Songwriting Doesn’t Come Easy For Trailblazing Lyle Lovett

I’ll start things off today

John Rich is a clown. He makes clown music and says clown things. More importantly, I don’t think he’s sharp enough to be commenting on these sorts of issues in public. Lets take a look at this comment shall we.

First of all, this was in response (according to the article you linked to) to a question about why he supports Fred Thompson for President. This was his answer? Seriously? Because he wants to take a firm pre-emptive stand against aunt/nephew marriage? Not the environment, or the economy, or the war, or health care, but the gays getting married and the inevitable widespread incestual marriage that is bound to follow?

Second of all, though John Rich may fancy himself a radical, or a bold thinker, or whatever, somebody should let the ex-Lonestar member know that being against Gay marriage because you think its icky for guys to kiss and using a slippery slope argument to justify your view is not radical. In fact its quite conventional.

And in his apology (which was almost certainly not written by him) he says that he opposes same sex marriage because “his father and minister brought him up to believe…” not so bold now are we. Now its, I oppose it because my dad and my preacher told me too. It is no longer a radical and principled stand against the unspeakable evils of nephew/aunt marriage. What a maroon.

the first Sara Evans record was actually pretty good, and though it was country (as opposed to her subsequent albums), I think its a stretch to call it “really really
traditional”. Its a Pete Anderson record afterall, and Pete is always making records that are current even when they are drawing on traditions of the past (which is what country is supposed to do right?). and if you take a listen, it is in no way retro, at all, Moot Davis may be retro, that Sara Evans record was solid 90’s country.

I can’t believe that Garth is making a full fledged comeback, but I guess we shouldn’t be surprised. He conquers all he sees. crazy.

“And why can’t someone be opposed to homosexual marriage and not be considered a bigot?”

What it really comes down to is whether or not you believe that homosexuality is a choice. If you think it is a choice, then you could argue that it is a deviant characteristic.

I don’t think it’s a choice, and so I agree that Rich’s comments are rooted in bigotry, because they serve to normalize one human characteristic over another.

It is bigotry because the judgment of what is “normal” is based off the perspective of those in power (white, strait men from a judeo-Christian upbringing).

I suspect that as well Antonio

Brady, you raise a good point about the context, all I have to go on is the article linked to here on the9513. That being said, though people may have labeled him bigot, I certanily didn’t. I also didn’t say he was a clown because of his specific views on gay marriage.

as for the slippery slope argument (which is always an argument fraught with peril) he is worried that other “unsavory” things will have to be legalized, such as the incestuous marriage between and Aunt and a Nephew. Now let me ask you this, how many Aunt/Nephew couples are there in the US? Do you think that the only thing stopping incest between an Aunt and Nephew are marriage laws? So when John Rich says “call me Radical, but allowing gay marriage would mean that incestuous marriage would have to be legalized” he is not being radical, he is being ridiculous. The argmuent is invalid (preface, its been a while since logic class, so I may not be using this in the technical sense) because incest/beastiality/pedophilia or whatever other off the wall marriage they claim they will “have to legalize” are not analagous to gay marriage.

I agree that someone can oppose homosexual marriage and not be a bigot, but his reference to his upbringing did nothing to explain how (especially since bigotry is most commonly established by ones upbringing).

All and all, if you are going to make a public comment on a hot button issue then you have the responsibility to be an informed and reasonable citizen, and I don’t think that John Rich was being reasonable. Call me a radical, but equating homosexuality with incest doesn’t seem very fair.

That’s another complex issue as well, Jim, but I don’t think it answers the question. Whether or not homosexuality is genetic, a learned behavior, or a choice it doesn’t make someone a bigot because they don’t agree with homosexual marriage if they’re still capable of accepting each person as an individual no matter their differences.

Since you did bring up the issue of whether or not homosexuality is a choice or genetic, I have something to ponder. If it were genetic and we applied evolutionary theory, wouldn’t the homosexual trait disappear since it doesn’t lead to reproduction? I think that’s where the unnatural argument comes from.

“Now let me ask you this, how many Aunt/Nephew couples are there in the US? Do you think that the only thing stopping incest between an Aunt and Nephew are marriage laws?”

If the same argument would have been used to criminalize homosexuality before it became prevalent, or at least more openly prevalent, would it have been valid?

“The argmuent is invalid (preface, its been a while since logic class, so I may not be using this in the technical sense) because incest/beastiality/pedophilia or whatever other off the wall marriage they claim they will “have to legalize” are not analagous to gay marriage.”

Simply stating that they are not analogous doesn’t make it so. If they aren’t analogous, there has to be some valid reasoning to discredit the comparison.

I figure I’ll go ahead and make my position a little more clear.

A few different things need to be taken into consideration when approaching this subject. First off, what is it that the homosexual community wants. Do they want the legal protections afforded to heterosexual married couples or do they want to subjugate John Rich’s way of thinking and replace it with their own? Legally, homosexuals have a case. Socially? It’s more complex, but going through the legal system isn’t the way to achieve social equality and branding everyone a bigot that doesn’t agree is hardly gonna further their agenda.

To legalize gay marriage, I think there needs to be a change of terminology. I think it’s safe to say that for the most part, when people get married, they aren’t looking for recognition from the government. They’re getting married because they love each other, the legal/economic perks are a secondary benefit.

Originally, I think marriage was a religious institution, or at least that’s the predominant stigma, which Rich perpetuates by stating what his minister led him to believe. As such, should the government be recognizing a religious institution? This is where the terminology comes into play. As a legal institution, I think marriage should be redefined as a civil union which would become the legal umbrella term to include marriages or domestic partnerships (or marriages if a church marries them since the government is no longer dictating what marriage is). All civil unions would be equal under the law and receive the same legal and economic benefits. I do believe homosexuality to be unnatural, but despite my belief, I think the same legal/economic benefits should be extended.

I’d like to begin by stating that I did not make this a discussion on gay marriage, all I wanted to talk about was why John Rich shouldn’t be allowed to speak in public. that being said.

Brady,

Point of fact, I agree with you 100% on the solution to this problem. I think that “marriage” which is a religiously weighted term, and is most important in its religious sense, should be the possession of those to whom it is important, and that the legal/economic benefits should be distributed without prejudice. which makes this little more than an intellectual fencing match on the details, but those are fun too.

“If the same argument would have been used to criminalize homosexuality before it became prevalent, or at least more openly prevalent, would it have been valid?” - Both incest and homosexuality were criminalized and laws against both incest and homosexuality (though not enforced) are still on the books, so obviously laws against homosexuality have not stopped homosexuality. Furthermore, I am prepared to go out on a limb and say that though we have no hard statistics on the amount of Aunt/Nephew relationships, Homosexuality is far more common and homosexual relationships far outnumber nephew/aunt incest, and I will venture to say that the inability of Nephew/Aunt couples to marry is not what is keeping the number down.

“Simply stating that they are not analogous doesn’t make it so. If they aren’t analogous, there has to be some valid reasoning to discredit the comparison”
actually, I believe that the burden of proof is on you to say why they are comparable. But here we go
1.a man can’t marry a child because a child is not a consenting adult,

2.a man can’t marry a fish because a fish is not a consenting adult,

3. Incest is trickier. First of all, both Incest and Homosexuality are taboo in some cultures, but Incest is MUCH MUCH more taboo, and the incest taboo is universal (though the definition of incest is not). Also, lets look at how the definition of marriage impacts a gay guy and a guy who wants to marry his aunt. For the gay guy, the law is saying that he can’t marry anyone that he loves or is physically attracted to ever. Any romantic relationship he has will not be afforded the status that Britney and K-Fed received, or that Pam Anderson and the guy from the Paris Hilton video are getting. For the guy who wants to marry his aunt, the law only says that he can’t marry THAT specific woman because she is a close relative, however, if he wants to enter into a legally recognized relationship with another female who is not related, then they will be happy to grant his request. So the difference is removing the opportunity for marriage in a general sense, and removing it in a specific sense.
There, see, not analogous.

I can understand that a person may think homosexuality is unnatural or even wrong. Such beliefs are often based on certain presuppositions that are neither provable nor unprovable and so long a logical line of thinking follows, I think that people are perfectly justified in holding those beliefs.

That being said, do you Brady Vercher, think that a gay person is on par with somebody who has sex with their sister/aunt/mother?

And here I just thought John Rich was a crap songwriter, seems he’s a bigoted idiot to boot!

It’s typical, really. Right-wingers have been in near-total control of the federal government and the public discourse for the last seven years, but have never stopped bitching and moaning about how oppressed they supposedly are.

Lot’s daughters got him drunk, had sex with him and gave birth to his children — and these were the only people God wanted to spare out of everyone in Sodom and Gomorrah. So the Bible says incest is A-OK!

I’ll just add that this is all a bit rich (get it?) coming from the guy who wrote “Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy).”