Your views on

Originally Posted by lesrae

I've been married 7½ years and I did it because one day it just clicked that the woman I was with was the one I wanted to be with for the rest of my life - I already new I was in love with her but this was an entirely different feeling. While we could have stayed together without being married, I'm a bit old fashioned and still see marriage as a commitment and as a sign of commitment, it's something I'll fight tooth and nail to hold on to.

Sounds about right to me, the actual 'marriage/wedding process' to me should just be getting your feelings set down on a legal document, not some sort of extravagent celebration. Finding a woman who shares this belief is another matter entirely.

[Letum]

Originally Posted by Tchocky

I remember Letum posting about another forum he frequents where that's a tradiition every time someone breaks a thousand posts. At least I think it was Letum.
O

Quite right!
How could I miss the 3k mark?
Post edited.

[XabbaRus]

Well I have been married 6 years last December ( wow that is weird posting that ) and I'm happy. Yes it has been hard work but you work through the problems. It seems in the UK a lot of divorces are because people give up to easily or they jumped straight in to the marriage boat without thinking.

As for extravagent or expensive weddings, isn't that pretty much most weddings in the UK given the average cost is £14,000. I just can't see the point of the big wedding inviting every tom dick and harry. Seen it too many times. A small wedding with close friends and family and all are invited to the ceremony and all to the reception and dance. I hate this thing we have in the UK now where you invite you family and best pals to the ceremony, then some more to the recpetion, and then last of all you invite your workmates and other people you know down the pub to the disco at the end. Either the people you invite are good enough for the whole thing or none of it. What is worse when someone at work gets married and you have to put something in the collection. Fine if you have worked with the person a number of years and you know them quite well. Not when they have been there a couple of months....arrggggg rant over.

[Tchocky]

Just hit 6 months with the girlfriend

Marraige has never hugely appealed to me, but I might change yet.
Skybird, I don't understand some of your post.

Thats the idea why families are under special protection by the state and the laws: the children. For the same reason I am strictly against equalizing homosexual partnerships to heterosexual marriages. Couples eventually produce children by their own, and to raise kids is an enomous enterprise. Homosexual partnerships do not compare to these risks, efforts, and longterm commitmeents to protect some vulnerable (while small) people. That political correctness these days has led to attempts to give an impression that such relations equal the social value and deserve special protection of hetero couples (who potentially always must be considered to produce children), shows how idiotic and perverted PC in this regard is.

How would extending marraiges to homosexuals harm the protection of children? That gay couples don't produce children shouldn't limit their recognition in the eyes of the law, and the future possibility of children is not what should underly the concept of marraige.
Anyways, we're talking about a rather small group of people here.

[Blacklight]

Don't even get me started on people who are prejudiced about homosexuals getting married and raising kids. I have two homosexual friends who are married and are raising kids as we speak and the kids are wonderful and there has been no problems with them. We as a society need to keep our minds open about these things. I won't go further except to say that I believe that people who oppose gay marriage and gays raising children are biggoted in the same way that the KKK is biggoted.
I won't continue discussing this subject further considering how it angers me.

As for marriage.. My wife and I both believe that it's a cash crop business and we rebelled against it for our wedding. My wife shunned the big white dress that makes weomen look like shower poofs. I wore my suit and she wore a likewise pink dressy outfit that she would wear to a job interview. We got married in her dad's front yard with a ceremony done by a Unitarian minister which we set the vows up pretty much to be, "Do you ? Do you ? Kiss the bride, you're married." We then changed into shorts and T-shirts. We had wacky party favors like clown noses and toys to play with all over the place. It was a lot like a kid's front yard barbeque except with adults running around playing with the toys and games. Our wedding cake was made of cupcakes.

There was no big white wedding in a church.. no reception hall... no DJ spinning out annoying tunes or getting everyone to do "The train" or "The chicken dance". We had been to so many of those weddings and each one was the same and we were so board by them. The way we got married.. no one was board. Everyone had a blast. It was so much more relaxing. Instead of going to an open bar and waiting in line to order a beer or wait for a waiter.. you would just go over to the local cooler and grab a cold one. It was the most fun wedding everyone had ever attended and the wedding industry hardly made a dime off of us.

[fatty]

Originally Posted by Tchocky

Just hit 6 months with the girlfriend

Marraige has never hugely appealed to me, but I might change yet.
Skybird, I don't understand some of your post.

How would extending marraiges to homosexuals harm the protection of children? That gay couples don't produce children shouldn't limit their recognition in the eyes of the law, and the future possibility of children is not what should underly the concept of marraige.
Anyways, we're talking about a rather small group of people here.

I think what Skybird was trying to say is that he feels homosexual couples do not have to weigh on the possibility of procreating when deciding to get hitched, which he thinks is an anchor for heterosexual marriage. Without concerns of raising and maintaining a stable family and household, a homosexual couple won't enter into marriage quite as seriously. I think.

[Blacklight]

I think what Skybird was trying to say is that he feels homosexual couples do not have to weigh on the possibility of procreating when deciding to get hitched, which he thinks is an anchor for heterosexual marriage. Without concerns of raising and maintaining a stable family and household, a homosexual couple won't enter into marriage quite as seriously. I think.

So.. my wife and I don't plan on having any kids ever because I have a pretty hefty bunch of genetic dissorders and I don't want to bring a child into the world with any possibility of him/her getting the same dissabilities I have. Also, neither of us can afford kids... let alone are we interested in adoption. Therefore, does that make it so we should never have gotten married ?

Oh.. and the homosexual couples I know take their vows very seriously btw.

[fatty]

Originally Posted by Blacklight

So.. my wife and I don't plan on having any kids ever because I have a pretty hefty bunch of genetic dissorders and I don't want to bring a child into the world with any possibility of him/her getting the same dissabilities I have. Also, neither of us can afford kids... let alone are we interested in adoption. Therefore, does that make it so we should never have gotten married ?

Oh.. and the homosexual couples I know take their vows very seriously btw.

I don't know, I didn't say I agreed with what I read, just simply what I took his message to mean. Don't shoot the messenger

[baggygreen]

Stay tuned, folks.... watch this space

I clicked a while ago, I'd always anticipated that id find someone and have. My lil baby sister (hardly, shes 20 now...) has always said she will never marry nor have kids, shes still stoic in that approach. Me, hell i love kids. I'll just try go to timor or the solomans on a posting about 3 days after their birth for a 9 month rotation - that way, i wont be woken up all night! Course, i'll probably be shot if i ever tell the boss lady that

I think its good, personally im not pro-gay marriages and im not pro-gay parents, but everyone has an opinion and rights, and i've got the decency to respect that. For mine, it stems more from me being a traditionalist in a lot of ways, rather than from me being homophobic (i used to love the gay nightclub in town - best music, cheap drinks).

btw, :rotfl:at KP, i cant believe YOU of all people said that!!! Passing on trade secrets???:rotfl::rotfl:

[GunnerGreg]

Been married to the same woman for nearly 25 years now. Like life, it has its ups and downs, but I can honestly say that I've been more often happy than not, and we survived some pretty serious problems.

My Grandmother was married to same man for 50+ years and he made her life a living hell, but she stayed with him because she was raised in a culture that taught "marriage was for life, no matter what".

My sister is on her third partner, probably won't marry this one (the first two marriages didn't work out so well, obviously).

My oldest cousin is on her second marriage and this one will probably stick, at least if the kids from the first marriage don't drive them apart.

My middle cousin is on her third partner (maybe fourth) and her life is a total mess.

My youngest cousin is just recently married, but I expect this one to last.

My parents divorced when I was in college, so it didn't really impact me that much. It hit my sister pretty hard and messed her up pretty good.

On the other hand, my wife's parents stayed married until he passed away, despite some serious problems, which, IMHO, messed a couple of my sister-in-laws up pretty good.

My point is, there is no ONE right answer for everyone. It's not black or white. Like life, it's shades of grey.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Tchocky

Just hit 6 months with the girlfriend

Marraige has never hugely appealed to me, but I might change yet.
Skybird, I don't understand some of your post.

How would extending marraiges to homosexuals harm the protection of children? That gay couples don't produce children shouldn't limit their recognition in the eyes of the law, and the future possibility of children is not what should underly the concept of marraige.
Anyways, we're talking about a rather small group of people here.

It is not doing active damage to children, but the relativating of the position of the institution that should have no one-amongst-other but a special status - for the sake of making it clear that the kids are under special protection by the state, and ideally, the community as well. That'S why they should be seen as something thatd stands out from the suual norms of living in couples, and should have finaical support that other forms of living together should not be able to take benefit from. You suggestion of seing homo-marriages as of the same value or type as families - effectively neutralizes this intention to line out that children and their interests should have a special status: a status that ranks higher than the interests for public representation of homosexual couples.

I am supoorting our coinstitution in this detail. I also agree with the churches in this aspect of their views on what marriage is. Marriage and children goes together hand in hand. And it has to be seen as a high value asset for the community, and has soemthing of higher value and importance than homosexual "marriages". Honstely, I even cannot take the term serious. It is a contradiction in itself. Marriage means one man and one women. that is it's meaning at the most basic fundament, and always has been - and i think it should stay that way.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Blacklight

Don't even get me started on people who are prejudiced about homosexuals getting married and raising kids. I have two homosexual friends who are married and are raising kids as we speak and the kids are wonderful and there has been no problems with them. We as a society need to keep our minds open about these things. I won't go further except to say that I believe that people who oppose gay marriage and gays raising children are biggoted in the same way that the KKK is biggoted.

So I am a proud owner of a white cap now? As I said in an earlier topic some months ago, I am not discirminating homsexuals, nor do I have any problem to deal with, and in fact I reffred to people whith whom I had good friendships and working together. But they - like me - totally objected shameful displays like Christopher Streetdays, and they (all being psychologist students like me) said they saw no reason in adapting children to raise them in a gay partnership, when it obviously was not meant by mother Nature to work this way. Parents are taken as examples by their children, and a mother is a female role scheme., like a ftaher is a male role scheme - children learn different things from both, and so it is a safe assumption that they also need both. We know that there is a significantly raised risk of later behavioral symptoms in children who were raised by one person only, missing mum or dad, and that it affects their way of approaching the other sex later on. We also know that it leads to different psychological attitudes if you are raised as asingle kid, or have sisters or brothers. the social community context forms us, and especially children. I know that there are psychological projects trying to prove that it makes no difference if the paretns are two of the same sex, or a mixed couple. But as a former insider of psychology, I am aware of how easy it is to inflouence a study project for the desired outcome, and I am also aware of the strong tendency in psychology to line up with what politicially is wanted, that way winning an ally that it needs to bolster it'S own fundament in society, and winning power and influence on the basis of PC. that is no exaggeration, but has something to do with the whole of psychology's history, the way it started, and it's initial - and still lasting - inferiority complex it suffered by coinstantly comparing itself to the established harcore sciences, namely physics.

As a general rule I think that children being raised by a homosexual couple, devellpe differently than children of a heterosexual couple. Where a man having children with a women and later finds out he is gay, eventually should be allowed to take his kids with him if the woiman does not take them (like sometimes one of the parents dies and the kids stay with the surviving nevertheless), I rule out the option of adopting foreign children by homo couples, under normal circumstances. Like usually for adopting foreign chikldren couples (hetero) are preferred to single people living alone. Hetero parents are the natural condition for children to be rasied, and that is the way nature wnated it to be - last but not least for psychological reasons.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Blacklight

So.. my wife and I don't plan on having any kids ever because I have a pretty hefty bunch of genetic dissorders and I don't want to bring a child into the world with any possibility of him/her getting the same dissabilities I have. Also, neither of us can afford kids... let alone are we interested in adoption. Therefore, does that make it so we should never have gotten married ?

Oh.. and the homosexual couples I know take their vows very seriously btw.

I said in my first post that if you create a new nation-wide law, you depend on giving it a form that is general enough to make it valid for most cases - the more you want to cover the individual case, the more complex it becomes, special rules apply, implications, etc etc. Most occaisons seeing a man and a woman marrying, they are yolung enough to have kids. Ofdtehn they plan it, sometimes they just intend to see what will come, and sometimes they do not plan for kids, but that there will be kids nevertheless is a chance. So this is the example by which you design the law then: man plus woman leads to children. this is a realsitic chnace, it happens most often of all constellation you can imagine, so this is what the law has to cover. therefor your law will imply that marriage deserves special protection, recognition and financial aide for the sake of the children it is likely to produce.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Blacklight

So.. my wife and I don't plan on having any kids ever because I have a pretty hefty bunch of genetic dissorders and I don't want to bring a child into the world with any possibility of him/her getting the same dissabilities I have. Also, neither of us can afford kids... let alone are we interested in adoption. Therefore, does that make it so we should never have gotten married ?

Oh.. and the homosexual couples I know take their vows very seriously btw.

Originally Posted by fatty

I think what Skybird was trying to say is that he feels homosexual couples do not have to weigh on the possibility of procreating when deciding to get hitched, which he thinks is an anchor for heterosexual marriage. Without concerns of raising and maintaining a stable family and household, a homosexual couple won't enter into marriage quite as seriously. I think.

More or less, yes, that'S what I think. And as I said, I think espoeiclaly oyung ones take the decison too light, often for egoistic reasons, and thus the vow is not taken seriously, and divorce rates go up. whent he first problems show up, many people choose to go the easy way and opt to separate, instead of trying to save it, which may requite efforts and more sacrifices from both. If you are not willing the latter, you should not marry - that simple it is.

[Skybird]

What I said, mostly affects the level of jurisdiction and children's proetction, this is what makes it object to regulations by the state. These are my main argument for being against homo marriages - on the other hand I would accept and support any laws that allow a homsexual partner to inherit at the same conditions like normal couples do, with the same taxation level. during life time I think homo couples nevertheless should be object to the same taxation level like singles and unmarried couples, in order to line out once again that the family (potential kids) enjoyes special rights, protection and priviliges comoared to any arbitray friendship or other partnership. for me it's not about discriminating somebody, but to give families/children a sepcial status and finacial support. Taxes are one tool here. And why should a partnership institution that never can give back to the community by producing children, receive benefits from the community that were meant to help the child thing? This is true for singles, and homo marriages. Nobody has a right to get money from the community just because he lives in partnership, is friend with somebody, wants to spend his life with somebody! that is not what the state has an obligation to do, that is not what the legal conception of marriage is about.

But let'S not forget that marriage also is a religious institution, and over the course of history this meaning is dominant. On this level, marriage is defined by the church. The church defines it as a life-long relation between a man and a woman. The defintion does not cinldue two males or two females. That's what marriage is, period. To say there is a homosexual marriage is like saying "this is a blue yeloow", "this tastes loud". It does not make sense.

It is not different in Judaism, Islam, hinduaism, Buddhism, as far as I am aware. Compared to this long tradition, the latest legal experiments of the modern era still need to prove themselves. It is 3 or 4 decades compared to several millenia.