Well – what a storm! The most senior cleric in Scotland, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, launches an impassioned attack on the government’s proposed gay mariage law. I have always been a relatively quiet supporter of same sax mariage if only to protect a couples right to legal protection similar to that offered to heterosexual marriage. I am also of the opinion that if two people love each other then they ought to be able to give legal substance to that by a public act of commitment.
I think some people in the church see marriage as a strictly Christian affair and therefore the word marriage should be kept to that context but a registry office marriage has been accepted for years -was that challenged when first introduced? I don’t know – any information out there?
Meanwhile I will continue to relate to same sex couples in the same way that I do to heterosexual couples.
“Gay Marriage” is
doubly false,
doubly destructively-aggressive, and
doubly deluded:
It is not Gay, such as all the many-coloured parasols on a summer seaside beach deserve to be cleanly called;
it is not “marriage” such as for the proper healthy human procreation of babies, and for their balanced total individual human-development, which needs desperately nowadays to be including ‘failsafe’ wholesome and practical education of each and then all-successively of the seven innate creative or divine energies
(as has long been recognised in the (NB innate) 7 Christian sacraments, (innate) 7 chakras, and (innate) 7 human-energy inter-functional body centres of the pastoral somato-psychic individual human-development schools.
———
It, and certain other human-relationships, need to be re-named,
and truthfully-descriptively so:
“homosexual life contract”
or
“life-friendship contract”
or
“couple-cohabitation contract”.
or
“same-sex-cohabitation-contract”.
——–
Otherwise not only will the whole human-relationships area continue mind, body, spirit and word polluted,
but so will our Establishment, Judiciary, Religions, Education institutes, local Community centres,
and Parliaments;
homosexual life contract”
or
“life-friendship contract”
or
“couple-cohabitation contract”.
or
“same-sex-cohabitation-contract”.
Ah well what is in a word in the long run?
My brother objects to my using the word “Feck!” which Anna Nicole used so liberally.
But then he was an airline captain in his day and where would they have been if he had not objected to it?
The same applies to schoolteachers,(where would they be?) although
policemen may not have any objections to its use in the curse of their work!!
Anna Nicole did, which was probably why!
[hit opera 2011 Mark Antony Tournedge]
Please validate this post on its merits and reason. “if you condone Gay marriage and rule it is allowable through the church , Any church that is founded on old and new testament doctrines, you will surely complete the Apostasy” from Genesis 2.18 through,Genesis 5.2 He created them male and female and blessed them.and in fact from the story of Noah all went in two’s both male and female, through the story of LOT,and what occurred due to the happenings attributed to Lot’s dwelling place,and onward through out scripture , We say an Englishman’s home is his castle ! and thus can any man tell that man how to run his castle? , thus if the Church is the castle of The Lord and the Earth his foundation , woe be unto any that would rule it was right and proper to marry same sex individuals in his house ! , i tell you the truth better you were not born. Is not the sanctuary of marriage not defiled enough with such rampant divorce and infidelity ? BE ADVISED , any whom would lessen and waiver the Laws of The Lord your GOD and put the laws of men over them , and note whom history records as The Lord of Lords and King of Kings , perhaps he is The Lord ye who are Lords are subjugated unto !!! rule wisely therefore , if you can find testimony throughout the Old and New testament in favour of homosexuality , then rule for , if you find throughout that it is against homosexuality , then you must rule against Homosexual marriage being conducted in a house of GOD……. a religious man i am not,a man of sin i am, but what is right is right and what is wrong is surely an abomination.
I believe in equality, but I’d quite happily see marriage confined to religious people and scrap registry office weddings. Make civil partnerships available to everyone, then leave marriage up to individual religions. We’d have to make sure the partnerships would be recognised around the world, though – I understand this is the issue with civil partnerships at present, and one reason marriage is preferable.
When the government’s proposal was announced, they said extending civil partnerships to everyone was not on the cards. I strongly disagree with that. How does that makes things equal? Civil partnerships should be available for anyone who wants their relationship recognised but without all the nonsense that comes with a wedding.
How could government be so blind to the depth of feeling people of faith, as well as those ‘not of faith,’ who see marriage as an act of devotion between man and woman, called ‘marriage’ as something revered and natural. Now to want to abuse it as something to be reduced to a farce and poluted the way you are deperately trying to do, is peculiar in the extreme.
How is it you are not aware of how the population in general were so outraged by the criminalisation of the Christian couple in Devon, forced to accept this practice taking place in their home. A small house, where their family lived, and their small business gave them a living. And then because of their natural rejection, having to pay an outrageous fine as it was unacceptable to them, under their roof. The lack of understanding and compassion in this matter is astounding to me. These people were elderly and sick, to do this to them was an act of spite.
What is at the back of this? It is so way off of any normal expectation of healthy practice for a nation, one has to wonder what the objective is in imposing on others such a way of life?
http://www.home60515.com/4.html
Homosexual couples already have the right to a ceremony that suits their relationship, but this is not enough. You want to remove the specialness of the relationship which promotes health and education for offspring within male/female partnerships and reduce them to a deviance.
Tolerance is one thing. Acceptance of same sex relationships as tantamount to ‘holy matrimony’ is another. And whoever wrote the world feels disgust at this is telling it as it is.
Rather than promoting understanding and acceptance between us all, by pressing us to have it in our face, the way you are doing, will counter to your objectives.
You are hiding the truth about this kind of alliance, and going so far with it, that you now want to destroy any feelings of faith we have in marriage as we know it. The truth is you want to destroy any sense of innocence we have in our belief of sacredness between man and woman. And the only reason for that is envy.
On top of that, encouraging tiny children into lessons of how this is a normal practice, without educating them at the same time on it’s dangers, is unconcionable.
If this continues, there will be an enoumous backlash, for which you will be responsible, because of your lack of understanding in the human psyche.
Maude becomes more strident by the day.
I hope it does not cost her too much.
@Twm:
Why not be bold, transparent and filled with openess by writing what it is you are really wanting to say here. Your vagueness is not enlightening.
I suspect your worry is far more to do with what it may cost you than what you are threatening it will cost me.
This thread has asked for views on gay marriage by the general public. Of which I am one. Are you suggesting it is simply put up as a means to produce consent for political policies, as opposed to wanting to know what the variety of thoughts are on the matter in reality.
Because if you are, then why bother with the blog?
A great many people are not interested in heterosexual marriage either, so worrying about the word is pointless.
Marriage is a contract, but when you consider that in recent years some building societies have lent money to more than two people for the purpose of buying a home, one wonder where it will all end, especially when Mormonism is no longer illegal in this country, a religion which practised polygamy
for many generations and in the opinion of some still attracts those who differ from the
normal kind of monogamy, particularly in this country.
Quite apart from which Muslim(2) and Mohamedan(4)Marriage (at the same time)in this country is covered by different laws, so
worrying about gays signing a contract would be footling.
I wonder whether there are any polygamous gays about yet? Bound to be?
I think the problem here is that religion claims it has prior rights to the word “marriage”.
It is interesting that the Cardinal has lots to say about how equality in marriage will wreck families, and very little to say about priests abusing children. He does have a bit more credibility than the Archbishop of Canterbury, whose office came about precisely because someone did
Perhaps the answer is to withdraw the right of all religions to conduct legal marriages and insist that the state must be involved in the oaths and paperwork. Those who then wish to have a ceremony in front of a religions official can then do that after they’ve done the legal bit, assuming they can find someone to conduct the ceremony. That way the state and church are kept separate as they should be.
The majority of priests exposed in the scandal you raise were abusing children who were boys. In the main, they were homosexuals who found being covered by their position as priests, meant they were less likely to be charged as the children involved were afraid they would never be believed. And often were not. Their suffering was immense.
Thought, in fairness, this should be raised as your post, appears, so uneasity, to accept there are other points of view.
http://christianchildabuse.blogspot.com/2010/04/expert-donohues-claim-that-most-abusive.html
Oops… the cat jumped on the keyboard. That middle paragraph should have been:
He does have a bit more credibility than the Archbishop of Canterbury, whose office came about precisely because someone did violate the sanctity of marriage by granting himself a divorce.
Dave’s comments are amusing, and any way at least that divorce ensured that the blood ancient Welsh kings courses through the veins
of the English monarchy for ever and a day.
Saying that, we know a little more about genetics now, and the only guaranteed gene, even in the one to whom Dave alludes to, so briefly and with wit, is 15% of either parent’s genetic material.
The many and wonderful fictions of the ancient art and science of genealogy on which the successions have been based, are totally discredited, and yet there are still people using the IGI (International genealogical Index)SLC(Salt Lake city) as their bible for
lawful succession.
Today they should be genetic!
The claimed descent from ancient Welsh kings was from Hywel Dda (Howell the good) a law maker of the 10thC AD, who was condemned by later archbishops for having had 17 wives.
I suspect, and nobody can do any more than that, that he did not actually marry any more than one of them, just that he was happy for people to know who his lovers were.
The contention that he had 17 wives, may in any event be Historiographical, ie revisionist, but H viii’s 6, certainly were not. Perhaps we should write a song about H viii and IVF. (in vitro fertilisation)It might have had a happier ending!*
He also wrote law on the rights (and wrongs)
of women, which made himm equally unpopular
with bishops and archbishops, Sigeric in particular, distinguishing between women of property and whores, not being something an archbishop was prepared to tolerate. Perhaps he thought they were all chattels, but even in the 10thC Hwyel Dda(the good) gave due thought to the division of property of man and wife, when the occasion required it.
Jonathan makes an interesting point but marriage was around a long time before Christianity and has changed as society has changed. Women aren’t regarded as chattels any more for a star (well not in the UK)t. I can’t see why, if gay people want to make a lifetime commitment to each other publicly (and it’s the lifetime intent which distinguishes marriage from civil partnership) why they shouldn’t. The Church of England being a flexible institution generally comes round to the popular ethic in the end. Meanwhile let’s get on with it. The various Churches can stick with their view and try and persuade their own adherents of their point of view; the majority who don’t care much what the churches say can make their own mind up.
Baroness Murphy,
Your comment may be be misleading. In general, Christianity led to the change of marriage as mostly a property contract from parents to husband with some aspects of personal covenant to a covenant between two persons. That was less true in England and among its neighbors than in some Christian countries. However, it is nonetheless true even in Western Europe.
@Baroness Murphy:
Before writing posts on open blog matters, you profess to have good knowledge of, you should do a little research.
Marraige was anything but marriage in the sense we know it before the intervention of religion.
You will see that marriage even included being wed to a dog as an acceptable state of affairs. In fact, this little piece, written by a so called expert, tells us the State background whatsoever in the ‘rights of marriage’ and that to be married does not require State sanction only religios approval. which means ‘gay’ marriage is perfectly acceptable in civil law because nothing close was ever needed before Christianity devised their ceremony of union between male and female participants.
http://www.stephaniecoontz.com/articles/article25.htm
The State, therefore, is overstaepping its mark in intervening in these matters at all.
Women aren’t regarded as chattels any more for a star (well not in the UK)
but unfortunately for some of the submissive gays who are drawn in to such contracts, the contract forms an effective substitute for indentured man servant of the 19thC,and before, where the one calls the tune and the other does not, something that the chattel of the gay partnership may not have considered before entering in to it.
Still in the end it was hard to decide who was in charge Don Quixote or Sancho Panza!
We all have our opinions about their very honorable friendship, the greatest story ever told.
Could parliament be under representing the nations peaople by having too many one sided views in both chambers?
It stands to reason those in places of power will only select people who have the same view as they on every matter likely to be raised. They are unlikely to ever choose those to stand for office who are so called out of step with their objectives. More often than not, those in the majority, who do not approve of or go along with the policies of their parties are sidelined and ejected as soon as possible.
Which is why a broader politically correct government may make sense after all.
As against PC as I am, to have government scrutinized on a regualar basis to asses how many of the inmates are made up of the exact percentage in the population would make sure we had a balanced government that would be acceptable to the majority of this nation.
Example, how many millionaires are in the Commons? How many in the Lords? What percentage of the population does that relate to? How many in both Houses have had jobs outside of government for at least a five year period? How may Christians, non Christians, Muslims, Jews, and the entire make up of the population correspond to the numbers in those Houses? Sexual orientation and the percentage collated in the general public? Aristocrats, commoners, academics, and so on. Disabled, the ethnic make up to correlate to the people. Women, and on ad infinitim, untill we have a percentage wide match from top to bottom.
This way we would have no doubt we were being democratically ruled. It is impossible to side step such a prospect as parliament is clearly so out of touch with the general public on nearly every issue. The only reason for this has to be because of the content of those in situ.
Time for a whole new rethink.
maude elwes: You seem to be unaware that the opinion polls show that a clear majority of people support gay marriage.
Lord Norton,
Has poll ever explicitly asked how many support or prefer sad, sober and serious marriage? There may be a good number.
@Lord Norton:
What opinion polls are these? How is it I, and no one I know, was asked to give their views? And how was the questions phrased? As I have yet to speak to ‘one’ person, young or old, who agrees with it. Including openly gay neighbour, who lives with one partner but is really into polygamy, as and when they fancy. Whom, I hasten to add, I like a great deal and would not change for another next door.
Are you really telling us that the entire country, from one end to the other, agrees with this ‘in the majority?’
You seem to forget vast amounts of the population are considered mature. And it is a well known ‘fact’ that the older the population is, the more conservative they are. And gay marriage is not a conservative view. Even though Cameron wants to pretend it is.
He is going to lose a lot of votes over this. No matter how Maude and your party try to get around it. Here is another example of the pretence of government once in office. You didn’t offer this up in your manifesto did you? Was that because you knew it was the emajority opinion of this country? I don’t think you would want to lose such a vote grabber like that. Manna from heaven I would have thought. Should it be what you truly believed, of course.
On top of this, we have religious factions who are riotously ‘anti gay marriage.’ Yet when they try to demonstrate they are removed and arrested. And yet, you try to convince us the majority agree with this policy?
Mind you, isn’t the old cry of all politicians ‘the majority of the people are in step with this idea.’ Didn’t the Westminster machine do this when immigration came up? And contiued with it under the Blair/Brown government, until it became so obvious the main reason they were being voted out of office was on immigration grounds and political correctness that denied the people free speech? It took the woman who Brown referred to as a ‘bigot’ to out the entire debacle. Then the public found the intention of the Labour policy all along had been to change the ethnic make up of the UK by design.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFl_evwML2M
The Tories should take note.
http://www.politics.co.uk/news/2012/03/07/maude-gay-marriage-will-make-us-electable-maude-gay-marriage
I see this issue as getting similar treatement. Fear to speak on the grounds of possible persecution should you do so. Akin to the Christian couple in Devon, where the husband collapsed under the strain.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1349489/The-Christian-hotelier-guilty-gay-bias-looks-set-lose-home-asks-So-whos-really-persecuted.html
Others losing their jobs for their opinions and deeply held beliefs. This is persecution, plain and simple. And it is about time the clerics spoke out against their being abused this way.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/archbishop-warns-clergy-gay-marriage-is-a-radical-step-7542457.html
maude elwes: The polls have the advantage of drawing on a representative sample of the population. Your neighbours, I fear, do not necessarily constitute a representative sample. An Ipsos MORI poll in 2007 found that 68% supported gay marriage, up from 46% in 2000.
The only discrimination is against those who discriminate. Perhaps the best argument for gay marriage is to be found in the sheer incoherence of the statements (one cannot say argument since there wasn’t one) of Cardinal O’Brien.
@Lord Norton:
Polls are often different from one day to the next. “007 was a very ling time ago in politics.
Why not have a referendum on it? That way it will be a clear point of view from us all.
The political difference these days between PC and non PC is that like Chris Bryant, and even one very fine Welsh rugby player, you have to come out as gay, or every one calls you a liar!
Any way quite a few of your fans may be gay, so like Dirk Bogarde, the finest French actor of past generations, it is a bit silly going round offending them by saying you are not!
Any way my late Dad was quite fond of him.
The French, thanks to the Napoleonic code, have got it right for some time before we eventually did in the late 60s/early 70s.
French cabinet minsters have always been gay, however many wives they may have otherwise.
That is the PC way. AS Blagger would say
“If two men want to get married let them fecking well go on and get married!!”
Ask yourself, why is the state involved in marriage at all? If the state isn’t involved, what does it matter if its gays getting married, mormons getting married, …
The state doesn’t need to be involved at all, so why is it?
It’s down to money. The state wants to shaft people. It wants the money but won’t pay out when its the other way round.
For example, benefits. Married you have to support your spouse, and the state won’t pay if they are unemployed if you have the cash. However, the state will treat you as individuals and take the money up front. It wants it both ways.
Its down to the basic problem. To justify their existence, politicians have to fiddle. When they fiddle, it just results in them taking more money, and creating more debts for others to solve.
Politicians are the problem, not the solution.
@LB:
‘Article 12’ of the ‘Human Rights Act’ quite clearly states under the ‘Rights to Marry.’
‘Men and Women’ of marriageable age shall have the right to marry and to found a family, according to national laws governing this right. (which means on incest, bigamy and other practices unlawful)
David Cameron wants to remove the ‘Human Rights Act’ from this country, in order to allow same sex ‘marriage’ even though civil ceremonies are already devised for gay marriage under that arm of the law and within the ‘Human Rights Act.’ Giving them equal rights with traditional marriage.
I find this very odd in a party that is selling itself as Conservative. Here is a short view of the Human Rights provisions. Which if you read them over, are very conservative indeed.
Another failure under this ‘Human Rights Act’ by government is the extradition of British men to a country that does not uphold or adhere to Human Rights requirements in many respects. Including the use of the Death Penalty, the right to a fair trial, which in the US is improbable, as they use punishment and threat to force the charged into plea bargaining. Or, in other words, press, by emotional torture, to plead guilty to a crime you did not commit under threat of dire consequences if you refuse their offer.
What an eye opener this is.
http://www.getreadyforchange.org.uk/childrens_rights/human_rights_act
It also has to seriously question the judgment against the Christian couple for their refusal to allow two men to sleep together in their home. Article 9: The right to think and believe what you like. The right to ‘Freedom of thought, conscience and religion.’ Add to that Article 8: The right to respect for your private, family life, home and correspondence.
And today we hear in the press, the leader of our country is prepared to flaunt the law on these rights. Which is not only unlawful, it will be dangerous to us all should he do so.
Men and Women’ of marriageable age shall have the right to marry and to found a family, according to national laws governing this right. (which means on incest, bigamy and other practices unlawful)
It doesn’t mean men have to marry women and vice versa. It means a man has right to marry. A woman has a right to marry.
It also means that if a country decides that polyandry is legal, its legal under EU law.
After all, why stop at one husband?
If it impinges on religious freedom, just start a religion that mandates what ever form of marriage you want, and hey presto its legal.
David Cameron wants to remove the ‘Human Rights Act’ from this country, in order to allow same sex ‘marriage’
Nope, he can just pass a law and under the right to marry whatever form of marriage you want is legal.
My conclusion is that the government should get out of the marriage business altogether.
However it won’t because its using marriage as a way of extracting money, and not paying out on its insurance contracts.
@LB:
According to this document, page 21, Marriage and Civil partnerships, you are wrong.
It clearly states that ‘marriages between persons self evidently of the same sex are void’ see (Talbot v Talbot (1967) These couples, in fact, are covered by civil partnerships.
http://www.londoninternational.ac.uk/current_students/programme_resources/laws/subject_guides/family/family_law08_ch2.pdf
Cameron is trying to change the law in this country in respect of this matter, whilst pretending it is written in the ‘Human Rights Act.’ He is doing this to enable same sex couples to marry in a Christian ceremony. As I believe it is not beholden on other religions to conduct such marriages, again, this is according to this document if you read down.
They did this same back door game with the rules on adoption, forcing Catholic agency’s to close down as they would not place needy children in these situations.
The outcome will be identical to the adoption changes, those Churches who refuse to practice this ceremony having to close down in order to stay within the law. One can only view this as an open atack on Christianity.
The post I wrote above misses out the section that I addressed on the State not being involved in marriage of any kind at all prior to the intervention of the churches.
They brought it into the foreground to enable the union to be specifically noted for the rights of children from that union.
Is a gay Muslim or Mohamedan allowed 2 or 4 partners in gay marriage as well in this country?
During my years as a parish priest rarely did I marry a couple whom regularly attended church nor lived separately..I’d have preferred to send them all down to the Registry Office to prevent the mockery of a church wedding based on religious grounds..it was all about dresses & flowers barely & rarely was there ever religious theology involved..based on my own experience of the righteous bishops speaking out against it.. a trail leads to each having a skelton in their family cupboard like a divorced member of their own family wanting to remarry “in church” or their beloved child wanting to marry a person previously divorced..this whole topic has a smoke screen round it hiding truth…beginning with the mitred and recinding to the evangelical rooted fanatics..it’s time to let the screaming cat out of the bag called truth and face the music and dance NOW!
@Stepen J Normand:
What a great post yours is!
Yes to it. And lets us have complete equality by, of course, remembering to make sure marriage in Church means marriage in Synagogue, Mosque and all other houses of religion. It cannot simply be Christian gays who have this options or right, can it?
We’re all in it together, aren’t we?
See how those onions go down with the populous.
“NOW”
we need at least one website and a library-reference “Human Relationships Encyclopedia and Glossary”
so let the United Nations publish that
and NB include detailed descriptions, and argumentations for and against or ‘behind’, every motivation and piece-of-behaviour and conduct that does or could happen within each relationship and within each contract and* covenant.
* this connective ‘and’ is not of the logic ‘ampersand’ type.
Vicars do very well out of Weddings. Where would they be without this aspect of their business?
It’s the only other time most of the Xmas day parishioners go to his house, and they or their celebrating pals, may go a couple of times a year for that.
Twm O’r Nant: An interesting point. Gay marriage could help save the church…
@Lord Norton:
Polls are often different from one day to the next. “2007 was a very long time ago in politics.
Why not have a referendum on it? That way it will be a clear point of view from us all.
Or, the alternative could be, it may finish it off altogether.
As so many devout Chrisitans left the Anglican Church to join the Roman Catholics over the political correctness issues, this may just be the straw that breaks the camels back.
Maude, that is UK law.
Since that law was decided in the courts there has been a new law, the HRA.
That gives people rights that didn’t exist before.
The case you refer to is superceeded by the HRA.
ie. Men have a right to marry. Women have a right to marry.
Now, you’re arguing that there should be restrictions on who should marry. If the UK parliament introduces a law that says men can marry men, etc, then your case law is irrelevant.
My take is that the government should get out of the marriage business. You can do what you want, the church can do what they want. It’s none of the government’s business.
@LB:
I am arguing, if that is how you wish to use the term, I would prefer another, for the majority people of this country to have their wishes on this matter not only heard, but serviced.
We have erroneous claims here, and on most political websites, that the country goes along with this in the majority. Which is simply untrue.
Today I read that 200,000 people have used the number 10 website to protest for marriage to remain between men and women. More than on any other matter raised.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2115168/MPs-handed-free-vote-gay-marriage-stop-Tory-rebellion.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
Anyone who has contact with family, friends and neighbours are aware of the insult felt by the people in this matter. Quite the opposite of the feed we are getting here.
The State should indeed stay out of the marriage game and leave it to those who understand the concept. Which clearly government does not. More, they should stay out of the bedroom and out of our vows altogether. Legislating in respect of the spiritual is impossible. And oppressive.
Civl practice Re: marriage in respect of the State is simply a means of dealing with settlement regarding property and rights of children on separation, whatever form that may take.
On the state getting out I agree.
1. The state doesn’t even marry people.
2. The state doesn’t take account of marriage in any way.
3. Divorce? With no state involvement in marriage that goes.
4. Bigamy goes
The whole hog.
Kids is an irrelevance. After all non married people have kids.
PS: Lets hope all those who vote remember how their MP feels on this matter and withdraw their vote at the next election if he/she doesn’t transmit their way of thinking to government as they would wish them to do.
So when you say, marriage between men and women, even that goes out the window. If you want some service, arrange for it privately. Church for example, or Marriage Limited for those that don’t believe.
@LB:
And when you say ‘mixed doubles,’ what eactly does that mean? Man and women as pairs, or, two of any type you want to throw in the pot.
Does it mean Wimbledon will be sued for hate crime by not abiding by equality laws in those events laid on specifically for two different sexes to compete? It will have to be termed ‘Any Gender Doubles.’ And so on, as we go down the line.
What is really going on here is, the complete removal of gender. It is one step closer to the androgynous lifestyle where no one is fulfilled. Where the enjoyment of our gender will be unlawful, as the nature of it, in and of itself, discriminates. To love being a man, or, to love being a woman, will soon be defined as hate crime, as it will be unacceptable to speak of the joy one gets from that gift of nature at birth.
The whole premis is preposterous. No longer to be known as wife or husband. No bride and bridgroom. No mother or father as the ‘new’ birth certificates will be genderless parents. It conveys a future distopia brought about by envy.
The Prisoner comes to mind.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDhFpj96a1o&feature=related
I’m getting married at the end of this month… sorry wrong word… I meant to say I’m getting ‘civil partnered’.
To me that’s the crux of it. This whole issue is about the need to reflect the normal language that we use to talk about things. Everyone I know (even my parents) talk about my impending marriage and wedding – they don’t talk about ‘civil partnership’ – it’s just sounds odd.
If we’re referring to the public commitment of a loving monogamous life-partnership then we use the term ‘marriage’ to describe it. It’s nothing to do with religion. (My fiancée’s father is a C of E vicar by the way and he’s supportive of us which is just great – even if he’s not allowed to conduct the ceremony himself which is a shame!)
So, I’m looking forward to my wedding day and marriage and will refer to it as thus because it just seems to make more sense to me (and others) to do so.
This whole issue is about the need to reflect the normal language that we use to talk about things.
And yet a woman who uses her maiden name in business, then expects you to know she has a husband,and to describe him as such, and is indignant when you do not. If she uses her maiden name then she must accept that she has a partner, but a husband?
“What do you think I am?” she enquires.
One might ask the same about her children in that case, which I had been wondering.
This from an apparently capable (otherwise)
Detective Chief Inspector in Dorset.
Marriage is a contract, EXACTLY the same as a share contract on the stock exchange. Religions in this country make money out of the marriage, which is why they make so much fuss about it.
It would be wise to describe them ALL as Contracts, gay ones, straight ones, marriages between dogs; anything.
Partnership contracts.
The Cabinet minister in the Labour government
who signed a deed of separation, with her sleeping partner, ie her husband, may still have been sleeping with him, but not as a partner, as a wife.
Then when they are in bed together they are not going to talk about sensitive government matters, which he might use in business, to his advantage, which as it happens was deemed criminal…. in Italy. As if anybody talks about cabinet meetings in bed!!!!!!?
Is that clear? As mud? Terrific!