Idiot…

Former Conservative MP Grant Hill, who is now the co-ordinator of the Restore Marriage Project, is circulating an e-mail urging people to contact MPs and push them to get the issue revisited “because restoring traditional marriage is essential to preserving our future as a society and a nation.” the star

Nice to see this dimwit is an ex MP.

Sad to see that this issue is being resurrected again.

Hill’s idiocy is refuted by the simple fact that we have had gay marriage for a year and our society and nation remain. Not that such loonies pay any attention to evidence. Rather they dress up their prejudices as attempts at preserving society.

Enough. Here’s my deal - if my MP votes to re-open the gay marriage debate I will conclude that she is simply too stupid to represent me and I will vote against her in the next election.

I would hope that other bloggers are willing to take the same, easy to understand, position and to communicate them to their MPs. This socon craziness has to stop. Now.

Written by jay on December 4th, 2006 with 14 comments.
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Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Sean
#1. December 4th, 2006, at 8:34 AM.

Grant Hill is not an idiot. He’s a very intelligent and principled man. He’s also a devout Mormon who has dislikes homosexuality as a matter of faith. I met him back during my stint as a Mormon and was impressed with his perspicacity, sincerity, and strength of character.

If you want to attack his beliefs, that’s fair game, but calling someone you’ve probably never met or spent time with an idiot based on one particular issue you disagree on him with strikes me as being a bit harsh. That’s also the province of Robbie McClelland and he’s going to accuse you of biting his style if you keep it up.

All that being said, Grant Hill’s gay marriage stance would preclude my giving him my vote were he in office, but doesn’t otherwise diminish my respect for a very honest and capable man.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com jay
#2. December 4th, 2006, at 1:40 PM.

Perhaps Grant Hill is not an idiot; but he and the other socons seem intent on behaving like idiots as they attempt to foist their religious beliefs into the essentially secular world of politics.

The trouble is that this sort of position reflects a profound misunderstanding of what the essential values of an Enlightenment based society must be. Mr. Hill seems prepared to rubbish those values to pursue his “dislike” of homosexuality. I view that as profoundly shortsighted and, bluntly, idiotic.

Here’s why: the only reason why the Mormon Church (or the Catholic for that matter) can exist in Canada is that the idea of an Established (that is legally the only permissible religion) was destroyed by the thrust of the Enlightenment. The cost of this conversion to religious pluralism was the loss of the state’s right to impose religious beliefs of any sort. Not an Anglican, no problem, not a Christian doesn’t matter in the slightest.

Mr. Hill has every right to abhor homosexuality and gay marriage. His church certainly has the right to refuse to marry homosexuals. He can, with my full support of his right to free speech, denounce gays and all their works from the pulpit or the podium.

What he cannot do, and what, according to the Supreme Court of Canada, the Parliament of Canada cannot do without overriding the Constitution, is deny homosexuals the rights other Canadians enjoy. Even if the Golden Plates tell him to.

To change that would mean that Canada would cease to have a secular government. And, as Mr. Hill claims to be dedicated to”preserving our future as a society and a nation.” he might want to think carefully before he trashes the critical element of the Canadian polity which allows for his own religious freedom.

He obviously has not taken that careful thought and, in my view, whatever his other merits, that shortsightedness makes him an idiot.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Tom
#3. December 4th, 2006, at 10:52 PM.

Wow Jay, a WHOLE YEAR has gone by and our society hasn’t crumbled. Clearly SSM has had, and will have, NO negative impact. On to our next social engineering project!!!

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com jay
#4. December 5th, 2006, at 12:53 AM.

Tom, Interpreting the Constitution is not a social engineering project. Recognizing the right of citizens to equal benefits is not a social engineering project.

And, yes, a year (more in some provinces), has passed with gay marriage in place. Can you name a single thing which has happened during that year which, to use Mr. Hill’s criteria, threatens “our future as a society and a nation?”

We may all be going straight to the Outer Darkness promised by the Book of Mormon but that is after the society and nation are no longer of much consequence. Likely not a sound basis for using the notwithstanding clause.

So, in this world, where are the society and nation threatening consequences? Name one.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com DCardno
#5. December 5th, 2006, at 4:21 AM.

Jay, when the ssm issue was last addressed (or more accurately, ducked) by Parliament the Liberal Party line was that it was “too divisive” to appeal any of the court findings that created a right to ssm. This, despite the majority resolution less than six year beofre that affirmed the “traditional definition” of marriage and required Parliament to take all steps to defend same. Similarly, it was “too divisive” to discuss the issue or to allow MPs to vote as they wished - the Liberals required cabinet solidarity, and both the Dippers and the Bloc whipped their caucus, with the Dippers going so far as to dismiss the one MP who decided she couldn’t vote for the bill in good conscience.

I have no particular problem with ssm, although I would prefer a civil-union approach for all ‘formal’ relationships with the religious ceremony (or lack thereof) left to the participants - but I can live with the situation as it is now. There are people, though, who would like to see the issue debated with MPs free to vote as they are directed by their conscience - or by how their constituents feel on the matter, depending on the MP. Until that occurs, the ssm bill remains to the social conservatives what repatriation of the Constitution is to the separatists: an illegitimate (in their view) exercise that they never had the opportunity to give or withhold consent to. Personally, I hope the issue is reopened, MPs are allowed a free vote, and the measure fails - it puts a stop to the debate, and obliges those opposed to the process (or who claim to be opposed to the process) to either shut up, or admit that they will always oppose such a bill on the merits, rather than on the process. This (obviously) doesn’t mean that I agree with ANY of Grant Hill’s arguments - but he has come to the right conclusion despite himself.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Tom
#6. December 5th, 2006, at 4:25 AM.

Riiiiight. Reinterpretting the constitution to include protections based upon sexual orientation, when such protection was SPECIFICALLY excluded by the framers, isn’t social engineering. Redefining a social standard that has been in place for, oh I don’t know, a few thousand years or so, isn’t social engineering. And clearly, any possible impacts to society of doing so would be perfectly evident within one year. Impeccable reasoning Jay, I don’t know why anyone bothers to argue against it. Nothing to see here folks, move along. Except, what if there is? What if the societal evolution that molded marriage, over thousands of years, into the institution that we had before the politicians decided they could do better, actually did provide the best possible outcomes for society? What if it actually takes LONGER THAN ONE WHOLE YEAR for the negative impacts to be felt? Seems like the costs just MIGHT be pretty high. Could be an awfully costly price to pay for yours and others failure to imagine. But hey, no reason not to vilify those of us who would rather a bit more caution when it comes to redefining our social norms (what some would even call “social engineering”, but not me, I’ve learned my lesson.)

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com lrC
#7. December 5th, 2006, at 7:31 AM.

SSM probably won’t threaten the society and nation, but why do you presume to be capable of recognizing corrosive and negative influences of any particular social or political evolution? My general instinct is to doubt that we can recognize any adverse trend before it is too late to squeeze the toothpaste back into the tube.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com jay
#8. December 5th, 2006, at 9:41 AM.

IrC, let us propose a thought experiment. For fun, let’s suppose that property rights were abolished. Now, do you think that this would have an immediately apparent, adverse, effect on society? I do and i think it would be obvious pretty immediately. Hill wants to “preserve our society and nation”. From what? From a bit of bureaucratic change which is in conformity with the constitution.

Tom, who are these “framers” you are talking about? A bunch of Premiers and the PM? Who managed not to expressly include gay people. (Having read the document a couple of times I note that there is no line in it that says, “Equality rights shall not be extended to gay and lesbian people” nor any words to that effect.)

There is, in fact, nothing to see here folks. Gay people have become married gay people: society and the nation remain intact. (And, by the way, what did you think would happen? I have always wondered what the devil the anti-gay marriage folks thought would change. So do tell.)

Dcardno, its a waste of time simply because Harper has stated he is unwilling to take the “notwithstanding” route no matter how the vote goes. Which means nothing will change. Which all of the Honourable members know which makes the entire process a grand waste of time.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com EMG
#9. December 5th, 2006, at 10:49 AM.

RE. “Hill’s idiocy is refuted by the simple fact that we have had gay marriage for a year and our society and nation remain.”

Timely that you should use that word nation. A fiddly argument perhaps, but it seems to me that a case might be made for a connection between the redefinition of marriage and the government’s recent undertaking with regards to Québec.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Alan
#10. December 6th, 2006, at 3:06 AM.

Reinterpretting the constitution to include protections based upon sexual orientation, when such protection was SPECIFICALLY excluded by the framers, isn’t social engineering.

Tom: the Canadian Charter is an unclosed set of protected rights. There were no “framers” and no limit to what can be found as an analogous right to be protected against discrimination under section 15. We have a living tree constitution in Canada, not a founding fathers model.

I think the only link between gay rights and Quebec as a nation is their lasting call to those who would judge and discriminate against them.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Tom
#11. December 6th, 2006, at 10:33 PM.

Thought I’d point out that, at least as far as whether or not this is a case of social engineering, Andrew Coyne seems to be on my side, as he writes in today’s NP “Rewriting the marriage laws to include homosexual unions is a radical social experiment,”.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com DCardno
#12. December 7th, 2006, at 1:43 AM.

“Which all of the Honourable members know which makes the entire process a grand waste of time…”

As distinct from all the valuable crap they would otherwise be doing? At least if they are discussing this they are not debating a tax increase or a new set of Kyoto requirements.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com lrC
#13. December 7th, 2006, at 4:16 AM.

>IrC, let us propose a thought experiment. For fun, let’s suppose that property rights were abolished. Now, do you think that this would have an immediately apparent, adverse, effect on society?

The question wasn’t intended to be whether you could predict adverse effects of any change you selected; the question was whether you could predict adverse effects of any particular idea handed to you.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Alan
#14. December 7th, 2006, at 6:34 AM.

Finding oneself in disagreement with Andrew Coyne is usually a great source of confidence.

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