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People desperately want to believe “elites” are the ones molesting kids when in reality it’s likely (as with all other crime) to be disproportionately underclass men who do so. For every Epstein or Prince Andrew there are thousands of nobodies in trailer parks and ghettoes across the West who mostly never get caught and who cumulatively harm vastly, vastly more people. “The elites are more debauched/degenerate/satanic” is the classic peasant conspiracy; there has never been much evidence for it, and for every Byron or de Sade there were countless unrecorded cases that were only less salacious because the people involved were nobodies.
As regards strangely high eBay or Etsy (etc) prices, this has been a thing for decades and while it’s occasionally a (usually very unsuccessful) attempt at money laundering, it’s often just mentally ill individuals. The same thing is true if you look at weird eBay where people “pay” insane amounts for things - the purchaser is usually challenged in some way and the money never changes hands because they don’t have it. I remember being maybe 10 and asking my father what happens if you win a bid and don’t pay, and him saying the government takes the money from you. Alas, that generally isn’t the case.
Especially in the US there are probably a lot of people who would rather blame lizard people than face the reality that their own ideology is at fault. You can't have complete separation between church and state while the state enforces Christian morality. Much of the American right clings to the constitution and libertarian ideas while wanting society to enforce their morality.
If the state is supposed to be not involved in religion, who says gays can't marry?
The state because there is no state interest in a homosexual couple. State marriage only exists to manage procreative couplings. That it is not narrowly tailored doesn't matter. Also the state has other strong interests in deterring homosexuality.
But infertile opposite-sex couples could always get married...?
Such as...?
That the law was over broad for its purpose is not a killer argument. Many laws are over broad for their intended purpose. Also for much of history this wouldn't be a worthwhile inquiry for the state.
Disease control. Encouraging procreative coupling.
I don't particularly care what the interests of the state are, in terms of whether or not I'm for or against something. Hell, in plenty of situations, like privacy or free speech, the interests of the collective state and that of its individual citizens are diametrically opposed. So much the worse for the state, is/ought distinction etc.
That being said, the Spartan state encouraged homosexuality as a male bonding exercise, so it's hardly unheard of.
What it is, is irrelevant, from the perspective of whether citizens should tolerate it.
Sure. The argument was about "why should the state care?"
It's consistent to say that the state should advance one set of values that serves their interests, while private citizens are free to hold other values that have nothing to do with state interests. E.g. the state has an interest in having a strong military and may choose to valorize soldiers with medals and memorials and holidays. Meanwhile private citizens may choose to adopt different values that don't glamorize dying in war.
I gave you an example of a state advancing homosexuality for what can be described as the sake of the state.
Idk about you, but I expect, being the citizen of a representative democracy, and likely to become a citizen of another one, that the state does its level best to align itself with the desires of the majority of its citizenry.
To be clear, I don't actually agree with the argument. "The state" in my view is barely a coherent concept as an actor - it's more a vehicle that various groups fight to control than a thing with its own desires (and to the extent it has its own desires they tend to be narrow "more money for our department" desires). I agree that in the real world governments usually take moral positions as a marketing exercise. If there's lots of religious conservatives, ban gay marriage. If there's lots of secular liberals, fly rainbow flags everywhere.
I was simply trying to redirect the argument back to the actual point of contention.
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