Vermont Legislature Legalizes Gay MarriageFollow

The purpose of marriage is not to produce children. People produce and raise healthy children regardless of their marital status.

The purpose of marriage is to form a stable social group.

The benefits for marriage promote marriage, and by that a stable social society. Other benefits, like child tax breaks, promote child production.

Edited, Apr 14th 2009 9:41am by TirithRR

ehcks,



Clearly the public schools are spending too much time illustrating the proper usage of condoms and not enough on how children are actually made. Of course that would answer a lot.





Edited, Apr 14th 2009 9:45am by hangtennow

That has absolutely nothing to do with homosexuality.

If you want to bicker about sex ed, I'll make a thread. Seriously, I will, but stop trying to change the topic.

Oh come on, guys. We all know that "natural" children are more imporatant than "unnatural" or "adopted" children.

Because we don't know ahead of time which heterosexual couples will produce children and which ones wont.

We know ahead of time that 0% of homosexual couples will produce children.

You see the difference, right?

EDIT: I misread the last part of your question. Um... You are aware that homosexual couples do not actually "produce" children, right? One of them produced the child, with the assistance of some other third party who by nature of the relationship will be excluded from responsibility or involvement in the raising of his child. That's their choice, but isn't something we should be encouraging.


And Joph. I'm not going to go digging for the last thread. I honestly don't recall you ever giving any sort of argument that the societal benefits of gay couples receiving said benefits justified the costs of said benefits. You did the same thing you're doing in this thread. You danced around the issue, tried to poke holes in the rationale for providing the benefits to straight couples, and then insisted that you'd given exactly the answer you never gave.


I've repeated my argument. Why not repeat yours?

Edited, Apr 14th 2009 4:24pm by gbaji

The stable social group benefits more than just children. Let's leave children out of the equation for now and discuss the benefits to society of promoting two people to be and live together.


Two people living in one household. Sharing income, sharing a house, sharing a life.

These two people pooling their slightly above minimum wage salaries together can now afford a house and car, and some of the luxuries that a single person wouldn't be able to since the huge portion of their single wages would be consumed by housing and transportation.

So, these people living together can now freely spend the extra money (less savings) earned by the other partner on the trivial items that promote economic growth.

They have to worry less about sickness and injury because if one of them falls ill or gets hurt, the other is there to take care of him/her and still provide income during their work leave (assuming the injury occurred outside of work and compensation is not available).


Now if that responsible person were single, they would be less willing to spend extra money on stuff. They'd want to save more for "just in case" times. What if they cannot work? They need money to take care of themselves if that happens.


Of course, you can say "Well, they can just do all that without marriage!" But guess what? Heterosexual couples can live together and have children without marriage as well. The benefits are there, in your own (paraphrased) words, to promote marriage and the benefits to society that come with it.

Which benefits the two people. No need for the state to provide additional incentives or benefits.



Which benefits the two people. No need for the state to provide additional incentives or benefits.



Sure. So can two (or more!) people who share expenses like say roommates. I already asked why me and a few roommates can't gain the same benefits as a married couple, and no one has answered this.



Again. That benefits them mostly. We're also veering into the territory of social welfare, since this point only makes sense if we assume that the state will care for adults who aren't able to fend for themselves and that the cost of this is worth funding benefits for marriage. Two assumptions I wouldn't count on being true...



This is still no different than a group of friends/family helping each other out if times get rough.

I also feel you're looking at the issue backwards. Add the burden of a child into the equation and marriage ceases to just be a nice thing that helps two people live their lives a bit more cost effectively, and becomes something that is necessary for those two people to raise the child without needing outside help. We can list off "what if" scenarios to show that two people who are sharing expenses and helping each other out are better off than a single person if something goes wrong. But if a child is added to the mix, the need is no longer a "what if". It's a day to day reality.



Yup. Well, I took the tack that most of those things are beneficial by themselves and aren't truly necessary unless something goes wrong.




Sure. They can. But what happens when they split up? See. If me and a friend choose to share resources without any sort of marital tie, we're free to move out at any time for any reason and the other has no legal recourse. It's a "nice thing" to share expenses, but is not legally binding. Marriage is. It enforces as set of civil contracts which prevent one member from just leaving without any recourse.

Now. If it's just the two people there's no real need to bind them legally, is there? Only if there's a dependent involved does there exist a reason to bind them. And having those marriage contracts in hand goes a long way towards ensuring the protection of that child in terms of social and economic support. Even if the couple divorces, the contracts of marriage ensure an automatic set of rules involving the care of any children. If they are just two single people, there are far fewer protections for the children.


I still think you're arguing this backwards. You're starting with the status and benefits of marriage and asking why they should be limited to just one set of people. But I'm looking at a group of people and the potential socio-economic pitfalls they can generate and seeing that marriage helps limit those.

Marriage exists to solve the problem of children born within society. That's why it was created even back in ancient times. While it carries other property and rights issues, the ultimate purpose for marriage is as a tool to ensure that when a woman has a child, the society knows which male is responsible for that child. How that society uses that information has varied wildly throughout the ages, but all societies adopt the institution of marriage for this reason.


It is why, for example, polygamy has at different times and places been accepted and adopted as a norm throughout history, but the reverse almost never. It's for exactly the reason that when a child is born, no one ever wonders who the mother is. But they can only know who the father is by some sort of social arrangement ahead of time. That social arrangement is known as "marriage".


You can attempt to separate the concept of marriage from the need to connect fathers to children, but I believe that when you do that, you're no longer really talking about marriage. No amount of re-labeling things changes that you're now dealing with a completely different concept and the reasons and needs for the status are no longer the same. You're trying to grant some kind of "equal benefits" to all groups. I believe that we should apply the benefits based on benefit to the rest of society, not a misplaced sense of social justice.

When I look at your statement it seems to me that you are implying that you want marriage encouraged financially because it shows benefit to the society, by reducing future crime drug problems, and welfare drains, which sounds logical, and i understand that argument i really do. What you have failed to show me is why children that are born into the home of a married couple would only apparently see benefits if they are their biological parents.

Why is it that if a person chooses surrogacy to have a child, it is no longer valid for you to encourage them into marriage for the benefit of society? I'm fairly certain, that a child born this way is still eligible for welfare, and capable of committing crimes. At no point are they doomed to failure, or destined for success.

Unless your opinion is that only heterosexual couples will make a child vastly less likely to end up as drains on society, then i would only assume that the following should hold true for homosexual couples as well.

Ok, your loss.Boy, for someone who can't remember the past thread, you sure can say just what I did, huh?

No, you're wrong. I've stated before exactly why I thought the benefits were worth it. If you're too lazy or self-absorbed in your own argument to go look for it, that's fine. Don't blame it on anyone but your own lazy ***, though.Because I've already stated it and don't feel like going through it again. Because, if you actually cared enough to listen, you'd have already looked for and found it. If you didn't care enough to pay attention the first time...

Edited, Apr 14th 2009 11:38pm by Jophiel

Yeah, I answered this too.

Then I'm here to keep religion out of our government.

Nope, it doesn't, looking at the traditional argument that Gbaji gave. As long as there are two parents and they take responsibility, then the marriage is serving its purpose.



Yes they can, as has already been pointed out. Hell, even in my post (in a part you conveniently skipped over) I mentioned that it doesn't matter where the kids come from; it matters that the parents are responsible for them. And yes, homosexuals can adopt. Maybe not in your state? No idea. The world doesn't revolve around TN.



No. It fell to the parents. If one died, it was up to the parent. Sex made no difference; responsibility was the key component here. Nothing says that a man is less of a parent than a woman (besides gender bias). We know nowadays that there isn't a difference outside anatomical ones, and if a baby can be fed with formula, breasts aren't needed.



Hahahaha, no. You are going to have no effect on what the government does. And we're not talking about the gay lifestyle; the entire post you copied from was about marriage. If marriage is a stable environment and responsibility, as Gbaji said it is, then gay marriage is just as valid as hetero marriage.

Not if Virus can help it.