To Kim Davis on her moral conflict

[kpete]

SUN SEP 06, 2015 AT 07:20 PM PDT
by sbloch

A letter to Kim Davis, and all the other clerks and judges fighting the same fight. Your cause would be noble if you actually had a moral conflict rather than just a grammatical misunderstanding.

Dear Ms. Davis:

Let me first say that I respect your willingness to stand up against what you consider an unjust law, even when it comes from the Supreme Court -- Supreme Courts have been wrong before. That integrity is presumably part of what got you elected to your office in the first place. It would be a noble act if you were actually standing up for a moral position. But going to jail for misunderstanding a homonym is just silly.

Let me explain. A homonym is a set of two or more words with different meanings that share the same spelling and/or pronunciation. For example, "dog&quot 1] is a noun meaning a four-legged domestic animal, while "dog&quot 2] is a verb meaning to bother or pester. As County Clerk, you're probably called upon to issue dog licenses; when you do so, are you authorizing the licensee to pester and bother people, or to own and keep a four-legged animal?

Here's another homonym: "marriage&quot 1] is a relationship recognized in the eyes of God, while "marriage&quot 2] is a relationship recognized in the eyes of the State. These two words overlap just enough to be confusing, but they're not and never have been identical. A couple married by a priest/minister/rabbi/imam who hasn't been empowered by the State to conduct marriages are married(1] but not married(2]. A couple married by a justice of the peace are married(2] but perhaps not married(1].

Members of minority religions have known this for centuries. The Catholic Church doesn't (didn't?) recognize the marriage of somebody who's been married and divorced before; the U.S. and all its States do. Both Islam and the Church of Latter-Day Saints, from their respective beginnings, not only allowed but encouraged polygamy; the U.S. and all its States forbid it. You've been fortunate, most of your life, that as a member of the local-majority religion, you've had a religious notion of marriage that matched the legal one pretty closely. Now that they don't match, you perceive a conflict between your job and your faith.

Fortunately, nobody is asking you to state that a same-sex couple can be married(1] in the eyes of God, which is a matter of faith. You're being asked, as part of your job as a public official, to certify that they can be married(2] in the eyes of the State, which is a simple, objective, legal question to which your faith is completely irrelevant, so there's no conflict. Going to jail for your principles when your principles aren't actually under attack is just a waste.

I hope I'm not bothering you with this missive. But if I am, it's OK -- I have a dog license.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/09/07/1419054/-To-Kim-Davis-on-her-moral-conflict

[dickthegrouch]

1. Brilliant

But if she reads it, and understands it, she might be able to weasel her way out of jail

[ejbr]

4. By issuing licenses?

Because aside from resigning, the judge has made her options quite clear.

[truebluegreen]

9. Being in jail for contempt of court

is not intended as punishment but to enforce compliance. If at any time she is willing to comply she can get out; or she can resign and get out. The only weasel option available would be to say she will comply, and then not do it--and she'd be back in in a New York minute.

[mnhtnbb]

2. Nicely done, but I suspect beyond the comprehension of Kim Davis.

[ChazInAz]

6. I have a suspicion.

It looks to me as if some group has made it clear to her that a handsome living depends upon her being unable to see that difference. That's why I expect to see her on Fox, with a ghost-written book appearing with incredible speed in Xtian bookstores, and making the rounds of the mega-churches.

[Plucketeer]

8. Or a cabinet position

in President Huckabee's White House!

[smirkymonkey]

3. Bravo!

However it will go right over the head of most of these anti-marriage equality idiots because the real reason they oppose marriage equality is just hate and prejudice, and that isn't something that can be overcome with reason.

[SharonAnn]

5. My religious/Catholic relatives in Italy and Chile understand this.

To be recognized as a marriage by the government, and have all the secular rights and responsibilities thereof, they must have a civil marriage.

However, these religious individuals believe that the only "real" marriage is the religious sacramental marriage. So they have both.

The legal one is usually a quick trip to the government office, and the religious marriage is usually the next day and is the full religious ceremony.

They don't have any problem with that, why should we? And these are overwhelmingly Catholic countries.

[MisterP]

11. ironically with established churches theology becomes a public issue so it's *explicitly*

negotiated, rather than sublimated into squabbles over the Earth's age or Lunar Genesis readings; religion's a dimension to life, rather than a label of identity or a "social group" (ironically I think this is because they have 80-95% of the country in one single denomination); even the nonbelievers talk in terms of the mainstream's theology (Philip Pullman calls himself a "Church of England atheist" for instance, and he blames the Papists for creationism and Victorian workhouses)

even my most conservative Catholic (they're Polish) acquaintances just turn and stare when I mention that 50% of the country volunteers that the Earth is 10,000 years old: they know that both Protestants and Catholics accepted Darwin and Wallace by 1875, provided it wasn't deist, Social-Darwinist (the Prots were more okay with this), or nihilist (heck, so did America's Baptists)--but America adores DIY religion, making it theologically different from even Canada, so we took a different path with the 1900s' revival and coining of "fundamentalism" against various Victorian theologies (who in turn were responses to something else)

also there's a different timbre in Continental and pan-Anglo conservatisms--remember that the 19th-c. "liberals" in the Catholic world that secularized the state were foamingly anticlerical but also economically right-wing (they slaughtered Canudos, enslaved the Maya, and gave us Columbus Day since they thought he was a progressive defying the Church); several dialectical twists and turns later we get a postwar politico-religious settlement in places like Italy while America was sorta divided between types who thought Jesus was the patron of the American Way (many of these would become Vietnam's conscientious objectors) vs. those who were certain that prosperity meant religion had only 15 more years to go as of 1966 or 1973 (again, this side was represented by Vietnam boosters and opponents), a configuration that was easily exploited to create the 70s-90s Culture Wars

[Jamastiene]

14. Believe it or not, The Catholic countries are way more moderate

than these holier than thou fundamentalist churches in the southeast here in America. The Catholics down here are downright liberal compared to the average protestant churches in my area.

[WinkyDink]

7. The ONLY legal marriage is one licensed by the State, which is why

all U.S. weddings---in a church; in a court; on a nude beach; in a Las Vegas drive-through---must be preceded by the purchase of a government license. "Married in the Eyes of God" won't get you death benefits if that's all you have.

[Ms. Toad]

15. Except in states which recognize common law marriage.

ETA: and Kentucky doesn't.

[WinkyDink]

18. Operative words: "states" and "law." Still zippo re: Religion.

[nvme]

10. Thank you

I appreciate your clarification

[Electric Monk]

12. There is a parallel with the extreme RKBA types too: Reading comprehension problems. k&r

[jwirr]

13. Excellent definition of the issue. Thank you.

[Tipperary]

16. She would be terrified by the word "homonym".

[WinkyDink]

19. A homonymphobe!

[Tipperary]

21. Lol!

It is a homo no matter which way you slice it (or so she would think I imagine!)

[uppityperson]

17. She probably quit reading at " homonym". Good letter, k&r

[treestar]

20. the part in bold

You've been fortunate, most of your life, that as a member of the local-majority religion, you've had a religious notion of marriage that matched the legal one pretty closely. Now that they don't match, you perceive a conflict between your job and your faith.

I always wonder why they do not realize, these Christians, that if they were a minority, the First Amendment would protect them from being persecuted. They don't get that one day they could be the ones. The protection of other religions now would protect them then. Guess they simply don't believe it is possible.

[Maven]

22. These people don't care about this kind of logic

They want the government to enforce their religious rules. They don't care about "civil" vs. "religious" because they'd like nothing more than for the former to be a codification of the latter. And they've been empowered in this way of thinking by, on the one hand, the plutocrats on the right who for years have used them to mobilize poor voters for policies that benefit the rich; and on the other hand, feckless Democrats who've indulged their lunacy and cowered at their false indignation, up to and including our current president. Hence we have ludicrous ideas based on nothing more than superstition competing on an even playing field with fact-based policies.

These people aren't misinformed about the difference between civil and religious proceedings. It is we on the left who've been misinformed about their intentions. They aren't civic participants acting in good faith who merely have their own opinions about matters for which "reasonable minds can differ", to paraphrase President Obama's onetime justification for giving credence to antigay bigots. They are the American Taliban.