Lawprof Katherine M. Franke explains:
If the rollout of marriage equality in other states, like Massachusetts, is any guide, lesbian and gay people who have obtained health and other benefits for their domestic partners will be required by both public and private employers to marry their partners in order to keep those rights. In other words, “winning” the right to marry may mean “losing” the rights we have now as domestic partners, as we’ll be folded into the all-or-nothing world of marriage....
As strangers to marriage for so long, we’ve created loving and committed forms of family, care and attachment that far exceed, and often improve on, the narrow legal definition of marriage. Many of us are not ready to abandon those nonmarital ways of loving once we can legally marry....
But we shouldn’t be forced to marry to keep the benefits we now have...
I was going to say that if heterosexual couples have been excluded from domestic partnerships — as they are here in Wisconsin — then you'd have to open up domestic partnerships to them too. But I think it would be acceptable to have a 2-tier approach to state-sanctioned relationships just for same-sex couples who are
already in domestic partnerships. No new domestic partnerships would be accepted. Now, perhaps Franke thinks domestic partnerships are a great innovation that should be open to same- and opposite-sex couples. I don't see a good reason for the state to maintain 2 different types of marriage-like relationships.
I didn't like the "covenant marriage" approach either.
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210 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 210 of 210@Jason (the commenter): Do you *really* believe all this, though?
I do see where you're coming from, vis-a-vis tribalism and so forth.
Still-- not to get all beating-my-chest about how hard the West rocks, but: the average Pashtun pater familias gets away with stuff that would make Caesar Augustus blush.
Are we in America really in an equation where it's a trade-off between Family and State?
I think strengthening our families would help out society just fine.
And I really don't put much stock in something called "community spirit". I mean in that buzzword sort of way. I want our Lockean liberal society to perpetuate itself, very much. But I don't want to go all "Bowling Alone" weepy civic republican all over it.
I think people who love their families well are just fine without the buttress of weepy civic republicanism.
T-man, we all come in alone, and we all go out alone.
In the meantime?
WAY too many of us are looking for just the right t-shirt.
And cripes, don't most t-shirts have some kind of "LOOK AT ME", pickin' my "TEAM", message?
Well, for good or bad...t-shirts have given way to Facebook Friends and Twitter Tank Tops.
Can "Less is More" become "More is Less"?
Ha ha
Hell, I don't know!
Try it on. See how it fits over your lifetime.
@Jason, please tell me that you are too intelligent* to actually believe that crap you just posted.
_______________
* As in having two or more digits in your IQ
You made me laugh, Freeman.
So can we agree about this at least?
Your subsidizers and my enhancers can meet in the morning?
Far as I know, the tent's gonna be up all weekend.
"In the West we've taken a lot of the feelings we used to reserve for our families and channeled them into community spirit."
Yes, you're the epitome of community spirit!
"Stregthen people's sense of family and they will care less about the wellbeing of society as a whole. And then society might fall apart."
It doesn't follow that people who care about family most, will not care about society enough. No one can be isolated enough. Your family members need jobs, your family needs a situation that protects property and gives stability and allows security and those things are outward looking.
There are two ways to be safe and secure... one of them is to build a fortress and strengthen your own... the other is to help those around you so that you're not surrounded by desperate rabble.
And the thing of it is that you need to have the fortress before you can have the condition of privilege that so much as *allows* you to spend time, effort and resources outside of your immediate circle. People do this first, and primarily, by forming a mutually supportive unit allowing needs to be met and surplus to become available.
At that point, looking outward only makes your own life better and more secure.
It's not more noble to care about strangers. What it is, is inefficient. Care most about what you can do something about. The abstract of "humanity" is all nice and good, but if it lets you off the hook for supporting the people who's condition you know intimately, it's a self-serving cop-out as well.
"Stregthen people's sense of family and they will care less about the wellbeing of society as a whole. And then society might fall apart."
Not sure who posted this, but bull. That sentence sounds crafted to be spoken by a community organizer to convince someone that they're important.
Nope.
"I don't see a good reason for the state to maintain 2 different types of marriage-like relationships."
I don't think there should be even one. If the state wants to encourage it, deregulate it (let everyone do it how they please, and it will flourish. If you have to put singles (a large and growing class) at a disadvantage to do it, then maybe it's not such a good idea. In other words, get the government out of our bedrooms. I can't sleep with bureaucrats in there. They snore and rarely bathe.
I don't see a good reason for the state to maintain 2 different types of marriage-like relationships.
I'd rather have no type of state-sanctioned relationship, but I'd rather have many types than only one. Why do you hate diversity?
re: Freeman's point
It depends on the circumstances and quality of life. When resources are very scarce those who forgo children are the ones who are doing society a favor - see China.
I'm one who thinks with a rational attitude towards birth control rather than the Catholic Church's attitude, a Mother Theresa would never have been needed in the first place. If you had decent policy you wouldn't need a Saint to make up for the bad. The CC is a bit bipolar on the whole issue.
Additionally, what kind of children are being raised? Is there a decent probability they will be an asset to society? Nature is quite chaotic, or perhaps better stated, likes to explore all probable outcomes as the fastest way to find an optimal solution and too bad for all the losers. (Remember the DNA computer?)
re: Jason's point: Rather than fight the family, perhaps expand your definition of family to include society? Not that I ever see that happening. The whole firstborn son thing is still going strong.
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