Preventing two autonomous, consenting individuals from marrying is a violation of their rights if their union doesn't impose on the rights of others or present any serious health concerns (incest). Gay people didn't need to be thrown in jail for their rights to have been violated.
Gay people being thrown in jail would have been proof that the state saw gay marriage as being against the law, which they did not. But the state did see inter-ethnic marriage being against the law thus why inter-ethnic couples were imprisoned. That is not a small insignificant fact, that is very significant and it shouldn't be easily dismissed. Gay couples were not prevented from being together the same way inter-ethnic couples were prevented because unlike inter-ethnic couples they didn't face the threat of imprisonment.
I think you meant conversation ;)
Thanks for finding a typo, to bad I never claimed to be an expert in grammar otherwise that would have undermined everything that I said thus far.
And of course opposing same-sex marriage is bigoted. The broad definition of bigotry is simply intolerance to others' opinions and views, but it's especially problematic with interracial and same-sex marriage because there's no logical reason to be opposed to those unions; they don't disadvantage anybody. To be offended by something that isn't harmful is both bigoted and stupid. When bigotry extends to lawmakers, as was the case pre-1967 for interracial marriage and pre-2015 for same-sex marriage, it can violate the rights of taxpaying citizens.
No, you can't be bigoted towards opinions and views. That is self-defeating, that is like saying being intolerant of those who hold racist points of views is bigoted. Btw, you think people who oppose gay marriage are bigoted; so aren't you being bigoted by not being more tolerant of their opinion? Don't you see how nonsensical that definition of bigotry is? Furthermore, I never claimed to be offended by gay marriage, I was merely making the point that challenging the idea of gay marriage isn't necessarily because of bigotry. Yes, it's true there was no logical reason to prohibit inter-ethnic marriage. But that doesn't mean the same is true for gay marriage as again, those are two fundamentally different situations.
It's really not that hard to define. Here's a definition from Wikipedia:
"Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a socially or ritually recognized union between spouses that establishes rights and obligations between them, between them and their children, and between them and their in-laws."
That definition hasn't really changed. The rights and obligations have, but the concept of marriage has been the same for centuries. The only thing that Obergefell v. Hodges changed was the arbitrary gender distinction. There's no reason why marriage should only be between men and women. We know that now. That's not called "bending to the will of the people," it's called recognizing a flaw in the system and changing it, just like we did with woman's suffrage and interracial marriage. There's no need to go sliding off a slippery slope.
Yes, it has changed from being a sexual institution to being a post-sexual institution. It went from being a marriage between the opposite sex, from being a marriage with just two people. Marriage being between a man and a woman wasn't just a small characteristic, but was at the center of what defined marriage. You say that Obergefell v. Hodges changed arbitrary gender definition. But there are two problems with this, first there is difference between sex and gender. So even though gender norms/roles are arbitrary, sex is not. Also, there is a reason for sex difference as without these difference there would be no procreation. And I know what you're going to say not all hetero couples are fertile or even want to have children. True, but even if a hetero couple can't have children they are still sexually complementary in a way that two men or two women are not. By conflating same-sex marriage with inter-ethnic marriage and women suffrage you're not looking at all the nuance and complexities of this issue and instead are thinking in vague generalities.
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