.
The suggestion that fathers – men – are an essential ingredient in the recipe for families is decried as sexist.
Terminology in schools has been scrubbed of references to sexual differences. Men and women are “people.” Husbands and wives are “partners.”
Children in elementary schools are being encouraged to “try out” gender to see whether they prefer being a boy or a girl.

These attitudes are being used to push social agendas that negate the regular natural desires of boys and girls to be just that…boy and girls. Consider just one case. Last year a Rhode Island school district cancelled its father-daughter dance after the ACLU threatened to sue the district for gender discrimination. In the future, only parent-child events, not father-daughter dances or mother-son ballgames, will be allowed.

Dennis Prager in his column, Why a Good Person Can Vote Against Same-Sex Marriage, points to the shallow nature of our discussions about the potential redefinition of marriage.

The history of left-wing policies has largely consisted of doing what feels good and compassionate without asking what the long-term consequences will be; what Professor Thomas Sowell calls “Stage One Thinking.” That explains, for example, the entitlement state. It sounds noble and seems noble. But the long-term consequences are terrible: economic ruin, a demoralized population, increasing selfishness as people look to the state to take care of their fellow citizens, and more.

From the beginning of time, culture has acknowledged the special value of the unique relationship between men and women in creating healthy families and building civilization. There are long-term consequences for our children and grand-children in creating a society that no longer wants to acknowledge the significance of our biology.

Marriage between a man and woman is a definition that has meaning…and significance. It is most certainly worth defending.

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March 15, 2013: All Things Being Equal

May 14, 2004: Order in the Courtroom!

All Things Being Equal

March 15, 2013

America is a country founded on equality. It is an idea formalized in our Declaration of Independence:

Jane Jimenez

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Yet, the modern understanding of equality is threatening to undo us, as we become more and more fractured in our attempts to make certain that we all get an equal slice of the American Dream. Bluntly put, equality today means that I can have what you have, no holds barred. You have it, and I want it. I deserve it because we are both equal.

Equality is at the heart of the battle between the sexes. And most recently, equality has been argued at the Supreme Court as the premise for redefining marriage to provide for equality. Equality? How so?

Ask any child what equal means. At the age of three, he knows what to look for….my slice of the pie is just as big as your slice. And kids have a very simple way to enforce the rules of equality. You slice the pie. I get first choice.

Sadly, many adults have never graduated from this simple definition of equality. They wildly bandy the term “equality” around, as if all of life is one big cherry pie to be shared.

Children grow in their sophistication. Sharing a pizza is so much more complicated than cherry pie. Even when the slices are perfectly cut from the center of the pizza into identical slices, there are so many ways to go wrong in getting your equal share.

How many slices of pepperoni are on each piece?
Which slice has the most cheese?
Does cheese matter to me?
If I give you my cheese, what will you give me in return?
If my brother is twice as tall, does he get twice as many slices?
What if I missed breakfast? Can I have more than my extra tall brother?

What does equality mean? Quite literally, it depends on how you slice it. Some may object to reducing the arguments for same-sex marriage to a pizza party challenge. But there is more to the comparison than meets the eye.

Cherry Pie – we all have relationships that could compare to sharing a pie. For instance, there is the line at the box office. Every person in line is equal as my competitor. Our equal chance to buy tickets to the concert is governed by who got in line first. If tickets are few and the line is long, they may restrict each purchase to six tickets. And still, at the end of the day, they will run out of tickets and there will be the haves and the have-nots. Some will have $300 to pay for a ticket sold online. Many will not be able to ante up the extra money and will have to read about the concert in the papers or hope for a YouTube upload. Every person in line is equal as my competitor. But at the end of the day…some have…and some have not. As my mother used to tell me, life is not fair. I will not get everything I want.

Pizza – we all long for the relationships that are special orders, people who are essential to our life in personal and unique ways. Every pizza is specially designed to appeal to the one who will eat it. If we are lucky, we may have many such special order relationships. Common understanding is that we will be able to count these relationships on one hand. If I am lucky to have five special people that I can relate deeply to, what is the likelihood that each of these relationships is equal to all of the others? There is the parent who is my best friend. My spouse is committed to the fulfillment of my personal dreams. My child protects me in a new and expanding world with challenges that I need help to deal with. My friend of 40 years knows the history of my failings…and he loves me in spite of them. Each relationship is special, but none of them are equal to each other.

How can we reduce marriage to a simple piece of cherry pie? That is at the heart of the premise presented to the Supreme Court justices…that equality will solve our differences.

All things being equal…there is never a day when all things are equal. The best we can do is discern the differences and ask what those differences mean to us.

Marriage? Special order…made especially for whom? This is what we need to ask.

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April 23, 2004: m…m…Married?

May 14, 2004: Order in the Courtroom!

Economics of Family

February 15, 2013

Jane Jimenez

It’s anybody’s guess…where the economy is headed. And lots of people are guessing.

With Obama duly sworn in for another four years, we are headed into uncharted waters. Tuned to the daily news reports, we try to gauge our economic plight with familiar terms: taxes, spending, deficit, sequestration, budget, interest rates, short sales and austerity measures.

But one thing is missing from the discussion of America’s economy…the economics of family. And it is no small thing.

We have come to treat the financial and the social parts of our lives as two completely different and isolated realms. In politics, people are known to say, “Economically, I am a conservative, but socially, I am a liberal.” At election time, we hem and haw, trying to decide whether to vote for economic issues or for social issues. We couldn’t be more wrong.

At the very time when we pray for economic recovery, America seems ready to abandon its commitment to traditional marriage between a man and a woman. Economically, our failure to support traditional marriage is also a financial decision.

Marriage is not just about a wedding cake, a piece of paper and insurance benefits. It is the foundation of society, the supporting structure for building families and caring for children. While we try to guess whether the GDP will go up or down next month, we do not have to guess about the consequences of deconstructing traditional marriage.

The Brookings Institute has extensively studied the phenomenon of out-of-wedlock births in America:

Since 1970, out-of-wedlock birth rates have soared. In 1965, 24 percent of black infants and 3.1 percent of white infants were born to single mothers. By 1990 the rates had risen to 64 percent for black infants, 18 percent for whites. Every year about one million more children are born into fatherless families. If we have learned any policy lesson well over the past 25 years, it is that for children living in single-parent homes, the odds of living in poverty are great. The policy implications of the increase in out-of-wedlock births are staggering.

Sadly, as we continue to keep count of the number of children living in single-parent homes, we do not seem to have the stomach for considering our personal and cultural failures that have brought us to this point. We want a strong economy. We just don’t want to fix the economy at the personal level.

We have reduced marriage to the trivial. We declare it as unnecessary for fathers and mothers, men and women. Conversely, we declare it to be the “a right” for those in same-sex relationships.

Our ambivalence about marriage is quite apparent in the educational programs being used to teach the next generation of Americans. Teens are taught that they can have sex “when they are ready.” We encourage their readiness for sex by supplying baskets of condoms and pills. Now, judges have secured Plan B drugs for children of any age “if they have an accident.” And if Plan B should fail, our government will assist our children in getting an abortion.

We are totally fixated on how to NOT have families. Nowhere in any of our educational plan for teens do we teach them about constructing families…about the positive link between sex, marriage, and children. This is not just a sexual issue. And it is not a religious dogma.

It is economics! It is basic Economics 101. Marriage between men and women is an issue that should matter to government because it is the strongest foundation for our economic system.

If we want to revive our economy, we must open a national dialogue that truly respects traditional marriage as a valuable institution worthy of our support. This dialogue must be more than media-friendly sound bites demanding same-sex marriage. The same-sex debate has completely derailed our understanding of marriage.

If we want economic recovery, we must start by restoring the economics of family. And these economics are grounded in the security of healthy marriages between men and women.

From the Home Front

DEFENDING THE FAMILY WITH ETERNAL TRUTH

Category Archives: Same-Sex Relationships

Too Much DIVERSITY!

Marriage Redefined

Marriage Defined

All Things Being Equal

Economics of Family