Is Marriage Really a Civil Right?

Discussion in 'Ethics, Morality, & Justice' started by Woody, May 24, 2008.

  1. Woody Musical Creationist Registered Senior Member

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    What's the debate about anyway? If two people want to live together they will.

    Marriage has been around longer than government has been around, and marriage really isn't our government's business anyway.

    Consider governments where people have no civil rights, like communist China, North Korea, and other extremest repressive governments. People get married there all the time but they have no civil rights. If marriage were a civil right then nobody could get married.

    Marriage has nothing to do with government. In many cases marriage has nothing to do with religion or morals either. Atheistic communist countries have marriage. :shrug:

    So why the big push from gay-rights activists? Gays just want the government to say they are moral.

    Gays also want government perks such as tax breaks, etc. Consider that income tax wasn't even levied until the sixteenth ammendment in 1909. Should income taxes be the basis for redefining what marriage is? This is nonsense.

    I think gay-rights activists are dumbing it up again. They want to redefine marriage so it means anything you want it to mean. It originally meant procreation of the human race.

    When the government gets involved it typically creates more problems than it solves.
     
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  3. D H Some other guy Valued Senior Member

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    Of course it does. A marriage is a legal contract. Husbands and wives (or co-husbands and co-wives) have specific legal rights, responsibilities, benefits, and penalties that pertain only to people who are married to one another. Do I really need to spell these out?
     
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  5. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    Either way

    For many voices in the gay marriage battle, an end to state recognition of any marriage is also an acceptable outcome.
     
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  7. Woody Musical Creationist Registered Senior Member

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    Isn't this discriminatory against single parents?:shrug:
     
  8. Woody Musical Creationist Registered Senior Member

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    Yes, I agree with that. Why should the state give out perks based on marital status? This is discriminatory.

    In america, we have certain unalienable constitutional rights as individuals.

    Why should those rights be compromised by twosomes, threesomes, foursomes, or whatever?

    Tax relief should be based on "need" not "status". If gays are second class citizens, it's because our government made them that way by meddling where it doesn't belong.

    And by the way, there was a time when several state governments decided people of different races couldn't marry -- shouldn't they have minded their own business instead?
     
    Last edited: May 24, 2008
  9. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    That's part of it. But the important part is that there are many situations in which you want the person you love and live with to be considered your "next of kin," and that's typically almost impossible if you're not married. There have been innumerable cases where this causes a problem. Suppose you've been in a coma for a year and your partner tells the doctor it's time to pull the plug. The doctor will call your mother and she'll tell him to keep you plugged in until all the family money has been wasted. Or your spouse abandons you and your baby, and you and your partner raise her for the next ten years. Then you die and your ex-spouse turns up out of nowhere and the judge says he or she gets your child instead of your partner.

    This stuff is real and it's horrible and it happens with some frequency to people who can't get married. Maybe "domestic partner" contracts will resolve some of it but it will be decades before there's a uniform standard domestic partner contract that's valid in all states.
    Hmm. In many societies it originally meant that the wife was for all practical purposes the husband's property. Do you want to bring that back too, or do you recognize our right and duty to change civilization's rules as we become more enlightened?
    Well as a libertarian I have to agree with you on that. But the government already is involved in marriage and it's very unlikely that we'll ever undo that, so we have to make the most of the situation we've got.
    I don't understand your question. What rights would you grant to a single parent that are denied to them because they are not married? If the poor kid only has one parent, what's the government going to do, go out and draft some hapless citizen to take the job? Reanimate a dead spouse? Check everybody's DNA until they find the missing parent? Break up another family and make an ex-spouse move back in with their first family? We've already got laws about alimony and child support. What more are you going to do?
     
  10. Pandaemoni Valued Senior Member

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    Taken to that extreme, the real answer is "there are no governments that deny all civil rights." The right to live and be free from assault are civil rights too, and they allow both--people both live and the government does not beat everyone all the time--in North Korea (at least for some people). In the same way, if totalitarian regimes allowed some (favored) group of people to marry and not other (disfavored) groups, then that might be interpreted as their lacking respect for the civil rights of the disfavored group.

    China does not respect the civil right of free speech, but if you wanted to praise the government, they didn't stop you from doing so. So they only disregarded the right of free speech when it was being used in ways they disliked.
     
    Last edited: May 27, 2008
  11. Asguard Kiss my dark side Valued Senior Member

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    it goes futher than that fraggle. Forget children and think of devorce for a second (not sure if this is the same in the US though as australia). In australia marrage is the provence of the federal goverment as is anything to do with family law (ie the family court is a federal court). Now if a gay defacto couple breaks up then the they have to use the surprem courts to deal with the devision of property ect because they are not federally recognised. Apart from that changing the devision of assests based on the state your in and probably exemptions for assests in indervidual names (sorry i dont have the full laws state by state) to launch an action in the surprem court is VERY expencive compared to the family court where i BELIVE its generally self representation.

    Also next of kin is hard to prove if your not married as you said

    Futher more if one of you is studying or looking after children while the other works this isnt recognised by centerlink (infact unemployed gays are taking a finantial loss in some cases currently to get recognised because they are currently both paid a single persons unemployment benifits rather than the couples rate)

    Then there is superanuation law (ie if you die your super goes to your family rather than your spouse)

    Death benifits arnt paid to gay spouses either and the millarty benifits are lacking as well

    Aged gay couples arnt automatically housed double rooms in aged care facilities (again a federal responcability)

    Even without marrage the federal goverment found over 100 indervidual laws relating to social securities, finantial law, family law ect which directly discriminated against a gay couple

    There is more to family law (and related law) than children, to go through and indervidually change every relivent goverment form to show your a partner and if anything happens to you they are your next of kin and benificury is a pain in the neck when compared to the fact it is all done automatically with marrage.

    Tiassa im sorry i dissagree with you there, marrage is a good thing if we remove the discrimination currently associated with it. I would rather get married and know my partner could deal with my medical needs rather than relie on a power of atorny with is expencive and can get lost
     
  12. lucifers angel same shit, differant day!! Registered Senior Member

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    thats not so, if you live with someone then you are common law man and wife! and therefore your partner would be your next of kin!
     
  13. Asguard Kiss my dark side Valued Senior Member

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    LA have you ever tried to prove that to a doctor?
     
  14. lucifers angel same shit, differant day!! Registered Senior Member

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    no, but things work differantly here than they do with you, i was in hospital before me and my husband were married and they said that i could name him has my next of kin, i have also checked it out with a soliciter, because if anyhting happened to me before we were married everything i had/have went to him, and he said that it was fine for me to do that, and my family had no right to contest it!
     
  15. Asguard Kiss my dark side Valued Senior Member

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    Yes if your concious you can name anyone you like as your next of kin. I was talking about if your brought in unconious, its VERY hard to walk into a hospital with a partner who is unconious and act as next of kin when you cant prove you are a defacto. I would have to bring joint bills in along with probably calling centerlink because they are the only department who can prove we are in a defacto relationship. Otherwise her mum and dad can overule anything i said. Now when this comes to end of life that isnt very plesent to be arguing with her parents as to wether to pull the plug and the hospital would have to refer it to the guardianship board in all liklyhood. I would win PROBABLY but not without emotional hurt to both sides
     

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