Marriage is marriage. If it's the same relationship with the same responsibilities, then it deserves the same name, same rights, and same recognition/standing in the legal and tax codes.

It's my understanding that governmental establishment of systems, taxes, other levies (including military levies, like the draft and military service), benefits, relationships, and institutions to which some citizens are entitled access and others are denied access based on membership in any group given codified protected status is out of the question. Government-mandated "separate but equal" "fixes" not only failed, but, more importantly, also are illegal in the United States.

There are so many constitutional angles to take on the issue, but to me, the easiest, quickest, "in a nutshell" path is as simple as this: As a woman, I am protected. As a woman, my sweetie is protected. "They" can't exclude either her or me from marriage and its rights, responsibilites, and benefits just because we're women, regardless of "their" little DOMA-thingie.

In fact, if "they" want to play hardball, then I think it would be cool and kinda funny if "their" little DOMA-thingie, in defining marriage, actually set up a special class of citizens, and perhaps could, if found to be unconstitutional, then be used to invalidate "their" heterosexual marriages performed since it's been in effect (or all marriages, if it included a grandfather clause), on technicality, thus making the only legally married citizens in the United States those homosexuals who were married in MA or abroad (or wherever else it was "temporarily" legal) since DOMA came to be. In the opinion of my twisted sense of humor: It'd be cruel to do to 'em, but might finally shut 'em up to have their backwards versions of "equal treatment under the law" turned back on them.

**Obviously, I never went to law school. Oh, and sorry, family. I still love you guys, even though I said that stuff about straight folk.

--Talk Derby to me.

Well, I'd take it because I'm selfish* but I wouldn't settle.

Of course, as smokinbluegrass said, there are TONS off issues surrounding this. If the federal government went and cocked it up like New Jersey has, that would be a travesty. But if they execute it fairly like the United Kingdom has (I am allowed to tick the "married" box on forms and there's no problem with it or the rights I receive as a result), I wouldn't argue the point. I would still want "real" marriage and the title afforded my straight relatives who are in committed relationships, but I wouldn't refuse an equalised civil union strictly on that basis.

But... I have personal reasons for feeling this way. Those who are in similarly compelling situations - aging partners who might lose their home if one dies, etc. - should also be considered.

*If "civil unions" would allow me to move back home to America and live there with my British wife, I'm not going to argue semantics at that point. I'll argue it once she gets her green card. :0)

True happiness, we are told, consists in getting out of one's self, but the point is not only to get out, you must stay out; and to stay out you must have some absorbing errand. -Henry James

I am sorry, but I personally don't like the title of marriage.  Not only my personal experience with failed marriages (yes,my mother was married 4 imes)  but with the national sucess rate to back my side, I just feel like marriage is a sad institution used to validate right wing moral obectives.  Marriage has lost more meanig among those who are prived to that advantage that personally don't want to classified with those poor sad individuals who use and abuse the sanctity of marriage.  Civil Union sounds just fine to me, just don't deny our basic human rights to love and be loved.  Hopefully we will have a better sucess rate. 

I don't really have issues with the term civil union, what will give me issues is what "legal" differences their are between the two. Because in the end, what I believe is that...if me and my significant other are sharing a home, co-parenting children, and otherwise behaving like any straight couple... our rights should be equal. I think the biggest thing to me is things like co-parenting children. Even if a man isn't the biological father of children in a marraige to his wife, if he "acts as a father" for a number of years and wants to enforce his rights as a second parent, he'll have a legal foot to stand on (especially if the other biological half is a non-issue). However, gay/lesbian parents have no such protection from losing rights to the children they co-parent should there relationships end. Especially if they are not the legal (adoptive) or biological parent.

So my issue with the excecution of the laws attached, not what the actual union is called in legal terms. If it is proved "Civil Union" vs. "Marriage" is no more than a convient term to seperate "straight" and "gay", then it won't matter anyway. Make the federal legal term for a "gay marraige" some other freakin' term if the term "civil union" has become to much trouble, because in the long term of common use they will become the same thing mentally for most people... it's just a label or word and the only power the word has is the power we give it.

Besides, no one is going to say "We're going to get a civil union", that will be the legal term but they'll be seeing and saying "we're getting married" and the world at large will see it being a legal act, like it or not. So basically it will all come down to how the law is written and exceccuted. If it actively restricts, it's wrong. If it allows others to enact restrictions based on individual prejudices against same-sex partners... it's obviously wrong.

Gays and Lesbians have been getting married (ceremony wise) without the law "blessing" it for a long time now, but to me, an actual "Marriage" on the emotional level is not what the "law" calls it but how commited the two people in the "union" are to each other. Marraige itself has become a sad institution even in the Hetero world. If by some miracle I met someone I wanted to be with forever the only reason I would seek a legal union (hey, I like that term, legal union, let us use that) is for the sake of legal protection if we co-parent children. Otherwise, I think what is conventionally thought of as "marraige" is an emotional connection no law can really effect anyway.

And I won't be 100% happy until we have FULL marriage rights.

However, I would never fight the chance for Civil Unions. Things change in steps and that is probably going to be a necessary one. As someone else pointed out, I've got to think about other people with this one. I'm 22 and don't see myself married or a loooong time. But there are those whose partners need the benefits a civil union could provide NOW and I won't ask them to suffer under 0 equality while I insist on 100 or nothin'.

I want marriage, but will settle for civil unions as long as we keep pressing forward. If you can ever get down to questioning people who say they are for civil unions but not marriage and follow up with questions, it usually comes down to the word and then folks get this look on their faces.

1. person: I support civil unions, just don't call it marriage.
2. me: How do you see civil unions as being different than heterosexual marriages?
3. person: Well, the can have all the same rights, just don't call it marriage.
4. me: So, do you mean that what you're objecting to is the word marriage , even if everything else is exactly the same.
5. person: yes
6. me: Can you explain that to me-- why if everything is the same they can't be called the same thing?
7. person: (dead silence)

I just don't want to get into a situation like DADT where they said it was a first step to gays serving opening in the military and that has not come to fruition.

...yep, I'll take it. It's a step forward.

People, marriage is not a right. You don't have a "right" to be married, no one does. Marriage confers no rights unto you - it confers priveledges, for sure, and I want in on that!

Call it "civil unions", call it "potato salad" - I could not care less.

If we show a little freaking respect to all of those who value their religous and cultural traditions, maybe they'd show more to us. You get what you give, and in this case it's Gays who demand everything. All of a sudden, after thousands of years of tradition, civil and religous, spanning damn near every construct of society known to man, the whole world must change it's definition of marriage to suit us. And we wonder why they feel the need to proactively defend their tradition of marriage.

Let's fight for civil unions now - we have the moral high ground. It is wrong for any citizen to be denied the benefits and privelegdes enjoyed by others purely because of sexual orientaion - and most Americans agree with this! But most also believe that marriage, as an institution, exists for the benefit of children - not the adults so much. It binds a father to a mother and is the best possible way for a child to be reared. It's not the only way - but statistics can not be ignored - it IS the best way.

Grab the civil unions now and fight for the brass ring later, if we even need to.

all "official" coupling in america requires a license from "the state" (i use this term broadly, to describe the government as a whole). the state is a civil institution. by definition, that makes all official couplings civil unions. anti-gay marriage people have gotten themselves into such a tizzy, basically because they are confusing the civil aspect of "marriage" with the religious aspect, and have sadly, used their religious interpretation (false definition though it may be) to influence civil law (and ain't that just one pathetic example of the encroaching stink of theocracy?).

technically, "civil unions", if granted the exact same rights under the law as "marriage", are on the surface, a step forward. if given the choice between that and nothing, grab it and keep fighting. but what the "give em civil unions and they will shut up" people miss is that, by choosing to officially define the two civil couplings differently, they automatically set up the long-established definition to still be considered more legitimate than the other. and that is still second-class citizenship, no matter how you slice it.

this is always a difficult topic for me; as an anarchist, i consider all marriages to be kowtowing to "the state" for rights that, as human beings, i believe ALL people should be entitled to, coupled or not. i think "coupling" is not some special accomplishment that people should be rewarded for. traditionally, it has just been a method of intermingling family wealth, carrying on family names, and making sure people breed, all of which is a bit outmoded at this point.

but i am also a pragmatic anarchist, and i realize that, if rights continue to be something that are doled out according to civil law, then that law should be applied equally across the board, without tiered nomenclature designed to reinforce the same social/civil constraints as before. so it's either EVERY coupling (het or homo) is a civil union by definition of law, or it's marriage for EVERYONE. separating the terminology according to sexual orientation is transparent doublespeak, used intentionally to coddle the right, and to patronize teh gays.

so basically, politicians: we see through your "safety in semantics" technique, and you can't feed us scraps and expect us to lick your hand for it. either commit to doing the right thing, and doing it all the way, or acknowledge that you are hiding in the shadows of heterosexual privilege and playing it safe, so we can send you home to pack.

In the UK civil unions for gay and lesbian couples has been allowed for a while now and while it allows same rights and protection under the law it is not referred to as marriage.  

I think that was done mainly to accommodate religious people who for some reason think they own the monopole on marriage and did not want their “holy” establishment tainted by including us in it as what we “do” goes against the teaching of god and to use the same term that is used to describe their “holy union” and our “sinful union” would be offensive to them.

As long as those religious people exist and hold the political clout they do, I think even the most progressive of countries will have to accommodate them and refer to gay-marriage as a civil union.

I personally say let them have marriage. Considering it raises such negative associations in a lot of people lets just give it to the religious fanatics.

My solution would be that all progressive states change their legislation to such an effect that all people (gay or straight) wishing to be joined as official cohabiting, domestic partners would be referred to as civil-partners by the state.

And all those who want to marry in church, temple, etc. can be “joined in holy matrimony” and be considered married in the eyes of their community and god/s.

Those people would still have to apply to a civil-partnership license from the state (as they do today for a marriage license).

How’s that for a solution that would make everybody happy (or at least will prevent them from killing anybody)?  

I love the Canadian marriage solution, for all people.  It works really well and there has not been much fuss about it since the law was changed, even when we voted in a Conservative government (they didn't have the numbers of parliamentarians or the ability to change our Constitution and overturn the law.)

In Canada ALL marriage is a civil union/civil marriage, although nobody calls it that.  Everyone's partnership, straight or gay, is equal in the law.  Every marriage needs a government-issued marriage license, which is a civil union since there is no religious component, but we call it "marriage" because that is the language that has been used historically for two people who love each other and who want to make a public statement of commitment. To use different language would imply that there is something different about the partnership and Canadian law has found that "separate but equal" was discriminatory.  Even though marriage has traditionally been conceptualized as being between a man and a woman, in law it has been (since women aren't seen as chattel being sold from a father to a husband anymore) effectively a contract between two persons, and the gender of those persons is basically irrelevant.

The ceremony is led by a person licensed to perform marriages, which can be a religious person.  Many people just get it done at city hall.  The civil ceremony is pretty standard, vows and signing the marriage license then champagne and photos.  Religious marriages have the addition of whatever flavour of religion you are (add or subtract champagne accordingly.) There is, of course, no silliness over forcing religious people to perform marriages that they don't approve of.  (Religious opponents here made it sound like every preacher was going to have to marry gay people, in order to stir up opposition.  But that would be infringing on their freedom of religion, so of course that was out of the question.)  Like with any other couple, religious figures can choose to marry a couple, or not.  Catholics don't marry non-Catholics or anyone else who doesn't fit the Catholic marriage ideal. Some churches do marry gay couples with enthusiasm, and in fact the United Church was helped to make gay marriage possible by performing religious ceremonies before it was legally possible to be in a same-sex marriage.

It's equal in every way, and it works, and nobody's noticed a change apart from a few thousand people who have gotten married since the law changed and their families and friends.  I think the fight for same-sex marriage did really increase visibility and acceptance, though.  It forced people to consider the idea that gays are boring and normal and just want to have a public declaration of their love for each other and the legal rights that go with that, and created a new public norm that anyone who objects to something so basic is warped against happiness somehow, particularly since there have been only positive side effects to the change.  I remember some newspaper stories from a few months ago that commented on the new statistics on marriage since the law was introduced and were basically like, "So gay people got the right to get married a while back and hasn't had any effect on society at large at all. Except straight people have noticed more gay wedding tourists.  So much for the apocalypse that was supposed to go down."

to me, marriage is marriage. I think there's not a single point in not calling gay civil unions marriage. and if that's the case, and if the only reason is a religious one, then don't call hetero civil unions marriage. My point is, we all deserve the same rights.

I think that denying the use of the word is still denying a right. But of course, civil unions are better (much better) than nothing, but from my point of view, it's not enough.

I don't know, I'm glad that here in Spain marriage is marriage doesn't matter if you're straight or gay.. All countries should care less about what the church will say, because state and church are (or should be) different institutions.

*Long ramble alert*

First I must note that to me, the term Civil Partnership/Civil Union means that it is the SAME as what straight folks get in Marriage, i.e. the debate is aobut what the thing is called and not about the details of what it entails. That by law, companies need to give people in CUs the same rights are married couples etc. I am arguing from the point that there are (virtually) no legal differences between the two. THis is the way it is in most European countries. If CUs in the USA are different, i.e. they only give you half the rights that marriage does, then please ignore my entire post.

Here are my two cents worth from a Dutch perspective. As you may know, in The Netherlands, there is both Civil Partnership AND marriage. Yes, the luxury is amazing. How did this happen? Well, the gay community simply realised nothing can be achieved by forcing people to accept things they do not want to accept.

Surely the issue here is not about what it is called but about the rights you get from it? So, when they started talking about Gay Marriage in The Netherlands, the political parties, church and most of the population, were not (yet) ready to call it marriage or to simply 'open up' marriage to gay couples. So they invented the Civil Partnership. It gave gay people the same rights as married couples and it was open to straight couples as well. The only difference had to do with adoption laws but they were easily circumvented as adoption by sinlge gay parents was perfectly legal so you just adopted first and then got the Civil Partnership. Yes, not exactly equal rights but, and this is important, aknowledging that this was alresady a HUGE step forward. Remember, gays andlesbians are a MINORITY. That means that 'the others' decide to give us these rights or not, sad as that may be.

Dutch gay community realised it was better to accept a Civil Partnership that gave almost exactly the same rights as marriage, rather than holding out (and inthe mean time stopping gays from having equal tax benefits, employment benefits, social benefits etc.) for something better. This was a first step. It also showed the 'straight world' that most gay couples have stable relationships and that it does NOT open the door for peados to marry children or brothers to marry their sisters.

After a good few years, almost without any public objection, the Dutch government decided to simply open up marriage for gay couples. The world had not collapsed, divorce had not shot up etc. Obviously those in a Civil Partnership remained Civilly Partnered but from then on, you could choose which one you wanted. I no longer live in The Netherlands but I suspect most couples simply get married these days.

In a country that seems tooppose so strongly against gay marriage, I just do not see why the gay community feels the NAME ismore important than the rights it gives you. Remember, we are a minority. We can not demand things and just assume everyone will agree with us. It doesn't work like that in a democracy. Refusing a compromise makes the gay community look petulant. You say you want equal rights. A Civil Partnership will most likely give you all the things we all want: the right to be called Next of Kin, the right to partner benefits, the right to make medical decisions etc. etc.

Why is it so hard to accept this as a first step on the road to wider acceptance?For as long as people DEMAND the right for it to be called Marriage, all that time, gay couples will face legal battles.

I am CIvilly Partnered in the UK. If I go back to The Netherlands and register my CP there, they will ask me: "Would you like to register this as a Civil Partnership or a a marriage under Dutch law?" If I want it to be seen as a marriage under Dutch law, I simply go to a registrar and sign a document that says: I am married according to Dutch law. In all countries around the world where they have Civil Partnerships for gays, I will be recognized as being in a CP or even married.

Isn't that the most important thing? Is it about getting the rights you want or is it about getting what everyone else has? Is the name so important that you rather have no rights at all?