So, seriously, you have no problem letting your kids be taught in school that it's good to be married to another man? Nope. Not at all. Nor do I have a problem with my kids being taught that it's OK to marry a fat person, a jew, a lazy-ass SOB or even an evangelical Christian. The only thing I have a problem with is someone trying to teach my kids that it's OK to define other people and their relationships as second class because they don't conform to a specific and limited sense of what's 'right'.

I think the whole gay marriage joke is something a very small minority is trying to shove down everyone's throat and would bet the majority of gays have absolutely no interest in it. Maybe, maybe not. But if you're right, can you explain to me how allowing this 'very small minority' of gays and lesbians who actually want to marry represent such a huge threat to the american public, the meaning and sanctity of your marriage and whatever else you claim is threatened? And when you're done, can you please explain precisely what this threat is, 'cause I seriously don't understand how two people who love each other and would enjoy the privilege of being able to legally join their lives and assets represents a threat of any kind to you or anyone else simply because they happen to share a gender.
They go around trying to force everyone to accept their lifestyle by legislation, thinking that somehow we will magically wake up one day and think, you know what, there is nothing wrong with 2 men getting married, it's perfectly normal, where have we gone wrong all these years? It will never cease to amaze me how enlightened our generation has become in the last 10 years. And the really funny thing is, it's only been about 40 years or so since black people in this country needed the help of legislation to get the rest of America to accept them. Maybe they were somehow thinking the rest of us would magically wake up one day and think, you know what - there's nothing wrong with this person just because he's black. Or maybe they realized that if they didn't fight and scream and demand to be treated equally, they never would be.

I have a gay brother in law and he echoes exactly what I'm saying, he has absolutely no interest in gay marriage and he doesn't know a single person who wants it. Your brother-in-law doesn't want to get married, and he claims to not have any friends who do either? Wow - you've really done some exhaustive work trying to understand the gay community, haven't you. Could you ask your brother-in-law what the rest of the gay people in the country think about Prada's fall line, 'cause I really want to know.

I know shows like Will and Grace and others continue to portray homosexual men as funnier, hipper and cooler than their stuffy heterosexual counterparts but the image is not always what I see in the real world. Wait - you mean ta TV show isn't an accurate mirror of the real world????? Shocking. I think gay marriage is a bad idea and is going to lead to a lot of problems down the road. I have no problem with gay unions or whatever else they want, but not marriage. OK, I'll bite - what problems? If gay unions are OK with you, what possible problems could stem from allowing the exact same thing to be called a marriage, except for the fact that it offends your sense of entitlement to keep that word for yourself? A rose by any other name, ya know....

Finally the argument about marrying 3 women is valid and has to be considered valid if we open up the definition to any consenting adults. Why open this pandora's box to please such a small minority? It's a fair question, though I'm not convinced it's necessarily bad to let consenting adults enter into and sanctify whatever relationships they want. But there are obvious legal problems with extending privileged relationship status to relationships that consist of more then two people, not least of which would be things like defining who has authority to make parental and medical decisions, who is entitled to what property in the event of death, etc... But it seems a little disingenous to say that gay couples shouldn't be allowed to marry because if we let that happen we might have other problems down the road. That line of thought could easily be used to continue to unjust oppression of any minority.

Okay, you asked for it:) It is like opening up a strip bar on the corner of your street. It doesn't harm anyone, if you don't want to go in, you don't have to. What right do I have to impute my values on those nice young woman who want to make a living. I give you props for understanding that you have no right to impute your values on these nice young women who want to make a living. But your analogy fails miserably in all cases except the city of Houston. Why Houston? Because Houston has no zoning laws. And zoning laws exist for a wide variety of reasons, among which are protecting property values for both commercial and residential owners, managing traffic flow to avoid overcrowding small streets and assisting in developing fire and police response strategies. So zoning laws have real purpose and meaning, much of which is designed to protect you from being intentionally or unintentionally harmed by the actions of someone else. Marriage laws do nothing of the sort. There is nothing about the marriage of any other couple of any stripe anywhere else in the world that threatens you, your property or your relationship with your spouse. Some marriages may threaten your view of the way the world works, but the existence of the KKK and the military industrial complex threaten my world view. Just because you don't like something doesn't mean it should be illegal. The same can be said for diluting the marriage vows which others are doing everyday (yes even those evil bible thumping, judgemental, fundamentalist evangelical Christians). How is it that the actions of anyone else (gay, straight, bible-thumping or whatever) dilute the value of the promise YOU made to YOUR spouse? If you meant it, you meant it. Period. End of story. It is fundamentally impossible for me, or anyone else, to dilute to value and meaning of a promise you made. You can't argue that because other people don't take similar promises as seriously as you take yours that somehow your promise is weakened. That line of thinking would lead me to conclude that because other people don't invest enough time in their kids that somehow the time I invest in mine is worth less.
Next step will be adoption of children (hate to break to the news to you, but you've been losing this battle for a while now).... rewriting the will/estate laws (you mean to allow to consenting adults who have committed their lives to each other to transfer assets upon death???? the horror. clearly you have an overwhelming interest in controlling what happens to the assets of some random gay man when he dies. but you'll have to explain what that is, 'cause I can't see one)....rewriting the divorce laws (only if they're gender specific at the moment, and Microsoft Word has this nifty find/replace function which would make changing the terminology cost less then a pentagon hammer), changing all the rules for beneficiaries, re-writing the entire tax code (more business for me but..) yadda, yadda, yadda. If you really think the fact that some legal frameworks might have to change is a reason to deny a specific subset of loving, committed, monogamous couples the same rights, privileges and responsibilities that you enjoy, then there's not much to left to say. But I would remind you that allowing women the right to vote in the early 20th century certainly carried a more onerous burden of change so I suggest you think long and hard before invoking the 'it's just too much of a pain in the ass' argument.

And for what? Is it fairness? Yes. Is it equality? Yep. What right is being taken away from a gay person? Marriage is a privilege not a right. Though I would be perfectly happy to debate the privilege v. right thing, I would instead ask you on what basis is this privilege being denied? Of what matter is it to the government whether two people who want to commit their lives to each other happen to both be men (or women)? And before you jump and scream about it's always been that way, I don't care about that argument. That we've been doing the wrong thing for a long time doesn't mean we should keep doing it. And before you say anything about your religion or anyone else's, I don't care about that argument either. Your religion is your's and your's alone, and it may provide you with an excellent moral compass but it's a crappy basis for making laws that effect people who believe differently. I'm pretty sure that's why the founding fathers wanted to keep the church and the state separate. No, what I would like is a sound, rational, clearly laid out argument that doesn't rely on fear, disgust or anything other then compelling logic to explain to me why a relationship between two men or two women is so hideous and wrong that we would deny those people the right to make medical decisions for each other, to inherit assets from each other, to willingly inflict the marriage tax penalty upon themselves or to otherwise enjoy the same government-bestowed benefits that you get to enjoy for no other reason then you happened to fall in love with a woman instead of a man. Can you do that for me?