Stepping backward
The issue of gay marriage is very complex. It is, in its essence, a litmus for the strength of human rights and tolerance in the society. In the one hand marriage are a social event and are very strong part of the social fabric; but in the other hand they are one of the things that the majority has no say, as it has no say in inter-racial marriage.
The NY court decision today, to reject challenges to the gay marriage ban, is very disturbing. Its effect is not limited to the rights of gays but it allow the legislature to regulate even more aspects of our life. I would not be surprised if one day we will face legislation to prevent people from getting divorce base on the court opinion that:
the Legislature could reasonably believe that "it is better, other things being equal, for children to grow up with both a mother and a father."
The court permission to the state to limit one liberties in the name of social stability, a vogue term by itself, is a real threat to the bases of the American liberties. Today social stability is measured by the person we are married to, and tomorrow it will be the cover on women faces. Free society is the society where the general welfare is secondary to the individual welfare.
"We hold that the New York Constitution does not compel recognition of marriages between members of the same sex," Judge Robert S. Smith wrote in the majority decision. "Whether such marriages should be recognized is a question to be addressed by the Legislature."
The court conceded that "the benefits of marriage are many." But the three-judge pluralitiy wrote that the Legislature could rationally decide, as a matter of social policy, that it is more important to promote the stability that marriage brings within an opposite-sex union than within same-sex unions.
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