Gay Marriage

Miss Anthrope said:
The only reason my husband and I are legally married is because of legal concerns, in the realm of "if something awful happens". We never needed or cared about the ceremony. It's only to ensure we have the legal rights of next of kin.

Take away all the social engineering concerns and you are left with this: gay couples are not getting the full legal protection and recognition across the US (and world) that they deserve as human beings. People are people are people. Gay adults should have the same right to make this choice that straight adults do.
Click to expand...

Yep. :p

EDIT: And I would have let my friend's Gay brother tickle my neice but he was more interested in bugging me. :)

Gays are okay around kids.
 
Everyone's posted the good arguments in defense of gay marriage, so I'll just leave the thread with this.

 
JJR said:
Yep. :p

EDIT: And I would have let my friend's Gay brother tickle my neice but he was more interested in bugging me. :)

Gays are okay around kids.
Click to expand...

Good, because my gay friends love my kids, and vice versa. I'd hate to think they were giving them cooties this whole time :wackyjiggy:
 
Ryokan said:
Or maybe not?

It's only in your country it's a right/left issue. Comes from only having two points of view; so if one is for, the other is against. In my country it's a much more complex issue, with parties both on the left and right being for/against.
Click to expand...

I've been very curious about why Norway doesn't have marriage yet. Would you mind summarizing what the arguments and state of affairs are there? I've been attempting to pay attention to marriage rights in Norway and the rest of Scandanavia since my family is historically mostly from there, so I'd love the inside perspective.

A good friend of mine just got domestic partner'd due to Washington State's new law that gives a couple of the rights of marriage (hospital visitation, inheritence and a couple other less controversial ones). This is their third time getting registered as a couple, having gotten married in Oregon when the Portland mayor was ignoring state law and in British Columbia after Canada started allowing marriage. His BF/DP/husband asked him how many times they were going to have to do this, and the response was "as many as it takes".
Shouldn't the "family values" right wing take note of the effort that people like this are making to be a family and realize that this is good for marriage? Obviously they won't, of course.
 
Gay people who insist on getting married over and over again make a mockery of the sanctity of marriage, where you only have to do it once.

[/joke]
 
pgwenthold said:
Gay people who insist on getting married over and over again make a mockery of the sanctity of marriage, where you only have to do it once.

[/joke]
Click to expand...

The best line I heard is that people who are genuinely interested in defending marriage ought to be going after divorce.
 
I'll preface this by saying I have no moral or other objection to gay marriage, nor am I arguing against it. This is just the regurgitation of some thoughts I've had on the subject.

Legal status as next of kin is an important component of marriage. Another is to confer the benefits of a full-time long term job to women who may be unable to earn such benefits for themselves due to the disruptions from pregnancy and child rearing. While the importance of the second has decreased in modern times, it can't be overlooked. The financial burden on governments and employers due to these spousal benefits is very high. IMO, they should only be provided to partners in parenting as there is no inherent need for a spouse to get a share of their deceased spouse's retirement if they had a full working life.

IMO, governments should reduce marriage to its minimum form: A legal partnership that conveys a legal familial relationship and some degree of co-ownership of household assets. The addition of a second legal relationship, that of a cooperative parenting partnership that could be established between the legal parents of a child, either by nature or adoption or some combination of the two could be used for the sharing of benefits like retirement, medical insurance etc..
 
In My Spare Time said:
I've been very curious about why Norway doesn't have marriage yet. Would you mind summarizing what the arguments and state of affairs are there? I've been attempting to pay attention to marriage rights in Norway and the rest of Scandanavia since my family is historically mostly from there, so I'd love the inside perspective.
Click to expand...

Seattle is riddled with Scandinavians. I have a ton of distant relatives there.

Anyway, the matter is a bit complicated, with a lot of political horse trading, but I'll try to explain.

There is majority in parliament for gay marriage, and there has been so for quite some time now. However, our last administration was a coalition between the Liberal Party, the Conservative Party and the Christian People's Party. The Christian People's Party is actually a center party, although a right leaning one, so not really comparable to the Christian right of the USA - more like the Christian Democrats of Germany. However, they're against gay marriage, and blocked any attempt to get it through parliament.

Our current administration consists of a coalition of Labor, the Socialist Left Party and the Center Party. The Center Party is a left leaning center party, mostly dealing with rural and agrarian matters. But they're also very conservative, more so than most parties on the right (probably because of the rural part), and are against gay marriage and has blocked any attempt to get it through parliament.

Both these parties think the issue is so important, they are not willing to be part of a coalition that makes gay marriage legal in Norway.

There was an attempt two years ago to sneak it through parliament, where Labor and the Socialist Left Party tried to make a deal with the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party. This deal, however, said that religious groups that were against gay marriage would be forced to have to marry gays, and this was not acceptable to the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party, who thought that groups who didn't accept gay marriage wouldn't have to marry them.

There is still work being done on this, though, and since there is, in fact, majority in parliament for this, I doubt it'll be long before we see gay marriages in Norway.

It's not a hot issue in Norway, though. Gay partnerships, cohabitating couples and married couples have pretty much the same rights already.

The only really gay issue that is still hot in Norway is that of adoption rights, and although there's also majority for this in parliament, I'm not so sure the majority of citizens favor it. But we're getting there.

Hope this wasn't too confusing :p
 
EvilSmurf said:
Thank you for helping me find my new career direction. Studying lesbian couples in detail sounds like fun.
Click to expand...

Not to burst your bubble, but they don't typically look like the lesbians you find in porn.


ETA: Just to clarify, because it occurred to me after I posted it how this could be taken: Before somebody thinks I'm calling lesbians ugly, all I'm saying is that porn lesbians aren't representative of real lesbians anymore than porn stars or situations are representative of real life. It was a shot at EvilSmurf, not lesbians.
 
Last edited:
Freethinker said:
<snip>

IMO, governments should reduce marriage to its minimum form: A legal partnership that conveys a legal familial relationship and some degree of co-ownership of household assets. The addition of a second legal relationship, that of a cooperative parenting partnership that could be established between the legal parents of a child, either by nature or adoption or some combination of the two could be used for the sharing of benefits like retirement, medical insurance etc..
Click to expand...


Since you include adoption as an option, I think that both elements of your definition of marriage could be equally met by couples of any combination of gender. I know you were saying that you were not arguing against gay marriage, and I just wanted to clarify this for my own benefit.
 
Ryokan said:
Seattle is riddled with Scandinavians. ...snip...
Hope this wasn't too confusing :p
Click to expand...

There are quite a few of us here, but it's nothing like Wisconsin/Minnesota.

Your explanation helped a lot, thanks much. My lack of knowledge of the issues the Center Party focuses on seems to have caused most of my confusion.
 
Hokulele said:
Since you include adoption as an option, I think that both elements of your definition of marriage could be equally met by couples of any combination of gender. I know you were saying that you were not arguing against gay marriage, and I just wanted to clarify this for my own benefit.
Click to expand...

Yes, I did mean any combination of parents. Gay, straight, cross-dressing. You name it.
 
EvilSmurf said:
Thank you for helping me find my new career direction. Studying lesbian couples in detail sounds like fun.
Click to expand...

You're probably going to be disappointed to find most lesbians, look less like supermodels and more like regular people.
 
pgwenthold said:
You don't see why the absence of a contract should prevent one from getting all the benefits one would get if there were a contract?
Click to expand...

No, I don't see why a third party (government) should grant rights to individuals simply because they have entered into a contract with each other which the government is not a party to.
 
Ryokan said:
It's not a hot issue in Norway, though. Gay partnerships, cohabitating couples and married couples have pretty much the same rights already.
Click to expand...

Given the queries in this thread about how to define a cohabiting couple, how does Norway go about it?
 
Norway still struggling over the Gay adoption uh-boy-I-might-be-kinda-a-Gayhippie-sometimes thang? Sounds like closed minded nazi nerd gypsy whispering from the San Diego Comic Con or something to me. Yet another nerd prom . . . unfolds.

I had good experiences with Gays as a teen (Rocky Horror Picture Show) and believe that it is possible for Gays to adopt children. I have had some problems with Gays but that's just due to their desire to be Communists. I cackle at my Southern friends for being NaziCatholics also so who is to say which extreme is worse? They're both closed-minded mindsets.

It's that friendly banter we need more of, "She's a Nazi . .. because she's Catholic!!! Dum dum DUUUMMM" . .. I said this to my neice recently because we were both raised Catholic and I wanted to help her. It's that half-teasing sugar coated jibe thing and I believe that in this case what works for family can work for a country or possibly the world.

Actually, I'd bet on it working for the world. I'd bet on it right now because we're all family. If that sounds at all ominous, then may I suggest that we have to stop worrying about who has been appointed for the, "Dad" position (who cares anyway?? Dad just gives us the quarters, we go play video games, and sub-leaders, pecking rights, and leadership are of the highest importance during the gaming mission. During play, we boss ourselves for the fun of it more than we get bossed by dear ol' pappy) and just try every day to do what we do with our family (even biting a head off or two when wronged).

Get er dun.
 
Last edited:
Jaggy Bunnet said:
No, I don't see why a third party (government) should grant rights to individuals simply because they have entered into a contract with each other which the government is not a party to.
Click to expand...

Are you against the idea of corporations as well?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom