Dragonlady
Designing Woman
Wasn't there something else besides marriage that would have taken care of the issue ?? Can't remember what it was called now, but it seems I remember something they all were talking about in order to keep marriage as a religious tradition and symbol between a man and a woman. What makes you think that everything is about gays when people are dissatisfied with the Demon-crat party ? Abortion is the huge elephant in the room wouldn't you say ??If the culture hadn't gone bat crap crazy, then the respect would have held over time, but once the culture went stupid it was on. That was the green light for the American people to be justifiably screwed over by those who sought to separate themselves from the crazies amongst the groups.And the worst thing that has happened to it is the Reagan GOP give away to the rich and screw everybody else system of the last 35 years, Super Duper. We have the worst inequality and upward mobility and benefits of any modern country... The dupes don't know that but they know every detail of phony Democratic scandals and believe everybody just got lazy. Pathetic Chumps of the greedy idiot rich.I wrote this over at USA Carry in 2013. Fits the theme of the OP's thread. Under Obama, our outlook was pretty grim
-Geaux
Because I was raised to love God & Country. My grandparents were hard working tobacco farmers for all their lives. They never ventured far from their home in Tennessee. During my youth, I spent my summers there working in the hot August fields and in the top of some bat and spider infested barns. But you know what? It felt like Utopia. The family would gather on Sundays for dinner (lunch down south) then retire to the vast fields for games of baseball until the lighting bugs blinked at sunset. America was a different place then. It was a place were a man was judged by the sweat off his brow and how he provided for his family. As grandma used to say; "I don't care if you dig a ditch for a living, just dig it to the best of your ability". They were true Americans who taught me the value and pride which comes from a hard days work.
I have tried to pass the culture to my son's. And to some extent, it is still a work in progress. It's just hard for them to see the forest through the trees. Some today get more fired up about a new release of the Ipad than it does at the prospects of employment. Sad
What would my grandparents think today of the America that turned it's back on their values? I picture the Indian with a tear in his eye (viewing litter) from the commercial years ago. The difference today is he would be reduced to a mere man on his knees viewing the cesspool society has manifested and nurtured.
The election was a referendum on the American Dream as my generation knew it. The shear fact that a little over half of us (America collectively) voted for the continued weakening of our National Sovernity is hard to stomach.
I can only hope the reason immigrants flock to America is because of the image it used to reflect, not the image of today. But as the subj: reads, I am on the slippery slope called hope and am growing more bitter by the day.
Can't say I blame them really, I mean who wants their family subjected to what Hollyweird is pumping out today, and all the crazy trends and deplorabalisms going on today ?? It takes money to separate, and this is what has taken place for many years now.
The crazies have figured it out, and that is why they seek government power to reel it all back in. They see it as no other way, and so the attack is on for power and control.
All of this is just bullshit. It is conservatives that have gone batshit crazy over every little thing. The rest of the modern world has adapted to giving rights to minorities. Only in the USA is there this crazed response to EVERY. LITTLE. THING. Most of which has absolutely NO impact on the lives of any of the people who are getting all hysterical over it.
Gay marriage is a good example. It has absolutely no impact on anyone other than gays, and those who want to illegally discriminate against them. But you'd think that gay marriage is the end of the world as you know it given the reaction of the American right. God will punish us!!! Think of the children!!!
I've lived in a country with gay marriage for nearly 20 years now, and it's had no impact on me or my family at all. But I see the positive impact it's had on the gay members of our communities.
One of the law clerks at my last firm was married and his husband had retired early for health reasons. Our clerk was able to add his husband to his supplemental health insurance so they both had full health insurance and supplemental health insurance at family rates, which was critical to their finances as my co-worker's husband needed a walker, and expensive drugs which aren't covered by OHIP until age 65.
In cases where there is no medical power of attorney, hospitals will call upon the spouse to make end of life medical decisions where the patient is no longer able to do so. Prior to gay marriage, gay partners were shunted aside in favour of estranged family members with no idea of the patient's wishes or history.
Gay marriage became necessary when a legal hierarchy was established as to who speaks for you when you can't. If you have designated Powers of Attorney for property, and Powers of Attorney for personal care, to designate who speaks for you when you can't, you have designated your attorneys, but in the case of minor children, it's their parents. In the event you have no P/A's, the law says your spouse is first, your adult children are second, and your parents, if living, are next. The person you live with in a relationship, has no legal standing, even if you've co-habited for 20 years.
No. Nothing else comes close to providing the blanket protections that marriage provides, both legally and socially. All jurisidictions throughout the world understand the legal concept of "marriage". Not all allow or recognize "co-habitation agreements" and certainly insurance companies, who are loathe to cover same sex unions in the first place, don't recognize them. Given that whether or not such a union would be recognized from state to state is ample evidence that the old methods weren't working.
What difference does it make whether or not you call it marriage?