�is "behavior" generally, or certain behaviors specifically, actually a civil right?�

What kind of a moron asked this question?

Women�s suffrage was about the �right to vote�. If that means anything at all, it means women wanted to be able to engage in VOTING BEHAVIOR. Blacks wanted �equal rights� with whites. If that means anything at all, it means they wanted to be able to engage in bus-riding behavior in the same way whites did. They wanted to engage in school-attending behavior just as whites did.

All �rights� are nothing but guarantees to act/behave. The right to keep and bear arms is the right to engage in gun-owning and gun-using behavior. The right of freedom of speech is the ability to engage in speaking behavior.

The right to choose whom you will marry is a behavior. Heterosexuals can engage in marrying behavior with the person of their choice, but Proposition 8 has made it illegal for gays to engage in marrying behavior with the person of their choice.

Behavior is ACTION. If you have civil rights, but they have nothing to do with the right to ACT, then you have NOTHING. Civil rights are guaranteed abilities to behave.

We can argue the semantics all day long, but that's only superficially what proposition 8 was about. Does anyone, Mormon and non-Mormon, genuinely believe that the support of Prop. 8 was about anything other than certain people trying to impose their religious beliefs upon others? There are simply NO scientific studies that support the contention that homosexuality is intrinsically "bad". Homosexuality is not a criminal act, it is not considered a medical disorder, it does not affect heterosexual rights or unions, and gay parents raise children as healthy and happy as those raised by straight parents according most accredited psychologists. This will play itself out over the next 10 years and one side will eventually be embarrassed to be associated with the side of bigotry. But until then why waste time arguing "behavior" vs. "action" etc. etc. Let's be honest: Is America a country that allows, as in places like Iran and Saudi Arabia, religious beliefs to determine the rights (or lack thereof) of its citizens? Fellow Mormons and non-Mormons, is this really what we want?

There are people out there who are gay and Mormon, and since Fidel is a journalist, I can't understand why he'd rather wait for "sociologists," when people at the cultural intersections are right in front of him every Sunday. But the fact that he doesn't ~see~ those people points to his biases.

This is where the LDS Church is presently: "marriage is not a solution for same-sex attraction." What is the solution, I might ask, if the Church is both against "gay marriage," and not for heterosexual marriage for gay people? Clearly, there's been a lot of objectification of homosexuality going on in the Church lately, which is frankly what people do when they're uncomfortable with something: touch it with a ten-foot pole to make sense of it. How does he feel when a non-Mormon objectifies the Mormon faith as something mistakenly worldly and not eternal? How does he feel when his marriage to his wife is described as a "behavior"? Probably simply: "Well, you're wrong." Objectification leaves those in the crossfire hanging; it negates people's freedom of agency, and yet Fidel still wonders why gays want "civil rights."

People are so easily deluded into parroting false arguments to support their own biases. "Preserve marriage." This is a red herring. Civil marriage today has nothing to do with the tradition of marriage in Western society - woman as property - and even little in common with the tradition of marriage dating back to the 1950s. Today any heterosexual couple can marry. "'Til death do us part"? Hardly. Divorce is messy but easy and common. But the biggest difference is remarriage. You can marry again. And again and again. To different people. So what is this traditional notion of marriage that is being preserved? It is purely the refusal to recognize gay relationships, and that's it. Marriage has already lost its traditional meaning. The argument that one is attempting to preserve some part of the tradition is merely a mean-spirited attempt to prevent gay and lesbian couples and their families - who exist and will continue to exist - from enjoying the same legal benefits that heterosexual couples enjoy. Period. Hence we talk of bigotry, and rightly so.

Cool.