Kyle Boddy dot com

Many readers of this blog know that I am a libertarian-leaning person who is more accurately described as an anarcho-capitalist. It seems worthwhile to comment on In re Marriage Cases, the soon-to-be landmark case overturning the ban on same-sex marriages in the state of California. There are many opinions on the subject, and while I support the results of the case, I generally do not support state-sanctioned marriage clauses as ultimately I view such policies as attempting to legislate and arbitrate morality. I will discuss the case and marriage in general in a categorical fashion.

On the State's Involvement in Marriage

I see no reason why the state should legislate on who can or cannot be «married.» Perhaps as a direct result of this view, I do not support the addition of laws that legislate who can be married. In general, I will abstain from voting for laws that sanction gay/transgendered marriage, but if forced to vote, I would vote No. Though I agree with the result of the law, it is not enough to support what short-term results come about due to policy. For example, I think the smoking ban in restaurants is great from a personal point of view, but it is unacceptable from an individual's rights point of view. Supporting such laws cedes greater control over individuals' lives to the state, which I am not in favor of.

I do realize that In re Marriage Cases simply overturns the same-sex marriage ban, which is a bit more favorable. Nevertheless, as a result of this case's decision, focus on abolishing control of state-sanctioned marriage becomes a lesser possibility.

On Business's Rights

LJ friend 'darthbeckman' is Catholic and thus is in favor of preserving the traditional Catholic model of marriage. He states in a recent post:

Likewise, if I were a business owner then I wouldn't extend benefits to same-sex couples like I would to married couples, because the latter are married and the former are not. Call it discriminatory if you wish, because I am discriminating between fantasy and reality. And I'd cheerfully go to jail before I recognized that falsehood as reality.

Though I disagree with his view on «reality,» I find his point valid. I have long held the belief that it is well within a business's right to discriminate based on race, religion, sexual identity/preference/orientation (whatever is now politically correct, I suppose), age, wealth status, or whatever they want. One only needs to look at Stanford's overturning of affirmation action policies and the data published as to why they took such action to realize that these policies are actually detrimental to minorities. Affirmative Action policies typically discriminate heavily against whites and Asians and favor Hispanics and blacks, but with greater acceptance of the latter groups comes lower graduation rates and average GPAs. This is to be expected for obvious reasons: If you admit people to your university that would normally not be accepted on a meritocratic status, they will typically fare worse than average as a result.

Therefore, I am quite obviously against any type of affirmative action program being instituted for both private and public businesses. However, I will take it one step farther (as I said above) and say it is okay to actively discriminate against these groups. It should be within the business's right to not want to hire Asians, blacks, gays, whites, or what-have-you. In reality, this already occurs under the radar, and laws that are introduced to attempt to stem these policies only adds fuel to the fire. Furthermore, active discrimination against group X by business Y means that business Y's competition has an economic advantage and can hire group X's members. It is a financial and economic mistake to discriminate against groups of people, but that doesn't mean it should be against the law.

On a personal note, if a business openly discriminated against Asian-Americans, why would I want to work there in the first place? The business should not be forced to hire me despite their reservations regarding my racial makeup.

----

I would like to say that I do appreciate the state of California telling the federal government where they can stick their marriage policies, because ultimately I think that these issues should be dealt with on a state-by-state basis with no involvement from the federal government.