Eyes down.
Cormac Flynn writes:
A game to play during the upcoming Marriage Equality debates. Each square is a tired No Campaign argument or cliché. Make a line or try for a full house. You can play online or you can print one to twenty randomly-generated cards and play at home or wherever a debate is being televised.
Play here
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Irish Mammy LOSES it While Watching the Six Nations
The biggest risk to this passing is phrases like “is a tired No Campaign argument or cliché” . Lots of the issues the no campaign are raising relate to a centuries old definition of a legal agreement. Instead of giving good reasons to change this many in the yes campaign avoid the debate and show no respect for the concerns of the voters.
I fear that if some respect is not shown towards the traditional institution of marriage and those who grew up believing in it then we will be in for a shock come results day. If these are tired arguments then it should be easy to address them – don’t just insult and intimidate those who believe in them.
You say “Instead of giving good reasons to change this…”
We repeatedly point to a good reason to change this, and that reason is because the current situation is discriminatory. One group in society has the right to marry their partners. Another doesn’t. This discrimination has no place in a modern republic (or at least a society that aspires to be one).
I would have thought the desire to marry would be the ultimate demonstration of respect for that institution.
Gay Irish people come from the exact same culture as everyone else here and look for the same stability in their lives.
As long as the like of Iona Institute spout their hate and lies, this is a good thing.
More of this.
There are lots of good reasons but many in the Yes campaign come across as extremely intolerant and will isolate people.
An example above is “Each square is a tired No Campaign argument or cliché” and one of those squares is “You’re redefining marriage”. Can anyone explain to me how this is a cliche. It is in fact the very reason for the vote, if marriage was not being redefined there would be nothing to vote on.
Many people such as myself who support SSM find the behavior of many in the yes campaign to be disrespectful and likely to isolate those with concerns they feel are genuine. Too often the argument is “if you express concerns you are bigot”
I probably should have said “Tired non-argument” for the example you give, as the act of redefinition itself is frequently used as a reason not to extend marriage rights to gay couples (i.e. you can’t redefine something full-stop).
Anyway, Alison – it’s a little bingo game, a bit of fun for Yes voters to take the sting somewhat out of the kinds of arguments we hear repeated ad naseum. Their repetition is what makes them tired or clichés. Nowhere do I accuse anyone of bigotry.
Nice work Cormac! I admire your commitment
“Too often the argument is “if you express concerns you are bigot””
Where are you seeing this in the campaigns? Or is it just online comments?
Legal concepts change over time. Slavery was once common place and legal and the concept change as society saw it as an infringement on human rights . The same concept applies to same sex marriage. Quite why marriage has to remain the same as it was for hundreds of years is beyond me. This denbate is about equal rights.
Den bating….. hmmmmm…. never tried that one :)
Come over and find out :D
That’s it. We’ll be horrified in decades to come that our laws were so discriminatory.
In the wider scheme of things, the heterosexual white male had it so cushy for eons.
ah here = discriminatory
Im with you Alison, as another yes voter but I feel the fatigue felt by many of us towards traditionalists is that the argument for love, for that of equality (being all that is sought) is so simplistic that it really becomes grating when folk insist on bringing children into it and trying to say things like ‘dont take our word or institution find your own.’ As much as this referendum might appear to be being taken by some far left liberals, the reality is the ones who’ve been discriminated against are being vilified for seeking the same, equal marriage and made out to be hijacking a policy of marriage that ensures heterosexuals are favoured over their gay counterparts. So there’ll be intolerance on both sides its inevitable, Im just saying its frankly funny that people make out Im intolerant simply for being incapable of relating to their shallow, outdated misery tactics.
You’re wasting your breath AlisonT, All this has been pointed out before on not just this but many other issues. Anything not complying with the groupthink here gets jumped on and ridiculed.
Or as rotide knows it as ‘ being left on his own because his ideas are about as useful as a chocolate teapot’
What ideas might they be Fluffy?
That we shouldn’t shout down people who don’t fully agree with our ideas and engage in reasonable debate?
OH THE HUMANITY
whilest this is very true – there is a whole load of shite on the Yes campaign too. but we can’t see that…it’s not cool
such as?
the main one I see regularly is some claim that its’ 2015 and ireland needs to get with the times. Considering we already have civil partnership and are having a vote on the subject of changing marriage to welcome in Same sex couple and given that only a minority of states in the world allow same sex marriage , that we in Ireland are to the forefront . But it doesn’t stop the meaningless drivel.
Same again I see people lamenting people being slaves to the church and all that….but completely ignore positive comments from bishop martin and others.
and that’s granny/grandad video for voting yes is cringeworthy …oh wow old people arent a prejudice as we stereotyped them to be…..stop the press.
The most annoying non-argument, and it’s not just found in this debate, is the one concerning time. It goes something along the lines of “can’t we leave the dark ages/1950s/past behind?” “It’s 2015 for pity sake” “Let’s get with the times!” etc
It’s the silly notion that everything we do/construct/design/believe today is, because of its newness, inherently correct. Things done/believed in the past are inherently wrong.
General point, not just on this debate.
Make your point, don’t just tell us it’s 2015. That would be my advice.
spot on.
It does get on my nerves that argument.
donkey kong – foolish comment and here’s why: Ireland as now a Catholic country is currently behind many other catholic states to have enabled same sex marriage – Brazil, Spain,Argentina, Portugal, most pretty certain to soon be all US states even the most southern or devout . I feel like you are expecting yes voters to be a bit too grateful at this junction when considering the campaign might fail despite polls, due to religious funding and traditionally family scare mongering. Understand your point about time to a degree however your point’s a bit contradicted by the fact several years’ polls’ have long pointed to a large majority victory just that we were waiting on a referendum date to be set.In other words, it really IS time.
*as now a progressive catholic country
Thanks Broadsheet for being so one-eyed and one-sided that you’ll actually turn some people away from a Yes vote by making it clear its only socially acceptable to think one way. You’re like a left-wing version of Alive.
Why are we even having a vote when obviously only bigots and homophobes could possibly consider voting No?
The difference being that BS readers don’t instantly support everything BS prints. It is routinely pointed out by a variety of readers that BS is indeed full of BS.
This is true. But the “left-wing version of Alive” comment is funny.
But, what do I win?
Where’s mah bailout?’
Think of the children!
What would one for the Yes side include? Anyone?
In a modern republic
It’s about love
This isn’t about children/the family
Bigot/Homophobe
I’m not saying everyone who votes No is a….
The Churches can still have their types of marriage
No one has any right to…
My granny who’s 109 is voting yes
My priest is voting yes
Gay people who vote no are….
STRAIGHT UP FOR MARRIAGE EQUALITY!
What about those who believe it’s unnecessary, that Civil Partnership gives gay people all the rights associated with marriage?
There’s 160 differences between civil partnership ad marriage.
Full list here:
http://www.marriagequality.ie/marriageaudit/full-list
I downloaded their spreadsheet but nothing comes up apart from a colour-coded list consisting of three headlines.
The first tab explains the color coding,
The other tabs list out the varius areas under family home, taxation, employment/pesions, etc.
Thanks. They could really use a straightforward article laying out the main points.
People keep quoting this. This document is from 2011, the year the civil partnership legislation was enacted. Most of these gaps have since been closed, and the remainder are supposed to be dealt with under the Children and Family Relationships bill
It doesn’t. Civil Partnership is different from marriage in dozens of ways that all seem to favour the richer homosexual partner. Almost as if it is marriage redefined by a bunch of millionaire gay lawyers.
They’re not the same and they don’t get all the rights, though.
So what’s the problem voting yes then? If civil partnership did confer all the rights of marriage on gay people who choose to avail of it, then there’s no issue in voting yes. In that case, all we’re asking for is to make sure it’s harder for any future government to withdraw those rights from gay people, which seems fair enough.
Well they should research the differences – like how a civil partner is not your next of kin.
thats the crucial part/ dont continue this discrimination by a no vote folks – civil partners are not spouses and lack basic rights in cases of illness -thats critical. watch Bridegroom.
A few years back an ncle of mien married his (female) long-term partner. They had no interest in maraige as an institution, they just wanted to make sure that as they got older, their kids and each other would be suitably taken care of should one of them fall ill or die. They sought legal advice – which was the easiest contract to cover everything was a marraige one.
It doesn’t take much imagination to see a situation where a gay person has a heated (or no) relationship with their family after coming out, is in a civil partnership, and they get into a health or similar crisis, but the decisions on how to treat that person fall to the family and not the partner. That’s just plain wrong.
There is no rational arguement against marraige equality. I see a lot of people who don’t like thier shitty attitude towards gay people being called out, but I say if you don’t want to be called a homophobe, then don’t say homophobic things.
That’s been changed as well: “Next of kin is not defined in legislation. However updates to the Equality legislation as a result of civil partnership mean that hospitals and other service providers are required to treat civil partners in the same manner as married opposite-sex couples.” From the Glen.ie website
That’s an improvement to be sure. Did they also fix the inheritence issues relating from the same root problem?
From a tax point of view at least, civil partners (and their children) are already treated the same as married partners. Then the Child and Family Relationships bill is supposed to provide legal protection for children who aren’t biologically and/or legally related to their parents
But is a civil partner treated as the inheritor of an estate in the absence of a will?
Lorcan Nagle – good points. I dont think the equality is there in terms of illness or inheritance until confirmation of marriage equality via a yes, happy to be told I’m wrong.
Wha’
no “I not a homophone”