Freddy, I may not be the last to state this in some form, but let me be the first after that statement: you’re being an idiot, especially in how you are responding to the marriage debate.
And I never said it was a Christian invention. I said it was carried over from the Christian tradition, because that’s what the Founding Fathers were, for the most part.
And of course same-sex couples want to get married. I never said they didn’t. But perhaps some would like the blessing of the Church with them.
Oh, and if “marriage” isn’t a religious term, then why does “civil union” exist?
Good lord… you seem to be completely intent on misappropriating my comments to suit what you think I’m saying without actually looking at what I said.
If anyone is arguing over semantics, it would be you or Cid and not me. Cid says that all marriages are really just civil unions
Where on earth are you getting this?
Cid said marriages are religious ceremonies and that only religious people should allowed to be married.
Or that? Out of your own head?
One last time. This is really not so complicated. Let’s be straight: The concept of a “legal marriage” has only been around for a couple hundred years. Hell, the concept of a “state” has only been around for that long. Marriage is and was a religious term. All that the state does as far as marriage goes is to afford the married couple certain legal rights. The term currently used for that situation is also “marriage”. This is confusing people, including you. All I’m saying is that the situation created by the government should just be called “civil union”, with all the rights currently afforded by what’s currently called “marriage”, and that way anyone who wants (gay, straight, whatever) could then get hold of the rights currently only enjoyed in the US by heterosexual couples. However, religious marriages, as they have been for thousands of years, would still only be between heterosexual couples, because forcing religious groups to marry homosexuals is a violation of their religious rights.
You’re right that your government and mine don’t agree, because your government feels that homosexuals should have NO civil rights at all as far as marriage, and I disagree, despite my own very strong religious views on homosexuality.
Now go back and read my words one more time and actually try to listen to what I’m saying, rather than imposing your own ideas on them.
I agree with Cid here, but I’m going to have to go a little further.
I believe that all religious groups that are recognized by the US government should be able to perform a religious ceremony that would give both (or more than both, gasp) parties the same benefits as “legal marriage” would. While most of you might think that all religious groups can indeed perform a legal marriage, this is in fact not true (in all states). Pagan marriages are not recognized in the united states as legally binding, and the amount of pagans in the US grows every single year. If we are to believe the constitution, then they should have just as much right to have any kind of marriage they want and to have it legally binding. That would mean, however, that our politicians would have to seperate their views for what is in the best interest of Democracy, which is something that most American politicians have a very, very hard time doing.
But I’m not even arguing that there is a reason to control homosexual feelings (unless, of course, that reason also includes controlling heterosexual feelings). I’m saying there’s more choice in sexual orientation than people recognize.
GAP: That’s why I like the idea of civil unions. Essentially no marriage would be legally binding under law, but people would have to go get a “civil union certificate” at a government office before or after the fact. The religious ceremony is completely separate and can be whatever the hell anyone wants.
Xwing: the point is that you can choose to do or not do homosexual acts, but the gender you don’t choose your own gender identity. There’s a book on the life of a boy who got a sex change shortly he was born after a botched circumcision. Go read it. You’ll have a field day.
I actually read the book that you’re talking about. It’s kinda disheartening, but at the same time it teaches a lesson of life. The lesson is that there is actually less conscious desicion involved in life than one would think. Since we had no choice on the basis of our own existences, why would we be able to choose what kind of lives we will lead consciously? I can honestly say I did not choose to be a restaraunt worker who has traveled across the US in search of something that I can’t even describe in words. But the the choices that I was able to make sorta influenced it.
One last time. This is really not so complicated. Let’s be straight: The concept of a “legal marriage” has only been around for a couple hundred years. Hell, the concept of a “state” has only been around for that long. Marriage is and was a religious term."
this is simply incorrect, unless your definition of a couple is “30+”. civil marriage has been around since ancient times. also, while the “state” has been around for 400 years or so, “government” has not been. a “state” is not neccessary for a government or society to endorse a secular marriage. marriage is and was a religious term, it has also simulataneously been a secular term.
All that the state does as far as marriage goes is to afford the married couple certain legal rights.
Those legal rights are atleast half of the value of marriage, not some side effect concocted in recent memory by a government! marriage has been defined by its social benefits for atleast as long as civil marriage has been around.
your entire argument is just outdated. i am an atheist, i can get married to an atheist girl in a courtroom by an atheist judge. it is a “marriage” not a “civil union”. what part of that has a religious connotation? are you also arguing that we do away with civil marriage in the united states? maybe then your civil unions for homosexual couples wouldn’t be “seperate but equal”.
I’m amazed at the fucking ridiculous emphasis that is placed on the use of the WORD marriage and the utter inability of certain people to understand what the hell people mean by a religious marriage vs a non religious marriage - ie a civil union.
Anyway, you’re wrong silhouette. Secular marriage is very recent because of how religion has dominated people for the past few thousand years. Uneducated peasants conformed to the religion of their environment. Every single time one got married, it was based on some cultural ritual that everyone in that community abided by.
I do know of the book you’re talking about. Yes, it seems that the former boy’s inborn heterosexuality began expressing itself in his teens. In truth, I’m open to the idea that there are biological inclinations in terms of gender identity, but I think people’s attitude toward those inclinations–that they are the absolute, determining factor in gender identity–is very much in error.
I tried to explain earlier: If you remove the social consequences of, say, being bisexual, what exactly is unattractive about it? It satisfies the sexual appetite, the desire for companionship. This was more or less the logic of the ancient Greeks. They didn’t have words like gay and straight; everyone lusted, and that was that. In fact, till Plato, I don’t think any major Western thinker argued against homosexual behavior. Even he didn’t condemn it, so much as call it irrational and unproductive and decline to participate.
My point is not that people should all become bisexual, but rather that people’s reasons for not being bisexual are not so much instinctive as rational. Couldn’t rational desires overrule natural, sexual inclinations? Surely a straight woman’s bad experiences with men could convince her to become a lesbian, after which she may be quite content. Ultimately, then, there is some choice in the matter of gender identity.
Ok, let’s talk about companionship since we mentionned how normal heterosexuals would cross the line; why do people do it? Not just for the company of another guy. The types of people that do it have severe social deficiencies and psychological issues. The point, I think, isn’t they become homosexuals. The point is that their psycholgical problems makes them have certain needs that may or may not be provided to them in a homosexual relationship even if they are still heterosexuals. The point is that they don’t become homosexuals, like people who have the wrong gender identity. Their biology is fine, they have another problem. A severe enough problem that they bypass the normal process. It has nothing to do with rationalization (or with biology) but with the psychological need for love. This differs from sexuality.
Marriage, the term used to describe a religious union? Not the concept of living together in a household? These “common law” <i>marriages</i> (the religious one!!!) were only called “marriages” to Christian Romans who operated under mutal consensus. Only very wealthy Romans could get it legalized in the government-approved fashion you’re talking about. Alright, so my definition is outdated, but your bit on “marriage” occuring before “The Church” is incorrect.