The panic of the extreme right over marriage equality continues to bubble in ugly ways. And Oklahoma appears to be the epicenter of The Crazy.
Item: Oklahoma rep thinks marriage should be restricted to religious practitioners.
Under House Bill 1125, judges would no longer have the power to officiate at marriages and court clerks would not issue marriage licenses. The clerks' only responsibility would be to file the licenses that couples received through their officiating clergy member. Of course, clergy can grant licenses according to their own religious beliefs, which again leaves a lot of gay couples on the outside looking in.Item: ever reliably anti-gay Oklahoma Rep Sally Kern has a trifecta of anti-gay bills. In addition to outlawing taxpayer's money supporting gay marriage licenses, and legalizing ex-gay therapy, Rep Kern wants to specifically enable anti-gay discrimination:
Representative Russ, (photo right) however, has a solution for those who aren't religious or aren't able to receive religious approval.
"They don't have a spiritual basis for a marriage and don't want to have a clergy member or a priest or someone involved in the spiritual aspect, then they can file an affidavit of common-law marriage," Rep. Russ told reporters.
House Bill 1597 would make it legal for businesses to flat-out refuse service to LGBT people:Supermarket, hotel, paramedic, hospital: you can all discriminate against Teh Gayz. Leave 'em dying on the street, if you want.
No business entity shall be required to provide any services, accommodations, advantages, facilities, goods or privileges related to any lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender person, group or association.
This is reminiscent of the brief effort in Washington to pass a similar bill, at which a legislative staffer commented if a supermarket refuses to sell food to gay couples, they can just grow their own.
Animus, much?
Meanwhile, not in Oklahoma ,Ben Carson warns gays ominously that if they keep asking for wedding cakes, they might be poisoned.
4 comments:
I wonder how the state will certify clergy? Snooki just to ordained in order to officiate the wedding of her hair dressers: http://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/news/snooki-becomes-an-ordained-minister-plans-to-officiate-gay-wedding-2015231
The Oklahoma proposal is no different from the current practice here in Quebec. A couple who want to marry go to a legal officiant (clergy, court clerk, or notary), the officiant causes notice of the proposed marriage to be posted, either in the church or at the local courthouse for 21 days, and then in the presence of 2 witnesses they sign a Declaration of Marriage or Declaration of Civil Union (both have the same rights and both are open to same-sex and opposite-sex couples), which the officiant then files with the Directeur de l'état civil. Good to see a Bible Belt state taking cues from North America`s most secular and godless society.
No, James, it's different. It is't a separation of civil from religious. It says that you can only have a legal civil marriage if a religious person signs off on it. Otherwise, all you have is a common-law marriage, which is not the same thing.
Wikipedia;
Common-law marriage, also known as sui juris marriage, informal marriage, marriage by habit and repute, or marriage-like relationship between unmarried spouses is a legal framework in a limited number of jurisdictions establishing marriage-like rights and responsibilities outside of ceremonial marriage.
Sally Kern has withdrawn her license -to-discriminate bill.
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