> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: If you substitute the word 'black' for
> the word 'homosexual' in your comments above, (which is how _many_ but
> not all GLBT activists would have you handle it) perhaps you can see
> the problem.
Not comparable. Black people marry exactly the same way white people
do. But heterosexual mating is (mathematically provably) different
from homosexual mating. Look up "stable-marriage theorem." eHarmony
is being asked to provide a fundamentally different type of service,
not merely provide the same service to a wider range of people. If
they tried to provide it, there would be immediate (and valid)
complaints that they're not doing it competently. Their software
would probably perform very poorly (again, look up the relevant
theorems).
I don't think gay activists would actually support this lawsuit if they
thought about the probable consequences:
(a) eHarmony moves to Texas and continues as usual but no longer contributes
to California's economy.
(b) Gay activists come to be viewed as enemies of personal liberty. Until
now, they wanted freedom to do their own thing; now they seem to want to
take freedom away from people different from themselves.
(c) Legislators conclude the California anti-discrimination law is too
broad, stamping on personal liberties, and decide to narrow it.
If somebody wants to set up a same-sex matchmaking bureau, why not do so,
and take advantage of the lack of competition from eHarmony?
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well, they already have. Without making
any references to eHarmony except in a very veiled, obscure way, this
televison commercial for chemistry.com (? I think ?) seems to imply
they want GLBT business. Regards your (b) and (c) above, gay activists
are typically liberal Democrats, and liberal Democrats tend to have no
problem with taking away personal liberties. The gay activists who,
conversely, are conservative Republicans -- and yes there are a few --
spend most of their time merely explaining themselves to whoever will
listen. They by and large will say they are 'traditional Republicans'
but they object to the party's evangelical religous leanings in recent
years.
And then, there are the gay activists who are libertarian either with
an upper case /L/ Libertarian (as in political party membership) or
lower case /l/ libertarian (as in general philosophy and sympathies
but without formal party membership). I place myself in this latter
category. Geeze, I could start an entire mailing list/newsgroup on
this topic, and I wish I had some help from gay activists one way or
the other on it. But, as Ralph Blair (founder and head of the gay
religious group *Evangelicals Concerned*) phrases it, "There is
overall so much hated and building of agendas in the world these days.
Everyone has their own agenda, and refuses to listen to the agendas of
anyone else." On that topic -- agenda building and protecting -- he is
absolutely, one hundred percent correct. If anyone wants to read what
I believe is a _comprehensive_ 'gay rights' view on things, I suggest
they go to my web site for same: http://gaynews.n3.net . And this
discussion on the eHarmony lawsuit is getting a lot of coverage in the
gay press. Lots of GLBT people hate me for 'allowing' all these views
to be present in my daily newspaper. PAT]
mc (look@www.ai.uga.edu.for.address)