marriage for breeders, only Options

[Divergent Realit...]

http://www.nwcn.com/statenews/washington/s...W.546c6a4d.html

Under the initiative, marriage would be limited to men and women who are able to have children. Couples would be required to prove they can have children in order to get a marriage license, and if they did not have children within three years, their marriage would be subject to annulment.

shit like this makes my head hurt...

[Billy]

I still support removing marriage from law. Seperation from church and state. No marriage should be recognized by the government. The home and people's relationships should not be controlled. Marriage should be solely ceremonial between any and all involved.

[impala454]

marraige is already separated from church though. sure people tend to have their ceremonies there, but as far as legally being married, that's all through the state and only the state.

[Aaron]

Obviously it is a ludicrous initiative, and the people who are suggesting it fully realize it. Basically, they're pointing out the flaws in the argument of social conservatives who say that marriage should only be available to heterosexual couples because they can create children.

This whole argument is gay (you know what I mean). If homosexuals want to get married and be miserable, let them.

[The Fanatic]

Technically under this initiative, if a man and women don't(can't) want to have children they can't get married.

Fuck this fascist bullshit

[theIncredibleEdi...]

Marriage is crap....I don't want the right to marry (but others should have the option). Like Margaret Cho says, if you are against gay marriage, but you laugh at Will & Grace.....FUCK YOU!

I want to get something passed that says that if gays move in to and renovate an area and raise property values (as they so often do), married people/or Republicans can't live in that area. Let them keep their nasty vinyl siding crap OUT!

[Spectatrix]

marraige is already separated from church though. sure people tend to have their ceremonies there, but as far as legally being married, that's all through the state and only the state.

Well, civil marriage and religious matrimony are technically separate, but regulations regarding civil marriage are still influenced by religion. If they weren't, there wouldn't be any big argument about gay marriage. This initiative is just an attempt to kill one of the more ludicrous arguments against gay marriage: that marriage is about creating a family unit and only heterosexual couples can have kids.

[Spectatrix]

From the Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance website (the folks who put forth this bill):

The Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance seeks to defend equal marriage in this state by challenging the Washington Supreme Court’s ruling on Andersen v. King County. This decision, given in July 2006, declared that a “legitimate state interest” allows the Legislature to limit marriage to those couples able to have and raise children together. Because of this “legitimate state interest,” it is permissible to bar same-sex couples from legal marriage.

The way we are challenging Andersen is unusual: using the initiative, we are working to put the Court’s ruling into law. We will do this through three initiatives. The first would make procreation a requirement for legal marriage. The second would prohibit divorce or legal separation when there are children. The third would make the act of having a child together the legal equivalent of a marriage ceremony.

Absurd? Very. But there is a rational basis for this absurdity. By floating the initiatives, we hope to prompt discussion about the many misguided assumptions which make up the Andersen ruling. By getting the initiatives passed, we hope the Supreme Court will strike them down as unconstitutional and thus weaken Andersen itself. And at the very least, it should be good fun to see the social conservatives who have long screamed that marriage exists for the sole purpose of procreation be forced to choke on their own rhetoric.

[Testm0nkey]

"This initiative is just an attempt to kill one of the more ludicrous arguments against gay marriage"

i think that goes above most peoples heads

[Spectatrix]

"This initiative is just an attempt to kill one of the more ludicrous arguments against gay marriage"

i think that goes above most peoples heads

Then they obviously didn't read the news article.

[Testm0nkey]

i think most people hear about a controversial topic and yeah dont get everything. i read the article that has nothing to do with the point i was trying to make

[chook]

Use whatever syntax for a don't care statement. I want to make tons of catholic babies!

[impala454]

Well, civil marriage and religious matrimony are technically separate, but regulations regarding civil marriage are still influenced by religion. If they weren't, there wouldn't be any big argument about gay marriage.

how so? how are regulations regarding civil marriage influenced by religion?

Besides, I wouldn't exactly categorize anti-gay marriage sentiment only to people who believe in a religion. not by far.

[Spectatrix]

The gay marriage thing is pretty much exclusively what I'm talking about. I'm well aware that there are non-religious folks out there that are opposed to gay marriage, but it's definitely members of the religious right that are the driving force behind prohibiting it. They may be a vocal minority, but I think that most of the anti-gay marriage movement would fizzle without them.

I'm not trying to hate on religious folks here, I'm just sayin' what I've observed.

This post has been edited by Spectatrix: Feb 13 2007, 04:18 PM

[impala454]

The gay marriage thing is pretty much exclusively what I'm talking about. I'm well aware that there are non-religious folks out there that are opposed to gay marriage, but it's definitely members of the religious right that are the driving force behind prohibiting it.

well that's not too shocking considering gay marriage goes completely against almost all major religions. It doesn't mean we have some infiltration of the state by the church though. Ultimately the congress member's votes come from their home state/district's views, which is how it's supposed to be.