a government takeover of an institution the government did not make, cannot in justice redefine, and ought to respect and protect as essential to the common good.

Why?  If marriage can’t make it in the free market, why should the government bail it out?

A civil contract has nothing to do with civil law. That’s the fun thing about the NOMBigots: no thought allowed in the anti-gay movement.

Did our Founding Fathers really create a right to gay marriage in the U.S. Constitution?

No honey, I’m actually pretty sure that “our Founding Fathers” all had marriages where their wives were considered a piece of their property.  But, you know, as that hasn’t changed at all, not even one speck, we should make sure things now are JUST LIKE they were back then.  I’m so looking forward to being my husband’s property…oh no wait.

This is as stupid as telling the Government to keep its hands off Medicare…

So NOM is now supporting the abolition of marriage altogether?  I guess that makes sense.

In my pretend happy world Maggie and her ilk would be attending a meeting for National assocation for marriage (what?) and this would bust out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOjHvukbE8g

MikeEss, yes but the problem is that stupid people get the right to vote and cause all sorts of mischief.

Saw this on a Mother Jones/Kevin Drum comment thread:

“Got into a long discussion about health care the other day, and the polite but somewhat loopy conservatives argued that health care was bad because then the government would have everyone’s Social Security number.”

Has government gotten so big that it has completely disappeared?  I know that stupid people exist, but I’m just surprised sometimes at how willingly they confirm that they’re so abysmally ill-informed.

Did our Founding Fathers really create a right to gay marriage in the U.S. Constitution?

For all their faults, the people who wrote the US Constitution had the good sense to realize that the world would change in ways they couldn’t hope to imagine. To safeguard against this, they added the 9th Amendment, which reads: “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.” The Constitution doesn’t specify the right to gay marriage, no, but it protects it just the same.

Maggie Gallagher proves once again that conservatives, especially religious conservatives, flatly do not know what the fuck they are talking about.  As a cultural anthropologist, I can categorically state that marriage, everywhere and throughout recorded history, is primarily a civil institution concerned with the assignment of particular social/legal right, privileges, and obligations.  It is only sanctified in a small minority of the world’s cultures, though several more do routinely bless marriages (as they would a new house, barn, or business).  Everywhere else in the world, marriage is a purely secular, civil institution with no religious overtones at all (and this includes the entire Muslim world).  IIRC, it was not even a sacrament in Christianity until the later Middle Ages, as part of the church’s efforts to extend its control over the lives of the peasants.

The Founding Fathers didn’t write the Fourteenth Amendment at all. And they sure didn’t intend to put the right to interracial marriage into the Constitution!

“Maggie Gallagher proves once again that conservatives, especially religious conservatives, flatly do not know what the fuck they are talking about.”

Since when has that ever stopped them before?...

And they sure didn’t intend to put the right to interracial marriage into the Constitution!

Or for women to vote.

Since when has that ever stopped them before?…

Actually seems to encourage them.

They are trying to have it both ways.  When they want gay marriage illegal, they want the government to prohibit couples from enjoying the same benefits as straights.  When the government legalizes it, they say that the government has no say.

So NOM is now supporting the abolition of marriage altogether?  I guess that makes sense.
Comment #5: Loch Ness Monster on 08/04 at 09:57 PM

Well, the government’s involvment with marriage at least. I’m sure they’d love it if only churches could have any say over marriages.

Except for the churches that support their gay members. Then they’d try to get those banned or something as not being “real” or “legitimate” churches.

And I second Albert Cirrus, these dumb fucks would love the government to be involved in your private life (just like with abortion) but only when it suits and benefits them.

as part of the church’s efforts to extend its control over the lives of the peasants.

Not only that, it kept upper-class young adults from declaring a marriage in front of a witness(like a convenient servant who could use a shilling or 2) and then the fun would begin.

There was even a remnant of that in my family history:

Grandfather Monk made it clear he wanted to marry Grandma, they were both Catholic and over 21, although she came from a middle-class family and Grandpa came from a land-owning upper-class family, which was one of the reasons Great-grandmother Monk didn’t approve of the match. This was in Shanghai, China, in 1936.

Since the Monk family was a lay Catholic family known for their generosity to the Church, Great-grandma made it clear that it would be better for a priest to have a millstone tied to his neck and be flung in the Yang-tse river than to marry her son and Grandma, because then there would be a sudden decrease in the flow of funds from the Monk family to the Church as a result of going against Great-Grandma’s wishes.

Since grandma had been born and spent the earlier part of her life in Hankou, she had connections to the Catholic Church there, and the church there didn’t get any donations from the Monks to be cut off.  So Grandpa and Grandma eloped there, found a priest to marry them, and came back to Shanghai after their honeymoon.

When Great-grandma found out, she fatalistically accepted it, and that’s how Grandpa was the first of his 10 brothers to get married, only the one who became a priest didn’t follow suit for obvious reasons.  :-D

IIRC, it was not even a sacrament in Christianity until the later Middle Ages, as part of the church’s efforts to extend its control over the lives of the peasants.

More precisely, there were no “seven sacraments” in the catholic church before the Council of Trent. There were just a bunch of religious ceremonies, like marriage and communion and such, that were considered “sacramental,” until theological disputes over the what was “sacramental” caused the church to put its foot down and say, “these are seven sacraments.”

Christianity has been involved in the marriages of members of its community since the beginning, which is logical, as Christianity began as an offshoot of Judaism, which also solemnized marriages of members of their community.

And sometimes the legal authorities needed to register the marriage with the church blessing it separately, and sometimes the church could serve as the legal authority, and sometimes, I’m sure, the local government just didn’t really care that much and whoever declared themselves married was considered married, and no one cared except the local church.

What was my point? Oh, yeah: enough with the church-history folktales. And no, the local lord did not get to spend the first night with the bride, either. Also, Maggie Gallagher is a moron just irritated because she’s not getting money from the Bush administration to shill on behalf of her cause.

And no, the local lord did not get to spend the first night with the bride, either
So, why would anyone want to be a lord again?

Yes, please get the government out of my taxation unions!  I don’t want them deciding how I get to appropriate my tax brackets!  This is so ludicrous but I see no way that this decision will be reversed by the Supreme Court.  Nobody wants to be the Dred Scott.  The conservative justices know it, if they reverse it will take time but will be undone and they’ll look like fools.  Nobody wants to have their legacy marred so badly. 

Should be interesting watching the cons froth though.

The problem is that government got in the “marriage” business in the first place. The government should only be giving out civil unions, and that goes for everyone. You want some spirituality with that civil union? Go find the priest/witch-doctor/Cpt. Stubing of your choice. Problem solved. But no, then church-sanctioned rituals would not have the government stamp of approval, except of course the ones that aren’t church-sanctioned in the first place, so the marriage licence in clearly a secular document and really a civil union anyway, and I know I had a copy of the First Amendment around here somewhere, except I think it just lost a game of Twister. Someday, someday, gays everywhere will be able to marry freely just like everyone else, and then we can work on what’s really important - booze on Sunday, in the grocery store!

Get the government out of our marriages! Separate church and state!

But no, then church-sanctioned rituals would not have the government stamp
http://www.etruereligionjeans-store.com/

DrDick: Generally, I find that conservatives who rally against government “takeover of institutions” never know what I’m talking about. Government’s have overseen marriage, transportation, healthcare, and practically everything else that the small-government people rally against since humans first formed governments.

Hector B: Government can’t get out of the marriage business unless you strip marriage of any sort of legal meaning. The spousal privilege in court, joint filing of income taxes, visitation rights, joint holding of property, and every other right held by married couples has to go if government gets out the marriage business.

In a way, I agree with this:  get govt. out of marriage.  Govt can and should create the framework for two people to have a legally recognized union with all the rights, etc, etc.  The couple can then seek to get a ritual marriage performed which has only religious significance but no legal standing.

3LetterJon @8; I don’t know whether that makes me want to laugh and point or cry.

DrD @ 10: the D of M people have a tenuous grasp of marriage history and cultural variety at best.  Marriage has always been…nothing they would understand as they seem to believe what is for them here and now has always and currently is everywhere.

Lee @25: As far as I’m concerned the only legal bit that matters is the one that makes two unrelated people now nearest kin, with the rights and privledges of that.  God help my spouse and children if my MOTHER got to decide my funeral arrangements and my health decisions before that.  She is fundie and we most certainly are not.

Civil marriage is civil union, and I frankly don’t care what it is called; religious marriage is whatever snake handling mumbo jumbo or disco ballish ritual the participants may desire.  The problem is these people who equate the two.

To those who argue that marriage is religious and civil unions are secular, you are flatly wrong.  Marriage is a secular legal institution which confers mutual legal rights and obligations on the couple.  In may parts of this country, and elsewhere, if you have a religious marriage ceremony without benefit of a civil marriage license, you are NOT married and enjoy none of the benefits of marriage.  Elsewhere, state laws recognizing “common law” marriages cover these and confer state sanction and legal status to such unions.  These laws also cover you if you simply shack up and call yourself man and wife.  All of the religious hocus pocus is just window dressing.

Helen 27, thats what I meant. Marriage isn’t just two or potentially more people getting together and setting up a house together. It creates all sorts of legal rights. The only way that government can get out of the marriage business is to abolish these rights.

“Maggie Gallagher proves once again that conservatives, especially religious conservatives, flatly do not know what the fuck they are talking about.”

like they say, it’s a feature, not a bug…

Christianity has been involved in the marriages of members of its community since the beginning

I won’t argue with that, but it was entirely optional until fairly late and in many areas of Medieval Europe, particularly France and England, many or most peasants simply moved in together, as they could not afford a church wedding.  There was a period when I read a lot of family history and could probably find the journal article if I dug hard enough.

Civil marriage is civil union, and I frankly don’t care what it is called

The problem is that in law, the language matters. A Civil Union is a specific legal institution that only exists in a few states. It is most decidedly not Civil Marriage.  Civil Unions were created for segregatory purposes: to keep same-sex couples out of marriage.

Get the government out of our marriages! Separate church and state!

More like, Get churches out of civil marriage! Separate church and state!

Why on earth should clergy be able to certify a civil contract?  They shouldn’t. Separate the ceremonies.

I still think it would be best if people could form family units for the basis of government benefits.  Grandparent and grandchild.  Aunt and nephew.  Siblings.  WhatEVER—let people decide what “family” means and let them decide who gets to be their legal partner/medical decision maker/guardian/recipient of benefits/etc.

Unfortunately, that would require MASSIVE changes in law, as the poor people with civil unions have discovered.  Civil unions are still not equal to marriage (and DOMA prevents that now anyway). 

It’s the failure to account for all meanings of ‘marriage’ and the bigotry of law enforcement officials that makes “marriage” a word worth fighting over.

As for the NOM nom nom silliness?  Reminds me of when creationists ask “Darwinists” to prove evolution by explaining the Big Bang or abiogenesis: there’s a fundamental disconnect in understanding the subject of the argument.

Actually, it would be pretty easy to make it the way it is in most european countries. Simply take away the authority of priests and ministers and rabbis and so forth to sign marriage licenses. Then you could have whatever religious ceremony you want or don’t, but to get the civil stuff you have to go down to the clerk’s office.

Paul @#35…that’s exactly what I’d advocate.

Actually, it would be pretty easy to make it the way it is in most european countries. Simply take away the authority of priests and ministers and rabbis and so forth to sign marriage licenses.

Yes, but what about all the special snowflakes who want their best friend to officiate? The reason, ultimately, that priests and rabbis and ministers can sign marriage licenses is because anyone can.

Tyro:

The appointment of random people as temporary whatevers to sign marriage licenses is not in every jurisidiction, afaik.  And best friends can still officiate at the wedding, they just can’t sign the piece of paper that makes the marriage a contract involving state benefits.

Actually, there is a sense in which “anchor babies” exist. As long as children who are US citizens are housed with their parents in immigration detention facilities, there will be some tiny amount of attention paid to conditions in those facilities. Because not even the current crop of republican judges is willing to say “You chose the wrong parents, kid, no access to the courts.”

Yet.