Sunday, March 16, 2008

Ten Couples

My sister and her better half recently sent me a link to the stories of ten couples. These couples are typical in many ways: they cook, clean, raise children, pay taxes, enjoy each other's company, and basically look and act like anybody else.

But these committed couples, some of whom have been together for more than fifty years, are not afforded the rights that my husband and I take for granted, simply because they are composed of two people with identical private parts. When you hear their stories, it really humanizes the over-politicized debate on marriage equality. They don't want special rights. They just want the same rights that other couples enjoy by virtue of possessing complementary private parts.

The money quote: "It doesn't matter who you love, what matters is that you can love and that you do love someone. And that's it."
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3 comments:

Twice said...

Great link - thanks for posting it.

3/16/2008 10:09 PM
Anonymous said...

The government shouldn't give special privileges to unions of two adults if they don't do the same for unions of three or more.

Traditional marriage has special privileges and that's unfair to everyone else. The reason for those special``rights" is historically it has been a good model for growing citizens. But culture has change and the model is broken. It's time for the government to stop granting special fiscal privileges to unions, instead just give it to full-time parents.

All unions of any number of people, regardless of gender identification should be allowed to make it official, for the benefit of say hospital visits, joint checking accounts, etc. If they want to dissolve the union, then they can go through an official proceeding for dividing up the goods they shared. I claim all childless unions don't benefit the government enough to warrant a 1200 dollar economic stimulus check if only 1 member is paying taxes.

3/17/2008 3:33 PM
Rebecca said...

Pete, I happen to agree that plural marriage should be open to consenting adults who agree to it. Getting people in this society to go along with that will be non-trivial, as they still seem to have a problem with certain unions of two adults.

That being said, there are other benefits to marriage as a privileged state besides those you mention. For one, with that privilege come responsibilities for one another, which saves the government from having to pick up the tab when one person is ill, disabled, or chooses not to work for whatever reason.

3/18/2008 7:39 AM

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