Marriage discussion

[meridian2]

NOTE: This thread has been split form the Jeremy Corbyn and Tom Watson discussion thread.

Marriage is a legal cementing of a relationship between two loving, consenting adult humans.

No it isn't, you can't have read the wedding vows. You may as well say marriage is anti childless couples as anti-homosexual. If people want a legal framework for the inheritance of property and an acknowledgement of status, a civil partnership offers them everything they require.

 

[AlterEgo]

No it isn't, you can't have read the wedding vows. You may as well say marriage is anti childless couples as anti-homosexual. If people want a legal framework for the inheritance of property and an acknowledgement of status, a civil partnership offers them everything they require.

But that isn't all a marriage is.

And it's not all that gay people want, is it?

Anti-gay marriage standpoints baffle me; the law has literally no effect on my quality of life, so live and let live. It's not even an important enough issue for me to even think about.

 

[meridian2]

Very confusing for me to understand why anyone would hold abhorent viewpoints in these areas. I guess that's the same across the country, hence nobody apart from the usual UKIP nutters (gay marriage causes floods) holds those views.

Certainly I can see a few areas of debate -- euthanasia for example -- it's fine in theory, but in practice you have to be sure that there's no pressure. Of course given that fiscally conservative governments encourage euthanasia, and even get away with systematic manslaughter of old (poor) people by reducing health and social care funding. I believe most of the parties are in favour of drug control - at least the use of drugs in public. With the exception of UKIP they all back the smoking ban for example.

Why is drug control or opposition to medical murder an "abhorrent viewpoint"

 

[meridian2]

But that isn't all a marriage is.

And it's not all that gay people want, is it?

Anti-gay marriage standpoints baffle me; the law has literally no effect on my quality of life, so live and let live. It's not even an important enough issue for me to even think about.

I think the gay marriage debate is a sideshow in a much wider debate about morality. If you believe morals are a relativistic phenomenon decided by cultural norms, and imposed by law, I completely disagree.

 

[AlterEgo]

I think the gay marriage debate is a sideshow in a much wider debate about morality. If you believe morals are a relativistic phenomenon decided by cultural norms, and imposed by law, I completely disagree.

I think that people who wish to proscribe gay marriage because they feel it's immoral must be bigots; such a marriage infringes none of their own rights and in no way affects that individual's quality of life.

 

[Barn]

I think that people who wish to proscribe gay marriage because they feel it's immoral must be bigots; such a marriage infringes none of their own rights and in no way affects that individual's quality of life.

I agree with your specific point on gay marriage but I'm not sure the justification you use is quite scaleable to other matters.

You suggest that the test for bigotry is whether the matter affects the rights of the potential bigot.

In fact, the reason gay marriage should be uncontroversial is that a marriage between two gay people doesn't affect the rights of anybody else.

It is not bigoted to be concerned about the effects of a policy on other people. I wouldn't call someone who had concerns about abortion or euthanasia a 'bigot' simply because the termination of a fetus or the commission of a mercy-killing did not affect that person or his quality of life. They may or may not be wrong in their opposition in your view, but they are not a bigot.

 

[meridian2]

I think that people who wish to proscribe gay marriage because they feel it's immoral must be bigots; such a marriage infringes none of their own rights and in no way affects that individual's quality of life.

As homosexual couples have forgone marriage rights for previous millennia, it's hardly a sudden imposition on the status quo. Marriage is a religious institution designed to provide a stable, lifelong framework for the rearing of children. It isn't anything else.

The debate between gay marriage and the rightful access to joint property in a same-sex civil partnership are two completely different issues. That marriage has become a temporary romantic liaison is the fault of society, not the institution. However as I said previously, in the bigger picture it's a sideshow to a wider debate about morality and society.

 

[northwichcat]

As homosexual couples have forgone marriage rights for previous millennia, it's hardly a sudden imposition on the status quo. Marriage is a religious institution designed to provide a stable, lifelong framework for the rearing of children. It isn't anything else.

So should all those heterosexual couples who got married with no intention of ever having children have had their marriages annulled?

 

[meridian2]

So should all those heterosexual couples who got married with no intention of ever having children have had their marriages annulled?

That would be silly. However those who conflated a legal union with family life were at least ill advised.

 

[Butts]

I may be alone here but I am not entirely comfortable with the whole business of same sex marriages and other associated aspects of modern couplings.

It's probably a generational thing as I am over 50 (grumpy old men springs to mind )

However that being said I realise I am out of kilter with most of society with regard to this and would not actively discriminate or wish any harm to the individuals involved.

 

[Domh245]

That would be silly. However those who conflated a legal union with family life were at least ill advised.

For heterosexual couples, Marriage is the only way to get a legal union and all of the associated financial benefits. Marriage may have been conceived as a religious institution, but it has since become just as much a civil issue, you can't now roll back the rules when it has changed as much as it has.

 

[GatwickDepress]

For heterosexual couples, Marriage is the only way to get a legal union and all of the associated financial benefits. Marriage may have been conceived as a religious institution, but it has since become just as much a civil issue, you can't now roll back the rules when it has changed as much as it has.

Exactly. Coca-Cola was originally invented as an alternative to morphine addiction, but you'll struggle to find anybody drinking it for that reason now!

 

[meridian2]

I may be alone here but I am not entirely comfortable with the whole business of same sex marriages and other associated aspects of modern couplings.

It's probably a generational thing as I am over 50 (grumpy old men springs to mind )

However that being said I realise I am out of kilter with most of society with regard to this and would not actively discriminate or wish any harm to the individuals involved.

That goes without saying. The problem is the freedom to express socially conservative views (irrespective of party political allegiances) has been curtailed by accusations of bigotry and malice.

 

[meridian2]

For heterosexual couples, Marriage is the only way to get a legal union and all of the associated financial benefits. Marriage may have been conceived as a religious institution, but it has since become just as much a civil issue, you can't now roll back the rules when it has changed as much as it has.

You could reinstitute marriage to the way it was before no-fault divorce, but it would take political cajones to do so. I suspect like European independence there would be considerable appetite for a social conservative party once it had countered the taunts and put its case. However as neither of the main parties have leadership in depth, hoping for a new one is a big ask.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Very confusing for me to understand why anyone would hold abhorent viewpoints in these areas.

I'm not sure what you'd think of as an 'abhorrent' viewpoint. Personally I'd only be inclined to describe someone's views as 'abhorrent' if they support violence against or persecution of certain people or groups of people. The list of issues you are responding to certainly includes many issues on which it would be possible to hold fairly conservative views without falling into that category, so I wonder if you're applying the word 'abhorrent' too widely?

As for not being able to understand why anyone would hold 'abhorrent' viewpoints - perhaps that's part of the problem? Perhaps if we all made more effort to understand why people hold views that are very different to our own, then politics in general, and these kinds of debates, would be much more pleasant and more productive?

I think that people who wish to proscribe gay marriage because they feel it's immoral must be bigots

I think that's unfair. Personally I completely support gay marriage, but I do know of people who don't support gay marriage, but who are certainly not bigots. Characterising all who disagree with you on an issue as bigots is really not the way debate should go - and is arguably exactly the kind of thing that drives so many people into the arms of UKIP - because it convinces them that their views are not respected by other parties.

After all, if you go back just 30 or so years ago you'd have found only a very small minority of people in the UK would have supported gay marriage. Does that mean that almost everyone living in the UK 30 years ago was a bigot?

 

[AlterEgo]

As homosexual couples have forgone marriage rights for previous millennia, it's hardly a sudden imposition on the status quo. Marriage is a religious institution designed to provide a stable, lifelong framework for the rearing of children. It isn't anything else.

The debate between gay marriage and the rightful access to joint property in a same-sex civil partnership are two completely different issues. That marriage has become a temporary romantic liaison is the fault of society, not the institution. However as I said previously, in the bigger picture it's a sideshow to a wider debate about morality and society.

That's a very nice way to say that gay people should be denied rights.

It was also the status quo for years that "practising homosexuals" were illegal and ostracised, but nobody claims that would be acceptable today.

Marriage hasn't always been a purely religious institution. In Greece in ancient terms there wasn't even a ceremony!

 

[AlterEgo]

I think that's unfair. Personally I completely support gay marriage, but I do know of people who don't support gay marriage, but who are certainly not bigots. Characterising all who disagree with you on an issue as bigots is really not the way debate should go - and is arguably exactly the kind of thing that drives so many people into the arms of UKIP - because it convinces them that their views are not respected by other parties.

After all, if you go back just 30 or so years ago you'd have found only a very small minority of people in the UK would have supported gay marriage. Does that mean that almost everyone living in the UK 30 years ago was a bigot?

A bigot in my view is someone who is an unreasonable partisan who is intolerant of others for no good cause.

People are welcome to hold a view where their own definition (religious or otherwise) of morality should be imposed on every other citizen, even where no harm is caused, and where their own rights are not infringed. However in my view this is partisan, unreasonable, and intolerant.

Morality, political correctness and the like are all contemporaneous. It's not proper or right to say "well 30 years ago everyone was a bigot then" - not contemporaneously, but only by today's standards. It's the same principle as people condemning the Prophet Muhammad for marrying a child - obscene today, but acceptable in his time.

I'm merely suggesting that such unreasonable opinions might be something for the 1970s, not 2017.

I haven't characterised "everyone who disagrees with me" as a bigot, only those whose views cannot be shown to have proper reason, and whose views restrict unduly the rights of others because of a private notion of morality or properness which they seek to impose on everyone.

I cannot change the views of other people but I am free to suggest that they are intolerant - a dirty word, sure. But nice, good, and educated people (clappers seems to be perfectly nice to me!) can be intolerant and bigoted, too.

I don't use "bigot" or any such terms as an insult.

 

[WelshBluebird]

The current Tory party are socially liberal free marketeers. There is very little conservative, or indeed Conservative about them. The difference between Boris Johnson and any of Blair's front bench is the school he went to. Ditto Cameron.

Except of course:
1 - The current Labour party is a very different beast to Blair's (for better or for worse).
2 - The current government is a very different beast to Cameron's government (again for better or for worse).

 

[miami]

I think the gay marriage debate is a sideshow in a much wider debate about morality. If you believe morals are a relativistic phenomenon decided by cultural norms, and imposed by law, I completely disagree.

There is no gay marriage "debate", any more then there's a "debate" about whether gay men should be castrated. I can see a debate about the practicalities of euthanasia -- in theory it's fine, but ensuring

Drug control seems a bit confusing - are you talking about the rights of people to not be subjected to drugs while in public spaces (i.e. banning smoking on the footpath), or the rights for people to do whatever they want in private to their own bodies?

However if Bob is against gay marriage, being against the legalisation of pornography, being against prostitutes, being against sex changes, banning black and Irish people from B&Bs etc. None of those things affect Bob, therefore I believe Bob's moral viewpoint should be able is abhorrent - he's trying to force his own viewpoints on you.

I'm a strong proponent of the freedom to swing you fist stops at my nose, however in most of these cases the actual act that 'social conservatives' decry is the swinging of the fist. If gay marriage was compulsory I would of course decry it, if non-gay marriage was banned I would decry that too. I'm not away of anyone If you want to reduce drug related crime, then legalise (and tax) drugs (I won't even mention the hypocrisy of allowing nicotine and tobacco but not allowing cannabis)

Please explain why you are against gay marriage? Are you also against civil marriage? Are you against the dropping of "Obey" from the traditional vows?

I assume that you believe a child brought up with two loving parents is a great place to be, especially if those parents have time to give to the child (i.e. not working 100 hours a week between them to fund the outsourcing of bringing up a child). Are you going to come out with something abhorant like 'same sex couples can't raise children as well as mixed sex couples'?

 

[miami]

That would be silly. However those who conflated a legal union with family life were at least ill advised.

Here are the main bit of the marriage vows

To have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part

Where on earth does it mention anything about a family life?

If we go back to the 'good old days' of "love honour and obey"

Groom: I,____, take thee,_____, to be my wedded Wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part, according to God's holy ordinance; and thereto I plight thee my troth.

Bride: I,_____, take thee,_____, to be my wedded Husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love, cherish, and to obey, till death us do part, according to God's holy ordinance; and thereto I give thee my troth.

Then, as the groom places the ring on the bride's finger, he says the following:

With this Ring I thee wed, with my body I thee worship, and with all my worldly goods I thee endow: In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Again where's the marriage bits? Or are we to expect that God's holy ordinance includes a requirement to'be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it., but not the bits about not eating bacon or prawns, or mutilating your son's reproductive organs.

If a gay couple marry and then have children, is that a legitimate marriage in your eyes? After all they're then bringing up a family in a state of wedlock.

 

[meridian2]

There is no gay marriage "debate", any more then there's a "debate" about whether gay men should be castrated. I can see a debate about the practicalities of euthanasia -- in theory it's fine, but ensuring

Drug control seems a bit confusing - are you talking about the rights of people to not be subjected to drugs while in public spaces (i.e. banning smoking on the footpath), or the rights for people to do whatever they want in private to their own bodies?

However if Bob is against gay marriage, being against the legalisation of pornography, being against prostitutes, being against sex changes, banning black and Irish people from B&Bs etc. None of those things affect Bob, therefore I believe Bob's moral viewpoint should be able is abhorrent - he's trying to force his own viewpoints on you.

I'm a strong proponent of the freedom to swing you fist stops at my nose, however in most of these cases the actual act that 'social conservatives' decry is the swinging of the fist. If gay marriage was compulsory I would of course decry it, if non-gay marriage was banned I would decry that too. I'm not away of anyone If you want to reduce drug related crime, then legalise (and tax) drugs (I won't even mention the hypocrisy of allowing nicotine and tobacco but not allowing cannabis)

Please explain why you are against gay marriage? Are you also against civil marriage? Are you against the dropping of "Obey" from the traditional vows?

I assume that you believe a child brought up with two loving parents is a great place to be, especially if those parents have time to give to the child (i.e. not working 100 hours a week between them to fund the outsourcing of bringing up a child). Are you going to come out with something abhorant like 'same sex couples can't raise children as well as mixed sex couples'?

Too many logical fallacies and straw men to warrant a reasoned reply.

 

[meridian2]

But nice, good, and educated people (clappers seems to be perfectly nice to me!) can be intolerant and bigoted, too.

I don't use "bigot" or any such terms as an insult.

I sincerely hope I'm not bigoted, as for intolerant, guilty as charged. Completely intolerant of the depths so-called liberalism has plunged the country into. This isn't a right-left political divide, both sides have supported inhumane working and financial practices, broken communities and overseen the erosion of traditional family life, all things that make Britain a worse place to live. Even expressing such a view dismisses one as a swivel-eyed, Mail reading reactionary, none of which I am, because the alternative that the country has descended into a morally cohesive basket case is too awful to contemplate. Modern liberalism is philosophically bankrupt, fiscally inept and literally has no moral standards. I don't think that's a good recipe for happiness.

Marriage as we know it is a Christian ceremony based on a permanent relationship and the rearing of children. This was an entirely unproblematic idea even within my lifetime, but like so many valuable social frameworks has been undermined by self-centred liberal politics. I couldn't care less whether pagans want to get hitched under a waning gibbous moon, or people declare they want to tie the knot until they get bored and something better comes along, neither of these things represent Christian marriage and suggestions they do is wholly misplaced.

I attend a church that is multi-ethnic (European, African, Asian) but mono-cultural, the culture being one of self and mutual respect and support, and Christian ethics. Absurd accusations of bigotry for believing such a paradigm beneficial and intellectually and morally consistent, necessitates its replacement with something more useful, and I don't see it. I think Western society as a whole is stuck on stupid, and thinks no further than its next Amazon parcel and lashing at anyone who might take away its right to do WTF it pleases. I think we're heading up s*** creek and am prepared to argue the reasons why.

 

[AlterEgo]

By extension, do you think that gay people getting married, instead of having civil partnerships (which you seem to support), leads to society being "a morally cohesive basket case too awful to contemplate", a society with "no moral standards" and us "heading up s*** creek"?

There's a hell of a lot of things wrong with modern society, and I can't agree entirely with the way things are headed.

But, allowing gay people the opportunity of marriage doesn't seem to me to be unreasonable.

We all have our own definitions of a moral and just world, but none of us have the right (in my view) to extend our personal morality to anyone else beyond our own property. And governments should not restrict the rights of others unless there is a good reason to - for example if harm could come from allowing those rights. I have many personal opinions about what is right and just but I wouldn't dare dream to suggest my opinions trump the rights of persons unknown.

Frankly I am not interested in Christianity - a belief people are welcome to, but not something to be imposed on wider society.

 

[najaB]

I don't give a flying fig either way about same sex marriage - if people want to get married, good on them. What I struggle to understand sometimes is why people want to get their relationship sanctified by or even be a part of an organisation that rejects the validity of that relationship.

If a Church wants to perform same-sex ceremonies, good on them. But forcing them to perform them goes against the idea of freedom of religious expression. If they want to be bigoted, let them be bigoted. Shine a light on their bigotry. Hopefully they'll change, but if not: [expletive] 'em.

 

[meridian2]

By extension..

No extensions, no straw men. I've explained what marriage is, if you want to conflate that with gay bashing, misogynistic, quasi-fascist, authoritarian, Mail reading, kitten killing tendencies, you know nothing of my opinion and very little about traditional marriage.

The fastest way to kill an intelligent discussion is to seek equivalence between unsupported and erroneous comparisons. I'm prepared to argue my case about what I believe constitutes social conservatism, but I'm certainly not willing to engage in a discussion about what you think I believe.

 

[AlterEgo]

No extensions, no straw men. I've explained what marriage is, if you want to conflate that with gay bashing, misogynistic, quasi-fascist, authoritarian, Mail reading, kitten killing tendencies, you know nothing of my opinion and very little about traditional marriage.

The fastest way to kill an intelligent discussion is to seek equivalence between unsupported and erroneous comparisons. I'm prepared to argue my case about what I believe constitutes social conservatism, but I'm certainly not willing to engage in a discussion about what you think I believe.

It was a question about whether you thought gay marriage led into the Doomsday scenario you outlined. You said that you both did not support gay marriage and that society was becoming amoral.

Your reluctance to enter that discussion is illuminating.

It is certainly authoritarian to suggest that gay people be denied a right because of your moral view where no harm is caused. I was trying to tease out whether you thought harm came from gay marriage, and whether that was why you thought it better to restrict it.

 

[DarloRich]

my personal view on marriage is that if anyone is stupid enough to get married good luck to them. It will, for many, end in unhappiness and financial difficulty.

 

[yorkie]

...Marriage as we know it is a Christian ceremony based on a permanent relationship and the rearing of children....

Nonsense. The concept pre-dates Christianity, just as many other traditions do.

 

[EM2]

Marriage is a religious institution designed to provide a stable, lifelong framework for the rearing of children. It isn't anything else.

Is it?! That's news to me, that's been married for twenty-four years, doesn't have any children and had the ceremony in a register office.

 

[najaB]

Nonsense. The concept pre-dates Christianity, just as many other traditions do.

I suppose that depends on what clappers meant by 'marriage as we know it'.