Vermont Legislature Legalizes Gay MarriageFollow

Time to poke yourself with a nice sharp lil pin and deflate.

I wish for you for a day when your child-to-be can legally and respectfully marry his/her same-sexed soul-mate and be able to live comfortably without discrimination in a nurturing family unit whose way was paved by all us self-righteous opinionated dolts.





Edited, Apr 16th 2009 3:05pm by Elinda

This all has nothing to do with the fact that gbaji's definition of marriage is pretty much up something he's making up as he goes along.

Gbaji is so getting rated down.

It's difficult discussing politics with people who don't understand what a right is.

Jophiel, when it's legally recognized in all states, will you marry me?

I feel sorry that Belkira and Nadenu has to share the state with you, varrus.

Edited, Apr 16th 2009 11:10am by Annabella

All identically likely if the two people are just roommates rather than a married couple. What exactly is the reason we need to get them to marry?



I was asking what reasons outside of dependent support would justify providing benefits to married couples. I was attempting to debunk the idea that we're doing it for any reason not having to do with children.



The same safety net would help two people who were just roommates. Hence the point I was making. If children do not enter the equation, there is no reason to provide those benefits to *any* two people just because they are living together. I was responding to an argument that there was some other social benefit to people sharing expenses that justified the expense. So far, I'm not seeing any good responses...



Yes. If the couple in question can't possibly produce children, then the potential negative effects from random things that might occur to them don't really affect me/you enough to justify the cost of the benefits in question.

Which was exactly my point. Take away the potential for the couple in question to produce a child and my need to care about what happens to them kinda disappears...




/shrug

I find it amusing that you dismiss my opinion as to the purpose of marriage in society, yet don't seem to be able to define an alternative which would explain why we'd bother to provide people benefits for it (or punish them harshly for violating it, as has been done in the past).

Don't agree with me? Give me an alternative explanation. Why do *you* think the institution of marriage was created Joph?

We don't need them to. We benefit if they do.I don't care what you were doing. My reasons for supporting it go beyond whatever parameters you want to put on the debate.Sure. And if those roommates want to undertake the legal wranglings to get married, bully to them. I imagine the issues in getting into and out of such an arrangement would prevent people from undertaking it casually just for the benefits just as you don't see heterosexual roommate couples getting married just to share those benefits.Your opinion. Mine is that it does.I've done so in the past. What I find amusing is that you've convinced yourself not only that your notions of marriage are the only valid ones but that no one else ever produces a counter-argument when, in fact, it happens on a regular basis. Why we provide benefits for it is more complicated than any one answer. For example, we traditionally provide sharing of pension (and other old age) benefits because it benefits society to not have indigent women wandering the streets with shopping carts after their husbands die. We provide Fifth Amendment based on English Common Law practices aimed at preventing torture of suspects or their spouses to extract confessions. Hell, I'd wager that much of our notion of shared benefits in marriage come from a tradition that "...they are no longer two but one flesh.". Children or no, government or no, people have an expectation that they have legal right to their partner's possessions (material and legal), the right to visit him/her in the hospital, in prison, etc. Much of our law is based around those expectations moreso than any deeply considered philosophy regarding the "purpose of marriage".I not only previously answered that, I answered it in this very thread (and in others). Once again, all Gbaji cares about is what Gbaji believes to be true.

Edited, Apr 16th 2009 5:42pm by Jophiel

The reason it was created is the same reason we grant benefits to couples who marry today.

Incorrect.

Then why not provide them to everyone and not just people who marry? That was my earlier question which started this line of reasoning. What is "special" about the relationship of marriage that affects those in the rest of society so much so that we'd give just people in that legal relationship special benefits?

If there are no reasons which don't also apply to any two roommates, then the relationship itself isn't why we do this. Which was the point I was trying to make. We don't reward the mere fact that two people marry. There's something that benefits us from that beyond just their relationship and sharing of lives/expenses.



I was responding to someone else's statement Joph. Someone insisted that the mere fact of being married was sufficiently beneficial to society to justify granting anyone who married (regardless of whether they produced children together or not) the benefits in question. I countered, that if that was so, then what do we as society gain from those two people being married that we don't gain equally if they are just roommates sharing expenses? I specifically asked for issues regarding children to be left out because the poster in question insisted that the societal gains justifying the benefits to the couple in question were there regardless of child production.

Jumping in and insisting that I can't exclude child production from my point is kinda silly. I'm asking for "proof" of the counter to my position. My position includes child production. Thus, I'm asking for equivalent argument that does not take children into account. You don't get to both argue that marriage has nothing to do with the cost society bears from children born out of wedlock, and then insist that you can include the advantage of children being raised by a married couple as a benefit to society.

You see why, right? I'm more than willing to let you argue my side of the issue if you want, but I don't think that's what you intended to do.




Not the point. I'm saying that if the mere fact that two people share expenses is so valuable to society as to justify the benefits in question, why make any "wrangling" necessary? Why not just allow anyone who is in residence with anyone else qualify on their medical insurance, and allow every pensioner to appoint on person to be their recipient if they die. And let's just add all the other things in there as well...

I was arguing the devils advocate case and asking if it made any sense. It doesn't. That's my point. We don't grant benefits to couples who marry purely because it's two people who have chosen to share their lives and expenses. Thus, if you disagree with my argument, you need to come up with some reason that goes beyond just those things.



Really? Why? And I'll ask you to keep in mind my point about just granting those benefits to any two people who are co-habitating. What do you (or any of us) gain from them entering a state of marriage that isn't identically beneficial to us if they're just sharing expenses?



No. You haven't. You keep dancing around with "you're wrong", and "I've already told you why" answers.

And know what? I went back and read the last big thread we had on this issue. You didn't give a reason then either. Insisting that you have over and over doesn't count.



And women were/are traditionally in that state because they gave up their careers to stay home and raise the kids. There is absolutely zero reason to grant this to a couple in which both parties had the same opportunity and ability to work and advance their careers as any two random non-married people.

Hence my point. It always revolves back to child production, and the assumption thereof.




Good thing we outlawed torture then. Really. is this even relevant or significant anymore?



All of which can be obtained via civil contract. Why do we include them automatically in marriage though? Again. Why automatically include two people who marry, but not any other two people automatically? It's not like they couldn't enter those arrangements separate from marriage, but we *require* them as part of the marriage contract. Why? You're looking at what marriage does. I'm looking at why it does it.

Because roommates are typically temporary arrangements and so it would not only fail to serve to create family units but it would also represent a legalistic nightmare of shifting benefit partners.That's nice. I was making my own remarks about marriage.And yet it works because here I am talking about it! Already answered above.You're asking me why I think it benefits society to have stable, theoretically permanent family units in which the whole is greater than their individual parts? Because, umm... I don't think I can answer that much better than the question answers itself.Insisting that I haven't doesn't mean I haven't. This is a fun game. Know any others? Although I congratulate you for finally getting off your *** and finding the old thread.Throughout their entire lives? Really? This is an interesting concept you have. In fact, the obvious solution there would be "have the kids take them in". But the reality is that these benefits aren't directly tied to child rearing at all.So now we enter the No True Scotsman phase of the debate Wrong. Really, that's been debunked so many times it's not worth getting into again.No, you're not. I explained why several of those benefits existed. You just don't like the answers. These are different things.

Edited, Apr 16th 2009 6:39pm by Jophiel