Trip Ups- North Carolina Politics and the Thinly Veiled Biases That Drive Anti-Gay Legislation

The Gist: NC Senator: "You're trying to trip me up":

'via Blog this'

Two things come to mind when watching the above...utterly infuriating clip: 1.) Signorile doesn't have to TRY very hard to "trip up" Senator Forrester at all, 2.) The misconceptions and loaded rhetoric behind his reasons- "gay as unhealthy lifestyle", "the preservation of marriage" arguments just don't hold up over the slightest scrutiny.

Its pretty sickening how a person can pass sweeping legislation without having to prove a whit of it. Fun with policy and stereotypes. I can play this game too- I read in some book somewhere that Mexicans are coming to "steal our jobs", and Asians are "good at math" and that Social Conservatives are "raging bigots" ...should that be the grounds for writing refferendums that alter these people's lives (or worse, punish them outright for belonging to this particular status group)? Nevermind whether we should ban people being married because of unhealthy "lifestyle choices". Let's disallow people who smoke-obviously a choice that without question limits one's life expectancy- to get married. But wait, that'll never happen because marrige is a "right" some people get to have regardless of who they are and what they do, while others are considered vile interlopers for having the audacity to want to engage in a meaningful social contract with the person they love.

Watching how little logical rigor it requires to absolutely obliterate the fallacies this Senator in my less great state is equal parts invigorating and depressing. The fact that THIS argument, unsubstantiated (to be putting it kindly), was all it took to push a referendum that will in essence rub salt in the wound of people who can't marry in the state anyway is too absurd for words. At the very least, I can't decide if listening to a Senator get so easily panned on issues he found "gravely compelling" enough to push through in a secret session a few weeks prior is a amusing, or more disconcerting than this catastrophe is in the first place.