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acludem said:So if we adopt this proposal can we allow gays to marry so long as they accept these conditions?
acludem
5stringJeff said:No. Marriage is still - and always will be - a covenant between a man and a woman. What my proposition would do is reestablish marriage as more of a legal covenant - something that's harder to get out of just because someone feels like it, which is what no-fault divorce has allowed. IMO, no-fault divorce is currently screwing up marriage more than gay marriage ever could. That doesn't make gay marraige good, it only means no-fault divorce is worse.
I don't advocate making it illegal in all circumstances, but I wouldn't mind seeing no-fault divorce get ditched.MissileMan said:What kind of steps are you thinking of? You can't make divorce illegal.
I didn't say that gay marriage must strengthen hetero marriage in order to allow it. In fact, that would not be a likely outcome.Where does it say that one of the required outcomes of gay marriage is it has to strengthen hetero marriages? What if it has no effect on hetero marriage at all and only serves to strengthen the relationships of half of the gays that enter into it? Why don't you see a benefit to society if a significant percentage of gays leave their life of carousing and enter into a monogamous lifestyle?
Is your (or anyone's for that matter) marriage affected by the divorce rate? Would your marriage be better if the divorce rate were lower...worse if it were higher?
They can do that divorced as well as married. The root of that problem is selfishness, and divorce doesn't solve that.liberalogic said:What about people who just hate each other after a while and cause miserable situations for the kids because of it?
Actually I think many marriages would be better if divorce was more rare and not accepted as normal so readily. As others have said, getting rid of 'no fault' would be a good start, I concur.MissileMan said:...
Is your (or anyone's for that matter) marriage affected by the divorce rate? Would your marriage be better if the divorce rate were lower...worse if it were higher?
is that? Talk, go to marriage counseling, go on a date together, whatever. Others just felt like 'it was time to do what they wanted to do.' How quaint and selfish. I do wonder what it is they want to do that couldn't be done in marriage, other than date?
5stringJeff said:This really sums it up.
jillian said:That's fine in theory. But if someone really wants out of a marriage, they'll say whatever they have to to meet the burden imposed on them. So, the more they have to prove, the nastier things get. It doesn't make people stay together who otherwise wouldn't, but it DOES make the process a more cutting one.
Personally, I wouldn't want someone to stay with me if he didn't want to.
jillian said:That's fine in theory. But if someone really wants out of a marriage, they'll say whatever they have to to meet the burden imposed on them. So, the more they have to prove, the nastier things get. It doesn't make people stay together who otherwise wouldn't, but it DOES make the process a more cutting one.
Personally, I wouldn't want someone to stay with me if he didn't want to.
acludem said:If you are making more of a "legal" covenant then you have to abide by the 14th amendment guarantee of equal protection under the law, thus making it impossible to pass this law without allowing gay people to marry.
Quite the catch-22 isn't it? Now you know why solidly Republican states have never passed such measures.
acludem
Hobbit said:This just shows right through your ignorance. The 14th ammendment doesn't apply, as it doesn't say that the law shall allow you what you want, but instead offers equal protection. The law allows gay people to marry the opposite sex, just like everybody else. The fact that they don't want to is irrelevant.
And the reason heavily Republican states haven't passed such measures recently is because their legal code already defined marriage as one man and one woman.
jillian said:Ummmmmm....actually, the law allows people to marry the other consenting adult of their choice. And the same arguments used to be made with respect to inter-racial marriage, hence many of us not taking them too seriously.
I think it's clear that a religious group couldn't be forced to perform such marriages, but a civil marriage or union is something else.
acludem said:If you are making more of a "legal" covenant then you have to abide by the 14th amendment guarantee of equal protection under the law, thus making it impossible to pass this law without allowing gay people to marry.
Quite the catch-22 isn't it? Now you know why solidly Republican states have never passed such measures.
acludem
Hobbit said:Compare it to interracial marriage all you want, but it's a proven fact that a man/woman marriage is beneficial force in society in all respects, while homosexual relationships are disasterous and harmful. There's justification for government endorsement of heterosexuality. Not so for homosexuality.
jillian said:All of the above being your opinion, based on a religious value-judgment and having absolutely no basis in fact. You're entitled to your opinion, certainly, but shouldn't expect society to get in line with it. Personally, I've known some really valuable homosexual couples and some really low-life useless heterosexual ones.
rtwngAvngr said:Jillian, anecdotal evidence does not disprove a valid generalization. You've exhibited this mental deficiency previously.
All this would do is force someone to commit a divorceable offense to achieve their goal...it might even cause someone not normally abusive to become so to qualify for a divorce. If two people reach a mutual agreement that they can't live together anymore, then dissolve the marriage. The idea should be to establish and maintain good marriages, not every marriage.Nienna said:I don't advocate making it illegal in all circumstances, but I wouldn't mind seeing no-fault divorce get ditched.
Nienna said:I didn't say that gay marriage must strengthen hetero marriage in order to allow it. In fact, that would not be a likely outcome.
Given the examples of other countries, it would have a negative affect on marriage in general, as the overall marriage rate for both heteros and homos fell.
http://www.law.ucla.edu/williamsinstitute/issues/dueling.html said:Comment: Equality doesn't harm 'family values'
By Joop Garssen and M.V. Lee Badgett
National Post (Canada)
Wednesday, August 11, 2004
Three years ago, the Netherlands opened up a new era of equality by giving gay and lesbian couples the right to marry. After some initial fanfare, same-sex marriages have blended into the Dutch social landscape. In the first three years, almost 6,000 same-sex couples married, representing about one in 40 weddings. On this side of the Atlantic, same-sex couples can tie the legal knot in Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia, the Yukon, and Massachusetts. But as the debate has moved to the federal level in Canada and the United States, doomsayers have argued that even a small number of gay couples have the power to topple the institution of marriage.
Now, a few Dutch scholars have issued what might at first appear to be a serious warning to Canada and the rest of the world: Learn from the Dutch mistake and stop gay marriage before it undermines traditional marriage, as it did in the Netherlands.
These scholars are out of step with their countrymen and countrywomen: A majority of the public in the Netherlands has supported same-sex marriage since the mid-1990s. In a poll last year, 80% of Dutch respondents agreed that same-sex couples should be allowed to marry anywhere in Europe. This was not something foisted on the society: The Dutch Parliament simply went along with its constituents' desire to give same-sex couples the same option that different-sex couples have. Even the current conservative government has made no effort to take marriage away from gay couples.
A minority warns that heterosexuals are now voting against marriage with their feet. Falling numbers of marriages and rising numbers of children born out of wedlock since 1990 supposedly confirm a serious crisis in marriage in the Netherlands that began as gay marriage was debated in Parliament. But these alarmist claims are based on the selective use of statistics. In fact, the annual number of marriages fluctuates. In their open letter, the Dutch scholars point to a decline from 95,000 marriages in 1990 to 82,000 in 2003. But one might just as well point to an increase over the past two decades from 78,000 in 1983 to 82,000 in 2003.
In fact, the propensity to get married declined steeply in the 1970s and early 1980s, but stabilized thereafter. The likelihood that a Dutch person would ever marry fell from nearly 100% round 1970 to about 60% around 1980, and has remained fairly stable since then. This demographic change obviously occurred long before the public discussion on same-sex marriage.
The Dutch have become more likely to have children before marrying, but that shift also started before gay couples got partnership or marriage rights. It's true that the non-marital birth rate rose from 11% in 1990 to 31% in 2003. However, a similar increase in non-marital births occurred in Ireland, Luxembourg, Hungary and Lithuania, all countries that do not give same-sex couples partnership or marriage rights. We obviously can't blame the rise in non-marital births in those countries on gay marriage, so why should we think that's what happened in the Netherlands?
The focus on parents' marital status when a child is born is also, in itself, misleading. For most of these child-bearing couples, the wedding is simply postponed, not cancelled. Although about a third of Dutch children are now born out of wedlock, only 11% live with unmarried parents by age five. As a result, 79% of Dutch families with children (up to age 16) are headed by married parents, and 91% are headed by a couple, either married or unmarried. Marriage remains relevant for Dutch couples because it is still the easiest way to arrange the financial and legal aspects of a family's life once children are in the picture.
These data do not describe a crisis in family stability that will hurt children: The large majority of Dutch children live with two parents, so the research on the possible dangers of single parenthood is irrelevant. One in 12 young children (up to the age of four) live without a father in the household, a share that is well below the European average.
It is also important to remember that the gay marriage campaign actually strengthened the tie between marriage and parenthood in at least one way. In the late 1990s, members of the Dutch parliament considered and, in 2000 passed, two bills at the same time, one giving gay couples marriage rights and the other adoption rights. These changes recognized that many gay and lesbian couples need the right to secure their family ties as parents and as marriage partners. Overall, as the dissenting Dutch scholars whose article appears on this page have themselves admitted, there is no definitive evidence that the debate over gay marriage contributed to recent trends in marriage and births. Our interpretation of the Dutch figures is that they reflect the continuation of long-term trends, not an effect of allowing gay couples to marry. These trends may be rooted in increasing pragmatism with respect to marriage. But they have little, if anything, to do with a decline in family values, let alone a lack of responsibility toward children. The Dutch experience confirms common sense: Equality for gay and lesbian couples does not harm either heterosexual couples or their children.
You can't seriously be blaming the conduct of heterosexuals on the conduct of homosexuals...people are responsible for their own conduct. Besides, I argued that gay marriage would reduce the carousing in the gay population, it would take a leap of illogic to deduce that gay marriage would have any effect at all on hetero-carousing.Nienna said:Therefore, it does not serve to reduce "carousing" in the general population; "carousing" actually increases.
Nienna said:And VERY few homosexuals practice "marriage" as a lifelong commitment
Nienna said:People are affected by the examples of others around them. Actually, at one time, I seriously contemplated divorcing my husband. It wasn't because of unfaithfulness or abuse, but simply bc of "unhappiness." I don't think that I would have considered it if divorce wasn't so common.
That being said, legalizing gay marriage is not a personal issue. A law is, by nature, a public thing. So asking what effect it would have on my personal marriage is irrelevant. We must look at its effects on the general culture.
jillian said:And generalizations are garbage when they're disproven, hence your hating anecdotal evidence.
