Submitted by NAB in AskRaddle

Everyone seemed to think it was good when the government “legalized” gay marriage, but was it really?

Shouldent the governemnt stay out of the bedroom? Should they really be involved in marriage at all? Why cant people who are in love just say they are “married” and have whatever ceremony they want? Why does the government need to sign a piece of paper to validate feelings?

Also, even if my dreams of abolishing government sanctioned marriage are too “far out”, the point still stands, was gay marriage “legalization” the landmark decision people made it out to be? Realisticly, there was still nothing preventing gay people from being in love and getting married without the damn government. All it would mean is less tax benifits, but even then all that is really is a perk.

How does everyone else feel about this though?

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indi wrote

How do you feel about gay marriage?

I mean, I think maybe we should date for a while before jumping into something like that.

Shouldent the governemnt stay out of the bedroom? Should they really be involved in marriage at all? Why cant people who are in love just say they are “married” and have whatever ceremony they want? Why does the government need to sign a piece of paper to validate feelings?

There is an astonishing amount of ignorance here.

You seem to think that marriage is just a government formalization of a fuck-partner arrangement, maybe with a couple "tax benifits".

In reality, a government-recognized, formalized contract between two people - you can call it "marriage" if you like, or you can call it a "fuck contract" if you prefer; doesn't matter - is very important for a lot of reasons.

Married partners can have joint ownership of stuff, and when there is a partner who doesn't earn a lot of money - usually because she (yes, it's usually she, but increasingly less so) isn't making as much because they're taking care of the kids instead - they are protected in the event that the partnership breaks up. In places that don't have that protection, it's not uncommon for men (yes, usually men) to turn women (usually) into virtual slaves: the woman can't leave the man because the man controls all the money, so the woman would be basically out on the street.

Married people can also become legal decision-makers for their partners. If you're in an accident, someone needs to decide what treatment you get - or if they should just pull the plug on you. Would you like the state to make that decision?

Married people can also get a lot of access to their partner and their stuff that other random people don't get. For example, a married person can have the right to demand to see normally sealed evidence in a crime involving their partner, and bring lawsuits. Imagine if someone you loved was gunned down by a cop, and you weren't married... all you could do is seethe and cry. But if you were married, you could start a case against the cops for wrongful death, and maybe... maybe... get some justice.

If you actually read a lot of the stories of gay activists who fought to get married, most of their issues were things like their partners not being allowed to share health insurance, or not being allowed to have power-of-attorney or life-or-death decision making in the event of emergencies, and things like that. People's lives were destroyed because their partnership wasn't given the same legal privileges as a het couple's - they lost their homes in some cases, they weren't able to get justice for their dead partners in others.

Gay marriage was about giving same-sex couples the same legal protections that straight couples have always enjoyed. It was not just a bunch of queers getting off on forcing Uncle Sam to acknowledge their bedroom debauchery.

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ziq wrote

I feel like it's none of your concern since you're not getting gay married.

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rot wrote

You're proposing? This is so sudden! I'm sorry but I just can't say yes. There's somebody else...

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