Gay marriage thread

[Beef Oven]

I have contributed little, because I am unable to understand the arguments of the people, here or elsewhere, who are against equal marriage. Like others, I have been married. I would still be married if I hadn't been widowed. I have children and grandchildren, and see myself as an ordinary sort of person in my seventies. I don't understand why people think equal marriage would undermine my marriage or anyone else's. I don't see why marriage would have to be redefined, except perhaps in certain small details. I don't see why children would be confused. If you tell a child that you marry the person you love and want to spend your life with, the child would surely accept that easily.

Above all, I don't accept the view that marriage can only be between a man and a woman. Until now, perhaps, but IT CAN CHANGE. Thank goodness we don't do everything because 'it has always been that way'.

Well put, a good post (not because I agree with your reasoning (that's why others in here think it's a good post) but because you state it simply and moderately)

Sadly, if another post was put in the same way, but arguing the opposite, it surely wouldn't get a festoon of silly emoticons and self-satisfied back-slaps.

[amateur51]

Well put, a good post (not because I agree with your reasoning (that's why others in here think it's a good post) but because you state it simply and moderately)

Sadly, if another post was put in the same way, but arguing the opposite, it surely wouldn't get a festoon of silly emoticons and self-satisfied back-slaps.

Why don't you try, then Beefy?

It would make a change

[Beef Oven]

Why don't you try, then Beefy?

It would make a change

I'll have a go later. My shower head has exploded so I must pop to B&Q.

And when I do, if it is sensible and reasonable (but you certainly won't agree with it), I expect loads of emoticons, kisses, back slapping etc. Deal?

[amateur51]

I'll have a go later. My shower head has exploded so I must pop to B&Q.

And when I do, if it is sensible and reasonable (but you certainly won't agree with it), I expect loads of emoticons, kisses, back slapping etc. Deal?

They're poised and ready to go, if you deliver the goods, of course

[Beef Oven]

They're poised and ready to go, if you deliver the goods, of course

Ok, but remember 'reason and good sense' as per post 1423. And don't quibble over the lexicon, we know good sense is often what we don't want to hear.

[ahinton]

I really can't see the point of people simply repeating that they do, or don't, agree with single sex marriage - that isn't discussion. It is, almost certainly, passing into law, and the younger generations will come to accept it without question.

I find the concept of 'equal marriage', as a description, more debatable. For many people, especially women, marriage is not 'equal' - particularly noticeable in my former profession where promotion could frequently mean moving from one end of the country to the other: e.g. easier for men to be away during the week than for the woman, if they have young children, or women giving up their careers to follow their husbands. Not to mention necessary disruption of careers to have children and bring them up when very young.

There may well be a transitional period of difficulty when it becomes more common for men to adopt childen. A while back the stories were of women in their sixties having children: which means some children of 10 having a mother in her seventies, while 'all the other children' had mothers in their twenties or thirties. And late teenagers might well have responsibility for looking after an aged parent (or being orphaned), whereas that would more commonly arise for settled 'children' in their fifties or sixies. That seems to me to pose more problems than single sex marriage.

Mary's post and yours both make plenty of good sense. Like any other major legislation, same sex marriage will need time to settle in, as you suggest. The question of family members looking after older family members is already an issue often fraught with problems because of greater social mobility; only time will tell whether the introduction of SSM will exacerbate this or make little or no difference to it, I think.

[ahinton]

I thought you wanted to get back on topic, so I posted a helper in that direction.

And I'd thought that you did! Anyway, I think that we are now back on topic, even though you have indicated that you have little if anything more to contribute to it.

Whilst I'm not personally a great advocate of SSM, I'm certainly not against it and I'm not persuaded that the UK government sought wilfully to introduce this legislation against the wishes of the majority of the electorate; one reason why I'm not convinced is that there appears to be no evidence that a government of different hue following the next General Election (if indeed a change of government is brought about by it) would seek to overturn that legislation.

[Nick Armstrong]

not because I agree with your reasoning (that's why others in here think it's a good post)

Your omniscience as to the thinking of 'others' is truly impressive, Beefy...

[Mary Chambers]

I think my inability to see the other side of the argument is probably a failing, but in this case I really can't. There has not been any argument against same-sex/equal marriage (whatever you like to call it) that has even begun to convince me. Most of them seem to be based on some sort of superstition, fear even, rather than reason. Sorry, but that's the way it seems to me.

However, please don't take this as an excuse to put the arguments forward yet again. I've heard them all, and so, I suspect, has everyone else.

[scottycelt]

I have contributed little, because I am unable to understand the arguments of the people, here or elsewhere, who are against equal marriage. Like others, I have been married. I would still be married if I hadn't been widowed. I have children and grandchildren, and see myself as an ordinary sort of person in my seventies. I don't understand why people think equal marriage would undermine my marriage or anyone else's. I don't see why marriage would have to be redefined, except perhaps in certain small details. I don't see why children would be confused. If you tell a child that you marry the person you love and want to spend your life with, the child would surely accept that easily.

Above all, I don't accept the view that marriage can only be between a man and a woman. Until now, perhaps, but IT CAN CHANGE. Thank goodness we don't do everything because 'it has always been that way'.

Forgive me for once again not being true to my word and staying out of this debate. However, I have no intention of indulging in any slanging-match with the usual suspects, and think reasonable-sounding posts such as the above need to be challenged if only on the grounds of simple logic.

So exactly where would you draw the line, Mary? If you say that there is no reason for the meaning of an ancient institution like marriage not to be subject to periodical change presumably, therefore, you would draw no "red lines" as that would destroy your own argument? In other words, there would be no reason to bar, say, polygamous marriage in the future? As many of us are no doubt well aware marriage is much, much more than 'two people who just happen to love each other' as the teenage witterings of Yvette Cooper & Co seem to indicate.

Another poster talked about the fallacy of 'slippery slopes'. Like 'the thin end of the wedge' these time-honoured phrases derive from the wealth of human experience. In recent memory, when the first shop broke the then trading laws and opened on a Bank Holiday, we were assured this wouldn't become the norm for every Bank Holiday in the future. The same with Sundays. PM Cameron once assured us faithfully that CPs would not lead to 'Gay Marriage'. Whatever our views on either subject the 'slippery slope' argument in each case has been thoroughly vindicated.

Those who think demands for further change in matters of sexual morality will somehow miraculously disappear, and everyone will live happily ever after, might wish to take a closer look at the recent bizarre experience of one of our very close European neighbours. Though the parallels are not exact, change does not necessarily mean 'good' or 'better'. Sometimes it might even have unintended consequences deplored by everyone here, not least by those passionately in favour of the proposed new laws on the grounds of 'equality'.

http://www.thelocal.de/society/20130201-47711.html

Of course it would never happen here ... of course not.

[Mary Chambers]

I am talking only about the proposed legislation to make marriage available to same-sex couples who are consenting adults, Scotty. I'll consider any further extensions of the idea of marriage if and when they are proposed. (I doubt if I would be happy about man and dog, because even an adult dog cannot give consent )

[ahinton]

I am talking only about the proposed legislation to make marriage available to same-sex couples who are consenting adults, Scotty. I'll consider any further extensions of the idea of marriage if and when they are proposed. (I doubt if I would be happy about man and dog, because even an adult dog cannot give consent )

!!! Indeed - whatever most of us think, legislating to endorse arranged marriages between anyone and anyone (such as, but not limited to, between human animal and non-human animal) would generally be regarded as a retrograde step...

[jean]

http://www.thelocal.de/society/20130201-47711.html

As an exemplar of the slippery slope/thin end of the wedge argument, this surely fails on the grounds that no-one involved seems to be saying if them, why not us?

[Pabmusic]

Forgive me for once again not being true to my word and staying out of this debate. However, I have no intention of indulging in any slanging-match with the usual suspects, and think reasonable-sounding posts such as the above need to be challenged if only on the grounds of simple logic...

I do hope you don't include me as a 'usual suspect', Scotty. But you have said you are challenging something 'on the grounds of simple logic'. No you are not; in fact you're raising a logical fallacy - the 'slippery slope' or 'camel's nose' fallacy. (If you let the camel poke its nose into the tent, the rest of the camel will follow.)

This has long been regarded as a fallacy, and thus a 'bad' argument, since the assumption is that something is wrong because it is next to something that is wrong. Or, it is wrong because it could slide towards something that is wrong. Neither says much about the quality of the substantive argument, but they do say something about the proponent. The fallacy is closely related to the 'straw man' fallacy (where I exaggerate your argument and then spend the time demolishing the exaggeration).

No-one is proposing anything but extending the idea of marriage to any two humans of legal age. To argue on the basis that something else might happen in the future is unhelpful. Anything might happen one day, but that has nothing at all to do with the current proposal.

And that, Scotty, is logic.

[Nick Armstrong]

a logical fallacy - the 'slippery slope' or 'camel's nose' fallacy. (If you let the camel poke its nose into the tent, the rest of the camel will follow.)

This has long been regarded as a fallacy, and thus a 'bad' argument, since the assumption is that something is wrong because it is next to something that is wrong. Or, it is wrong because it could slide towards something that is wrong. Neither says much about the quality of the substantive argument, but they do say something about the proponent. The fallacy is closely related to the 'straw man' fallacy (where I exaggerate your argument and then spend the time demolishing the exaggeration)

I like it Pabs Very clear. I've wanted to deploy that argument many times in real life, and failed to do so as clearly as that. I'm going to print that out and learn it by heart!