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The Daily Dose/June 26, 2011
By Gaylon Kent
The Writer's Shack
Notes from around The Human Experience...
HERE COME THE BRIDES: The New York State Senate voted Friday night to allow people of the same gender to marry. This follows the passage of an identical bill by the New York State Assembly earlier in the day, and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who ran for the office promoting gay marriage, surprised no one when he signed the bill Saturday.
The first same-gender vows could be exchanged as early as next month.
The Usual Suspects:The usual religious zealots are expressing dismay over the bill's passage. All of their arguments are summed up rather nicely by New York state senator Rev. Ruben Diaz, a minister from the Bronx, who decreed:
God, not Albany, settled the issue of marriage a long time ago…
Oh, Jesus H: Well, that's great, Reverend, but it is useful to note that while you have dedicated your life to the ministry, not everyone believes what you believe. Just because you have a god that prefers marriage be between a man and a woman doesn't mean everyone else does, too. Some people are attracted to their own gender. It's the way the world is built and good luck changing that and it is wrong for certain segments of society to require others be in step with their beliefs.
Standard Internet Disclaimer: Uh, we're not gay, goddammit. Just rather libertarian. The purpose of government is to provide for the liberty of its citizens, even its homo ones. If allowing two men or two women to marry - and divorce and bicker over money and where to go for dinner - makes their Human Experience easier, then our government should do what it can to facilitate that.
Back On Message: We have said this before, almost ad nauseam, in a variety of contexts: just because something is legal, does not make it mandatory!
Here's The Deal: If marrying someone of the same gender violates your personal or spiritual beliefs, or just grosses you out, don't do it! It's like anything else. If you don't want to go to the corner bar and get sloshed tonight, you are under no obligation to do so. If you're in Vegas and don't want to go and put the rent money on black, you don't have to, although if this is you, please don't come to Vegas, you're just taking up space.
To Review: The New York law does not oblige you to gay marry, it merely makes it available to those who are of a mind to do so.
IT HAS TO BE TRUE, IT WAS PARODIED ON BATMAN: According to legend, the Pied Piper led 130 children out of the town of Hamelin, Germany on this date in 1284.
A weirdo playing a flute may or may not have been the cause of 130 children leaving Hamelin. They may have died, with the Pied Piper merely representing death itself.
Eff This Noise: Or maybe they were a bit precocious for their age and merely up and left.
But something happened to a bunch of kids in Hamelin in 1284. A stained glass window in a Hamelin church memorialized the event, and town records refer to it being "100 years since our children left".
MCCLXXXIV: In other news from the 1284 AD desk, Germany imposed a trade embargo on Norway after those zany Norwegians had the nerve to plunder a German ship. This is significant, as Norway is cut off from grain and vegetables and other assorted foodstuffs, causing a general famine.
Also, the Venetians start minting a gold coin known as the ducat, that year. The ducat would remain in use until the mid-1850's.
What The Hell's Going On Here? The Catholic Church has three popes ruling simultaneously on this date in 1409 after the Council of Pisa elects Petros Philargos, who becomes Pope Alexander V. Officially regarded as an antipope, Alexander would serve until his death the following May.
Alexander joins Popes Gregory XII and Antipope Benedict XIII as claimants to the papacy. This period is towards the end of what History now refers to as the Western Schism, a time that lasted from 1378-1417.
Great Moments In Assassination: Francisco Pizarro is assassinated on this date in 1541 in Lima, Peru.
Originally from Spain, Pizarro had taken Peru from the Incas in 1533 in what is, numerically, at least, one of the most improbably conquests in history, as Pizarro was armed with under 200 men, facing an Incan army estimated at over 80,000 strong.
The groundwork for Spaniard conquest had been laid in the late 1520's, when Pizarro and company first landed in Peru. They had the foresight to bring the popular disease smallpox with them, which had previously been unknown in the area. This killed the Incan emperor and caused his two surviving sons to start a civil war. Pizarro and company then return to Spain, before returning to Peru to conquer it. Inca leader Atahaulpa, the victorious son, was captured, then later executed.
Let's Get Some Strongly Worded Resolutions Going Here: Representatives of 50 nations sign the United Nations Charter on this date in 1945 in San Francisco. A 51st, Poland, would sign later.
Good Luck With That: The Preamble to the Charter talks a good game, but basically is just a bunch of rhetoric, as humans, and nations, have insisted on acting true to form over the decades, preferring to act in their own self-interest. Failure oozes from the first line of the charter
We the peoples of the United Nations determined: to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war…
Really, They Mean Well: It gets better. More from the Preamble, edited for content:
…to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and to establish conditions under which justice…can be maintained…
Thought For The Day: {This} whole book...has been written under the influence of a kind of religious awe produced in the author's mind by the view of that irresistible revolution which has advanced for centuries in spite of every obstacle and which is still advancing in the midst of the ruins it has caused.- Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America
Answer To The Last Trivia Question: Justice Potter Stewart was the only dissent in the 6-1 Supreme Court vote in Engle vs. Vitale, which overturned prayer in public schools. Stewart's views can be boiled down to the first two sentences of the third paragraph of his dissent:
With all respect, I think the Court has misapplied a great constitutional principle. I cannot see how an "official religion" is established by letting those who want to say a prayer say it.
Today's Stumper: When did the United Nation's Security Council first meet? - Answer next time!
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