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The word is marriage as in married. When I marry my partner we will be married and that's important to me, not some half [BLEEP] term that makes homophobes more comfortable. Marriage period.

Quote:The word is marriage as in married. When I marry my partner we will be married and that's important to me, not some [BAD WORD REMOVED] term that makes homophobes more comfortable. Marriage period.

It's not a homophobia thing for me. It's a separation of church and state thing. "Marriage" was a religious term first, and imo, it should have stayed as such with a different term used for governmentally-recognized unions to begin with. I doubt we'd have had this whole argument in the first place if "marriage" had been strictly a religious ceremony and "civil unions" been the binding contract between any two consenting adults for legal purposes.

Quote:It's not a homophobia thing for me. It's a separation of church and state thing. "Marriage" was a religious term first, and imo, it should have stayed as such with a different term used for governmentally-recognized unions to begin with. I doubt we'd have had this whole argument in the first place if "marriage" had been strictly a religious ceremony and "civil unions" been the binding contract between any two consenting adults for legal purposes.

Well, it didn't end up that way. It was decided that equal rights was best and I was very thankful for that. I know have the same rights as you do with no asterisk or anything saying it's almost the same. It's now the same.

What about non religions people who get married? Or people like Charles Manson who got married? They're allowed to use this all of a sudden sacred term?

Quote:Well, it didn't end up that way. It was decided that equal rights was best and I was very thankful for that. I know have the same rights as you do with no asterisk or anything saying it's almost the same. It's now the same.

Oh, I agree completely. Given the use of the term "marriage", extending that right to same-sex unions was a necessary step. I do wish, though, that the decision that had come down was that the use of the term "marriage" in governmental context is unconstitutional, as the word has been historically associated with religious ceremonies and customs. A change of all government-recognized unions between two people to "civil union" terminology would have been my preferred outcome.

Quote:It's not a homophobia thing for me. It's a separation of church and state thing. "Marriage" was a religious term first, and imo, it should have stayed as such with a different term used for governmentally-recognized unions to begin with. I doubt we'd have had this whole argument in the first place if "marriage" had been strictly a religious ceremony and "civil unions" been the binding contract between any two consenting adults for legal purposes.

A lot of terms have changed meanings over the years. Marriage is now the term used when two people wed, no matter what it started out as. Why change it now? No one was up in arms about the term when straight people got married anywhere other than in a church, so why get upset about it now?

Quote:A lot of terms have changed meanings over the years. Marriage is now the term used when two people wed, no matter what it started out as. Why change it now? No one was up in arms about the term when straight people got married anywhere other than in a church, so why get upset about it now?

That whole sanctity of marriage and yada yada. Old Kentucky Kim is on her 4th redneck right now and it's still called marriage.

Quote:A lot of terms have changed meanings over the years. Marriage is now the term used when two people wed, no matter what it started out as. Why change it now? No one was up in arms about the term when straight people got married anywhere other than in a church, so why get upset about it now?

I wouldn't call myself upset by any means, but there are a couple of reasons:

 

1. It is, historically, a religious custom, and with the benefit of hindsight, the US government perhaps should have recused itself from the practice and issued a license with a different term lacking religious connotations. I'm sure you'd have the farthest-out-there wackjobs up in arms over government "legitimizing homosexuality" by issuing civil unions, but they would be a small minority. The extreme blogs, the Fox News sheep and the county clerks are one thing, but there are a lot of people out there opposed to same-sex marriage--probably most people opposed to it, actually--because "marriage" is a ceremony within their religion, and their religion does not recognize a union between two members of the same sex.

 

A sermon from a Southern Baptist minister in Virginia that made its way to YouTube is well worth-watching, even at 20 minutes long. I won't link it here because it is in no way, shape or form CoC-compliant, but the gist of it is that it's the sermon he gave the weekend of the <i>Obergefell</i> verdict, and while it's pretty clear throughout that he has some serious reservations about performing a same-sex marriage, it's also clear that he does not hate gay people, he does not preach inequality, and he is, best I can tell, someone who recognizes that there's a culture problem in that particular church conference regarding the treatment of homosexuals and seeks to be more inclusive of them. That's the type of moderate, everyday person I'm referring to who has no particular issue with homosexuals being joined for life, but is not comfortable with the application of the term "marriage" to it. That kind of leads into my second point...

 

2. I'm generally the type who believes that when dealing with a highly-sensitive issue, both sides should walk away from the table feeling ok about the end result, with a few outliers on either side up in arms. Had the Supreme Court come back with a verdict extending the legal and tax benefits of marriage to all people while simultaneously taking the word "marriage" out of government paperwork for everyone going forward, I think you'd have a far less polarizing situation. Because a verdict came down that was exactly what one side wanted and exactly what the other side didn't want, you push people further towards fringe politics rather than bringing them towards the center. Life is about give and take, not about flawless victories. I've had to mediate a few disputes between employees, subcontractors, even clients in the past. My rule is typically that you want everyone to walk away feeling pretty good about the end result, but a little pissed off at the same time. That's how you know that the end result was fair, and that you've ultimately strengthened your team rather than shoving one party off to the side and leaving them feeling marginalized, which can come back to bite you.

 

Again, given the context that "marriage" is used in, the Supreme Court absolutely made the right decision in extending that to everyone. I think an alternative ruling taking the term "marriage" out of government and replacing it with "civil unions" for everyone would have been better, though.

Quote:That whole sanctity of marriage and yada yada. Old Kentucky Kim is on her 4th redneck right now and it's still called marriage.

 

Not officially, unless the husbands were relatives. We're talking about Kentucky, yanno?

Quote:I wouldn't call myself upset by any means, but there are a couple of reasons:

 

1. It is, historically, a religious custom, and with the benefit of hindsight, the US government perhaps should have recused itself from the practice and issued a license with a different term lacking religious connotations. I'm sure you'd have the farthest-out-there wackjobs up in arms over government "legitimizing homosexuality" by issuing civil unions, but they would be a small minority. The extreme blogs, the Fox News sheep and the county clerks are one thing, but there are a lot of people out there opposed to same-sex marriage--probably most people opposed to it, actually--because "marriage" is a ceremony within their religion, and their religion does not recognize a union between two members of the same sex.

 

A sermon from a Southern Baptist minister in Virginia that made its way to YouTube is well worth-watching, even at 20 minutes long. I won't link it here because it is in no way, shape or form CoC-compliant, but the gist of it is that it's the sermon he gave the weekend of the Obergefell verdict, and while it's pretty clear throughout that he has some serious reservations about performing a same-sex marriage, it's also clear that he does not hate gay people, he does not preach inequality, and he is, best I can tell, someone who recognizes that there's a culture problem in that particular church conference regarding the treatment of homosexuals and seeks to be more inclusive of them. That's the type of moderate, everyday person I'm referring to who has no particular issue with homosexuals being joined for life, but is not comfortable with the application of the term "marriage" to it. That kind of leads into my second point...

 

2. I'm generally the type who believes that when dealing with a highly-sensitive issue, both sides should walk away from the table feeling ok about the end result, with a few outliers on either side up in arms. Had the Supreme Court come back with a verdict extending the legal and tax benefits of marriage to all people while simultaneously taking the word "marriage" out of government paperwork for everyone going forward, I think you'd have a far less polarizing situation. Because a verdict came down that was exactly what one side wanted and exactly what the other side didn't want, you push people further towards fringe politics rather than bringing them towards the center. Life is about give and take, not about flawless victories. I've had to mediate a few disputes between employees, subcontractors, even clients in the past. My rule is typically that you want everyone to walk away feeling pretty good about the end result, but a little [BAD WORD REMOVED] off at the same time. That's how you know that the end result was fair, and that you've ultimately strengthened your team rather than shoving one party off to the side and leaving them feeling marginalized, which can come back to bite you.

 

Again, given the context that "marriage" is used in, the Supreme Court absolutely made the right decision in extending that to everyone. I think an alternative ruling taking the term "marriage" out of government and replacing it with "civil unions" for everyone would have been better, though.

Except this isn't a negotiation. It's the law. You don't negotiate the law just because some people don't like it.

Quote:A lot of terms have changed meanings over the years. Marriage is now the term used when two people wed, no matter what it started out as. Why change it now? No one was up in arms about the term when straight people got married anywhere other than in a church, so why get upset about it now?

Exactly.  Buddhists get married, and consider marriage a secular affair.  Atheists too.  


You know what nobody needs to get married?  A church.  You don't need a priest either, or even a ring.  I didn't hear people complaining that Atheists were getting marred.  Or Buddhists for that matter.  People who get married on a beach by a justice of the peace is just as married as the couple that gets married in a church.  I wonder why all of a sudden they want to take 'their word' back.  The definition has varied between cultures for hundreds of years, and will continue to vary for hundreds of more.  


If you want religion involved in your marriage, that's your right.  But you don't get to own the word.  Not when you haven't had control over it for a very long time, and certainly not in most cultures.  Marriage isn't a religious term no matter how much the other side wants it to be, or considers it so.  


People often want compromise when they know they won't get what they want.  not sure why they think the other side should have to compromise.  


 

Quote:People often want compromise when they know they won't get what they want.  not sure why they think the other side should have to compromise.  

I remain impressed by how often people here miscategorize which "side" I'm on. Let's just say that what I'd love to see happen and what I think should happen are rarely the same thing.

Quote:I remain impressed by how often people here miscategorize which "side" I'm on. Let's just say that what I'd love to see happen and what I think should happen are rarely the same thing.

 

If that's not what you want, then I wasn't talking about you, now was I?


And I don't get how you could think compromise is what should happen. Why should anyone compromise liberty?

Quote:If that's not what you want, then I wasn't talking about you, now was I?


And I don't get how you could think compromise is what should happen. Why should anyone compromise liberty?

I suppose I don't see semantics as liberty. As long as the rights extended are the same for everyone and the terminology used is the same for everyone, who cares what the name attached to it is? I think you'd find a lot less objection to homosexual couples being extended government-backed civil unions. We might not even be talking about a certain middle-aged female Cartman in Kentucky...

Quote:I suppose I don't see semantics as liberty. As long as the rights extended are the same for everyone and the terminology used is the same for everyone, who cares what the name attached to it is? I think you'd find a lot less objection to homosexual couples being extended government-backed civil unions. We might not even be talking about a certain middle-aged female Cartman in Kentucky...

Do you really think that everyone is upset just because of a word?

Quote:I suppose I don't see semantics as liberty. As long as the rights extended are the same for everyone and the terminology used is the same for everyone, who cares what the name attached to it is? I think you'd find a lot less objection to homosexual couples being extended government-backed civil unions. We might not even be talking about a certain middle-aged female Cartman in Kentucky...

 

So people should be expected to change the entire word for everyone, because a few clerks refuse to do their job, and they might do their job if a word was changed (although it's doubtful, I'm sure they'd find another reason to oppose it.)   It's not just the word they disapprove of.  They disapprove of that 'lifestyle'.  I'm sure we'd still be talking about a middle-aged female Cartman in Kentucky even if the word was changed.  


Oh and what about the few churches that will allow gays to get married?  

Quote:One could argue that "marriage" should have remained a religious term in the first place.

Nevermind

Quote:Do you really think that everyone is upset just because of a word?

Quote:So people should be expected to change the entire word for everyone, because a few clerks refuse to do their job, and they might do their job if a word was changed (although it's doubtful, I'm sure they'd find another reason to oppose it.)   It's not just the word they disapprove of.  They disapprove of that 'lifestyle'.  I'm sure we'd still be talking about a middle-aged female Cartman in Kentucky even if the word was changed.  

You know what? I give up. I'm not advocating capitulation to homophobes. Screw them. I'm talking about taking a divisive issue and finding a solution that most reasonable people on both sides would see as a fair solution. Go find and watch that video I posted about earlier, then tell me that that isn't a reasonable man who wants to reach out to homosexuals and integrate them more into the church and community, but do so in a way that doesn't compromise a central tenet of his belief system. You don't even have to invest 20 minutes in watching it; if you spend a few minutes with Google, you'll find it on his blog. It's the most recent entry on the front page. That's the type of person that I think was pushed just a little farther away from center by the verdict.

 

Mike Huckabee, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio and their breed can stand off to the side shouting about all the reasons that homosexuality is immoral, against nature, a threat to America's youth, whatever, and nothing will change that until they draw their last breath. The vast majority of this country, at this point, is comfortable (at least) with homosexuality. It's not an unspeakable evil, but many of them still have reservations about certain religious concepts being applied to situations that fall outside of what their beliefs allow for. It's 10 PM and I have work in the morning, so I'm not going to bother digging up poll numbers, but I suspect that you'd find that many of the 40% of America that listed themselves as against same-sex marriage are actually fine with the concept of two members of the same sex living a committed, lifelong relationship with each other. I don't know, maybe I just give people too much credit in assuming that we all, at our hearts, want to be reasonable, but part of being reasonable is learning to find solutions that grant equal rights to everyone, even if not everybody is happy with the rights granted.

 

And see, that's kind of the point for me. The government should never have issued "marriage" licenses in the first place. They should have been issuing "civil union" licenses all along, but since the state governments back in the 19th century never could have imagined that two men or two women would want to marry each other, they had no reason to secularize the terminology. Had the Supreme Court undone that mistake and changed all government unions going forward to civil unions, with the term "marriage" being left to the private sector, everyone would have the exact same rights that they do today, but lots of people, including that pastor in Virginia, would have walked away feeling less marginalized by the outcome.

Quote:It's not a homophobia thing for me. It's a separation of church and state thing. "Marriage" was a religious term first, and imo, it should have stayed as such with a different term used for governmentally-recognized unions to begin with. I doubt we'd have had this whole argument in the first place if "marriage" had been strictly a religious ceremony and "civil unions" been the binding contract between any two consenting adults for legal purposes.

That kinda makes sense to me. Everyone is legally entering into a civil union. Getting married then would just be the act of having a wedding. I would be fine with that if the definitions were applied to all parties.

I agree with much of what TJBender has posted, and I think he kind of understands my point of view.

 

Consider this.  Why was the whole issue of gay marriage started in the first place?  It was because same-sex couples wanted the same legal benefits of traditional couples.  For example, they wanted to be able to file taxes as "married", wanted to have spouse survival benefits in the event of the death of their spouse, wanted to be able to purchase insurance as a family rather than individuals, etc.  I personally see nothing wrong with that and support it as most reasonable people do.

 

The problem is that there are many people who consider marriage as a religious union between a man and a woman.  All that I'm saying is that a reasonable solution to avoid problems such as this lady that is the subject of this thread, is to change the legal term to a civil union on legal documents.  After doing that, then anyone entering a civil union can call their union whatever they wish, and if they choose to call it a marriage they are certainly free to do so.

 

Here is another way to look at it.  The civil union is the legal binding contract between two people.  A marriage or wedding is the ceremony celebrating and recognizing that legal binding contract.

 

 

Quote:That kinda makes sense to me. Everyone is legally entering into a civil union. Getting married then would just be the act of having a wedding. I would be fine with that if the definitions were applied to all parties.

 

We might actually agree on something.  Time to test out the new bunker.