The difference was that gay couples were forced into civil partnerships rather than marriage. Take that away and what else is there?

Indeed.

In which case, since nobody is planning to remove the opportunity for a gay couple to decide what level (if you will) of formal commitment they wish to make, the same options should be available to heterosexual couples too.

I still think the concept of gay "marriage" is ludicrous. It seems to me that the concept of marriage came about as a mechanism for holding couples together for the long period of time needed to raise human offspring. The fact that gay people cannot procreate seems to make it a wholly unneccesary concept so far as they are concerned. By all means allow them the same legal rights but let's keep the word and concept of "marriage" true to its original and cultural meaning.

By this argument, no heterosexual couple that adopts or decides to remain childless will need to marry.

The thing about words and concepts that are made up is that you can confer whatever meaning onto them as is desired and there's no requirement for either to remain with a single definition for eternity.

Anyway, my mate Gareth (gay, in a civil partnership) has a son. Me and my missus don't. So... y'know.

Norman Tebbitt's views: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... y-son.html

Norman Tebbitt's views: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... y-son.html

Well, I'm truly shocked, I was sure you were gay. Anyway, I think you thinking it's ludicrous is what's ludicrous.


It did? Perhaps you should run that one past the anthropologists. I'm pretty sure, as a species, we managed to get through maybe a couple of hundred thousand years just fine to dominate the world, without marriage. Elephants and primates (for example) seem to do alright too, but AFAIK they don't hold marriage ceremonies either. I conclude that the "mechanism" is plainly unnecessary, and irrelevant to that purpose.


But marriage is not restricted to those who can procreate. Are you saying an older couple who wish to marry, or any couple who cannot reproduce by natural means, should be debarred? If not, then why shouldn't they? They can no more fulfil your requirement of raising human offspring than a gay couple, so what would be the distinction?

Are you against the millions who live their lives (and in many cases successfully procreate) without ever getting married? (Even if you are, and think they are doomed to hellfire for living in sin, you have to admit, it doesn't seem to affect reproductive capacity).


Well, that's mighty big of you. A tad condescending, ("allow", indeed) but FYI they already have "the same legal rights" for the most part and it is irrational to propose that this is as it should be, while at the same time proposing that there should be exceptions for bits you personally don't like.


Indeed: a formal union of two people who wish to express publicly and officially their wish to spend the rest of their lives together. All you need to get past now is your phobia of gays, and accept that they are just normal people, some of whom are not interested in marriage, and some of whom are. It makes no difference to you, and you would protest like hell (rightly) if gays tried to restrict your rights, so what gives you the right to restrict theirs?

That wasn't the point. It was if all couples can marry why the need for civil partnerships once this is so given there will be next to no difference between a registry office wedding and a civil partnership?

What is the difference between a civil partnership and registry office wedding if they are open to all and confer the same legal status to all?

I wish someone had explained this to me 30 years ago.

You'd be refering to me as "The Millionaire JerryChicken" now.

My understanding is that there are legal/pensions/tax differences anyway – and the civil partnership was not and is not marriage, which is a particular social construct.

Get hitched in a registry office and you're still married.. The original legislation was to enable LGBT couple to formalise their relationships, but without the big emotional row we're getting now because marriage is something different again.

The reality is that it means different things for different people; it has never meant the same throughout all human history or been carried out in the same way. but for many people it appears to be considered the apotheosis of a public statement of commitment.

Not all LGBT people will want to 'upgrade' their civil partnership into a marriage. They will have a choice (which they do not currently have). So the choice should also be extended to straight couple who don't want to marry but wish for some legal formality etc.