The whole context of my argument excludes anything having to do with the religious aspect of marriage. I don't care if even the great majority of churches won't marry my partner and I. So just talking about the civil aspect of marriage...
Let's say that we define marriage as the current relationship between a man and a woman as we currently know it. Then let's say that we define a separate term, "civil union," as a relationship between two people of the same sex, and let's even further say that a civil union has every right that marriage currently has. Now you have two separate terms and from that point forward, you make it possible to exclude civil unions from new rights that are granted to marriages. So, okay, let's define civil unions as having the same rights and responsibilities as marriages, including new rights that are not yet defined, so that when marriages get a new right, civil unions get them too. Well, that solves part of the problem, but now we get to the central thesis of the argument. What is so wrong about my relationship with my partner that we're not allowed to call it the same thing as the relationship between a man and a woman? Why can't we be equal? Why can't we use the same term? Why is the right to use the term denied to us? One argument I've gotten in the past at this point is "well, it's just a term; why do you care?" And my response is always "Why do *you* care what I call it?" David Churvis -----Original Message----- From: Sam [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, November 17, 2008 2:52 PM To: cf-community Subject: Re: the list On Mon, Nov 17, 2008 at 11:11 AM, David Churvis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > You make an excellent point, and in an ideal world, I actually agree with > you that marriage should be entirely a religious term defined on a > church-by-church basis as it sees fit, with a separate system of civil > unions that applies regardless of orientation. However, attempting to > divorce the religious marriage from the civil union will again be seen as > "redefining marriage", and so it will never pass. In fact, it would be > faced with an even bigger backlash, as we would then, in a very real way, be > "attacking other people's marriages." So that would never pass muster. I can see that opening a new can of worms. If the Church doesn't sanction you're marriage people will assume you're gay. That could eventually water down the use of the term marriage but I guess that's the point you're making. They'll fight like hell to keep that from happening. I'm just thinking this out as I type so bear with me. > The bottom line is that we're not trying to redefine religious marriage > anyway. The equality we seek only extends to the civil protections of > marriage. The problem is that most people can't make the distinction, which > reinforces my previous point that we'd never reach a point of separation > between religious and civil marriage. OK. > So attempting to get civil unions everywhere would in effect leave us in a > limbo where we have marriages for straight people and civil unions for gay > people, and no way to rectify them. They'd be separate but equal. And we > all know how well separate but equal works. This confuses me; you don't want the religious aspect but won't accept anything less. I don't know enough about those supporting the ban to defend them; I just figure they can't all be haters. My argument is that equal but separate is a step closer while you think it's a step back. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:280598 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
