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2 party state, America, American Liberty, Barack Obama, BBC, Christianity and Islam, Civilisation, Defend the modern world, Democracy, democratic reform, foreign policy, Gay Marriage, Liberalism, media, politics, politics of irrelevance, punch and judy, Race and ethnicity in the United States Census, relevant, same sex marriage, United States
Gay marriage has been legalised in all 50 states of America. Jubilation is conquering the social networks. Celebrities are popping open extra bottles of champagne. The religious and conservative are bemoaning the imminent destruction of the country, if not the world.
My view? None of this matters… and that was always the point.
Gay marriage is part of the politics of irrelevance (POI), a very deliberate side-show performed in democratic countries to distract voters from a lack of real choice.
In America, the POI usually concerns things like flag-burning laws, school meals, the death penalty debate, prayer in schools and cannabis law reform.
Airy and light topics like these are easy to speak passionately about. It is easy and respectable to take a different side on any of these matters to your core electorate, even to your best friend or partner.
By contrast, real politics, real life and death issues – China, immigration, foreign policy, Islam etc… – are more difficult for the actors in a phoney democracy to speak freely about.
Since politicians in the West want to get elected more than anything else, they won’t lay out a concrete position on substantial issues for fear of diminishing their vote. Instead, they will practice a very developed (almost artisan) kind of hypnosis – dancing a merry dance around the subject and climaxing with a very vague (but complete sounding) answer.
America would change dramatically if the politics of irrelevance was no longer an option. Politicians would then be forced to take a stand on real, flesh and blood topics. Career politicians would be weeded out almost immediately. The mind-numbing centrism of the modern US would give way to a sharp divide, providing the people with genuine choice.
There is a reason Fox news and MSNBC exist. In Britain, we call it ‘Punch and Judy politics’ (Punch and Judy are the titular characters of a traditional puppet show – popular in English seaside towns – in which each character beats the other with a stick). The kind of politics so loudly combative and dumbed down that everyone can understand it – everyone except the genuinely informed. Rachel Maddow and Sean Hannity are not real journalists. They are cartoon characters – Mrs Liberal and Mr Conservative, and they fight exclusively about the irrelevant.
But what happens when the irrelevant can no longer be made to seem relevant? We may soon find out.
Gay marriage has now gone. Flag burning legislation was worn out years ago. Cannabis is being steadily legalised… The authentic is primed for a comeback, and that could be explosive.
The long sleep of the real has provided protective cover to profound failures of government. It has deadened the limbs of the libertarian majority, who when woken may throw off the establishment, both right and left. Phoney politics has postponed argument over the relationship between Islam and Islamist terrorism, the increasing use of the Spanish language in a traditionally English-speaking nation, government surveillance of law-abiding citizens, suicide rates among army veterans, the Mexicanisation of the pacific South-West, the national debt, trade imbalances with China and India, and a whole variety of real, consequential topics.
American politics is due for a makeover.
D, LDN.
Defend the Modern World 
Well, I do get where you’re coming from, since the Trans-Pacific Trade Partnership was passed, unfortunately, just as we were cheering for marriage equality.
That being said, the financial and legal benefits that marriage brings with it can make a real difference to people’s lives, so I wouldn’t say it’s irrelevant.
It would be nice to think that we would be able to focus on multiple important issues at once, instead of just getting distracted by one…but our attention span in this smart phone age may be too short for that.
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I entirely agree. I didn’t mean to downplay the seriousness of the new marriage laws for those directly affected by them. In the bigger picture, however, it seems a trifling matter.
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Oh, I do understand. The other thing that happened just as the marriage equality ruling came down was that multi-country outbreak of ISIS violence…and we know what ISIS would like to do to all of us, gay or straight.
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Absolutely. ISIS must be the first priority.
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ISIS seem to like throwing gay men from tall buildings. I hope, in time, all patriotic Gay men join the fight against Islamisation. Along with women, they stand to lose the most.
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Yep. I can tell you that as a bisexual woman, few things are scarier for me then the vision of Islamic fundamentalists forcing us back into a medieval-style morality. This is a fight for survival.
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I’m don’t have much of an opinion on gay marriage.
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I don’t have much of an opinion on gay marriage either. In fact, for a long time, I was actually opposed to gay marriage – and as a gay man I delighted in expressing my contrarian views to my peers.
My views have softened though, there is such carriage for it, that it seems dictionary definitions will be changed (if they have not already).
In liberal democracies that do not yet allow people of the same sex to marry (each other) such as in Australia, the “fight” for gay marriage will rage on, and the left here already feels shame that even America (the land of the religious right) beat us to it…
However it still confounds me that it’s seen as a right to marry when the whole damn institution was designed by religious orders the world over to unite a man and woman. Why would anyone gay want so desperately to be a part of something that specifically excludes us by definition? Why does the government have to endorse our choice to be open about our sexuality and life partners? I feel confident that in this day and age, that there is adequate recompense for any acts of bigotry toward one because of their sexuality in a western liberal democracy. God knows, there is plenty of exclusion for straight people when it comes to the gay community: just yesterday I read an article about the upcoming Pride Season, where it actually recommended straight people do not attend Pride marches if they wanted to be thoughtful. I vomited in my mouth as it also suggested that Pride is not the place to gawk at members of the LGTB community. That is exactly what it is designed for: its the definition of the the word pride…
There is an odd analogy that I have referred to before on this topic, and its about another one of those important issues that you may, or may not file under the politics of irrelevance. Capital punishment: anyone who watches a murderer be executed does not feel any better once the state-sectioned murder has been executed. The pain stays. I fear that the gay lobby will still be screaming and running around all over the great states of America after this decision has been made. Acceptance is a two way street.
The left needs to stop going after the right on this issue in the west – “the war is won”, and instead concentrate lobbying on countries where the penalties for being homosexual are still truly abhorrent.
It is time for the powerful American left lobby to reflect, and pick their next battle, hopefully to make the world a better place.
Closer to home, I hope that Australia too decides in favour of gay marriage soon, so that the focus can shift to more important ones of LGBT people worldwide. It certainly is a distraction in the meantime.
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“… it still confounds me that it’s seen as a right to marry when the whole damn institution was designed by religious orders the world over to unite a man and woman. Why would anyone gay want so desperately to be a part of something that specifically excludes us by definition?” – Very good point. I do think there is an element of ‘trolling’ in the push for gay marriage. I’m sure some gay people like to see their former oppressors squirm a bit.
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Freemanski – “It is time for the powerful American left lobby to reflect, and pick their next battle, hopefully to make the world a better place.”
I def LOL’d at that one. Their leveling game is their idea of making the world a better place.
And DTMW’s “I do think there is an element of ‘trolling’ in the push for gay marriage. I’m sure some gay people like to see their former oppressors squirm a bit.”
Element of trolling and a bit of squirming are maybe an understatement. The left is enamored by the image of the young black man drinking from the “whites only” fountain. That is their photo-op for everything that ails them, real or imagined.
Politics of irrelevance – if one considers that such politics will ultimately cause the irrelevance of the human race, then yep, it’s the politics of irrelevance all right!
And I too am LGBT – tho i rarely identify that way even when i lived in the “ultra-liberal” northern states. Actually, if we were to be honest, LGBT month ought really be called Openly Crazy Well-Off White People Month, anyway. LOL!
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You oppose gay marriage then? Do many LGBT people oppose it?
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no, actually i don’t, but that doesn’t mean the radicals aren’t being eye-pokey about it. LOL! the bad part will be those such radicals making a stink over various tax situations for the protestant church. i think that’s the one radicals dislike the most out of all of the faiths, if i’m not mistaken. their “nemesis” so to speak!
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Indeed. There will always be radicals looking for a fight.
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For example, today some group decided Austin, Texas needs to take down the marble 10 Commandments on the steps of their state capital.
Okay, perhaps it should not have been there, if we’re going to get picky about it, but the fact that these things keep coming up serve to annoy other certain groups… both need to either begin overlooking things or enforce every dastardly code ever put in the book.
Same with politicians – they’re always looking to expose the worst dirt than their own on the other guy/gal.
Both sides like to use nit-picky stuff inside the law books, because they can. This is a land of milk & honey for lawyers.
And advertisers. LOL. Media is king. Media owns the universe. The unreal is the real, until further notice. (Don’t pay attention to that beheading over there… But do come back tomorrow!) In fact, I was remarking earlier that were Marie Antoinette the monarch in Greece, she’d be saying, “Let them eat wireless 4G.”
I guess you can say i am enjoying the show, which is madness, and no one knows where it’s going and how it will end.
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A lot of truth in this article. We only have to tune into the BBC’s Question Time to see this POI in action.
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Indeed. I hate watching QT these days. I used to love it. Now it’s just ‘bankers bonuses, bankers bonuses, bankers bonuses, evil bankers, wind farms, Tax credits etc…”
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We could also use the POI in our favour.
A truly patriotic(Islamoaware) leader in the right position of power could send the leftists on a feeding frenzy on such irrelevant issues, while quietly implementing reforms on immigration, benefits & national defense.
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Yes we could. But then I think Leftists are smarter and more cynical than that.
There is a hierarchy of victimhood for the Left. Say if a wave of anti-Black or anti-gay sentiment broke loose, that might be an opportune time to legislate against Islam.
Muslims are way down the list.
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Then we have to be cleverer than the leftists!
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Gay marriage – well it’s a bread and butter issue for the extremes of the American right and left. And Both great much mileage out of it. As a gay man myself (and hopefully with some measure of knowledge), this all seems more a matter for faith traditions to fight it out among themselves. Marriage is a word that Americans misunderstand. Frankly, what is truly being is the issue is contract law. Not if some supernatural overlord approves this or that kind of relationship… However, America have generally moved on with the issue. In my opinion, this covers enough to displease both the left and right concerned over the question. We really do have more important matters at hand than the what and who of relationship.
But – we may expect to see further noise of the issue. Much of the American right is lost in a maze with the religious…. Wisely Barry Goldwater saw the problem with them, and stayed far from them. As for the left – oh, gay marriage remains an issue. However, transgender is becoming the hot ticket item with them. Oh, the upcoming twin population – transable and transracial. Naturally, these will probably get little motion with the majority of Americans. What these are the times in America.
We have much more better matters.
Yes, the left seems smarter. However, look deeper past the terms, and there is little logic or facts to back them up. You must be willing to be attacked for this, and rarely will the left accept. Strangely, the rank and file rightists from the religious tradition of America shares much in common with the leftists. Both live in a world of terms, and have little in the way of what was called a classical education.
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Yes, I think transgender issues will replace gay campaigns eventually. And then after that… something else.
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Indeed. The thing is this is a rather empty thing. One thing, as I finished out any thought of Episcopal identity, is the general reaction to the transgender of Bruce Jenner – in the leftist wing of the Episcopal church. It was rejected as a symbol of transgender. He/she is white, weathy and not a ‘right’ symbol for the movement. The fact is – the leftist has no place for the individual. People are only defined by group label that also serves an cause. But – none of this has any meaning past the group – or better; the collective.
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i hope not, but it seems many are now transitioning not only to become the other gender – the one they were not born as – but they also want to be gay or lesbian or whatever in-between there is AFTER transitioning to the opposite sex. (example, a female becomes a male, but wants to be a gay man, not a straight man.) some of us swapped to become traditional in the opposite gender (long story, but this makes us chauvinists to some of the LGBT) and while we’re not “closeted” we do feel there is little use in transitioning if we have to walk around announcing to everyone that we were someone else entirely, prior
regardless, and despite all that, i will not be joining any pro- or anti- nutjob groups to show my support or disagreement to whatever these groups are being hysterical about… mainly, because lawyers would eventually get around to it more peacefully on a one-on-one basis to fix whatever problems there remain, which is prolly where something like transgenderism belongs if there are any legal ramifications that haven’t been addressed yet… done one case at a time.
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By and large, it is my belief that a good majority of gay, lesbian and bisexuals see little in common with the trans population. I was okay with adding the bisexuals to the ’cause’, but was concerned about the transgender. Most people are generally either in the middle or somewhat to the right on matters of life. Indeed, those of us like this aren’t ‘popular’ with left-extremist. Two things that have caused my mind over the issue; Bruce Jenner wasn’t what the desired image those had in mind. Too white, too rich and far too right-wing. The next; LGB’s are just an issue for use. That American religious tradition, Unitarian Universalism already are dropping LGB’s for fresher material. People are just tools for use – nothing more. This is what we face. The last thing I had as interaction was an experience that it is the cause that matters; anti-Western, anti-freedom and total re-ordering of society in a new order of ‘fairness’.
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I agree that LGBTs are used for a larger political agenda. As they become more accepted, they will lose the support of the Left-wing establishment. They may even become part of the ‘oppression’.
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Indeed.
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