1. I'm not an atheist because I make no presuppositions as such things are not consistent open inquiry.
Ok
2. When I use the word "intent" I do not use it from the intelligent design viewpoint. That the heart is the sole means for pumping blood through the circulatory system is fact. It is not a matter of the heart being "better suited" over other organs. No ther organ can fill the role. The heart has no other role. Just because you have somehow managed to supplant higher cerebral functions with colorectal excrescence doesn't make the case that reproductive organs have some ephermal function akin to bestowing lifelong personal fulfillment.
Tell me, what is the purpose of an ostrich's wing? Or a bat's eyes?
The fact that reproductive organs can facilitate some sort of personal fulfillment most certainly makes that a function that they perform, ipso facto. And its left to our values to judge the import of that function. Similarly, some detached observer might surmise that a function of the heart is to pump blood in order to provide a good environment for the billions of bacteria that live inside our bodies. Or maybe its to facilitate the existence of cancer cells. Or maybe its to keep human minds alive. In fact, it is all those those things - and we only usually think of it, so narrowly, as the latter because that one is simply the most important to
us - in our anthropic conceit - not nature's values. Nature - so far as we know, from a scientific or medical perspective - is valueless.
From a scientific perspective, there is no ephemeral ideal of man, to which our bodies and organs must conform - in fact, they always change - that's how evolution works. So there is no moral indiscretion in using body parts for a function for which they are not highly specialized, or refusing to use them for a particular task at which they are highly specialized. Nature doesn't care - its only
we who care. In millions of years we won't even be the same species - our descendants will have organs specialized for different tasks... there is no moral imperative on their part to conform to our old mold, as if we're the way its *supposed* to be.
And so from a scientific perspective, accusing homosexuals of using their organs for roles in which they are not highly specialized, tells us nothing morally relevant - at all. We can call them aberrations all we want from a statistical perspective - but again, nothing morally relevant is conveyed. No moral conclusions can be derived from such a categorization.
3. You claim this is based on rights. Yet, you cannot/will not define what those rights should be and if those rights are qualified. You even go so far as to re-assert in the face on constant evidence to the contrary that some privileges are rights.
4. Claiming gay marriage is the same as left-handedness or high melanon counts is ridiculous. The former is merely a statistic and the latter is only a variation of kind. Reproductive organs are for reproduction. Any other variation/deviation will fail to produce offspring.
Again, where is this moral imperative to always use our reproductive organs for reproduction? Do you mean to tell us you use them for nothing else?
Until God be revealed any "rights" enshrined in our society are little more than fabrications of our own hand.
If 10% of the population decided to enslave 90% they would unless A) God delivers the 90% or B) the 90% reject the 10% even to a contest of arms. When has life ever been otherwise?
Ok... but so what - I asked what YOU would do. If YOU value rights, then we can have a conversation about whether same-sex marriage is more or less consistent with principled rights. If you don't, then we need to have another conversation.
Now tell us how it is you demand gay marriage fits into the "consent of the governed" scheme and what if the governed reject the demands of the minority?
Rights often preserve liberties of minorities..
Homosexuality is not a moral imperative. Marriage is a social construct invented by humans. Homosexuals have every right heteroes do within the context of constitutional law. If the COTUS does not recognize a right it is beyond the ability of the feds to mandate an outcome becasue the feds can only compel what COTUS allows them to regulate. You are asking the feds to intercede where they have no power.
They certainly acted like they had that power in the case of miscegenation laws - where the supreme court ruled them unconstitutional, and that states had no rights what-so-ever to prevent mixed race couples from marrying. I'd argue the same in regards to gender.
