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Civil unions AND gay marriage: yay or nay?
Qingu
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
A while ago, there were reports that civil unions in France had an unforseen side effect—instead of being limited to gays, many straight couples opted for civil unions precisely because they were less "official" than marriage. For example, they're easier to get out of than divorce. Proponents of gay marriage point to this as civil unions actually weakening the institution of marriage, and say this is why we should just have gay marriage and not civil unions.
I'm obviously all for gay marriage. However, I don't agree with the interpretation that civil marriages in France are a bad thing. Actually, I think it's good that people now have the freedom to entire into a wider gradient of socio-economic arrangements with each other.
In the abstract, marriage is a contract that confers a huge set of rights, responsibilities and economic benefits to two people. That's cool. But what if two people want to enter into a contract with only a portion of those rights and responsibilities? They should have that right.
I would even support friends entering into civil unions with each other. If you think about it, why do legal and economic arrangements like marriage and civil unions need to implicitly rely on a sexual relationship? I trust and depend on my closest friends just as much, if not more, than a lot of my family members—why shouldn't they get visiting rights in a hospital?
So discuss: is it worth having civil unions for their own sake—completely apart from issues involving gay rights?
I'm obviously all for gay marriage. However, I don't agree with the interpretation that civil marriages in France are a bad thing. Actually, I think it's good that people now have the freedom to entire into a wider gradient of socio-economic arrangements with each other.
In the abstract, marriage is a contract that confers a huge set of rights, responsibilities and economic benefits to two people. That's cool. But what if two people want to enter into a contract with only a portion of those rights and responsibilities? They should have that right.
I would even support friends entering into civil unions with each other. If you think about it, why do legal and economic arrangements like marriage and civil unions need to implicitly rely on a sexual relationship? I trust and depend on my closest friends just as much, if not more, than a lot of my family members—why shouldn't they get visiting rights in a hospital?
So discuss: is it worth having civil unions for their own sake—completely apart from issues involving gay rights?
Qingu on
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I'm in a civil union right now and I'm not gay.
All I did was tick "civil union" and file a combined tax return with my gf (better tax wise for us at the time), and we got a government letter in the mail asking us to confirm our status which we both signed and sent back. Then we got our taxreturn checks and we've been filing jointly since. What's not to love?
Edit: reread that and it sounds a little misleading....we live together and have joint property and such were not gaming the system.
What worries me about the above idea is that it would make real life too much like Facebook. Or The Sims. Which is a fun game, but the add-ons get pretty expensive if you want to stay current.
I'll admit I never heard of straight folks wanting to enter into civil unions.
Today, people form networks based on common interests, precipitated by the Internet. Friends can now keep in touch with each other to the same extent and with the same intimacy formerly reserved for family members and husbands and wives. I've seen all sorts of generalizations about the Millenials that friends have become the new family for kids nowadays.
I don't know if Facebook is a reflection or a herald of this trend, but it does seem that this is the way the world is going to work in the future. So our social institutions ought to evolve along with it.
There can be a variety of reasons why marriage might be awkward. We have a few reasons, one of which is that I'm protestant and she is catholic.
in Canada I bet there are more straight "common law partners" than gay. (gays can have full regular marriages here same as straight people, common law partners have almost the same rights/responsibilities as married but it isn't reserved for gays)
Edit: also I believe it was ruled that common law partners get to duke it out in divorce court, so you can watch both gays who are fully married and gays who are common law partners get divorced in FabulouS DivorceS
Don't we already have a word for that?
What you seem to be suggesting is that the government should grant special rights to those who have entered into said contract. I do not see why the government would want to do this.
Marriage is beneficial to society. Its provides stability both on a macro-scale in terms of encouraging people to "settle down" and micro-scale in that it will help build family units with two parents that can hopefully do a good job raising their offspring, build communities blah blah blah.
The civil unions described above seem to simply be half-assed version of marriage. You are in a relationship, but aren't committed enough for marriage so instead of taking the leap you take the hop and get unionized. Fine, but the commitment is pretty much what society is paying for when giving the benefits of marriage.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
They shouldn't. Honestly, the government really has no business who I'm fucking as long as I'm not making babies or maliciously spreading HIV.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Not really. My dad is Protestant and my mom is Catholic. I was raised Catholic and my fiancee is Protestant. And if you're religious enough that this is an issue, you're already violating your faith by getting semi-married anyway.
I mean if you don't want to get married that's cool. I proposed to my fiancee on our 8th anniversary so I'm not a rush to marriage guy. But that doesn't mean you should be afforded the privileges when you aren't willing to go for it.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
So what would have happened if you two had split up after 7 and 3/4 years?
My common law partnership is, for all intents and purposes, the same as getting married without having a wedding. Health insurance (prescription drugs etc), taxes, immigration, divorce....all the laws here treat them the same.
But if I wanted to do that with a single girl, a trip to the courthouse for a marriage license will do that all the above. And more! I get community property and community debt, too. (At least in my state. Your mileage may vary!)
This is why I call marriage a "grab-bag" of legal rights. Independent of a sexual relationship, we consider these arrangements important enough to consult a lawyer over. In the context of a sexual relationship, we (as a society) say, "Go ahead! Knock yourself out! Merge your life with somebody else's! Then get divorced and do it again!" We encourage people to do it, despite the huge risks involved.
And, frankly, I don't see any reason why except for some fuzzy notion that it's traditional.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Hence why you don't have to enter into a contract that the government knows about in order to fuck.
Also Feral, you are wrong about power of attorney. Marriage definitely does not grant power of attorney to your spouse.
You can sign a mortgage together quite easily without marriage.
The government doesn't want you filing taxes jointly for specific reasons.
A bunch of the rest of that is covered by wills.
Honestly I'm not seeing the benefits of marrying your friends beyond hospital visitation rights, and I'm not seeing any advantage to marrying siblings at all.
And "half-assed version of marriage" is precisely what I'm proposing. Again, I'm not opposed to marriage, or gay marriage, or anything. But I also think there are plenty of people who, for whatever reason, don't want to make that level of commitment, or who simply want certain rights entailed in marriage but not others. Civil unions would simply be a way to expedite "grab-bags" of contracts between consenting adults.
My gut says no, though. I think the two things are so extremely similar, that having both would likely just cause confusion. If there is an issue with how hard it it to get divorced, then I'd rather have that issue be fixed, and divorce made a little easier, rather than creating another catagory which will only end in confusion.
I started to say something similar, then stopped because the words weren't coming. You said what I wanted to express, only better, so :^:
I'm tepid in my support for civil unions while marriage still exists, as I worry over the bureaucracy of having two systems. I would vote for civil unions were it on the ballot, but with reservation. I would prefer a single system of marriage, and I would be even more in favor of redesigning the system of rights and privileges into smaller, more sensible arrangements.
In Saskatchewan, if a couple has lived together in a spousal relationship for two years, the law considers them to be as good as married.
Common-law partners in Saskatchewan do not need to register their relationship or take any other active step in order to acquire the legal status of spouses. The mere passage of time gives them all the rights and responsibilities of spouses.
I don't know if this is ideal but it seems to be working as intended and hasn't brought about any newsworthy situations.
insurance and green cards
Make them all civil unions legally and let people call their relationship whatever the fuck they want.
No more government sponsered looting.
Marriage, right now, is so fucking broke as an institution that the last thing it needs is more government regulation. As-is divorce, which happens 50% of the time, has become one big looting-fest where each party just tries to fuck the other; often turns into an angry looting-fest with government assistance that no-fault divorce made easy to do.
And as a believer in men's rights, family courts have become so over-run with "mommy judges" and so hostile and unconsiderate (if not hateful) as to the rights of men, that marriage, as-is, has become even less attractive and stable, especially to men.
Ironically, a union where less is expected of you is a more stable one because you feel more free.
I.E. one of the things that breaks marriages is each side has stratospheric expectations of the other party and, when those are not met, resentment sets in which leads to anger and divorce. However, if you go in expecting less (and knowing you'll be unable to loot the other person if things don't go so well) anything above the basics becomes a bonus.
To Barney it down, say your boss says you're getting a 4-day weekend but, oh noes, the day before he says it'll only be a 3 day. You'll feel cheated, even though a 3-day is cool. But say the day before a 2-day he tells you "Hey, we're having a 3-day" you feel good.
To sum up, this is one things the Libertarians get right, IMHO:
1.3 Personal Relationships
Sexual orientation, preference, gender, or gender identity should have no impact on the rights of individuals by government, such as in current marriage, child custody, adoption, immigration or military service laws. Consenting adults should be free to choose their own sexual practices and personal relationships. Government does not have the authority to define, license or restrict personal relationships.
Note that that includes "normal" marriages as well.
Margaret Thatcher
Yeah, medical insurance and immigration are good examples. Child custody, joint mortgage, joint taxes (may or may not be an advantage), medical power of attorney, inheritance.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Marriage, like all relatinships, involves compromise, man.
If you are the type of person that is unable to deal with that stuff, then you simply shouldn't be getting in to relationships at all.
Great, and those are two things that the insurance company/your job/the government specifically doesn't want to give out to people who aren't actually a part of a stable long-term commitment, like marriage.
Marriage is not necessarily a stable long-term commitment.
Stable long-term commitments are not necessarily marriage.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Read your own post.
Brilliant!
Let's do it ASAP.
Who hurt you so bad?
Also, I've seen no research supporting civil unions being more stable than marriages.
Your spouse doesn't have power of attorney over you, your brother has medical visitation rights, your spouse doesn't get custody of your children unless (s)he is the parent also, you can sign a mortgage with whomever you please and your will determines who gets your inheritance if you are single. The only exception on your list is filing taxes jointly, which is intended specifically for married (or in some state unionized) couples.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
The reason Saskatchewan and much of Canada adopted common law partnerships is precisely because "dealing with it in court" would otherwise often results in very unfair rulings.
I understand you're a lawyer (or in law school, I don't remember which) and I'm not, but unless I'm mistaken this depends on state law.
You're right, my bad.
Of course, you could replace "brother" with "best friend" and it would still apply.
So let me be clear on this.
If I have a child with somebody I'm not married to, separate from that person when that child is an infant and take the kid with me, marry somebody else, and then I die when my child is, say, 12... will custody revert back to the mother?
Is this true in all states?
It is my understanding that to do so with rights of survivorship between unmarried cotenants requires additional paperwork. Again, you're the lawyer, not me, so can you tell me if I'm wrong and if I am wrong is my wrongness generalizable to all states?
If I'm single, and I die unexpectedly without a will, what happens to my assets?
I'm married, and I die unexpectedly without a will, what happens to my assets?
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
If one parent is gone the default is the other parent unless something is disqualifying like custody had already been stripped due to abuse or neglect. You can name a guardian in your will but you can't strip someone else of parental rights. Its possible the court would find for the guardian if it was disputed and say the father had never met the child and they thought it was in the best interests of the child. Again not an actual lawyer/student, but I am signing a mortgage later this month with my fiancee so I've done research in this recently. There is actually no difference in the law if you are married to someone or not when buying a house together (you are assumed equal co-owners, and upon death the sole ownership of the house reverts to the other).
This is fairly state dependent IIANM. In the former it'll generally go to your closets relatives. My dad got a couple hundred bucks because he was tied for the closest relative to his 2nd cousin three times removed a couple years ago.
In most states the latter goes to your spouse/children. My fiancee's grandfather died without a will and it completely fucked her family over (late-in-life wife sold off a campsite in Maine that they had paid the taxes on for over a decade for instance).
Leaving it to chance = terrible idea either way
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Haha, I got caught up in a mix-up of terms, but my point still stands. You can feel free to marry your friend (and I think you should be able to whether they are same sex or opposite sex). But expect that the rights you gain so easily will come with the downsides.
Basically what you guys want are all the benefits that marriage "easily" gets you without the downside when you decide to split. That is not going to happen for a bunch of reasons.
Marriage is meant to be some kind of long-term commitment, that at least is what we define it as as a society. That it doesn't always end up this way doesn't enter into it.
Stable long-term commitments are not necessarily marriage, but I doubt that anyone is going to make it as easy to transfer all of those benefits to another person without the downsides of severing that contract that marriage provides.
I am not sure, but I doubt power of attorney is automatically given in any state. Because if it was, some messy things could happen. For example, if you had your spouse's power of attorney, you could sign a contract divorcing them and giving all of their assets over to you, and then take the kids and leave.
If you want your friend/brother to get custody of your kids or part of your inheritance when you die, then make a will that says so. If you have children you should have one anyway.
I don't get how you guys can't see the downsides of "marriage lite."
There are implications regarding your social security benefits if you stay legally married for more than 10 years. That's all well and good, yay long term "committment," but if someone screws up the proceedings things get nasty down the road when Social Security benefits start to kick in. My finance is trying to streighten such a screwup now, his (ex)wife filed for divorce eight years ago, everybody thought it was a done deal including his ex and her common-law husband. As it turns out, she missed a step, so we found out rather nastily that he's still legally married to her - fortunately, we found out before he was guilty of bigamy. Yay for knowing a good attorney.
In other words, slapping the legal term "marriage" onto something means jack-all regarding whether it's actually a stable or long term anything.
Oh, and I'm "yay" for both civil unions and marriage for people who are of sound mind and over the age of majority, regardless of gender, orientation, or political leanings.
I don't see how the religious community could really have any problem with this, as it's just taking away a legal function from ministers that they shouldn't really have in the first place. I'm sure that it would nonetheless provide fodder for the "war on Christ" crowd, however.
edit: and I realize that this is really controversial and would never fly, but I think ANY two adults should be able to form a civil union. If two bachelor brothers are living together and never plan on getting married, I think they should be able to form a civil union and recieve all the legal benefits that a romantic couple would have. I mean, they're already family, they should enjoy the benefits.
Actually, I agree with you on this. I think that if you want to establish these legal and contractual arrangements, you should have to file them separately. As PantsB has shown, it looks like most of the ones I thought came with marriage you'd have to file separately under any circumstance.
My argument is that if you see downsides to "marriage lite," then those same downsides apply to marriage proper. I don't believe that marriage, as a legal arrangement, actually does not offer enough benefits to society that outweigh the downsides. I believe in offering marriage to gay people because I believe in equal rights for gays - but in my dream utopia, there is no legal concept of marriage - saying that somebody is my "wife" it would carry as much legal weight as saying she's my "bff."
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
I understand things like wills and power of attorney and just about any sort of contract or agreement you could ask for could be drawn up in advance, but most people don't bother with any of that. Having some default laws and agreements that apply to marriage and common law spouses unless you specify otherwise seems like a good thing to me.
That's what I meant by "power of attorney," though I think my mistake was that I forgot that the phrase "power of attorney" refers to a lot more than just making medical decisions on somebody's behalf.
When I added my ex-gf as a domestic partner on my insurance, she signed a medical power of attorney form. (It was one of the pieces of documentation that my prior employer would accept to allow her to be added as a dependent, and with all the medical conditions she had, it was a good idea anyway.) It cost $10 - just the notary fee - and we submitted a copy to the closest hospital and I kept a copy at home with our important papers.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
That's much simpler and cheaper than I imagined it would be.
Still, I feel like there would be tons of couples (or ex's in your case) out there who don't do that kind of thing and if there was no grab bag of rights for couples the medical community would have to rethink the whole asking permission thing.
To be honest, my employer's benefits management firm provided me a boilerplate medical power of attorney form to use.
I think had I not had that privilege, I might have been able to get one for free or cheap through my local legal aid society.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
But it should be. It's in society's best interest to encourage couples to settle down for long-term relationships. Contributes to economic and social stability, don'tchaknow.
I'd prefer there be a single, nonreligious agreement you can hop into with someone. Call it a "civil union". Do it with whomever you please - lover, friend, sibling, whatever - such that you have a long-term binding of assets and rights. If you want to call that person your wife, hey, cool. Go to a church and get "married" in addition.
I don't really see an advantage to having half a dozen variations of marriage. Too confusing - if the standard contract isn't good enough for you, you can pay to have it arranged by an attorney piece-meal.
Marriage provides another benefit we have not talked about in this thread yet:
Being married and having a family means that one person can stay home or work less and take care of the children more, and be protected from getting fucked over by the other party. Mom or Dad puts her/his career on hold so that their children can be better cared for, but Mom/Dad can't just be dumped on the side of the road by the money-making party without compensation.
That's a big part of marriage that gets destroyed in your plan.