The underlying case
As of yesterday, my brother’s marriage is legal in all 50 states.
Just like my other brother’s marriage.
Before yesterday, my one brother’s marriage wasn’t legal everywhere, while the other brother’s was. Which means that they were being treated differently.
That’s what we call discrimination.
I’m just glad that five members of the Supreme Court saw it that way too.
August 29th, 2015 at 9:43 pm
I wish your brother well. But please remember: legal does not equal right.
August 30th, 2015 at 9:22 pm
You are absolutely right. Legal does not equal right.
Examples abound.
1. Thirty-three states allow for the death penalty, even though DNA evidence has pointed out countless wrong convictions (including one case in Texas, where a man was exonerated after he was executed). It’s legal, but it’s wrong.
2. It’s arguable whether the mortgage chicanery that led to the subprime mortgage meltdown and the Great Recession were done legally (perhaps so), but not only did no one go to prison, many of them skipped off with millions and millions of dollars. And we (the taxpayers) paid for all of it. That’s wrong.
3. The invasion of Iraq was legal under U.S. law, but patently wrong. Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed or maimed for no good reason, and in an operation that destabilized the region and gave rise to ISIS.
Gay marriage is legal. But unlike these other cases, it’s not wrong. By extending the same rights to homosexuals that heterosexuals have, it removes second-class, discriminatory, treatment.