North Carolina Passes Amendment Banning Same-sex Unions

[PanzerJaeger]

You cant see the difference between celebrating a vice and removing laws that punish it.? Im not pushing for those things to be illegal, but i would push hard against them being grounds for special recognition in law. Recognizing that vice exists and that people have the free will to decide to engage in it if different than giving someone thousands of dollars in tax breaks and a special status for it. For the lateryou require my complicity, for htfor the formeryou just a excercise your rights. Im trying to find a middle ground that both preserves the rights of individuals to live there lives by making the choices theyd like without draggingme down with them

Do you think homosexuality is a choice?

[Kadagar_AV]

I joined late: But could someone explain to me why the easiest solution isn't:

A) A contract open to any-ones who love each other and want to spend their lives together, signed by both partners.

B) If someone after that want to go to church and have the marriage blessed by god - They are free to do so if the church approve.


Can anyone, Christians as well as atheists, say this isn't a workable solution? And if so, what is this whole thing all about?

[ICantSpellDawg]

I am not sure. It seems to be a choice and life outlook from my perspective, but I've read some things that could also make it sound genetically or hormonally determined. Do I think that it is a choice? Yes, but not in the same way that picking favorite number is or sports team is, I beleive that it is a culmination of many choices and pre-dispositions that you may have or have had throughout your life, consciously and subconsciously. I view it very similarly to tastes, interests, religious preference or political philosophies. I've seen interests become hobbies and hobbies become obsessions and I think that what you believe and the things that you do become you over time.

I am agnostic on the subject. I don't pretend to know one way or the other, but I will call people out who say that it is settled science.

[Sir Moody]

I joined late: But could someone explain to me why the easiest solution isn't:

A) A contract open to any-ones who love each other and want to spend their lives together, signed by both partners.

B) If someone after that want to go to church and have the marriage blessed by god - They are free to do so if the church approve.


Can anyone, Christians as well as atheists, say this isn't a workable solution? And if so, what is this whole thing all about?

part of the problem is one party wants to deny the contract the name of Marriage (which despite claims to the opposite isn't a religious institution) - this is how it was originally installed in the UK

a Straight Couple get Married (even if they don't do so "before god" and don't get married by a priest) - Gay couples have Civil Partnerships

the difference is in name only - they both get the same rights in the eyes of the law

the problem is if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck it IS a duck - the Civil Partnership should be called a Marriage because basically that's what it is...

recent legalisation will soon be fixing that and changing it so both Straight and Gay couples can get Married

this is the perfect solution - both Gay and Straight couples can get Married and the Religious overtures are left entirely up to the couple - if they want the marriage "in the eyes of god" they simple make their vows in front of a priest in a church

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I joined late: But could someone explain to me why the easiest solution isn't:

A) A contract open to any-ones who love each other and want to spend their lives together, signed by both partners.

B) If someone after that want to go to church and have the marriage blessed by god - They are free to do so if the church approve.


Can anyone, Christians as well as atheists, say this isn't a workable solution? And if so, what is this whole thing all about?

I'll give you to problems.

A) If two people can get married regardless of gender, what about 3, 4, 8 or 20? What is the practical reason not to allow this? I can't see one, but many people who support Gay marriage pour scorn upon other living arrangements - no matter how enduring.

B) The whole "Churches won't have to" won't fly - the ECHR has already ruled that if the UK passes a "same sex marriage" law religious institutions will be guilty of discrimination if they refuse to perfom such services, but not if they refuse to perfomr "Civil Partnerships".

the problem is if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck it IS a duck - the Civil Partnership should be called a Marriage because basically that's what it is...

Unless it's a goose, which walks like a duck but honks slightly differently.

Civil Partnerships do actually have a few different legal paramaters:

http://www.spainwilliams.com/family/...ersh.html#more

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Governme...iage/DG_193751

Not the same - just very similar.

They are different because the practicalities are different, slapping a "marriage" label on the tin won't change that any more than calling rain hail will freeze it.

[Sir Moody]

A) I think I have said this before but so long as all parties concerned are consenting and in agreement, why not? of course the next argument the "anti" crowd brings up is Marriage with animals or inanimate objects - Animals cant consent and frankly who cares if someone marries an inanimate object (they are just saving us time in declaring them mentally unstable...)

B) I disagree with the ECHR on a number of rulings - this being one of them - I don't see how a Church which has the right to Worship cant chose who it marries based on the tenants of its faith... there are already Churches in UK that will only marry couples who follow their guidelines (i.e. attending Church on Sundays for x number of Month's before the marriage) how is this different?

I wasn't aware of those differences - though they do seem to only concern the "ending" of the Partnership - I still think they are close enough to each other that calling them both Marriages is fair enough

[Catiline]

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I wasn't aware of those differences - though they do seem to only concern the "ending" of the Partnership - I still think they are close enough to each other that calling them both Marriages is fair enough

That's basically the same emotional appeal.

"Well, they deserve to have it called marriage."

A "marriage" is a yoking-together of a man and a woman, a reflection of basic biology. A Civil Partnership is two people choosing to live together because they love each other.

Yes, it is the Bible which describes a man and a woman becoming "one flesh", but it says that because that is exactly what happens when a man and a woman have children. Marriage has always been between a man and a woman for that reason, even when men have contracted multiple marriages it has been with women - even the examples HoreTore linked to centre around a heterosexual couple even as both in the couple aquire new (heterosexual) partners.

That's not the same, it's just very similar.

[Sir Moody]

but Marriage was around before the Church - and you can get Married without ever seeing a priest or the inside of a Church

trying to claim the Marriage is purely Religious and using that to say Gay couples cant marry is ignoring the fact that in out Modern world, it isn't.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

but Marriage was around before the Church - and you can get Married without ever seeing a priest or the inside of a Church

trying to claim the Marriage is purely Religious and using that to say Gay couples cant marry is ignoring the fact that in out Modern world, it isn't.

That's absolutely true - but I didn't say that.

I merely quoted the Bible - I'm allowed to do that in support of the argument, the opinions of the Biblical authors are not invalidated by their being Christians.

Also, until around 1750 odd the Church in England was not legally involved in marriage, and whether you were married or not was covered by Common Law. Marriage statutes were introduced to clear up legal confusion in the 18th Century and the Church became involved as an arm of the State.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Yuh sure?

Ask the 19th Century anti-slavery protestors, or perhaps the levellers.

[Sir Moody]

That's absolutely true - but I didn't say that.

I merely quoted the Bible - I'm allowed to do that in support of the argument, the opinions of the Biblical authors are not invalidated by their being Christians.

Also, until around 1750 odd the Church in England was not legally involved in marriage, and whether you were married or not was covered by Common Law. Marriage statutes were introduced to clear up legal confusion in the 18th Century and the Church became involved as an arm of the State.

which is another bone of contention with me... its about time we separated the Church of England and the State... that's just a pipe dream however - I cant see the Government letting go of their control of the Church...

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

which is another bone of contention with me... its about time we separated the Church of England and the State... that's just a pipe dream however - I cant see the Government letting go of their control of the Church...

It won't happen before we become a Republic - and despite what ideaological opinions you might or might not hold regarding monarchy, that is not a process you are going to want to live through.

[Sir Moody]

It won't happen before we become a Republic - and despite what ideaological opinions you might or might not hold regarding monarchy, that is not a process you are going to want to live through.

Funnily enough I am pro Monarchy as well as pro Secular... sadly you are mostly right we cant have both...

If I had to chose one or the other it would be a Secular Republic...

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Funnily enough I am pro Monarchy as well as pro Secular... sadly you are mostly right we cant have both...

If I had to chose one or the other it would be a Secular Republic...

It's a nice idea - but it's not worth sacrificing peace and stability for. Even Italy, which abolished it's monarchy by popular referendum, did so only after the Facists had ruined the country under the cover of the Crown.

[Sir Moody]

it seems to work well for the French...

(and don't bring up the French Revolution - hopefully we have come far enough now we wouldn't need bloodshed or to abolish the Monarchy to institute a Republic if it came to that... or am I being optimistic?)

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

it seems to work well for the French...

(and don't bring up the French Revolution - hopefully we have come far enough now we wouldn't need bloodshed or to abolish the Monarchy to institute a Republic if it came to that... or am I being optimistic?)

I don't like the French system, it relies on you being very French for it to work - and it is highly prescriptive. Nor are the French political class as accountable for their actions as the Bitish are - witness Strass-Kahn, caught only because he was in the US when he misbehaved.

As to change without a revolution - find me a country that has managed it without either first going through national trauma, or having trauma subsequntly.

Now, for Whacker - as he insists on picking a fight with me:

I have at no point made a judgement of the sorts of emotional or spiritual relationships which may be formed between two men, two women, or a man and a woman.

I shall make such a judgement now, so that you may have it on record:

It is impossible to quantify the love which two people can have for each other. Such love can take many forms, the emotional relationship between to otherwise heterosexual men or woman can reach such a pitch as to border the erotic, likewise some parents find after twenty years of marriage that they have little in common besides their children and yet that is enough for them. Some relationships last a lifetime, some of the most intense can last only a few months, some are warm and secure while others are like an inferno. Some of the most loving relationships are utterly destructive to those involved and those around them. Love is not always found where we expect it - intimacy can arise between people who have not obvious compatability, somethimes they are not even of the same sexual orientation. Plato tells us that Socrates believed the greatest love was between two people who had no sexual involvement at all, regardless of preference or gender while Aristotle opined that a relationship between two men of equal status who do not debase themselves or each other is better than any other kind, especially because any sexual act between them expresses Eros and is not driven by a base need to procreate.

From this I would draw one conclusion - namely that whatever else may be said of the various couplings human beings engage in it can be said exclusively of heterosexual relationships that they produce the next generation, and of homosexual ones that they are entirely free of this motive. From this may be drawn a further conclusion, that no man will ever into a relationship with another man merely in order to have someone to bear his children.

However, the potentially superior emotional and spiritual quality of homosexual relationships does not mean that homosexual physical unions should necessarily be given the same social or religious status as marriage.

[ajaxfetish]

B) The whole "Churches won't have to" won't fly - the ECHR has already ruled that if the UK passes a "same sex marriage" law religious institutions will be guilty of discrimination if they refuse to perfom such services, but not if they refuse to perfomr "Civil Partnerships".

IMO, the ECHR is clearly in the wrong here, as long as they consider that discrimination wrong. On the surface of course, it is discrimination, pretty much by definition, but we consider plenty of discrimination to be perfectly acceptable, and allow religious institutions to discriminate in many ways (they don't have to accept anyone as a member, for instance). This is another way they should be allowed to discriminate, in line with their moral stance.

Ajax

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

IMO, the ECHR is clearly in the wrong here, as long as they consider that discrimination wrong. On the surface of course, it is discrimination, pretty much by definition, but we consider plenty of discrimination to be perfectly acceptable, and allow religious institutions to discriminate in many ways (they don't have to accept anyone as a member, for instance). This is another way they should be allowed to discriminate, in line with their moral stance.

Ajax

Law in the UK and Europe doesn't work that way - if Gay Civil marriage is the same institution as marriage then refusing to perform a marriage for a Gay couple is discrimination. If, on the other hand, it is simply a very similar institution with a different name then it is not discrimination, but it can't be a different instition with the same name - because that would be discrimination.

In the same way you can't have "white alchohol units" and "asian alchohol units" and call both "alchohol units" on the basis that different ethnic groups have different tollerances.

[Catiline]

From this I would draw one conclusion - namely that whatever else may be said of the various couplings human beings engage in it can be said exclusively of heterosexual relationships that they produce the next generation, and of homosexual ones that they are entirely free of this motive. From this may be drawn a further conclusion, that no man will ever into a relationship with another man merely in order to have someone to bear his children.

But marriage is completely unecessary for procreation of the next generation.

[Conradus]

B) The whole "Churches won't have to" won't fly - the ECHR has already ruled that if the UK passes a "same sex marriage" law religious institutions will be guilty of discrimination if they refuse to perfom such services, but not if they refuse to perfomr "Civil Partnerships".

Seriously? Could you link me that judgment?

Because we have the gay marriage for quite some time now in Belgium and I've never heard of churches being forced to perform a gay marriage.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

But marriage is completely unecessary for procreation of the next generation.

I refer to the previous 11 pages for the reasons we have a social construct to attach a man to the mother of his children.

Sufice it to say, the contruct exists to identify the children's father, to give the father legal rights regarding the children and the woman legal hooks into the father.

[Kralizec]

B) The whole "Churches won't have to" won't fly - the ECHR has already ruled that if the UK passes a "same sex marriage" law religious institutions will be guilty of discrimination if they refuse to perfom such services, but not if they refuse to perfomr "Civil Partnerships".

B) The whole "Churches won't have to" won't fly - the ECHR has already ruled that if the UK passes a "same sex marriage" law religious institutions will be guilty of discrimination if they refuse to perfom such services, but not if they refuse to perfomr "Civil Partnerships".

Did they? Source?

[Tellos Athenaios]

Seriously? Could you link me that judgment?

Because we have the gay marriage for quite some time now in Belgium and I've never heard of churches being forced to perform a gay marriage.

Well yes, but the UK case may be a bit different due to the fact that the CofE is part of the English state. Also if religious marriage is deemed equal to marriage before a civil servant then that would tend to complicate it further.

By contrast since in Dutch (and presumably Belgian) law only marriage before the civil servant "counts" and religious marriage rituals have no legal significance whatsoever (except in the case where you get the order of ceremonies wrong, in which case the conduct of the religious rituals constitutes a crime), so the religious rites can be denied to couples that don't fit the institution's dogma.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Well yes, but the UK case may be a bit different due to the fact that the CofE is part of the English state. Also if religious marriage is deemed equal to marriage before a civil servant then that would tend to complicate it further.

By contrast since in Dutch (and presumably Belgian) law only marriage before the civil servant "counts" and religious marriage rituals have no legal significance whatsoever (except in the case where you get the order of ceremonies wrong, in which case the conduct of the religious rituals constitutes a crime), so the religious rites can be denied to couples that don't fit the institution's dogma.

Bingo.

2010 Austria: http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/2010/j...l-partnerships

Mar 2012 France:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/reli...an-ruling.html

Ah, but it seems Thinking Anglicans dissagree: http://www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/...es/005436.html

I am not convinced - but it all depends on the legal relationship between heterosexual and homosexual marriage in the UK.

CofE lawyers have already expressed concerns because CofE priests can officiate at legal weddings.

[Kralizec]

Apparently, this ruling (GAS AND DUBOIS v. FRANCE) is the one PVC intended. I had to use Google Translate because I can't read French very well (or quickly); but I haven't been able to find anything in the ruling that suggests that churches can't refuse to hold ceremonies for gay couples.

In the Daily mail:

An earlier version of this article included the paragraph 'The ruling also says that if gay couples are allowed to marry, any church that offers weddings will be guilty of discrimination if it declines to marry same-sex couples.' This was in fact an implication of the judgement rather than a statement contained within it.

Except that I'm not seeing where such a thing is implied, at all. Maybe it has something to do with the UK's idiosyncracies in regards to marriage procedures and the state-church relationship in general that I'm not particulary familiar with.

[Lemur]

Of interest: longtime conservative pollster explains why GOP should moderate on gay marriage.

Implications:

[Jan van Lohuizen] goes on to say that this is consistent with conservative principles: “As people who promote personal responsibility, family values, commitment, and stability, and emphasize freedom and limited government, we have to recognize that freedom means freedom for everyone. This includes the freedom to decide how you live and to enter into relationships of your choosing, the freedom to decide how you live without excessive interference of the regulatory force of government.”

The pollster is not arguing morality or public policy. He is, however, suggesting his party recognize that it has staked out positions on this constellation of issues that fly in the face of rather rapidly changing public attitudes. Not unlike warnings from other strategists about Republican positions and rhetoric that have hurt them badly with the growing Latino vote, the GOP here risks being on the wrong side of an issue where the world is moving in a different way.

To be sure, political parties are not supposed to be weather vanes, changing whenever the wind blows in a new direction. When they choose to fly in the face of evolving public attitudes, though, they need to think about it long and hard; they need to decide if it’s really worth it and consider that times might have changed.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Apparently, this ruling (GAS AND DUBOIS v. FRANCE) is the one PVC intended. I had to use Google Translate because I can't read French very well (or quickly); but I haven't been able to find anything in the ruling that suggests that churches can't refuse to hold ceremonies for gay couples.

In the Daily mail:


Except that I'm not seeing where such a thing is implied, at all. Maybe it has something to do with the UK's idiosyncracies in regards to marriage procedures and the state-church relationship in general that I'm not particulary familiar with.

Well, for one thing, any citizen of the UK has the automatic right to Church wedding and burial, and christening but that's less an issue. Individual Vicars can get tetchy about non-communicants but you just wave the Canon and Statute under their noses and they'll wilt.

If Gay people can have actual wedding ceremonies you can't justify denying them a Church wedding if it's available to anyone else.

http://www.parliament.uk/documents/u...agemeasure.pdf

Note the complete lack of "man" or "woman" because they are assumed - but not there stipulated.

The worst part of this is that Parliament can legislate for the Church.

[Lemur]

Well, for one thing, any citizen of the UK has the automatic right to Church wedding and burial, and christening but that's less an issue.

Well then, that's your own fault for having a state church. What a foolish, anachronistic institution to maintain! That's almost as silly as paying to keep royalty around ... oh, um, nevermind. Best to the queen and all of that.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Well then, that's your own fault for having a state church. What a foolish, anachronistic institution to maintain! That's almost as silly as paying to keep royalty around ... oh, um, nevermind. Best to the queen and all of that.

Call me silly, but I'm not a fan of the bloody insurrection needed to change to a Republic, and I don't find France, the US, Italy or Greece encouraging models.