The Conservative Case for Gay MarriageFollow

Where's the fun in that?

I have never held this position, nor argued it. Many people have countered that if marriage is about procreation, then why do we allow people who don't have children to marry. To which I have responded with an argument ranging from "we can't determine which will or wont with certainty unless the couple is same sex", to "Ok. Even accepting that position, then it still excludes same sex marriages".


I have always argued the same exact point on this: That the state's interest with regard marriage is to encourage heterosexual couples to enter into it as frequently and as early as possible so as to minimize the number of unwed mothers and the resulting negative socio-economic effects this has on their children and the society which will inevitably have to support them.


My argument is not about what marriage means to those who enter it. It is not about prohibiting marriages from anyone who wants it (even gay couples and polygamists). My argument is that the state status (which is what all the legal fighting is really about) only qualifies couples for a set of state mandated benefits. Everything else we associate with marriage can be obtained via contracts meaning we are left with asking why the state rewards people for marrying. Based on my position in the paragraph above, I conclude that it is perfectly correct for the states to have qualifying criteria for that status which excludes all couples not consisting of one man and one woman.


That has always been my position on this issue. It has not changed...

Just so you don't claim I'm ignoring this point:



It wasn't that I wasn't very interested, but that neither of these issues debate the importance of marriage to the state. They start with the assumption that marriage is important and move from there.


But hey. If you can find some documentation of either of those in which there some clear discussion of *why* the state should reward people who marry, I'll gladly take interest. The last time you brought this up, you failed to do so.

They directly debate why those benefits exist. You know, the benefits that you so desperately need us all to believe exist as an incentive to get married? Well, examining them will show us why they exist.


Any time you want to stop pretending, without absolutely zero evidence, that the benefits exist as "rewards" you go right ahead and do so. Because, for someone who refuses to examine why these benefits exist, you're really, really eager to just insist that they're "rewards" for getting married.

Wonder why that is... wait, no I don't. It's because you know you can't show that they're "rewards" but you hope if you just insist over and over again that it's true, we can skip all that sticky stuff about why the benefits exist and jump right into a debate about why we need to reward people (ignoring the fact that there are no "rewards" as such).

This was a joke right? If you divorce, custody and support enforcement is handled through the exact same state agency that handles non-marital custody cases.

Gbaji, I've asserted that most of the legal framework around marriage is there to deal with people who are married. It is not there to encourage people to get married, but rather as a reaction to the need for a different set of rules for people who are in these permanent dependent relationships. This is why it's important to examine stuff like pension reform and womens rights. They are examples of relationships and societal norms changing and necessitating the development of new rules to deal with them.

I have also, in an attempt to engage you, as you seem tied to the idea that marriage structures are an incentive, have tried to demonstrate why these relationships are worthwhile and valid for both homosexual relationships and hetero ones, but as you just dismiss this, I've mostly given up on this route.

In the end, most of the rules and laws, if not all of them exists as reactive rather then proactive measures. Philosophers pontificating on the value of marriage has little to nothing to do with how the legal stuff around marriage came to be.

Yes. Except the facts of paternity are already established, aren't they? And you have to pay to get divorced, which covers the costs of the courts time making up the settlement agreements (or the lawyers do it without a court being involved). And there's no need for the state to potentially take up the care of the child while paternity is being sorted out. And there's no issue with the mother just not bothering to name the father either, is there?


The key question, "Who's child is this?" Is answered before any state agency has to get involved Joph. That's the point.

I'm an atheist, and I can still get married.

Because even gbaji isn't retarded enough to use religion as a premise for a legal argument.





The United States was never a christian nation.

Because it's worthless. We already have though, and the problem with the religious aspect is that it doesn't belong in the lawmaking process.

Separate but equal fails again. It doesn't even sound nice.

"Oh we're getting civil union'd on Saturday." What the fuck?

Edited, Jan 19th 2010 10:36pm by bsphil

Wow, you missed the point by so much, I'm going to have to assume it's purposeful. Married couples need a different set of rules, because they form a unique situation. The situation is unique without having to include children. This is in response to your thought experiment remember? Children can be part of this unique situation, but they are not essential to it, nor are they unique. Due to this we make separate laws and rules regarding children, because they are recognized as a separate legal issue.

The times when we've started to go down these roads you've immediately dismissed them as irrelevant. I mean, hell your previous post did. I'm not going to go do a bunch of research when you're not willing to engage. Philosophy is not historical evidence by the way. We can go over how gender rights made sure that the women would get paid out pension, and how women starting to work affected the tax law as prior a family would normally just have one significant income. I would assert that most of our legal structure evolved to deal with the fact that the couple shares their property.

Blatantly Blatantly false. You have. You have asserted that gay marriage provides zero benefit to society. That is a direct quote. Zero.


What have you given? You've given an argument, so have we, and in both cases it's more then simply saying this is the way, although yours hinges on the idea that all of the stuff surrouding marriage is there to encourage people to enter into marriage, and your only defense of that has been to jump up and down and insist it's true. We've referred to actual changes in marriage law, and you've referred to a philosopher.

I'll freely admit that a marriage is a great place to raise a child because it is a stable place. However unless you have some kind of religious reason, a homosexual marriage is also a great place to raise a child, for the same reasons. Given the fact that these days with the ease of contraception and the fact that most children are chosen, your statistical argument about only hetero marriages having a benefit here really doesn't hold water. It's also irrelevant.

Edited, Jan 19th 2010 11:33pm by Xsarus

Yeah, people keeping going 'round and 'round with him about details when they don't agree on the basis of his argument. But, then I realize how boring the forum would be without gbaji and varus, and just shrug.