On 09/11/2006, at 11:47 PM, jdiebremse wrote:
--- In [EMAIL PROTECTED], Charlie Bell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
The former of your definitions has only recently been added to
marriage law in Australia. The latter, well why not? *shrug* Provided
people make provision for the children of such unions (adopted,
fostered or biological), what business is it of anyone else.
Despite your cavalier attitude - "shrug" - you are, nevertheless,
talking about a dramatic reordering of our basic societal structure.
What? How? It doesn't change my marriage if my mate and his partner's
relationship is recognised too.
I
don't know what "provisions" those are that you are talking about, but
you are basically suggesting a social experiment on a grand scale with
children as the little white laboratory mice.
What? How?
Gay people have kids already. Gay people can adopt, as can single
people. Not stopping those gay people who already have kids or who
have adopted from forming full "civil unions" -or, in other words,
marrying - protects those kids. It promotes strong relationships.
By the way, both those arguments were made about mixed-race marriage.
As I see it, the State provided incentives to marriages (unions of one
man and one women) because such relationships were fertile, and
provided
the best structure for the raising of the next generation. Now,
pedantic types will point out that the State also provided the
incentives of marriage to elderly and infertile couples, but prior to
modern times, the number of such marriages was small (one rarely if
ever
knew if a couple would be infertile beforehand, and there were much
fewer elderly remarriages), and in any case, such marriages didn't
alter
the basic societal structure.
Neither will gay marriage. The actual numbers of marriages will be,
obviously, small compared to straight marriages, but the security and
protection that life partners and children of gay people who choose
to marry receive is vital to those people.
In other words, such marriages are
historical artifacts, rather than the result of any conscious intent.
All marriage is a historical artefact.
Charlie
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