Faith writes:
quote:
A little creative thought could have provided such protections without destroying the role of marriage. The goal WAS the destruction of marriage, even if you don't quite share that goal yourself. In any case there could have been other solutions but a vindictive spirit against Christanity was more important than those supposed benefits. For health insurance there is even a Christian model that has created a pool people pay into to take care of catastrophic illnesses. Surely the LGBT community could have come up with something like that. There are other forms of contracts than marriage too. But no, the whole point was to kill marriage.
Nice try, but that is so bogus.
All of those things were tried. After all, there was no marriage. But the problem is that it is both prohibitively expensive to do those things (power of attorney, wills, trusts, etc., all cost money) as well as not recognized by the courts. If you try to leave everything you have to a non-relative, your relatives can sue to have your will overturned citing fraud and corruption, claiming that you were not of sound mind.
And it works. Judges routinely overturned wills of gay couples since they were of the opinion that there was no such thing as being gay, that it was mental illness.
Not to mention the fact that some things simply cannot be covered by such things. The marriage contract specifically provides rights that cannot be acquired through any other way: Suppose you and I are roommates. If the house is in my name and I die, I cannot simply will it to you without financial penalty. We're not next-of-kin the way we would be if we were married and thus, you'd face inheritance taxes for accepting it. You are now facing eviction.
And that ignores the family trying to contest that bequest, as mentioned before.
And if it's a rent-controlled apartment, I can't leave it to you.
That you think health insurance equals "catastrophic" coverage, you clearly don't understand what health insurance means. We already saw this happen during the 80s and 90s with HIV. It didn't work then. What makes you think it'll work now?
So why not have a "civil union"? Why do you have to call it "marriage"? It'll have all the rights and benefits of "marriage" but will save that word for Christians (you can see the obvious problem right there, can't you? We'll come back to that.)
Because we tried that, too. After the Vermont Supreme Court said that denying the rights of marriage to gay people, they ordered the legislature to come up with a solution that provided all the rights and responsibilities of marriage to same-sex couples and the Vermont legislature came up with "civil unions." But there was a problem: There were discrepancies between the two. California tried the same thing, too. But the courts found that there were many discrepancies between the two and thus a "civil union" was not the legal equivalent of a "marriage."
And that doesn't even get into the problem that they don't cross state lines. If you get a civil union in one state, that means nothing to any other state. Thus, it isn't the same as marriage.
And that also doesn't get into the problem that the feds don't recognize civil unions. If you get a civil union, you don't get any of the federal rights of marriage such as being able to file jointly. Thus, it isn't the same as marriage.
Legally, if two things are not named the same, then they are not the same thing. They can be treated like different things. We learned that when we tried "separate but equal" doesn't work.
And, of course, there's the original problem: If your complaint is that your religious attitude is offended because someone else has entered into a legal contract called "marriage," that is a direct violation of the First Amendment guaranteeing freedom of religion. Do people who aren't Christian get to be married? Or is "marriage" only for Christians?
If it's truly the word that's the problem, then you as the one who is offended over a legal contract are free to come up with some other contract that satisfies you. I know! "Holy matrimony." It has the benefit that everybody already knows what it means and directly puts forward that you're talking about a religious ceremony, not a legal one.
As people keep asking you, Faith: Why does the legal contract between other people affect you?
Why is it so hard for someone who has a desire to discriminate against people to become a private contractor? You get to pick and choose your clients when you're a private contractor. Why do you feel the need to force the public square to your whim? Do you honestly not understand that if you get to do it to others, then they get to do it to you?
Be honest, Faith: When your faith becomes the minority, will you agree with them when they start to discriminate against you? If the majority in this country were some other religion, would you accept being told that no, you can't purchase this or rent that or lease the other because you're "one of those"? Or will you demand that you not be denied services because of your religion?
Don't you think other people feel the same way?
Rrhain
Thank you for your submission to Science. Your paper was reviewed by a jury of seventh graders so that they could look for balance and to allow them to make up their own minds. We are sorry to say that they found your paper "bogus," specifically describing the section on the laboratory work "boring." We regret that we will be unable to publish your work at this time.
Minds are like parachutes. Just because you've lost yours doesn't mean you can use mine.
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