North Country Sen. Betty Little “a No vote” on gay marriage
I spoke a few minutes ago with Dan Macentee, spokesman for state Sen. Betty Little. He described an unprecedented barrage of emails and phone calls on the issue of same-sex marriage.
The issue has been moving rapidly, with Sen. Little’s fellow Republican Senator Roy McDonald — whose district snakes up into the Queensbury area — announcing that he will change his vote to a Yes.
In the past, Sen. Little has described this as “a difficult issue.” Two Republican assemblywomen from her district — Janet Duprey and Teresa Sayward — have been strong supporters of same-sex marriage, describing it as “a civil right.”
According to Macentee, however, Sen. Little “is a No vote” on the issue.
Sen. Little has been described at times as a possible swing vote on gay marriage, but her voting record is pretty consistent at this point and appears to be heartfelt rather than political.
The Senate’s Republican leaders have made it clear that lawmakers should vote their consciences on this issue.
And while a Yes vote might trigger a primary challenge for Sen. Little, Assemblywoman Duprey survived a conservative challenge last year handily.
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well, no, there’s certainly no contradiction here, only sloppy logic on your part. full equality and integration for gays just means… giving them whatever straights have. if you think a man and a woman have the “right” to a legally recognized marriage/civil union, then equality means giving gays the same “right.” if you think a man and woman have something short of a “right” to that (as seems to be the case from your 6:57 comment?), whatever it is, that’s what gays get too. that’s all that equality means. it doesn’t require you to exactly specify to what extent straights do or don’t have the right.
of course you can say that. because the two things have nothing to do with each other. that’s what my whole previous comment was about.
this polygamy thing, in the context of the gay marriage debate, is bs for the following reason. many opponents of equality for gays like to posit that there’s a compelling analogy between gay marriage and polygamy. it’s supposed to be such a compelling analogy that if we legalize gay marriage, we’ll have to legalize polygamy too. but upon inspection, it’s actually a terrible analogy. gay marriage is orthogonal to polygamy. and so the whole argument falls apart.
unfortunately, bret, you’re one of the people pushing this terrible analogy and its attendant line of argument. and to push this argument means there’s no freakin’ way you can say that a straight marriage is fine and dandy but a plural marriage isn’t. that was, again, the point of my previous comment.
for some arguments against polygamy, have a look here.
as i said before i think that would be totally fine. but it’s also a punt! i could say that i’d like to resolve the world’s financial problems by unleashing an army of benevolent leprechauns to hand over lots of gold to everyone. but that’s evidently not going to happen. and so it goes with the government getting out of the marriage business — it’s never going to happen. if you think there’s a big outcry about the advent of gay marriage supposedly “weakening” straight marriage, then just imagine the response if the government actually decided to stop calling people’s marriages by that term!
right, and i’m sure that’s all the abolition of jim crow was about too. you simply couldn’t be more wrong and hurtful.
I support gay marriage and equal and civil rights above all. I wish Senator Little did too and have informed her as such.
Bret4207: plural marriage is chauvinistic, patriarchal and is historically rooted in arranged marriage practices, where the bride is not given a choice and the choice is made by a father and/or religious figure. I know that this may not be the case 100%, but if you want your daughter to grow up in an equal society and not an ancient misogynistic religious order, then you might want to reconsider your perspective and argument on free choice in plural marriages.
Oh, and for all of the religious minded bigots, please note that our truly great and wise Greek fore-fathers were also the gayest old bunch. The famed 300 Spartans of Thermopylae would have made Barney Frank blush. Did the sky fall on them, or did they flourish and develop the political order that would one day inspire the Nation that now gives you freedom from religious and monarchical tyranny?
Perhaps you should turn away from the Levantine and restudy the Greek Bibles like our Founding Fathers actually did after thousands of years of religious and monarchical rule.
Equal rights for ALL!!!
ht,
I couldn’t have said it better.
The ideas that have been expressed by “religious” people on this topic, and other issues, seem to be extremely intolerant of any one that does not see the world as they do. The concept that the rules of a “correct” life and “God’s will” are known to anyone and that those so endowed must “save” us, is beyond my comprehension.
I am 70 years old and have always worked to be tolerant of their narrow-minded and simplistic views however; I find my self becoming aggressively intolerant of people who, under the guise of being righteous, endorse the limiting of another person’s rights or circumstances. These changes trouble me, as it is my intent to always be openminded and contemplative. If we are all “children of God,” is it not illlogical, that there are people who’s rights can be limited by law because of who they are? Do we burn witches?
HT, sorry, I don’t have much time to respond.
Glad to see you got a new thesaurus. It sure is impressive when you can use the word orthogonal instead of irrelevant, or completely independent. Of course the fact is the issues of gay marriage and plural marriage are no more irrelevant in the context we’re speaking of here than gay marriage and heterosexual marriage are. You refuse to deal with it, fine. But covering your ears and shouting “NAAAHHHHAAAHHH” won’t change the fact that the subjects are intertwined and that opening the door for one opens the door for the other.
Tom, you’re right. Limiting the rights of people seeking plural marriage or to marry close blood relatives or those who wish to marry animal or trees is no more right than limiting gays.
to review, bret, my position is that gay marriage and plural marriage aren’t very analogous at all. and therefore the argument that allowing gay marriage must compel us to allow plural marriage is bunk.
and the the thing is, i’ve actually made my case for why i think the analogy between gay marriage and plural marriage is a terrible one. i made it in the second paragraph of my 2:19 post. and i gave a nice little link in my last post. none of this seems have registered with you. from the rauch piece:
earlier in this thread you wrote, “So if [gay marriage] is fair and right, then why would it be fair and right to limit plural unions?” well, jonathan rauch just gave you an answer. and hey, fair enough, maybe you don’t think his point is sufficient to outlaw plural marriage. but so what? the point i’m making is that gay marriage and plural marriage are really different. the analogy between them is terrible. rauch’s point demonstrates this perfectly.
so when you write (my emphasis)
you’re making a fool of yourself. quite the opposite of “refusing to deal with it,” i’ve actually engaged with the matter and made my case. but what’s worse, you’re making a hypocrite of yourself. for i have offered my thoughts as part of a good-faith discussion, and you, in turn, have done nothing but cover your ears to them.
so let me give you a homework assignment: make the argument. overcome your hypocrisy. explain why allowing gay marriage will logically compel us to allow plural marriage too. in everything you’ve said so far, you’ve taken it as an obvious fact that this is the case — now really explain it. explain why there’s a strong analogy between gay and plural marriage. explain why this analogy is so strong, why the two are so similar, that one makes the other inevitable. explain why there can’t be any differences between them that allow us to distinguish our policy approaches to them. as you explain yourself, make sure your argument doesn’t show that plural marriage is also logically compelled by heterosexual marriage. or if you find that heterosexual marriage does also compel plural marriage, explain why gay marriage is still relevant. i’d love to hear your thoughts.
and sorry to say it, but “orthogonal” is a word i use in everyday conversation. no thesaurus necessary!
it occurs to me that i should also propose a bonus question for bret. in your 10:04 comment you wrote about civil unions:
so my question is, if opening the door to gay marriage necessarily opens the door to plural marriage, why doesn’t opening the door to gay civil unions open the door to plural civil unions? or does it in fact open the door to plural civil unions, in which case, why is that not a problem?
Bret,
Your sarcastic remarks equating gay marriage to bestiality, incest and marrying inanimate objects just proves that you are a bigot. So no matter how much you rationalize and argue the issue, you might as well just say I am against gay marriage because I am a bigot and equate homosexuality with incest and bestiality. You are awfully wordy for being so simple.
Big Red, insults at the 3 rd post? That’s the best you can do? FYI Big Boy, the Spartans were around in 380 BC, long before Christianity got it’s start. So what the Spartans have to do with the Bible and The Founders I don’t see. I would also note that the Greek culture died out from the same thing the Roman culture did- liberalism breeding corruption breeding apathy and eventual dissolution. We should learn from history.
BTW- work on your reading comprehension. I said marriage, not having sex with animals, relatives, etc. And after reading your remarks regarding people of faith… well, I guess you’re a bigot too, eh?
For the record- I am NOT in favor of plural “marriages”, “marriages” of people to animals, trees, rocks or multiple other people ror close relatives. I’m not in favor of “marriages” of men to men or women to women either. Why? Because it’s not a marriage. In our culture and society for the past thousand years or so marriage has been one man, one woman. That’s my beef. So no HT, heterosexual marriages of one man, one woman doesn’t open the door to everything else in that sense because nothing else IS a marriage. In other words, IMO, heterosexual marriage int he traditional sense is orthogonal to gay marriage, plural marriage, human/animal/tree marriage, etc. With all due respect to HT and the other pro gay marriage crowd, I understand WHY you think it’s just and fair. I just disagree with the basic idea that altering a term to fit something altogether different is the right way to go about this. But don;t worry, you’ll win in the end. I’ll be interested to see how long it is before something else like plural marriage becomes vital to obtain rights for an oppressed group.
Hey HT, you didn’t want to play my game in the other thread, I’m not taking homework assignments from you.
well of course you’re not going to explain yourself, bret. because you can’t. your position is unsupportable. you’re just going to stand there as a hypocrite. no problem with attacking others (falsely, at that) for things you turn right around and do yourself. you’re caught red-handed, but you’re never going to acknowledge it or apologize for it. not how you roll.
by the way, given that you’ve no intention of facing up to your hypocrisy or admitting that you’re wrong, bringing up that other thread is probably a pretty good diversionary tactic. but i should remind you that, as i explained over and over in that thread, your “game” was already taken into account by the cbo analysis i mentioned. so, as so often seems to be the case, you’re full of it.
Insults, that’s all you can come up with. There’s no hypocrisy in my opinion of what marriage means. It’s entirely based on your values and perception. You want, desperately, to believe you are right. I disagree based on the traditional meaning of words like marriage. I’m not even discussing whether or not being gay is good or bad, right or wrong, I’m talking about definitions we use and what the change may bring. To you it’s wrong to limit peoples ability to marry based on their sex. Yet you support limiting other peoples desire to marry based on your values. That is hypocrisy too HT. Why is it right to limit some people but not others? That’s the question that you basically ask me when I say gay marriage is wrong. You want full equality for gays. So why not full equality for plural marriages, marriages of close relatives, etc.? You say I’m wrong for applying my values to the issue, but you are doing the same thing and then calling me a hypocrite! You certainly won’t admit you’re wrong despite the fact nothing you’ve offered convinces me that my position has any less merit than yours.
We’re right back at square one, same as always.
HT- here’s the key point in the other thread that let’s you fall on your face. Your words- “i don’t have the time or patience to wade through the cbo analysis right now, so i don’t know if it takes any of manzi’s objections into account. ” Bingo, you don’t know what the CBO took into account and what massaging was done. You WANT to believe that your position and you cherry pick the numbers that back up your opinion.
bret, for goodness’s sake, try harder! your sloppiness, the lack of precision in your thinking, the ridiculous ways you twist my words (or more likely, fail to understand their plain meaning in the first place), it’s all breathtaking. i’m sorry to insult you but it’s exactly what you’ve earned. and rather than whine about it, i’d suggest subjecting yourself to a bit of that good old conservative personal responsibility and make some improvements.
i’m obviously not calling you a hypocrite for your position on marriage itself. and how should you know this? you should know this by actually reading what i’ve written in this thread. two comments above, in my 12:13 post, i laid out plain-as-day why you’re a hypocrite. it’s not because of your position on marriage. it’s because you accused me of “not dealing with it” and “covering my ears and yelling ‘naaahhhaaahhhh'” when this is exactly what you’ve done yourself! if you’d like to stop being a hypocrite, then go ahead and make the argument why gay marriage will lead to plural marriage. don’t punt on any of the points i raised in the next-to-last paragraph of my 12:13 comment or in my 1:16 comment. show me what you’ve got.
as for the other thread, this is just… not very savvy. i confess, i never did take a detailed look at the cbo analysis. and i still don’t know if it addresses the narrow, specific points that manzi raised. but this quote of mine you’re using, it doesn’t prove your point at all! this “game” you talk about playing, it’s all about how increased fuel/electricity/energy costs will filter through the economy and increase costs for everyone. go look at the thread — you mention this game at several points, and each time this is plainly what you mean. and the thing is, just a cursory glance at the cbo analysis tells you that this is exactly what it’s about! i don’t know how many more ways i can say it. it makes no sense when you accuse me of not playing your game, because the cbo has already played it for me. now, if you don’t like this or that way that the cbo played the game, then the onus is on you to explain why (and recall that the manzi piece you cited talked about the epa’s analysis of the bill, not the cbo’s). but to accuse me of not playing the game is just wrong wrong wrong!
HT, I DID explain why I believe one will follow the other, numerous times! Use the same argument that’s being used for gay marriage- ” Who will it hurt, we have rights, we’re a loving couple/group that is denied our basic rights like straight and gay couples”. Simple as that. I realize you think you are just SOOOOOO much smarter than dumb old farmer Bret, but honest to God, it’s all there in black and white. You refuse to even consider the possibility that one could follow the other, you simply say they are irrelevant to each other and that my scenario won’t happen. So, you put your hands over your ears, etc. That’s not listening, that’s making up your mind and sticking with your opinion.
I’ll have to get back to you on the other thing, I have to work and pay taxes here ya know.
Bret – I am just calling a spade a spade and as for this:
“work on your reading comprehension. I said marriage, not having sex with animals, relatives, etc.”
As a Christian (or even not) I would assume that you believe that one certainly follows the other. But really that is just laughable and you appear to be quite an impassioned person who is not open to argument, just arguing. Much like my wife at certain times.
Also, however the Greek and Roman civilizations happened to decline, the advancements they made in political organization, civil society, arts, literature, philosophy and agriculture (think large public works like aqueducts) were the pinnacle of thousands of years of western history. This was followed by over a thousand years of human travesty where the Christian church and tyrants suppressed most of what is good in mankind.
When the founders of our nation looked for a model for our future government, is it a surprise that the best models were from a period known as B.C.
i have to begin by apologizing, bret. i did lay out plain-as-day why you’re a hypocrite in my 12:13 post. and i stand by every word there. but in my most recent comment i wrote
now, of course you have punted on almost all the points i raised in my 12:13 and 1:16 comments. i’d still like to see you explain why there can’t be any differences between gay and plural marriage that allow us to distinguish our policy approaches to them, or why opening the door to gay civil unions doesn’t open the door to plural civil unions.
but i was too sloppy myself with the first sentence in that quote. i was hoping that context would make clear what i meant, but i don’t think it did. i honestly don’t think this rises to the level of sloppiness that you’ve been reaching in your posts, but it’s still sloppy. and i’ve been complaining about your sloppiness, so i apologize.
the way that first sentence is worded, it sounds like my beef is simply that you haven’t explained why gay marriage will lead to plural marriage. and as you rightly point out, you have. i don’t think your argument withstands much scrutiny, but at least you’ve made it. and that was a sloppy sentence for me to write because it really misrepresents why i think you’re a hypocrite, which i explained in the “so when you write” paragraph of my 12:13 comment. the problem is that you’ve completely covered your ears to the points i’ve raised, but you have the gall to accuse me (falsely, at that) of covering my own. and to summarize, i proposed in the following paragraph of my 12:13 comment that you remedy your hypocrisy not just by reiterating your argument for why gay marriage will lead to plural marriage, but by addressing and rebutting the points i raised.
if you’re content to remain a hypocrite, then just keep doing what you’re doing. if you want to apologize, as i have done here, then that would be great too. if you want to actually address my points, then show me what you got.
what on earth does you being a farmer have to do with this? i grew up around loads of farmers. like, well, people in general, some of them aren’t so smart, and some of them are incredibly smart. it really sounds like you have an inferiority complex, and i wish you wouldn’t project it onto me.
look, i certainly acknowledge this. i mean, it’s possible that gay marriage today somehow follows from interracial marriage 45 years ago. and that interracial marriage 45 years ago had something to do with the mormon church outlawing polygamy over a century ago. i mean, hey, maybe you’re right, once you allow any change at all to marriage, then anything becomes possible. (but on the other hand, if we’ve already changed marriage to allow for interracial couples, then isn’t the genie already out of the bottle? why should allowing gay marriage make any further difference?)
but i don’t think any of that is right. i think there are important differences between these forms of marriage, and that these important differences give good reason to treat them differently. that’s what the rauch piece i cited above is all about. it’s patently untrue that the arguments for gay and plural marriage are equivalent; as he put it, again,
that’s an excellent reason for allowing gay marriage but prohibiting plural marriage. allowing gay marriage does nothing to invalidate the argument against plural marriage. allowing gay marriage has no bearing on the argument that plural marriage, in practice, acts to suppress women. these are all examples of why i think gay marriage is orthogonal to plural marriage. and the force of that is that, if we allow gay marriage, the argument against plural marriage remains perfectly well intact. and i think that argument will be plenty robust to resist any push to legalize plural marriage.
so when you make the argument
for why gay marriage is supposed to lead to plural marriage, i think you’re making a mistake. it’s with the “who will it hurt” part. plural marriage has a number of serious negative consequences which gay marriage doesn’t. i think that makes all the difference in the world.
First off, you have no need to apologize HT. This subject is almost pure emotion and theory, I cut people a lot of slack on this stuff.
Look at this- “Same-sex marriage stabilizes individuals, couples, communities, and society by extending marriage to many who now lack it. Polygamy destabilizes individuals, couples, communities, and society by withdrawing marriage from many who now have it.”
Okay, in my mind that is the biggest bunch of crap I’ve seen in a long time. How exactly does gay marriage do what plural marriage won’t? I’m not talking about Fundamentalist Mormon plural marriage where the Bishop directs some 13 year old girl to the bed of a 60 year old Saint. I’m talking willing adults with their eyes open. Yeah, it’s not a large segment of the population, but that’s not the issue really, the gay population that wishes to marry isn’t very large either. We’re talking concept and theory here. If gay marriage of consenting adults is good, then how does it follow that plural marriage of consenting adults is automatically bad? Or how does it follow that close relatives marriage is bad? (I won’t go into marrying trees and cows because that just irritates you.) To me when you automatically discount plural marriage as a perversion and plainly wrong you sound just like that Trombley guy equating gays with diseased dogs. You wouldn’t accept me pointing out the violence and dominance issues in gay male relationships as a reason to bar gay marriage because it’s irrelevant to the issue. It follows that cherry picking the bad in this issue is wrong for either side. So what has happened in the past in plural marriages where there is sexism or control or other not so nice issues isn’t germane to the issue of marriage where those issues don’t exist.
Why do I harp on the possibility that one will follow the other? You said it yourself, interracial marriage was banned at one time. If we allow 2 whites or blacks to marry, we should allow 2 gays to marry. If we allow to gays to marry then how can we ban 3 gays from marrying? At least with interracial marriage it met the traditional idea of 1 man, 1 woman. But if skin color is no bar and sex is no bar then how can we possibly bar people based on a number or relationship? Move from theory to reality- should the time come that a vocal minority desires plural marriages or marriage of close relatives…what is the defense against it going to be? You can’t because of a number? You can’t because it’s your sister, even though her tubes are tied and you had a vasectomy and have no intention of rearing children? Are you going to call it PERVERSE?
I don’t see a defense that can logically be made. You wish to corrupt a term and it’s definition because you see barring gay marriage as unfair. Well, when you change the terms definition you change more than just that. Unintended consequences.
As for my “inferiority complex”, I look at it as your self inflated ego. Somewhere in this thread you said I was incapable of understanding what you wrote, ie- I’m dumb. News flash, I may not agree with you and the points you make, but I can certainly understand them, even when your thinking is jumbled and not worded well. You seem to have a real hard time grasping what I’m clearly saying. I put that down to my communication skills rather than you being an idiot. I call that humility.
Red, the Romans and Greeks were also big on slavery and sacrifice. The Founders took the best from the various ages and societies. They also took the best from Biblical teachings and thoughts, they left the bad behind. The Nazis developed the autobahn and rocket science, does it follow we should have taken the death camps and human medical experimentation with the interstate highway idea?
Your bigotry is clear to see. If you want to make an argument, you’re going to have to do better than simple insults and cherry picking bits and pieces.
bret, i suspect we’re both getting tired of this thread, so i’ll totally understand if you want to stop. but let me ask you a question that i think might have a clarifying effect. according to you, why is plural marriage a bad thing? why is it something to be avoided or outlawed? is it just that it will open the door to other kinds of marriage arrangements? or does it have its own intrinsic problems that, in your view, make it undesirable?
Yeah, we’ve about beat this horse to death, but I enjoy debating with you.
Plural marriage…in some ways I can understand those who seek it, both male and female. For some people it must seem “normal”. I can’t relate to it myself any more than I can to a gay relationship. I would think it must also seem “normal” to some that would like to have a legally recognized marriage to a close relative, as uncomfortable as it makes me feel. Why am I not in favor of those marriages? A couple reasons-first, because they aren’t marriages, that is one man, one woman. I’m sorry if it get’s old, but to me that’s a marriage. Secondly because it’s just not “normal”. Maybe that makes me close minded or a bigot hatemonger or something, but when you have a relationship so far outside societal/cultural norms…it just feels to me like there’s a reason they are so far out of the norm. As Igor said, “Abby something….”.
My apologies to my good Mormon friends and gay friends, (yes, I have both), but what is natural/normal for some just isn’t for others.
We can carry on on the other, newer thread if you want HT.
And thanks, I get tired of talking to sheep and horses sometimes.
if that’s how you feel about plural marriage, bret, then i can understand why you’re concerned about gay marriage opening the door to plural marriage — or maybe to get rid of that problematic m-word, let’s say plural civil unions instead. personally, i don’t feel that just because something doesn’t feel “normal” to me, that’s anywhere near sufficient reason to prevent other people from doing it. i feel like the bar has to be much higher. i mean, after all, we’re talking about a major restriction of freedom here — few things are more basic to the human experience than who you marry. and if i’m going to call for a major restriction of freedom on someone, then i really ought to have a very good reason for it.
and i should also say that i find this problematic:
it’s totally fine to take that as a guide for yourself and your own relationships. but it’s really something else to try to impose that on everyone else.
But HT, you do the same thing. You form an opinion based on your views, feelings, “gut instinct”. In my family I have relatives that are entirely in favor of what are clearly harmful and addictive behaviors. Should I give them a complete pass because they enjoy or desire something harmful? Alcohol kills brain cells and pot is not a benign substance. Yet many here and across the nation are entirely in favor of those substances. Or take guns- many people are for the complete outlawing of ownership of firearms for any reason. Or cars- many are for the severe restriction of fuel use for instance. Where does choice and personal freedom enter into all this? We all form opinions based on what seems “normal” or “right” to us. It doens’t mean we always get our way, but it also doens’t mean we’re “wrong” for seeing things that way.
no doubt there’s an element of truth to what you’re saying, but i don’t think that gets it right.
here’s my model for how i form positions on the kinds of issues that come up on this blog (or at least this is the process that i try to go through — i definitely can’t claim that i do it perfectly every time). let’s say that controversial position X comes up. i try to think of all the reasons why X would be good. and then i try to think of all the reasons why X would be bad. and then i try to think of what some alternative possibilities would be, and think about the pros and cons of those. and then i look at all my pro-and-con lists. and i use my values and judgment to evaluate and weight the different pros and cons, and then i add everything up and see what comes out on top.
so no doubt, my values and “gut instinct” are definitely part of the process for me — as they are for everyone.
but, crucially, there’s a lot more to the process than just those. in particular, i think it’s really important to be able to explain why i’m for or against something, rather than letting gut instinct run the whole show. i mean, otherwise, why bother thinking about anything?
and you’ve done this too with the examples you’ve raised. you don’t just have a bad feeling about alcohol, you gave a specific reason why, namely that it kills brain cells. surely you could come up with other specific reasons if i asked you.
and you don’t just have a bad feeling about pot, you said it’s not a benign substance. and well, ok, that’s not saying a whole lot more, but if i asked i bet you could come up with a bunch of concrete ways in which it’s bad.
so again, i think that giving reasons why we think something is good or bad is a vital part of how we, erm, reason. to put things only in terms of values or feelings or gut instincts leaves that part out.
and sure enough, you can say your “reason” for opposing something is simply that you have a gut feeling against it. that’s allowable in my book. but my judgment is that that’s a very weak reason to be against something, and it’s an incredibly weak reason to use to try to restrict someone else’s behavior.
of course i’ve used my own feelings and values to render those judgments. your own feelings and values may lead to you different judgments; maybe you think that have a gut feeling against something is all the justification anyone needs. if so we would probably have to agree to disagree. but i do at least think it would be helpful to both of us see where exactly in the process the disagreement is located.
i feel like i’m losing the thread (or perhaps it’s already long gone), so let me bring this back to plural civil unions. so far all you’ve said is that you’re against them because they’re not “normal” (actually you said this about plural marriages, but i’m assuming the same goes for plural civil unions). maybe you’ve thought more about this since i originally asked, so are there any other reasons that you’re against them? are there any specific, concrete reasons why you view them as bad?