Reply #127: Because that would be removing rights, which is not what we are doing.

[Lone Pawn]

Nobody, for example, is suggesting removing the rights of blacks to vote. We're considering not making "create gay marriage" a plank in the platform.

We're talking about ceasing to publically support giving additional rights to one of the above groups of people for an election cycle, which would then allow us to halt the actual rollback of rights which occurs under Republicans and redefine the terms of debate on the issue, at which point we can recommence equalizing rights.

Take, for instance, the Gay Marriage Backlash in the '04 election. The election was close enough that it's quite possible that had we not decided that an election year was the best time to begin a social movement, John Kerry would be president at the moment, and there would have been no reason for all the anti-gay marriage state-constitution amendments around the nation to exist. We actually lost ground in this war by pushing too hard. Wouldn't it have been smarter to, say, WAIT until we had taken power before pushing an unpopular but moral idea on the American people?

Now, I didn't vote for Gays, though that would have been my third choice. I would have voted first for Affirmative Action (see my reasoning in an earlier post,) second for Immigration, and third for Gay rights. And I would only abandon Affirmative Action, whereas I would merely suspend the other two. And no, I would not vote for abandoning all three.