Gay marriage in Britain

What?

I don't know if that was a general comment, joeyjojo, but this was back in 2006 when the prospect of gay marriage being fully legalised here was a long way off.

edited 31st Mar '12 2:35:28 AM by pagad

uh?

k

Whoops, sorry, misread your post. I thought you were saying it would be odd for a country to refuse to recognise a gay marriage in a different country if gay marriage was already legal in that country.

I just love the difference in tone in this thread, vs the American one.

It pretty much mirrors the difference in the general opinion in the various countries.

Here: it'll happen, other stuff will happen, let's move on.

There: it'll happen. No, it won't! God, I hope not. It had better! Not, you mean! Etcetera, etcetera.

Indeedy - I think it reflects the relative lack of power that anti-gay marriage folks have (especially various Christian groups) and therefore the lack of money they can afford to put into their campaigns. Ergo the pro-gay marriage side doesn't have to raise much campaign money in either and so there's much less public hysteria on the whole. That battle's almost been won and our concerns are more about things like racism.

Recognising foreign marriages is pretty common, otherwise there's a lot of issues. For instance, muslims that get married and then go to UK, would their marriage become invalid because it was a muslim marriage? There was a time where they weren't allowed in UK afterall. So it's not entirely unusual to have a foreign marriage recognised even if you can't do it in your own country.

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edited 23rd Jul '17 1:49:07 PM by Jicragg

Indeed. Although, the Quakers have been the most supportive of homosexuality. Which doesn't really surprise me; Quakers themselves were nonconformist. (Not saying homosexuality is nonconformist, but you get my message).

Quakers are generally awesome.

^That's only becuase they hate procreative sex in general.

Does the UK allow for same sex civil unions and, if so, do they give all the same rights/responsibilities as a marriage?

Civil Unions, yes. I'm not sure exactly what the rights are but they do have most of the same ones as heterosexual couples, but cannot be religiously affiliated and it's explicitly not the same as marriage.

Yep, Civil Partnerships are allowed and have the same rights and responsibilities as a Civil Marriage that took place in a Register Office — what this is about is Same-sex Marriage taking place in a Religious location, such as a Church, with all that belongs with it.

edited 1st Apr '12 8:16:06 AM by Greenmantle

Got it, I just wanted to confirm how far along the UK was on the issue. Support seems to be pretty heavily in favor so it seems like its a case of typical parliamentary procedure to get same sex marriage done.

Pretty much, since the Church is schisming in England over it. In Scotland, only a barely noticable minority oppose it, in England the Church leaders are against it but there's enough church groups and members who support it to completely ruin any chance of a unified stand by them against it.

So there is opposition, but it should pass, and Scotland will pass it one way or the other.

The notion of Scotland passing it and England not does have one amusing thought attached - in the old days, people used to elope to Gretna Green (10 minutes from where I grew up) to marry because parental consent wasn't needed in Scotland, whereas it was in England. In the above scenario, that could start happening again withe gay couples, theoretically!

edited 1st Apr '12 8:58:33 AM by CaissasDeathAngel

Well, that, and it's dead romantic, anyway. Hmmm... can you imagine the snobbish caché several years from now if this were to happen? "We got married in Grenta when it meant something!"

That's basically what it's like now. It's still ridiculously busy as a wedding location, but you'd find more romance in the waste disposal unit of an abbatoir. It's a factory, people go in and out with as much efficiency as possible.

Last place I'd ever get married.

There are a number of practical problems with gay marriage, the one that most recently came to my attention is, who arrives at the altar first.

Suzie - Mel wants me to be at the table waiting for her, so she make sure I turn up and don't run away.

Me - But you asked her.

Seriously. There is NO difference between Civil Marriage (straight) and Civil Partnership (gay). The civil part means that religion CAN NOT be involved in any way (The straight couple who wanted Angels by Robbie Williams were told no, they couldn't as it mentions angels). All the same laws apply to both types.

The Labour government used the legislation (they brought it in) to work a neat little wheeze. If you claim benefits from the state you can lose them if you are married or living as married. With civil partnerships this closed the loop hole that gay couples could not be considered as living as married - Two gay people, each with a child, could receive more benefits as 2 x 1 parent family, than as a 'living as if in a civil partnership' (ie married) with 2 kids.

edited 7th Apr '12 7:05:31 PM by LastHussar

One could argue that changing gender roles and a shift in how people view religious marriage also cause those awkward issues. But those things are pretty minor and people can be rather adaptable and creative in these kinds of circumstances. Canada has had same sex marriage for years now; I haven't heard of any significant issues like that. At the worst its a private issue that should have no bearing on civil rights.

In fact, now we can have transgender people in our beauty pageant. Har!

But yeah, it's a big waste of time to try to create equal but separate legislation. Just allow gay marriage and let the people deal with the cultural fallout. That's not the place of the government anyway.

You solve a heck of a lot problems, especially with gay individuals who have cheating spouses and so on, they now have legal tools to fight back. Plus they can also divorce (since Harper gave up his attempt at trying to annul a bunch of marriages), which is an important legal tool in family law. I mean, does the UK really want to waste time writing two sets of the same law?

The only thing that will happen is that they will slowly drift and not be the same.

Of course, we could just create a standardised civil union system, like they have in certain nations on the Continent. You can have a secular civil union (regardless of orientation), or a civil union, but celebrated religiously.

I think that could console those straight couples who wish to have a civil union, but not a 'civil marriage' (although, they're the same thing).

Well, saying that the term "marriage" necessarily carries religious overtones is dubious to me. It was always a civil institution.

edited 8th Apr '12 2:47:10 AM by breadloaf

Hmmm, I agree.

I mean, it would get rid of having two separate bills. To be honest, I actually think this isn't really an Act of Parliament in itself. It's more like a kind of Marriages Act (Amendment) 2012 or something.

And besides... which religion?

Then, of course, you get into the whole 'can atheists get married?' thing, and yadda yadda yadda.