If same sex marriage is legal, can sisters marry sisters or brothers marry brothers? Can sons marry dads or daughters marry moms?
Do you have to actually be homosexual to marry a same-sex partner or could you just marry a friend that you love dearly, but have no intentions of having sex with?

there's another thread on this where i've already given my opinion. no need to repeat it again. let's just say that these questions were asked years ago when we wised up and decided that the world wouldn't grind to a halt if we allowed people of different races to marry. this very same line of arguing was made then as well. i'd have hoped that we would have learned our lesson then and not gone on to repeat it.

but speaking of the slippery slope argument... if we start writing discrimination into the constitution, which group of people will be next? is it okay to do so as long as you're not in the group facing discrimination being written into our nation's rulebook?

does it matter to you if you feel safe enough now?

I'm not trying to debate why people are gay and/or gay rights. I too have a very close gay family member that's been in a committed relationship for longer than I've been married, probably 15 yrs. . ..... That's not the point of my question.

My question is posed from the standpoint of owning a small business. If you offer benefits to employees and their spouses or families, and same sex marriage is legal, where will the line be drawn. If a man's brother needed health insurance, could the two of them run down to the courthouse, say their vows (there's nothing in there about sex) and force a company to include the brother as a spouse for insurance?

I really don't care one way or the other about whether one state or another decides to allow what kind of marriages. It is offensive to me that anybody would cheapen the Constitution by putting any reference in it to any kind of sexual relationship. That is not what the Constitution is for. It's for guaranteeing the broadest of rights to the American people! If you begin to use this document to narrow rights, you begin to reach the REAL slippery slope, wher the Constitution is no longer defining rights, but limiting them! THIS IS WRONG, WRONG, WRONG!!!!!!!

*************rant off***********

rd2 -- trust me, even being married is no guarantee of insurance rights. we cannot afford to have me on my wife's insurance, and her employer is a pretty well-off county municipality.

the insurance she has is total crap first off, but then the rates are insane. her copay is $50 per dr. visit, $40 per prescription -- for generics!

but check out the premiums:

for one person: $70/mo
for one FAMILY (meaning 1 parent and children): $110/mo
for ONE COUPLE: $470 PER MONTH

outrageous. i have no insurance; it's cheaper to pay out of pocket than to have it!

anyway, there is a HUGE misunderstanding that gay men want to get their "AIDS-ridden partners" on their health insurance. first off, that's not even remotely why gays want the right to marry by far, secondly, even IF such hordes of AIDS-ridden gay men existed (btw, the lowest transmission rate is among lesbians; the fastest growing rate in non-white HETERO women), pre-existing condition clauses wouldn't allow for this.

the "where to draw the line" question is not as dynamic as some would have it, though. i do understand your concerns, but first off, less than 10% of people are gay. of that 10%, nowhere NEAR every one of them wants to marry. but there is a huge hue and cry to allow same-sex marriage because this IS a population who has been fighting for this for decades. there are NOT similar numbers of people in the other hypothetical situations who have been trying and trying and trying to get the right to legally marry, though. even if there were all these hypothetical people wanting this, there are not the sheer numbers, and there is not the demand. look at how many gay folks have gone to court for the right to marry -- then look for court cases of these other hypotheticals. they're just not there.

it makes no sense to withold marriage from a group of people who have been asking for it for decades just because of the fear that some other group of people MIGHT ask for the same -- especially when there's no evidence that such other groups exist or have been seeking the right to marriage if they do.

the same problem, though, exists if you think of bush's advocacy and push of people to marry. say a bunch of heterosexuals all clamor for the altar -- that too would jack up the number of people eligible for health care -- again, assuming they would be a) really eligible (no pre-conditions), b) able to afford the premiums and c) don't already have their own individual plans -- many folks of all orientations have their own health plans through their own jobs and do not use their partners' plans. 🙂

Hmmm interesting. Incest is illegal primarily because of the offspring it can produce. Inbreeding can amplify bad recessive genes. But in a relationship that could never produce children, this would not apply. Though the idea is repellant to me, I can't think of an argument against it right now. Assuming everyone is of majority age and in good mental health.