The marriage amendment trial aired on Wisconsin public TV last week and I am told that it will air in Milwaukee tomorrow night at 11 pm on Channel 10.
I have read that some anti-amendment bloggers have criticized my opponent, UW Law Professor Michele LaVigne. This is preposterous. She did an excellent job. She realized that an emotional approach is best for her side and for the format (very brief everything) we were stuck with and she delivered that.
I couldn't really do that because the arguments for the amendment that I want to make are not that simple and not rooted in emotion, although they do draw on very primal understandings of the nature of marriage. In that sense, the format worked against us. But its hard for me to be objective. Both Michele and I agreed that we would never watch it (but I did anyway). I think it is fair to say that the trial produced some thought provoking arguments and is worth seeing.
What say you in response to this? You keep justifying your Yes vote on the belief that civil unions will in some way erode marriage for heterosexuals (despite the evidence that we heteros are doing that quite well on our own).
ReplyDeleteDoes this change your thinking?
People also cite the Scandanavian experience for the opposite propostion. I haven't done that because I am not persuaded that the experience of countriesy where marriage has already been in decline translate well into our context. In other words, since I can't say that other stats which show marriage on the ropes are related to partnership laws, I won't say that some incremental changes that are positive are.
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