Which do you think would be a bigger threat to your children's futures: 1) Some other random people you don't know getting married, or 2) Being broke.
Most intelligent people would recognize that option 2 is probably a bigger threat. In fact, above a threshold IQ of about 90, a person realizes that option 1 isn't even a threat at all, while option 2 could really imperil your children's lives. However, as profiled in an article in the Sacramento Bee, some people, who have donated incredible sums of money in favor of Proposition 8, which would amend the California constitution to ban gay marriage, somehow calculate otherwise.
This Sacramento Bee article is depressing. First, there's the Pattersons:
It's a traditional lifestyle they believe is now at risk. That's why the Pattersons recently made a huge financial sacrifice – they withdrew $50,000 from their savings and donated it to the Yes on Proposition 8 campaign, the ballot measure that seeks to ban same-sex marriage.
...
The Pattersons, who have been married 14 years, say there were thinking about their children's future when they decided to tap into their savings to contribute. And they also said no one pressured them into giving.
Then there's David Neilson:
"Absolutely not," said Nielson, a retired insurance executive. He and his wife, Susan, live on a budget. The couple donated $35,000, he said, "because some things are worth fighting for."
The couple will forgo a vacation for the next two years and make other sacrifices to pay for their donation, he said.
"If it doesn't pass, then at least I can tell my grandchildren I gave everything I could," Nielson said.
David, seriously, maybe your grandchildren would be better off with the two or more years of in-state tuition that the $35,000 could buy?
I just don't get what motivates these people. Even if, somehow, I could be convinced that two other people I don't know getting married effects me in any way whatsoever, I still don't think I could be convinced that it effects me to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars.
Yes, I understand that some people are narrow minded and easily led astray by demagogues. Yes, I understand that some people are ashamed of their own closeted homosexuality and will go to great lengths to keep it under wraps. But 35,000 dollars?? 50,000 dollars??
The fact that people would give so much money, much of their savings, to this cause astounds me. It is far beyond the notion that they and I disagree on some policy. They really think it is ok to put these vast sums of their money to this particular cause rather than to, say, feeding 1000 refugees for a year, or starting a college fund for their kid, or taking their whole family on an amazing life changing trip around the world, or paying down their niece's credit card, or rolling 2500 cigars in $20 bills and smoking them.
We are up against something truly scary that I don't comprehend. Can anyone help me understand?