Gay marriage in america

Right,
Having children is not a criteria for getting a marriage license. Indeed, No one is forced to take a test or prove their capability to raise a "healthy" child before they are given a marriage license. (so, even though it has been proven that Gays and Lesbians raise healthy children, it is a moot point)

The benifites of mariage are not contingent on haveing a child. Rights to health care, hospital visitation and bereavement are extended to all married people, not just married people with children.

 

Laetus, you ask why homosexuals should be allowed to marry, and not polygamous partners (or something to that effect)? I say, let polyamorous people marry whoever, and however many, they'd like as well! I don't understand why people who are straight and monogamous feel so threatened by the idea of relationship styles that are not the same as their own. I personally am bi-sexual and polyamorous. What does that mean to the straight, mono couple next door? Not a damn thing. I'm not out there trying to "turn" women into bi-sexuals. I'm not trying to say that just because it's what works for me, that everyone should be polyamorous. But that's what a fair majority of straight, monogamous people think they have the right to do. By litigating who may marry whom, and by enforcing laws that make homosexual sex punishable, despite being between consenting adults, they are trying to force their lifestyle onto everyone. It's illogical, and it goes against one of the founding principles of our country, which is that all men have the right to pursue their own happiness. I wish more people would remember "Do unto others as you would have done unto you." You don't want me to try to make you live my way, don't try to make me live yours.

 

They don't even test straight couples for their ability to raise a child when they're actually having a child. I find it deeply tragicomic that prospective adoptive parents are vetted to such an extreme when biological parents are pretty much left to it and given free license to screech obscenities at anyone who questions their parenting skills until they actually kill someone.

 

I'm playing devil's advocate to an extent here, but there is a difficulty in legislating polyamorous marriage that does not exist within monogamous marriage. That's not to say it's wrong by any means, but issues like legal kinship are a big part of why people like me want gay marriage legalised - so that we'd have the same rights as heterosexuals. Polygamous marriage would require different rights to be considered as the same. Again, that's not a reason not to do it - with all the extra paperwork involved that would need to be done you could make a serious dent into the unemployment figures - but in the terms laid out by Laetus over the legality of it, it is sort of a different matter.

But yeah, change is good. I have no problem with change.

 

...That's it? That's all I get?

Are you ever going to elaborate on how same-sex couples could limit children's freedoms by "harming them biologically"? Because I'm a university man, and if I said

in an essay, I'd get a big fat fail right there. "It seems to me" is insufficient and rather wishy-washy.

 

okay, I'm probably going to stick my foot in my mouth here, but how is polygamous marriage different rights? Kinship is still the main issue...

take my situation: We are currently in a polyamorous quad with another couple who are legally married to each other. We are also living together, but, due to the fact that we legally have no status to each other, if our apt building management finds out, we could be evicted. We cannot, however, get a home of our own, because the two people in the houssehold with steady income are not married, and so cannot apply jointly for a loan (or so I've been told by my bank). Any gay "life partner" out there knows all about the nightmare possibility of serious medical problems. And let's not even get into such drear mundanities as car insurance, child care, and taxes. It needn't even be that much more complicated, just different.

 

I wasn't aware that there were houses you could only rent if you were married.

The only one I was really raising was kinship, in that it would depend on assets being divided, etc. It's not really a major issue unless you don't make a will, I think, could be wrong there. I have no issue with polyamorous relationships being recognised per se, but I still reckon it would be more complicated, if only because (and this is a really minor niggle with it) all those hideously expensive computer systems our governments keep investing in will only have one slot for "partner".

I think that polyamory, like homosexuality, has an image problem with regards marriage, in that relationships aren't expected to last. I know people like to say how it's a myth and so on, but I'd say they do kind of have a point, even if it's not a reality I'm personally happy with.

However, with society going the way it is, I personally believe civil partnerships are actually the way forward. Creating an entirely new institution, open to people of any sexuality or relationship structure, would make so much more sense than to adapt the existing institution.

 

For damn sure it sould be legalized!!!! When someone is in love it shouldn't be judged! Love is a powerful thing regardless of the gender! Just because someone who believes in god doesn't think its right....and trys to stop it from happening. Is like forcing relgion on someone. And in America you are intitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happyness. (In the declaration of independenc) Well homosexual people who want to get marryed is a pursuit of happyness. And their beinging denied that right!!!!!!!!! NOt fair!!!!!!

 

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GypsyPriestess,

The current laws afford marriage to two people, two heterosexual people. I advocate that the laws are extended to include same sex unions. I believe there's compelling reasons to do this. You are suggesting that the laws be extended to include multiple people. The issues are completely different and hinge on separate contingents of the law.

No, they aren't necessarily mutually exclusive issues, but they are for me. I oppose polygamous marriages because of the reports of teenage Mormon sisters in Utah being married off to the same pervert old man.

I don't care to know the specifics of your relationship, but it is a relationship between two opposite sex couples, I would gather that the vast majority of those types of relationships involve only heterosexual relations. We call that wife swapping. That's a major difference from any relationship that involves same sex couples. I'm unsure how you could confuse the two. This thread is about extending the right to marry to same sex couples, not multiple people.

.

 

Yeah, sorry hipunk, I got a bit off topic, but Laetus pushed one of my buttons. And Mormons are an example of institutionalized polygamy gone wrong. Most Mormon women(girls) were given no choice in who they were to marry. That's not what polyamory is about.....whoops, doing it again.
Trying to stay focused....all I'm saying is that it's all about the "norm" not accepting anything "out of the norm". It's the only true stumbling block for any kind of marriage that isn't "One Man, One Woman".

 

I think the difficulty is that we're all very used to reactionary jerk-offs saying that if you allow any form of marriage other than heterosexual, you're opening some kind of floodgate that will lead to everyone marrying and buttfucking each other's 3 year old cousins and so forth.

 

Its bad enough there are already enough kids out there who dont have a father or other way around of not having a mother.
Now you have 'gay couples' deliberately planning to put a child through that.
Wow.
Just so they can 'feel the same' as a normal couple and have some kids too.
Totally offensive.

 

Where are these couples who decide to get married with the purpose of depriving a child of a mother or a father? Where are you meeting them? Last but not least, why are you putting "gay couples" in quotation marks? A couple is a couple is a couple.

The assumption here seems to be that any male-female couple, no matter how briefly they stay together, no matter how impoverished, no mattter how abusive, is highly superior to any same-sex couple. That seems to be a major stretch.

I don't see having both a mother and a father as a bad thing. I think it is possible for two men or two women to raise a child at least as effectively and lovingly as many male-female couples do.

 

Exactly. That's the point I tried to make earlier. Before I got sidetracked by the poly issues, which, for those who are interested, I'm starting a thread to discuss in the relationships forum., since it doesn't precisely belong here.

Now, back to gay marriage in America....this will be my last post on the subject, because it's all been said, and I'm sure someone will say it again. There is NO real, logical, scientifically backed reason to ban gay marriage. All of the reasoning against gay marriage is either religiously based, or based personal discomfort. Here's a tip for those of you in the second category - no one's asking you to be gay, and no one's asking you to watch gay people have sex. If you don't like seeing gay people kiss or hold hands in public, don't watch!!!

Gay marriage should be allowed, period. Have a lovely debate, I'm done here.

 

There is a 'logical' reason to reject same sex marriage.
The citizen does not want to give more of his or her 'pie' so the same sex couple can have a little bit more.
The Marriage benefit is a special right its societies right and business to decided who it wants to give it to.
This is an issue for and about the 'everyone else'.

 

i must say i have always found it rather ironic that there are gay people who want to deny or do not approve of marriage rights being extended to polyamorous or even incestual couples.

Love does not discriminate, afterall.

i say make everyone get a civil union and leave 'marriage' to churches.

 

So, single parents are offensive?

What seems to be the issue here is not the marriages, but the benefits offered in marriage... I have a simple solution: remove marriage benefits. That would make it so that no citizen could complain about a same-sex marriage disseminating benefits; much less any other legal bonding performed by the church... That solution is both logical and applies to 'everyone else.'

I approve of marriage on all grounds; it's their deal, afterall. Oh, by the way, there were several legal same-sex marriages performed under the authority of the church in Rome during the time where Christianity was the offical religion...

 

As I write this answer or should I say reply, I wonder; Why is it so important to not allow 2 people who love each other not to be married? Let 's see now, if I remember my USA History, (it has been 21 yrs. since I graduated from H.S.), in the state of Idaho they still practiced polygamy,( as far as to the yr. 1985, the yr. I graduate from H.S.) as long as u r not living off the government (ie: welfare) or breaking the law (other then polygamy) they leave u alone. See u can be str8 and marry as many wives as u wanted if u r a man, but if u r a str8 woman u can not marry more then 1 husband. Go figure? Talking about double standards. Even in the world of polygamy, women r classified as not worthy to procreate w/more then 1 hubby!! Now, being married, man to a man or woman to a woman, is illegal in the USA and immoral according to religious organizations in the USA. WHY? I have my personal opinion on this, because god forbid we might actually prove all the opinions and prejudices that r placed on us to be all wrong!! See, a married Gay or Lez. couple, might actually lead more of a healthy marriage lifestyle to each other and actually be happy and stay married longer, then str8 couples, and oh yes, we would also break the stereotypes, by the str8 world that if ur a gay/lez couple and u have kids(ie; through adoptopn or a previous relationship w/a str8 person) u create gay/lez chidren, & Oh, lets not 4 get the biggy, Gay/Lez. ppl r child molesters!! Yes, I am a Lez and I am in a very long and very happy committed relationship w/ my partner, the only thing missing? That lovely piece of paper w/the black n white writing stating Mrs. and Mrs. were married here on.....? some thing imp. 2 us that would only prove our love and happiness w/ each other even more.
peace and love to all,Kat

 

We are a culture that no longer relys on religion. We are opening up and broadening o ur horizons.

Marriage is not just for Catholics any more. I'm not one, and will never get married in a church, but I WILL get married.

What gives any religion the right to claim God is the only reason to marry? Love is.

I was so glad when Ontario passed bills to allow gay marriage. Then Stephen Fuckin Harper came in.

 

Levictious (pardon my spelling) speaks out against homosexuality due to the captivity the Jews experienced long ago in Babylon. Open homosexuality was accepted there, and the Jews wanted to seperate themselves from these particular pagans as much as possible; as a result, you have homosexuality being seen as sinful...