Judge Blocks Prayer at High School Graduation. Students still prayed.

[Perd Hapley]

Whether or not it is marriage to meis unimportant.
Defining or approving "marriage" doesn't need to be addressed by the government at all.

Agreed, marriage is a known quantity well defined.  We don't need you or the government to define it differently than what it is has long been recognized to be.  Government limits the legal definition for factors like age and incest, and has also limited it for racial reasons, but it has never widened the defition.  And the govt. recognizes the marriage, rather than approving it.  It's usually one of the mothers-in-law that does the disapproving.  Eh, wot?

The civil union should be the joining together of consenting adults.

Yes, and so is a business partnership, but we don't consider marriage and business partnerships to be equal legally or socially.

You keep saying that a heterosexual union of one male and one female should be legally considered differently than any other long-term relationship.

That has been the case historically and should be case as marriage is different than other relationships.  Any agreement, partnership or contract can involve children, but marriage is the only legal arrangement that produces children.  

Oh, and I don't think that the civil union need address the sexual aspects of the relationship at all.  If we changed your hypothetical to the single mom moving in with her single sister and forming a civil union to help raise the kid, I think that would be fine as well.

I thought you read my "Secular Argument" but I guess you did not.

[Nightfall]

Why can't we be friends?
Why can't we be friends?
Why can't we be friends?
Why can't we be friends?

End musical interlude.

I just wanted to take a moment to curse you, fistful. Thanks to that post, I've had that song stuck in my head, constantly humming it, whistling it, singing it. Thanks alot. :p

[cordex]

I thought you read my "Secular Argument" but I guess you did not.

Sure I did.  That's actually the only reason I added that part.

Fistful, no matter how you try to dress it up, the true and full basis of your argument is ...
"This is the way it has always been done, so this is the way it should stay.  The legal protections and provisions for a marriage should not be duplicated or imitated for any other union.  Because."

While it's fine to hold that opinion, one can't really argue for or against the position since it is based entirely on tradition rather than reason.

I had misunderstood your argument to be that the legal institution of marriage exists only to protect children, thus only relationships capable of producing children are deserving of the protections that a marriage type union gives.  I don't think the "for the children" argument holds water considering your position on children who are brought into infertile couplings.

[Perd Hapley]

Oh, and I don't think that the civil union need address the sexual aspects of the relationship at all.  If we changed your hypothetical to the single mom moving in with her single sister and forming a civil union to help raise the kid, I think that would be fine as well.

That's what I was talking about.  It seems you were telling me exactly what I was trying to tell you.  A cornerstone of the argument is that homosexual relationships deserve no special recognition because they are purely sexual/romantic in nature and therefore add no more value to society than friendships, business partnerships, etc.  They may care for children, but there are many arrangements that do so without being considered marriages.

"This is the way it has always been done, so this is the way it should stay.  The legal protections and provisions for a marriage should not be duplicated or imitated for any other union.  Because."

Why add more relationships to the government's business?  Homosexual relationships don't give us any reason to do this.

[cordex]

Why add more relationships to the government's business?  Homosexual relationships don't give us any reason to do this.

Your entire argument continues to hinge around tradition (which can be valuable, and I do not fault you for defending your traditions) and the mistaken premise that governmental interest in marriages is solely for the protection of progeny produced by a union.

Again, infertile or willfully childless heterosexual relationships are simply romantic and sexual in nature, yet they are given the same government protections as a family with thirteen children.  Your secular argument is dead set against giving any legal recognition to homosexual relationships only because they are incapable of producing children within the union, yet you dismiss infertility or lack of willingness to produce children within heterosexual marriages as unimportant.  In other words, given two barren couples who will never bear children of their own, you would award all the legal protections of marriage to one and refuse it to the other.

[richyoung]

Again, infertile or willfully childless heterosexual relationships are simply romantic and sexual in nature, yet they are given the same government protections as a family with thirteen children.  Your secular argument is dead set against giving any legal recognition to homosexual relationships only because they are incapable of producing children within the union, yet you dismiss infertility or lack of willingness to produce children within heterosexual marriages as unimportant.  In other words, given two barren couples who will never bear children of their own, you would award all the legal protections of marriage to one and refuse it to the other.

Apples and oranges.  An "infertile" heterosexual couple still has much more non-zero potential for CONCIEVING a child than a homosexual couple, where the chances are exactly ZERO.  An infertile couple may be misdiagnosed, or treated through surgery or drugs, or, if willingly childless, change their mind.  Marriage is simply a recognistion that a child needs and deserves a stable relationship, so societal recognition and pressure is brought to bear to stabilize those relationships with a possibility of conception.  If you want to know why, just look at the poverty and infant mortality rates for single-parent households.  Even if the relationship does break up, a costly and difficult process must be followed, as part of which the children's financial interests are protected.  To extend "marriage" beyond what it is already will be to take another step down the road of destroying the nuclear family - and thats bad.

[cordex]

Apples and oranges.  An "infertile" heterosexual couple still has much more non-zero potential for CONCIEVING a child than a homosexual couple, where the chances are exactly ZERO.

What, you don't believe in miracles?

Marriage is simply a recognistion that a child needs and deserves a stable relationship, so societal recognition and pressure is brought to bear to stabilize those relationships with a possibility of conception.

So you're saying that you would support extending the protection of marriage to homosexual relationships where one or both of the parties are already the designated guardians of children, or when children are brought into the relationship through adoption or other means?

To extend "marriage" beyond what it is already will be to take another step down the road of destroying the nuclear family - and thats bad.

How could two members of the same sex "marry"?  Your position on the definition of the word "marriage" is very clear - and no homosexual couple could fulfill the criteria.  What is the problem with granting some of the same legal protections to other types of relationships, though?

[Perd Hapley]

Why add more relationships to the government's business?  Homosexual relationships don't give us any reason to do this.

Your entire argument continues to hinge around tradition (which can be valuable, and I do not fault you for defending your traditions) and the mistaken premise that governmental interest in marriages is solely for the protection of progeny produced by a union.

Again, infertile or willfully childless heterosexual relationships are simply romantic and sexual in nature, yet they are given the same government protections as a family with thirteen children.  Your secular argument is dead set against giving any legal recognition to homosexual relationships only because they are incapable of producing children within the union, yet you dismiss infertility or lack of willingness to produce children within heterosexual marriages as unimportant.  In other words, given two barren couples who will never bear children of their own, you would award all the legal protections of marriage to one and refuse it to the other.

I thank you cordex, and the rest of you who have critiqued my thinking; I continue to get a clearer picture of the issue.  There are many areas where my thinking has not been well-expressed or went slightly in the wrong direction or did not go far enough.  I should like to know, then, what government's interest in marriage may be, if not with regard to children.

That marriages with the biological mother and father present are the best environment for raising children is not mere tradition; it is something we have learned the hard way in the past few decades and over the course of millenia.  That "infertile" couples or those who choose childlessness may yet have children is not a tradition either, especially when infertility is so often overcome.  This is why an argument can be made that government should support marriage or at least recognize it.  Our choice is a leviathan state with layer upon layer of safety nets for fatherless children and single mothers, and a huge law enforcement and prison system to deal with the crime that results, or a society that supports itself with strong families.  Homosexual relationships, as wonderful as some may represent them to be, simply don't benefit society in any recognizable way.  If they do, let us see what it is.  Now if people are raising children together and can't or won't marry, then perhaps there should be some sort of civil union arranged on the basis of child custody, but as this is inferior to marriage, it should not be put on the same legal footing.

[cordex]

That marriages with the biological mother and father present are the best environment for raising children is not mere tradition; it is something we have learned the hard way in the past few decades and over the course of millenia.

I agree wholeheartedly.

I still believe that the legal aspects of marriage do not exclusively exist to benefit children, and I'm curious where you got that understanding.  It has always been my understanding that the legal aspects of marriage exist to establish and protect a new family that is formed from the union of the husband and wife - whether or not that new family produces children.

[Nightfall]

Homosexual relationships, as wonderful as some may represent them to be, simply don't benefit society in any recognizable way.

Yikes, that smacks of socialism fistful. Why should we care if a homosexual marriage benefits society? Shouldn't it be enough that it benefits those two people? I've always thought of marriage as a contract between two people, not an oath for two people to benefit society.

[Perd Hapley]

Cordex, what is it that these two people need protection from?  Why do two people need a special arrangement just because of love, cohabitation, etc.?  I am not sure what other government interest you see in two people living together or having sex, where only consenting adults are involved.  I don't know why two consenting adults can't sort out matters on their own.  Let them get married in any ceremony that suits them, but why is it government business if they are just two adults, with no chance of reproducing new and helpless individuals?

Yikes, that smacks of socialism fistful.

I'm not saying that anyone is obliged to benefit society, either within marriage or without, or in any other relationship.  I am not saying that marriage is only for children or that marriage is not complete without them.  I am not saying that marriage is only what government recognizes it to be.  

I am asking myself what sets marriage apart from other seemingly-private living arrangements and/or personal commitments.  The importance of marriage to children - future citizens - is first and most obvious.

It protects the rights of children who cannot help themselves or defend themselves.  Children have a right to their parents' care and regulating marriage is a way of keeping children and their parents off of state assistance or charity and keeping families stable.  In this way, it protects children, while protecting society from the social ills of broken families.

For other types of relationships, there are wills, powers of attorney, and other options available.  If not, perhaps there should be.  Perhaps they are too difficult to obtain and we should deregulate a bit.  Fine.

However, government classes different organizations differently according to the needs, behaviors, purposes and other characteristics thereof.  It observes a distinction between a for-profit oil corporation and a non-profit shelter for abused women, between a private college and a Mormon temple.  To put heterosexual marriage together with homosexual relationships or with sexless cohabitation is to fail to recognize that different types of organizations have different purposes and different needs.  It is to pretend that a man and a woman is the same combination as a man and a man.  Ivory tower theorists can pretend that sexual differences do not exist, but who are they fooling?

[Guest]

I just gotta say how nice it is to hear arguments that are about topics and not about how much of a doody head the other person thinks you are. You don't learn from people who think like you, but its rare for there to be so many disagreements on this board, and yet, so many people who respect those who disagree with them. You all should be really proud of that.

[Nightfall]

It protects the rights of children who cannot help themselves or defend themselves.  Children have a right to their parents' care and regulating marriage is a way of keeping children and their parents off of state assistance or charity and keeping families stable.  In this way, it protects children, while protecting society from the social ills of broken families.

How? Is not child support based on whos genetic material created the kid, rather than marriage? Also, how does marriage keep parents off welfare? Is this based on the premise that two incomes are more likely to be able to provide enough for the child? Makes sense, but thats covered by child support, isnt it? Marriage as a way to keep a family stable? Ever heard of people screwin around outside of marriage? I dont have to look hard at all to find examples of it, as well as the resulting children, or to find examples of marriages falling apart, or causing exponentially more friction because two badly mismatched people feel an obligation to stay with one another to the detriment of all involved. In short, I don't see marriage causingstability.

As for protecting society from these ills, well, end welfare. Those kids with parents on said wont benefit from being around parents who cant (or more likely, wont) provide for them. Put them in a family that wants them AND can care for them, so that the only ones being harmed by their own poverty is the parents.

In the end, I agree with you that a pair of upstanding parents is the best environment for raising a child. However, that environment comes from two well-matched, loving people with good, consistent morals. The legal contract of marriage doesnt cause those things, nor are those properties a pre-requisite for nuptials.

[Perd Hapley]

How? Is not child support based on whos genetic material created the kid, rather than marriage?

I'm not sure what this implies.

Also, how does marriage keep parents off welfare? Is this based on the premise that two incomes are more likely to be able to provide enough for the child? Makes sense, but thats covered by child support, isnt it?

Married parents, no matter who earns the bread, usually keep one household, spend less money on lawyers, don't waste as much money trying to buy their kids' affection, don't waste time shuttling children from house to house, and don't have both parents supporting a second or third family in a second or third marriage.  And that's just the beginning.  Our current system is foolishly biased towards mothers in matters of custody.  The foolishness lies in that divorce would be less common if divorce meant that men had to take care of the children (which they should, as they generally earn more money) and women would be seperated from their children.  Regarding welfare, by which I mean government aid generally, it seems reasonable to assume that single mothers are more likely than marrieds to need govt. assistance.  Especially as child support requires that the father actually pay.  Then we must consider how the children behave later in life.  Patterns of divorce and out-of-wedlock births pass down from generation to generation, just as other behaviors do.  Also, the negative effects of the fatherless home are not a secret.

Marriage as a way to keep a family stable? Ever heard of people screwin around outside of marriage?

Uh, yeah and yeah.  Ever thought how much more third-party sex goes on without marriage in the picture?  Marriage applies social and legal pressure on men to be faithful to wife and kids, and on women to avoid having illegitimi.*  Please don't tell me that these items do not matter.  I will not know what to do with you.

I dont have to look hard at all to find...marriages falling apart, or causing exponentially more friction because two badly mismatched people feel an obligation to stay with one another to the detriment of all involved.

So a contentious marriage is worse than the ridiculous, court-ordered custody-sharing, legal wrangles, unpaid child support, and everything else mentioned above?  This is outdated thinking, popular when divorce was the latest trend in women's liberation, but long-ago debunked by the ubiquitous complications of divorce.

As for protecting society from these ills, well, end welfare. Those kids with parents on said wont benefit from being around parents who cant (or more likely, wont) provide for them. Put them in a family that wants them AND can care for them, so that the only ones being harmed by their own poverty is the parents.

Speaking of socialism, this smacks of B.F. Skinner!  I add another ! for emphasis!  My goodness, man, like I said earlier:
"Our choice is a leviathan state with layer upon layer of safety nets for fatherless children and single mothers, and a huge law enforcement and prison system to deal with the crime that results, or a society that supports itself with strong families."  
I would love to see federal welfare entirely replaced by charity groups or local govt, of course.  Marriage and moral standards, in a culture that values them much more highly than our own, are the best way to keep families solvent.  As it is, we can't possibly eliminate welfare; too many Americans are too corrupt to take care of themselves.  And the Democrats have buses to take them to the poles!

In the end, I agree with you that a pair of upstanding parents is the best environment for raising a child. However, that environment comes from two well-matched, loving people with good, consistent morals. The legal contract of marriage doesnt cause those things, nor are those properties a pre-requisite for nuptials.

I didn't say marriage could do everything, but it can encourage morality and commitment.  However, it is not as if heredity means nothing to children; abandonment by a parent can scar a person for life.  And something else I said earlier.
"Now if people are raising children together and can't or won't marry, then perhaps there should be some sort of civil union arranged on the basis of child custody, but as this is inferior to marriage, it should not be put on the same legal footing."

*Yeah, I know that ain't proper Latin, or at least Wiki said so.  I'm gonna go look up "ain't."

[richyoung]

How? Is not child support based on whos genetic material created the kid, rather than marriage?

No.  The husband of a married woman is legaly the father of any child she concieves - even if he is infertile, or otherwise could not have sired that particular father.  Although a few exceptions exist, hundreds of EX-husbands are paying child support for children positively excluded as their offspring by DNA testing.  Thats the law - its set up that way to protect children.

[cordex]

Cordex, what is it that these two people need protection from?  Why do two people need a special arrangement just because of love, cohabitation, etc.?  I am not sure what other government interest you see in two people living together or having sex, where only consenting adults are involved.  I don't know why two consenting adults can't sort out matters on their own.

Because marriage isn't just about romance and sex.  Nor is it just about children.  Your "defenses" of marriage are going an awful long way to cheapening the word.

Marriage - even in its most secular sense - is not simply to serve as a baby factory for the State.

Marriage, as you and I well know, is the willful commingling of two individuals into a new family.  Among the things that are joined are their financial, health, inheritance and immigration matters, as well as other legal issues - all of which are currently handled automatically by signing a marriage license.  Nightfall brings up the point that there are other laws - entirely distinct from marriage - that attempt (poorly) to preserve the stability of childrens' lives through requiring financial support.  Given that not all children are born within the union of marriage, having the laws that govern duties to one's genetic material seperate from marriage seems like a sound idea.

Marriage is the opportunity for a man and a woman - fertile or not - to join themselves together.  Offering a similar civil union to other groups whether or not they plan on, or are capable of making babies doesn't bother me.

Let them get married in any ceremony that suits them, but why is it government business if they are just two adults, with no chance of reproducing new and helpless individuals?

Actually, given modern advances targetted at infertile heterosexual couples, homosexual couples are theoretically capable of reproduction - given enough assistance, of course.  Lesbian couples could choose to become impregnated with sperm from a sperm bank just as a couple with a fertile female and an infertile male could.  Gay men could make arrangements with a host mother (though they would have to use her eggs) to have a child as a couple with a fertile male and infertile female might choose to do.  And of course there is adoption, which your argument continues to ignore.

The absolute best situation for a child is to be in a happy home without major financial problems with a loving and mature mother and a loving and mature father as well as strong ties to a loving and mature extended family.  Not every child has that ideal situation, and marriage - while certainly beneficial to many families - does not offer the benevolant protection you seem to imply that it does.  As evidence, I cite this:

Married parents, no matter who earns the bread, usually keep one household, spend less money on lawyers, don't waste as much money trying to buy their kids' affection, don't waste time shuttling children from house to house, and don't have both parents supporting a second or third family in a second or third marriage.  And that's just the beginning.

Wouldn't that be an argument against the institution of marriage providing "stability" in children's lives?  In other words, when a marriage falls apart it damages children rather than protects them.  When it works, it works wonderfully, when it doesn't, it's a suicide pact.

[cordex]

The husband of a married woman is legaly the father of any child she concieves - even if he is infertile, or otherwise could not have sired that particular father[sic].

State laws vary on this.

As I recall from my limited reading on this, Indiana State law contains an exemption for situations where the husband can prove he was not the father.

[Perd Hapley]

I could continue this, but I could also continue to beat my head against a cement floor.  I am amazed that you are still hung up on infertile couples, as if I tried to say that they are not really married.  Of course, I'll probably chime back in, I'm just fed up with trying to explain perfectly obvious matters to seemingly intelligent and rational people.

 government classes different organizations differently according to the needs, behaviors, purposes and other characteristics thereof.  It observes a distinction between a for-profit oil corporation and a non-profit shelter for abused women, between a private college and a Mormon temple.  To put heterosexual marriage together with homosexual relationships or with sexless cohabitation is to fail to recognize that different types of organizations have different purposes and different needs.  It is to pretend that a man and a woman is the same combination as a man and a man.  Ivory tower theorists can pretend that sexual differences do not exist, but who are they fooling?

[cordex]

Fistful, I'm not particularly hung up on the fertility issue.  I address it only because you have repeatedly brought up the red herring that marriage == child producing union, which is demonstrably not the case.

[Perd Hapley]

Here I am again.  I never said that's all that marriage is.  I said that is the reason why government might have some reason to recognize marriage, and why it is unique among other relationships.

[cordex]

Fistful,
Exactly.

[Nightfall]

How? Is not child support based on whos genetic material created the kid, rather than marriage?

No.  The husband of a married woman is legaly the father of any child she concieves - even if he is infertile, or otherwise could not have sired that particular father.  Although a few exceptions exist, hundreds of EX-husbands are paying child support for children positively excluded as their offspring by DNA testing.  Thats the law - its set up that way to protect children.

Thats what I get for assuming, and expecting common sense or justice from government.

Ever thought how much more third-party sex goes on without marriage in the picture?  Marriage applies social and legal pressure on men to be faithful to wife and kids, and on women to avoid having illegitimi.

Yeah, marriage may provide pressure not to go screwin around (or at least not to produce children via said). I guess. Maybe. Honestly, Ive seen so many unfaithful spouses that its hard not to be jaded about how effective that pressure really is. The pressure it really seems to create is "not to get caught". Speaks sadly of the state of personal honor with the population, by and large.

So a contentious marriage is worse than the ridiculous, court-ordered custody-sharing, legal wrangles, unpaid child support, and everything else mentioned above?

It can be. Whats better? Two parents living together, screaming and cursing at one another in front of their child, or two calmer, saner people separately? Depends on the degrees I would think, but the former isnt the example of human interaction a healthy child can be raised on.

I didn't say marriage could do everything, but it can encourage morality and commitment.

Our only real point of contention here seems to be marriages effectiveness as a morality encourager. The solid marriages Ive seen have come from two people who were on solid moral ground as individuals before hand. In the end, the less than upstanding folk who got married didnt settle down because of a ring, some vows, and/or some social pressure. My experience in life hasn't really supported this effect you claim marriage has.

[Perd Hapley]

So a contentious marriage is worse than the ridiculous, court-ordered custody-sharing, legal wrangles, unpaid child support, and everything else mentioned above?

It can be. Whats better? Two parents living together, screaming and cursing at one another in front of their child, or two calmer, saner people separately? Depends on the degrees I would think, but the former isnt the example of human interaction a healthy child can be raised on.

I'm not talking about abstract theory, here, I'm talking about the evidence we have seen, as a society, since divorce rates increased.  When marriages are expected to last, couples work harder to make them last and children are better cared and provided for in such unions.  But divorce usually doesn't get parents, or children, out of the relationship.  It just puts the two parents on different terms, with the same backbiting and so on and so forth.

Our only real point of contention here seems to be marriages effectiveness as a morality encourager.

I was talking about the effect women often have on men, in a long-term, monogamous relationship.  Tends to keep 'em from runnin' around, drinkin', fightin' and so forth.  Settles 'em boys down don't ya know.