Lesbian Couple Married in San Francisco

[scullyAGD]

That is not the argument at all. My point is that if you want homosexuals to be allowed to get married, then you cannot discriminate (draw a line) against "appropriate" incestuous relationships too. They loooooovvvvvvveeee each other and want to get married too and want the relationship to be recognized by others as such.

Are you seriously comparing the act of incest to a commited couple who loves each other and want to get married? That seriously boggles my mind. In most cases, incest is a crime of someone taking advantage of someone else. I fail to see the comparison to a gay couple who wants to declare the same commitment and love as their fellow heterosexual citizens.
Its basically making the statement that these people are sub-human and are not entitled to the same rights and privleges as everyone else.
Personally, I think people like Britney Spears and Liz Taylor, and the throngs of people who marry at will and dump like it never happened are more of a "threat" to the institution of marriage than two women who have been together for 50+ years.

[NinjaPoodle]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object...gerosie101.jpg









All images are copyrighted.

[DWAlphaGam]

Yay for my sisters Dee and Jen and your excellent comments!

Mayor of NY Town Marries Gay Couples

By MICHAEL HILL, Associated Press Writer

NEW PALTZ, N.Y. - Up to a dozen gay couples began exchanging wedding vows on the steps of village hall Friday in a spirited ceremony that opened another front on the growing national debate over gay marriage.

Officiating was Jason West, the 26-year-old Green Party mayor in this village 75 miles north of New York City, who joined Gavin Newsom of San Francisco as the country's only mayors to marry same-sex couples.

"What we're witnessing in America today is the flowering of the largest civil rights movement the country's had in a generation," West said.

Billiam van Roestenberg, 38, and Jeffrey McGowan, 39, were the first to wed to the cheers of the crowd. Wearing suits, they held hands and carried flowers.

"I feel happy and joyful and peaceful," van Roestenberg said. "A little bit of peace has finally come in. I feel proud to be an American."

"Now I'm normal and equal like every one else," he said.

More than 100 people, mostly supporters of gay marriage, turned out on the green across from village hall, outnumbering family and friends of the couples there to marry. A few scattered protesters carried signs opposing gay marriage.

Jay Blotcher of High Falls, N.Y., said that while West could only give him a certificate and not a marriage license, it was still important to go through the ceremony.

"We have to show people who we are," he said. "We've been badmouthed by religious zealots. We've been deprived by President Bush (news - web sites) and we have to show people that we're your friends, neighbors and family."

One protester stood outside the hall with a sign that read, in part, "It's Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve."

"It's against nature," Angelo Da'Quaro said. "It's against religion, it's against all of that."

The ceremonies came a day after the state Health Department said New York's domestic relations law does not allow marriage licenses for same-sex couples. It said a clerk issuing such a license or anyone solemnizing such a marriage would be violating state law.

West and some legal experts said they read the law differently.

"For a marriage to be legal in this state all that's required is for it to be properly solemnized by someone with authority to do so," West told the CNN cable network early Friday. "I'm fully able to do that."

Vincent Bonventre, a professor at Albany Law School, said nothing in New York law explicitly prohibits same-sex weddings, but that the framers "clearly were contemplating opposite-sex marriages."

Discussion of gay marriage heated up this month after the top Massachusetts court ruled that anything less than full-fledged marriage for gays there would be unconstitutional. Since then, San Francisco officials have performed more than 3,400 same-sex marriages and have challenged their state law barring such unions. Earlier this week, President Bush endorsed a movement to amend the Constitution to ban the practice.

A bill in the New York Legislature would ban same-sex marriages. Similar bills have died without action in the past. At least 34 states have enacted so-called defense of marriage laws.

***********

(Bolding added by me to emphasize good points.)

[aurora_borealis]

Originally posted by DWAlphaGam
Yay for my sisters Dee and Jen and your excellent comments!

Mayor of NY Town Marries Gay Couples

By MICHAEL HILL, Associated Press Writer

NEW PALTZ, N.Y. .....

"It's against nature," Angelo Da'Quaro said. "It's against religion, it's against all of that."

She should really state it is against HER religion. I know in mine it isn't. I don't see how religion was involved with a mayor performing a Civil Ceremony, if it was performed in her church then that comment would be valid. Also if she is so concerned with things being against religion, why isn't she going after all these heterosexual couples that live together unmarried and people having children outside of marriage? Some consistency would be nice.

NinjaPoodle, I won't be home for a couple weeks, but have there been any protests that you know of at City Hall, or anywhere in The City?

[Colonist]

Honestly both these mayors should be drawn and quartered

[GeekyPenguin]

Originally posted by Colonist
Honestly both these mayors should be drawn and quartered

Last time I checked, the Patriot Act didn't get rid of the Eighth Amendment.

[Rudey]

Originally posted by sageofages
Tell that to a single parent raising their child. Tell that to the grandparent raising a grandchild because their parents have died. Tell that to the aunt or uncle who is raising their niece or nephew because the parents have disappeared. Tell that to the older sister or brother who is struggling to make sure their younger sibling doesn't end up in foster care. Tell that to the new couple who have just moved in together (married or not).

Two people *can* and many times *do* make a family, even by legal definitions.

You obviously have no clue what I'm trying to say and in your attempt to utter a bit of an emotional response just so you could show how incredible a person you are, you made a very ridiculous post. By two people I meant the two people in the marriage and not the child.

-Rudey

[Rudey]

Nice usage of dictionary.com. It went a long way in proving how you know how to go to that website. It did not show anything about how families are a two person thing.


If you want to be without children then why would you marry?? Nobody seems to be able to answer that.

Godfrey if it's about all these incentives and benefits then why aren't all those single folks getting married and divorce going down? What no answer?? come on.

-Rudey

Originally posted by AGDee
The definition of marriage, per dictionary.com is this:

mar·riage ( P ) Pronunciation Key (mrj)
n.

The legal union of a man and woman as husband and wife.
The state of being married; wedlock.
A common-law marriage.
A union between two persons having the customary but usually not the legal force of marriage: a same-sex marriage.


There is nothing about religion in there. For some people, religion is a part of marriage but for many it is not. When you are married by the Justice of the Peace it IS marriage, even though there is no religion involved. THIS is what they are doing in San Francisco. This has nothing to do with religion, this has to do with law.

Homosexuals can live together and be committed to each other without being legally married. But, they can't visit their partner in ICU because visitors are limited to "family" only and they aren't legally family. They don't inherit anything from their loved one and can end up in legal battles over joint property after their loved one's death. In most cases, they aren't entitled to their partner's benefits. How is any of that fair? Add me to the list of those who don't understand why these people should not have the same legal benefits as heterosexuals.

Now for the definition of Family per dictionary.com:

fam·i·ly ( P ) Pronunciation Key (fm-l, fml)
n. pl. fam·i·lies

A fundamental social group in society typically consisting of one or two parents and their children.
Two or more people who share goals and values, have long-term commitments to one another, and reside usually in the same dwelling place.


Note, the second definition says "two or more people". How are heterosexual couples who decide not to have children leading to the dissolution of the family? I think if people don't want children, they shouldn't HAVE children. What a horrible situation for those unwanted kids to live in if they did.

Incest holds issues other than the genetic factor. Generally, there is a power issue there. Just as it is unethical and illegal for a boss, psychologist, doctor, pastor, police officer, etc. to take advantage sexually of someone who is in the scope of their care, it has to do with equal power in a relationship. It is too difficult to determine whether it is consensual in unbalanced relationships such as these.

I truly don't understand what it will take away from heterosexuals to allow homosexuals to marry. I hope those of you do feel that way, thank God every day for making you heterosexual so that you don't have to deal with those issues.

Dee

[Rudey]

Originally posted by scullyAGD
Are you seriously comparing the act of incest to a commited couple who loves each other and want to get married? That seriously boggles my mind. In most cases, incest is a crime of someone taking advantage of someone else. I fail to see the comparison to a gay couple who wants to declare the same commitment and love as their fellow heterosexual citizens.
Its basically making the statement that these people are sub-human and are not entitled to the same rights and privleges as everyone else.
Personally, I think people like Britney Spears and Liz Taylor, and the throngs of people who marry at will and dump like it never happened are more of a "threat" to the institution of marriage than two women who have been together for 50+ years.

I could and would make the comparison. In fact it seems you are incestphobic when so many countries in the world have cousins and closer marrying each other. You are an incestaphobe!!!

-Rudey

[PhiPsiRuss]

Originally posted by Rudey
I could and would make the comparison. In fact it seems you are incestphobic when so many countries in the world have cousins and closer marrying each other. You are an incestaphobe!!!

-Rudey

Eleanor Roosevelt's maiden name was... Roosevelt. She, and FDR, were cousins.

[sageofages]

Originally posted by Rudey
You obviously have no clue what I'm trying to say and in your attempt to utter a bit of an emotional response just so you could show how incredible a person you are, you made a very ridiculous post. By two people I meant the two people in the marriage and not the child.

-Rudey

I suppose then you should write what you mean...you said "2 people do not make a family". Not terribly ambigous is it. I say two people *can* and do make a family.

[sageofages]

Originally posted by Rudey
Nice usage of dictionary.com. It went a long way in proving how you know how to go to that website. It did not show anything about how families are a two person thing.


If you want to be without children then why would you marry?? Nobody seems to be able to answer that.

Godfrey if it's about all these incentives and benefits then why aren't all those single folks getting married and divorce going down? What no answer?? come on.

-Rudey

I can answer why two people without children would want to marry....because they love each other, because there are significant legal advantages to being married, because they MAYBE they don't like children...can't have children....children don't fit with their life plan.

[sageofages]

Originally posted by russellwarshay
Eleanor Roosevelt's maiden name was... Roosevelt. She, and FDR, were cousins.

Fifth cousins once removed actually.

[sageofages]

Originally posted by Rudey
I could and would make the comparison. In fact it seems you are incestphobic when so many countries in the world have cousins and closer marrying each other. You are an incestaphobe!!!

-Rudey

and if you are not....I am worried for your family members

[Rudey]

Originally posted by sageofages
and if you are not....I am worried for your family members

Yeah ok incestaphob...you just have a lot of bias and hate.

-Rudey