[extropy-chat] gay marriage

[Adrian Tymes]

--- Harvey Newstrom <mail at HarveyNewstrom.com> wrote:
> Kevin Freels wrote,
> > I am so angry I can't even type a decent letter!
> This gay marriage thing
> > is just as stupid as segregation!
> 
> It is interesting that you compare this debate with
> the one on segregation.
> I see the concept of civil unions as being "separate
> but equal" for gays.

How about the followup: ...and then ban marriage
entirely, converting already existing marriages into
civil unions?  Thus, neither hetero nor homo get
government-sanctioned religious institutions. 
Anything
currently going to marriages and not to civil unions
would either have to be revised or become universally
inapplicable.

> I don't believe this.  Many cultures have had
> marriage across all different
> religious settings.  Even pagan, primitive or
> non-religious cultures have
> had marriage or family units.  Even other species
> have their mating rituals
> and pack-like groupings.  This is not a religious
> institution invented by
> churches.  We know from history and evolution that
> it is not.

Invention and ownership are not the same thing, and to
many people, religious institutions "own" marriage.

> I agree with this, but I would even go further.  Why
> have any legal union at
> all?  Why not let people choose other people for any
> relationship they want?

Government social policy.  They would prefer, for
example, that children have a stable family growing
up, and to them that means incentives for the parents
to stay together.

> Let people live with whomever they want.  Let people
> leave their property to
> whomever they want.

Already doable, if they care enough to state their
choice.  Marriage and family just cover the default
case.

> President Bush announced
> the amendment and then the San Francisco mayor
> reacted, not the other way
> around.

No, actually, it's the other way around.  Check the
newspapers.  It may have been that the Republicans
were planning to propose the amendment (for instance,
on 1/29, the Senate Family Services Committee passed
a measure by 4-3 supporting an amendment of that
nature), which prompted San Fran's mayor to act, but
the public announcement of the amendment (2/24) came
after the marriage2 (2/17).