Tag Archives: government

  • My Gay Marriage Manifesto

    January 9, 2008

    8 Comments

    Over at the Crunchy Cons blog, Rod Dreher has a post entitled “Liberty and Limited Government” in which he uses the issue of gay marriage as an example of the inherent difficulties surrounding the ideas of liberty and limited government. Needless to say, a discussion about gay marriage ensued in the comment boxes. I want to share what I posted as my “manifesto” on why I do not support gay marriage because I think that as a whole, those in favor of a traditional definition of marriage have not done a good or even honest and fair job of explaining their position. So here’s mine:

    Traditional marriage served the purpose of largely confining procreation to two parent families which are the most stable, create the least need for government supervision and on average (although certainly not in all specific cases) creating the healthiest, most responsible new citizens for the perpetuation of the society. Even in cases where a couple choose not to, or were unable to procreate, marriage was still useful for ensuring that the fertile spouse would not run the risk of procreating on the “free market” and any unintentional pregnancies took place within the confines of marriage. Continue reading »

  • What does the state need to be able to do to "their" kids?

    April 20, 2006

    1 Comment

    I read an article today about homeschooling in VA where apparently there are some rather onerous requirements for assessment. Fortunately, there’s also an out: a religious exemption clause which allows parents who are homeschooling for religious reasons to do so without interference from the state. Now some people are wondering if the law should be revisited due to the large number of homeschoolers claiming this exemption. Any how, what woke me up was this quote from former State delegate Jim Dillard who wrote VA’s homeschool law:
    “It goes back to the idea of an enlightened electorate,” he said. “In order to have society function as a democracy, the state needs to be able to inculcate certain values in its children, in order to prepare them for citizenship and to have a meaningful role in society.”
    Hello!?! The state’s function is to protect rights, maintain law and order, create a climate for commerce to function, not to “inculcate certain values in its children”! And this certainly isn’t the role of a democracy – only in fascist regimes like Hitler, Soviet Russia and our current batch of Islamofascists is indoctrination of children seen as a proper role of the state. Our founding fathers would be appalled.