Kurt's been having a lively discussion about same-sex marriage, which, as usual, gets me thinking.
Inevitably, the good ol' "slippery slope" argument comes up when discussing the topic, and someone throws out, "but if allow same-sex marriage, then polygamy and interspecies marriage and all kind of nasty things will happen!" I don't want to rehash why that's a ridiculous argument - Kurt's already done that nicely. My concern is another slippery slope:
What if we allow religious doctrine to dictate legal definitions?
We might wind up with all manner of ridiculous things. We might decide that the criteria for being a safe and legal driver simply excludes women. We might decide that it is perfectly fine to execute minors, despite a global consensus to the contrary. And hey - there's no problem with religion in school. They're just trying to help the community, right?
As for that all-holy institution? We might decide that the definition of a perfectly acceptable marriage is one between an unwilling eight year-old girl and a fifty year-old man that paid the girl's father $13,000.
Think this is ridiculous? I can find biblical passages that would support each and every one of these.
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My favorite bit of the slippery slope discussion: if we outlaw abortion, what's to keep us from outlawing birth control?
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