Tennessee governor signs bill allowing public officials to refuse to perform same-sex marriages

Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee ® signed a bill Wednesday allowing public officials to refuse to perform same-sex marriages.

State lawmakers approved Tennessee House Bill 878 last week. The legislation states people “shall not be required to solemnize a marriage” if they refuse to doing so based on their “conscience or religious beliefs.” According to the Tennessee Legislature website, the governor signed the bill Wednesday.

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Sounds like a good reason for queer people to start getting jobs as county clerks in Tennessee so they can refuse to solemnize cishet marriages based on their conscience or religious beliefs.

Coasting0942,

Really Mr. Woke Bond?

I cast “LGBTQ isn’t a conscience or religious stance in the State of Tennessee”.

Your move Mr. Bond….

CrazyEddie041,
CrazyEddie041 avatar

"LGBT" doesn't have to be a conscience or religion belief. You can just state that heterosexual marriage against your beliefs.

HopeOfTheGunblade,
HopeOfTheGunblade avatar

I mean, heterosexuals do get the vast majority of divorces, and divorce is a sin...

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Yep. Jesus had a lot to say about condemning divorce. He didn’t really say anything about anything LGBT-related.

Froyn,

heterosexual 'relationships' cause more abortions

Theprogressivist,
@Theprogressivist@lemmy.world avatar

Man, gays must really scare you, huh?

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

“Mr. Woke Bond” is the best insult you can come up with?

That’s pretty pathetic.

Rapture,

At least he recognizes himself as the evil villain in this situation

sukhmel,

As per Poe’s law, that might have been a joke. Well, it might’ve been not ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Zombiepirate,
@Zombiepirate@lemmy.world avatar

Which bond villain was a magician?

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

https://y.yarn.co/c3c606b8-4942-46fe-a6cf-8daf1782b349_text.gif

swiftcasty,

cringe

SeaJ, (edited )

Being against heterosexual marriage can certainly be a personal belief. It does not have to be a religious or conscience stance.

If you want a religious stance: refuse to marry people who have been divorced.

Froyn,

"Have you consummated your relationship?" Yes? I'm sorry, I can't approve of your marriage.

Fapper_McFapper,

Ooooh this is a great idea!

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

They’d have to do it very stealthily though. Pretend to be die-hard cishet Republicans until after the election. Santos them, but go even further than Santos did by pretending you aren’t even queer.

DaMonsterKnees,

I will take time out of my day and thank you. Fucking SMORT! Get’em girls!

Lemmeenym,

deleted_by_author

    •
    FlyingSquid,
    @FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

    Ministers and churches are not public officials.

    Ministers and churches already had that right.

    You are simply incorrect.

    Lemmeenym,

    Yes I was, sorry. This is even more useless than I thought. The Kim Davis case has already established that public officials have an obligation to perform their duties without regard for the sexuality of the people they serve. The law has already been preempted by federal law and precedent in the 6th Circuit which is the appeals court with jurisdiction over Tennessee.

    Fedizen,

    just discrimination by adding 1 extra step.

    TheMightyCanuck,
    @TheMightyCanuck@sh.itjust.works avatar

    https://sh.itjust.works/pictrs/image/17a02bcc-8a93-4db8-bb5b-e2fa0e4f55d3.jpeg

    Birdie,

    We don’t care 'bout no constitution. We gon discriminate when and where we want, and you’d best not come after OurPreciousSecondAmendment, neither.

    But seriously, they can’t refuse to issue marriage permits, right?

    LodeMike,

    Yes. This law is unconstitutional under the equal protection clause.

    Bakkoda,

    Of course they can. It’s pretty clear laws are reactive so this will be tested 1000%.

    swiftcasty,

    Solemnizing a marriage = officiating
    People can already refuse to officiate weddings, this bill is symbolic posturing

    NatakuNox,
    @NatakuNox@lemmy.world avatar

    These people think about gay people more than gay people think about gay people.

    Ashyr,

    That’s only true if you assume these people aren’t deeply closeted.

    Pulptastic,

    Didn’t this already get knocked down in another state?

    Edit: Kim Davis in Kentucky tried this and failed.

    tacosplease,

    And is now fined over $100k for her bullshit LOL. Who’s going to be the next idiot to throw their life savings away?

    OneOrTheOtherDontAskMe,

    Life savings? Governor? No sir, that was a couple years’ savings at most (I assume. Most politicians like that might not be paid EXTREME amounts for their public office, but their speaking engagements and stock portfolios are no joke)

    HopeOfTheGunblade,
    HopeOfTheGunblade avatar

    Governor? She was a clerk.

    OneOrTheOtherDontAskMe,

    Oh my bad, I thought we were still talking about governors and wasn’t familiar with her

    HopeOfTheGunblade,
    HopeOfTheGunblade avatar

    Nah, see, when politicians pass laws like this and cost the state massive amounts of time and money fighting over it in court, fuck-all happens to them. When a random state employee decides on her own one day, "fuck them queers" and acts on it, she gets consequences. Or at least, she used to. Goddess knows what to expect here going forward.

    homesweethomeMrL,

    That is the face of a human who went wrong

    AbidanYre,

    What a great opportunity for the Supreme Court to uphold this law and then cry about how nobody thinks they’re credible anymore.

    blackstampede,

    If you’re that worried about it, then make it a form that people can fill out themselves. While we’re at it, roll marriage agreements into contract law and remove the two-person cap.

    RedditWanderer,

    That would come to close to achieving a middle ground, needs more obstruction and human suffering…

    Branch_Ranch,
    • too close
    HelixDab2,

    That last bit is such a ridiculously bad idea on so, so many levels.

    First, as we have seen throughout history, any time multiple marriage is permitted, in practice it turns into polygyny, with a single man having multiple wives. This has a well-known destabilizing effect on societies. If you want to see what the practical result of having multiple marriages is, look at fundamentalist Mormons.

    Second, from a legal standpoint, a divorce with just two people can already be incredibly complicated and expensive if one person is fighting it. If you add another person, it becomes vastly more complicated to legally sever.

    blackstampede,

    Why does a man with multiple wives have a destabilizing effect on society?

    HelixDab2,

    Because–and this sounds icky–men with no options for mates tend to be more likely to engage in violent and antisocial behavior. When you look at fundamentalist Mormon communities, they end up making up reasons to excommunicate and expel young men from their communities so that they aren’t competing with the Mormon elders for women. But those are largely isolated and small groups; once you expand that to an entire country, you end up needing to find a way to get rid of the competition in a more permanent way. Historically that’s been war.

    blackstampede,

    I can see how that would be a problem for a smaller, more insular religious community, but on a national scale you would have much more variation in relationships. Most people would probably still be monogamous, some would lean towards multiple wives, others multiple husbands, some more complex arrangements. The impact of any particular relationship pattern would be diluted by the size of the population.

    HelixDab2,

    When it’s been legal on a country- or society-wide basis, the tendency has been for a relatively small number of very, very wealthy men to have a large number of wives, even while the majority of the remainder of the population has been monogamous. Women have–again, historically speaking–ended up being commodities.

    The effects can be quite significant even if only a small number of people are practicing polygyny, particularly if you have a very small number of men that have a large number of wives (e.g., someone like Brigham Young who had 57 wives, or Warren Jeffs with 87 wives). If you look at relationships as a competition–which they very much are if you take a biological viewpoint–a single person like Warren Jeffs means that you have roughly 86 men that have no opportunities for partners at all.

    Now imagine all 86 of those men becoming incels as a result, particularly in an age where it’s easy for people to communicate their grievances and form communities online. Given that the US has been trending towards fewer rights for women (gee, thanks, Mr. Trump…), it’s not hard to see women being fully commodified under a system that permitted polygamy or polygyny.

    (To be clear: polygamy = multiple people in a marriage, with gender not specified, polyandry = one wife with multiple husbands, which has, AFAIK, only one historical analog (Joseph Smith Jr. notwithstanding, since his “spiritual marriages” were flatly illegal), and polygyny = one husband with multiple wives, which has many historical analogs. A single wife and many concubines is also fairly common; concubines were legally wives, but their children could not inherit position, wealth, or power from their father.)

    blackstampede,

    When it’s been legal on a country- or society-wide basis, the tendency has been for a relatively small number of very, very wealthy men to have a large number of wives…

    I’m not sure that this would hold true if you made polygamy legal nationally today. While I agree that this has been the historical trend, it’s also almost always been tied to high levels of religious fervency and few protections for women. While we can argue about whether the current situation on both fronts is trending one way or another, I think we can agree that it’s certainly improved in the last century.

    I doubt that a woman who wasn’t living in a close-knit, isolated, religious community, would tolerate being in an exclusive relationship with a man who has 85 other wives.

    HelixDab2,

    I agree that treatment of women has trended towards better over the last century, but it appears that it is trending worse right now. And given that young men are becoming increasingly right-wing, I fear that this trend could continue. It’s especially worrisome given that young men are trending to the right despite being less and less religious as a whole. We’re seeing courts and legislatures erode many protections for women–especially in regards to reproductive rights–that had been the law of the land for nearly half a century in some cases. Obviously we’re seeing a strong, sustained backlash against LGBTQ+ people, and that’s even extending to opposition to things like legalizing interracial marriage.

    I doubt that a woman who wasn’t living in a close-knit, isolated, religious community, would tolerate being in an exclusive relationship with a man who has 85 other wives.

    I have known a number of women that have been trapped in unhappy and abusive relationships because they lacked the economic ability to leave. It’s not far-fetched to imagine a wealthy person structuring a relationship to be economically punitive to any person that tried to exit. Shit, my ex-wife did her level best to bankrupt me and leave me homeless, and we were poor; if she’d had $50k to drop on an attorney, I would have been homeless. That’s definitely a strong disincentive to leaving.

    blackstampede,

    Abusive relationships aren’t unique to polygamy. Assuming that they occur in polygamous relationships at roughly the same rate that they do in monogamous relationships, and that polygamous relationships are less common over all, I think it’s unlikely that highly lopsided marriages would occur often enough that the number of single men would rise drastically and increase the likelihood of violence or civil unrest.

    Even assuming that wealthy men, specifically, would acquire and maintain large harems of women who are dependent financially or otherwise, there’s nothing stopping them from doing that now. All a marriage gets them is a higher risk of losing their wealth when one of their wives decides to leave.

    HelixDab2,

    Again: commodification. Wives as property. That’s the problem, and the likely outcome of allowing polygamy. That’s historically always been the problem, and given the way society appears to be going, that would likely be the problem.

    blackstampede,

    47% of workers, 42% of managers, and roughly 62% of people engaged in polyamorous relationships are women. Women are financially, socially, and politically more powerful than at any time in the past, and if polyamorous relationships are anything to go by, then we should expect polygamous marriages to be skewed toward multiple men to each woman, rather than the other way around.

    HelixDab2,

    …You actually just demonstrated my point. If 62% percent of the people in polyamorous relationships are women, that means that there are fewer men ‘monopolizing’ more women. Socially, that’s not a good thing. If you wanted to demonstrate that women had more power in relationships, you would need to show that there were fewer women in polyamorous relationship, e.g., that is was more common to have a single woman with multiple male partners, rather than a man with multiple female partners.

    blackstampede, (edited )

    Sorry, I was in the middle of doing something else when I wrote that, and not thinking clearly.

    Either way, polyamory is the biggest example of large scale, voluntary, non-religious, polygamy-like relationships that we have, and it’s stabilized at +12% women, which is a far cry from the harems you’ve described. We’ve also been assuming that they’re straight, which they are not. Some estimates put the prevalence of bisexuality at 50% among poly women, much higher than in the broader population.

    Most examples of broadly polygamous societies were a long time ago, highly religious, and had no access to modern technology, transportation, or media. Women at the time could be kept as property because they were taught by their religion and culture that it was right, because they didn’t have the ability to travel quickly to get away, because they often didn’t have money or property, and because their society didn’t recognize them as legal people.

    None of this is true now.

    HelixDab2,

    Look around you. Look at Alabama, at Texas, at Louisiana, at the ‘Freedom’ caucus in the House, at consistent efforts to eliminate bodily autonomy for women, and roll back women’s rights, and how those efforts are succeeding. Look at the way conservative states are limiting access to factual educational materials for children (and adults!) in public libraries, and they way that they’re trying to limit speech online.

    We’re not far from regressing back to a point where women were property. We are dangerously close.

    blackstampede, (edited )

    No, we’re not.

    There have been recent challenges to freedom of speech, bodily autonomy, and privacy, along with other developments that both of us disagree with and find to be dangerous. But there is a vast distance between where we currently are and a society in which women are considered property. Women hold roughly 30% of public offices (varying between about 25% and 35% depending on type of office), are about 20% of the US military, and as I said before, fill almost half the working and management positions in the country.

    It is not possible to make women property or force them to be subservient at scale. They may not be equally represented everywhere, and there is certainly room for improvement, but they hold too much power for this to happen.

    sukhmel,

    There may be a gender cap then, no more than one person of each gender

    HelixDab2,

    Oh, that I’d be fine with.

    clif,

    It’s pretty easy to get registered to perform weddings in TN… And many other states.

    Universal life Church is well known online ordination “place” that has been accepted with zero scrutiny in two other states by me and in TN by a friend.

    I’ll just leave this info here, do with it what you will.

    sentient_loom,
    @sentient_loom@sh.itjust.works avatar

    I really didn’t think we’d move backwards like this, but here we are.

    treefrog,

    Progress often seems to be three steps forward, two steps back.

    HorreC,
    HorreC avatar

    If I was a state over I would be on top of this, never wanted to work in the government but this seems like a reason to stick my spanner in the works. They would be salty the times when I just dont feel like giving anyone a marriage, and I have a moral objection to...... rich men marrying younger females, ganna have to stick to my guns on that one too.

    FlyingSquid,
    @FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

    I can see all kinds of things to object to based on my conscience if I moved to Tennessee and got a job giving out marriage licenses!

    Not enough sexual partners to know firmly if you two are sexually compatible? Sorry, I’m going to have to object, on my conscience, to giving you a marriage license.

    There’s an age gap of more than four years between you? Sorry, I’m going to have to object, on my conscience, to giving you a marriage license.

    One or both of you already have children? Sorry, I’m going to have to object, on my conscience, to giving you a marriage license.

    You don’t have the same blood type? Sorry, I’m going to have to object, on my conscience, to giving you a marriage license.

    Neither of you speak Swedish? Sorry, I’m going to have to object, on my conscience, to giving you a marriage license.

    You’re white and Christian? Sorry, I’m going to have to object, on my conscience, to giving you a marriage license.

    Spitzspot,
    @Spitzspot@lemmings.world avatar

    The GOP hate/persecution list:

    HOMELESS, IMMIGRANTS, DRUG ADDICTS, BLACK PEOPLE MENTALLY AND PHYSICALLY DISABLED PEOPLE, GAY PEOPLE, UNIONISTS, SOCIAL DEMOCRATS:

    www.hmd.org.uk/…/nazi-persecution/

    FlyingSquid,
    @FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

    You don’t have to leave out Jews just because they aren’t the Nazis from Germany.

    After all… “Jews will not replace us.” Something said by those very nice people on one of the both sides.

    (Muslims too, don’t mean to leave you folks out, you’re also victims of the Republican hate machine.)

    Zerlyna,
    @Zerlyna@lemmy.world avatar

    They hate everyone. I don’t get how they still have support.

    1D10,

    The people who vote for them are ignorant and angry, and the people who fund the gop are the only people who benefit from their policies.

    Jaysyn,
    Jaysyn avatar

    They are currently just paying Trump's legal bills.

    Infynis,
    @Infynis@midwest.social avatar

    That’s what the chumps are for

    agent_flounder,
    @agent_flounder@lemmy.world avatar

    It would be quicker and more complete to list who they don’t persecute.

    lolcatnip,

    That’s a woefully incomplete list.

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