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Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

nytimes.com

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Re: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

#781

Post by ctdonath »

vilmosi wrote: post #729
ctdonath wrote: post #580

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The state has a vested interest in procreation (i.e.: creation of new citizens & taxpayers as others die off), so takes an interest in "marriage" as a means for facilitating the most efficient & effective means of promoting procreation, doing so by giving special benefits in return for parents taking on special obligations. Expanding the beneficiaries of those benefits to those to whom there is absolutely no chance (…

Marriage has nothing to do with procreation. The government doesn't care if you plan to have kids when you get married, there's no tick box saying "You agree that this marriage license is only valid if you have kids.". Marriage is about a union, that's it.

Marriage has everything to do with procreation.

For most of human history, and without having to get into more specific details, a man and woman living together for more than a short time usually resulted in children. The institution was enacted to encourage such couples to avoid getting into such a situation unless they agreed to stay together, ensuring the likely offspring would be raised by their own parents (generally the best possible conditions).

There's no point in formal social recognition of a union if there's no chance of reproductive consequences thereof. And by "no chance" I mean "the notion is utterly preposterous", not "they may choose not to" or "parts don't work"; if literally two bits of information (one quarter of a byte) is enough to make the decision, that's enough.

Re: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

#782

Post by vehementi »

kefka wrote: post #527
eropple wrote: post #481

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What should happen is the government should stop defining marriage of any form (leave that to religion or personal tradition), and simply define all these rights under civil union (or a similar phrase with no significant religious/cultural attachment). Sure. And that was not in the cards. What you want is not on the table and likely never will be. But expanding the rights of people because of basic fairness is a st…

> Asking gay people to wait for a unicorn is bullshit. Please don't be That Guy. Ideological purity is so often the enemy of making the world better. But, why not? I'm a male. And I'm bisexual and polyamorus. I understand, and accept if a family wants to have 3 adults. Or 4 adults. I'm even OK if children are raised in that atmosphere. Right now, there are rules and restrictions on polygamy (which is a subset of poly…

> But, why not?

Because gays not being able to marry is an injustice, an unfairness, oppression, etc. Priority #1 is to stop doing harm to those people however it can be implemented. We didn't* say "Oh black people should have rights, but let's postpone that until we can come up with the best possible way to write it in legislature"

*racist people did in fact use that argument

Re: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

#783

Post by millstone »

baddox wrote: post #602
bighi wrote: post #470

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But marriage is not a religious thing. Before most popular religions were created, marriage was already old. For cultural reasons, it's popular to do a RELIGIOUS CEREMONY along the marriage. What's religious there is the ceremony, not the marriage. You can have religious ceremonies without marriage, and marriages without the religious ceremony. Two independent concepts that, by happenstance, often come together.

Marriage need not be a "government thing" in the modern sense, with all the legal distinctions we currently have. Marriage is inherently a legal thing, in the sense that it's a contract between people.

Marriage confers very special rights, such as permanent residency or social security inheritance, that you cannot obtain through private contracts. Therefore the government has to be involved.

Re: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

#784

Post by tommorris »

jivardo_nucci wrote: post #698
honestcoyote wrote: post #607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've often wondered if polyamorus families could make an end run around the old anti-polygamy laws by creating a corporation. It would give legal protection for shared property and money. Would also provide a mechanism for divorce by allowing the remaining people to buy out the shares of the person leaving. It wouldn't be perfect but it would be a start. I'm personally not poly in any way, but it's a fun thought expe…

In the midst of reading this I was struck by the question "If corporations are persons, can corporations marry?"

A while back, I was joking to American gay friends that if they wanted to have their rights recognised in post-Citizens United America, they ought to set up an LLC together rather than get married.

Re: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

#785

Post by wj »

edko wrote: post #565
drcube wrote: post #526

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Marriage has always been a government institution. Religion co-opted it for themselves at a later time. This "leave marriage to the churches where they belong" cry is disingenuous. Marriage is about a contract between individuals. It provides government granted privileges in regards to taxes, healthcare, inheritance, court testimony and child custody. It has nothing to do with religion. If you want to have a religiou…

There was almost no difference between government and religion when marriage originated, so it makes little sense to argue who invented it. Was Moses a political or religious leader? Were pharaohs political rulers or gods? Etc. What is very clear is that, in our society, civil and religious marriage are two different things that share a common name, and that one should have no influence over the other.

That might be very clear to you and I but I'm hearing a lot today about religious liberty being trampled. So I suspect it isn't as clear to a lot of people.

Re: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

#786

Post by chc »

DannyBee wrote: post #765
0x5f3759df-i wrote: post #723

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There has been basically nothing, in the history of our country, considered more of a state right than defining marriage. Sorry, this statement just isn't true: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia >The debates over everything in the past that led to amendments looked roughly the same as the debate over same sex marriage. For example, people beat each other on the floor of the senate chamber over slavery…

" Sorry, this statement just isn't true: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia" I'm aware of loving, which said nothing different? Loving basically said the same thing i did - they need a legitimate state interest. Race based discrimination is not a legitimate state interest. Therefore, Loving falls. That is sane legal theory. But it doesn't change this case? "So you are saying that every social issue must…

> I'm aware of loving, which said nothing different? Loving basically said the same thing i did - they need a legitimate state interest. Race based discrimination is not a legitimate state interest. Therefore, this falls.

How is sex-based discrimination in marriage a legitimate state interest but not race-based discrimination in marriage? I'm having trouble seeing how Loving — which overrode states' control over marriage when it was unnecessarily discriminatory — can be a good ruling while Obergefell is a bad ruling because it overrode states' control over marriage when it was unnecessarily discriminatory.

Re: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

#787

Post by wj »

caskance wrote: post #773
trhway wrote: post #622

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I don't think that's the full story. I suspect that religious marriage existed long before nation states and most of the current legal distinctions associated with marriage. I suspect that marriage - a man/wife pairing (or 1-to-N grouping) recognized by the tribe/village with respect to all those legal distinctions related to property, children, etc... - existed long before the religion.

That would require humans to have existed before religion, which is frankly quite ridiculous.

I do not follow?

Re: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

#788

Post by millstone »

wyager wrote: post #520
bighi wrote: post #470

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But marriage is not a religious thing. Before most popular religions were created, marriage was already old. For cultural reasons, it's popular to do a RELIGIOUS CEREMONY along the marriage. What's religious there is the ceremony, not the marriage. You can have religious ceremonies without marriage, and marriages without the religious ceremony. Two independent concepts that, by happenstance, often come together.

Even if it's just a social ceremony, the government should not give it special legal allowance. The government doesn't recognize Quinceañeras or bar mitzvahs. If you believe that marriage has an important legal function, it's also not fair to preclude polygamists from getting those same legal utilities. A much better generalized solution is to expand the purview of contract law to allow it to do everything marriage d…

Private contract law cannot enable foreigners to come live with their spouses in the US, or grant spousal testimony privilege in court.

Re: Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, Supreme Court Rules

#789

Post by mod »

masklinn wrote: post #587
yellowapple wrote: post #566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My impression is that OP wants the current rights from marriage to be part of civil unions instead, not for said rights to be eradicated outright. The former sounds like a more reasonable position and would address your (and the parent commenter's) concerns.

So he wants the exact same thing with a new name for essentially no reason? That strikes me as an inane waste of resource.

The reason is to abolish the religious ties, I believe.
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