Thought experiment

Already thoroughly covered by Tane at The Standard and Russell Brown at Public Address: Stephen Franks’ comments, repeated multiple times, recorded on multiple occasions, that his opposition to gay marriage is at least somewhat grounded in the idea that “just because I love my dog doesn’t mean I should be able to marry it“; and the complaints, at this latest reporting of it, that he is being “taken out of context”.

Just one question.

Exactly what context could possibly exist to make “marrying a human of the same sex = marrying an animal” not offensive?

He defends this, in the clip at the Standard post, by saying “love isn’t enough” … and while I can certainly buy that many people do indeed think that marriage is about different things like procreation, or … okay, just procreation, really – the fact is that this is clearly not the objective reality of marriage in New Zealand. We don’t, for example, forbid infertile heterosexual couples from marrying, or force heterosexual couples to divorce when the female partner hits menopause, or health complications render one partner or the other sans reproductive capability. We let post-transition transfolk marry.

Letting a pair of men, or a pair of women, who love each other and want to spend their lives together gain legal acknowledgement of their partnership and all the benefits which heterosexuals have enjoyed as long as there’s been a state to endow them, is not like marrying your fucking dog.

Unless you’re Stephen Franks and his ilk, and you think gay people aren’t full human beings – but you’re too cowardly/”politically pragmatic” to say so up front, and hope that Middle New Zealand will buy the Preserving Marriage, But Some Of My Best Friends Are Gay act.

Stephen Franks, on the charge of Whining About Your Offensive Comments Being Taken Out of Context, you are Officially Scum.