Gay Marriage Analogy

[talktooloose]

I just wrote this email to my dad:

"I was thinking about your question about gay marriage. You asked why it is important that gays be able to call their civil unions 'marriage'. Why isn't it enough to have just the legal rights?

"I thought of a good analogy. What if we told immigrants that no matter how long they live here, they cannot call themselves 'Canadians'? After five years, they could apply to get the rights of Canadians, but they could never call themselves citizens of this country. When asked for their citizenship at a border crossing, they would have to say, "Armenian, with Canadian Validation Status," instead of "Canadian."

"I mean, they'd have all the rights, but if we let them call themselves 'Canadian,' they dilute the word for the rest of us, you know?"

Comments

[mofic.livejournal.com]

This is a great analogy!

[painglass.livejournal.com]

I LOVE this! It perfectly gets across the problem with civil unions vs marriage! Thanks for posting it!

[quirkstreet.livejournal.com]

;-)

[strumquill.livejournal.com]

It's a great analogy.

But I still feel the institution of marriage discriminates against single people like me in so many ways.

Why can't I give benefits and financial support to a chosen person with whom my relationship is NOT sexual. It looks like it is going that way for many Canadians who live in non-sexual families.

Cody

[chutzpahgrrl.livejournal.com]

Is the issue that you only want to marry someone with whom you are sexual? Because you could marry the person you would like to have those benefits with, and just not have a sexual marriage...

[talktooloose.livejournal.com]

I think that idea makes sense. It would be equitable if all Canadians could choose one other individual with whom to share those legal rights and obligations.

As chutzpahgrrl points out, not all marriages are sexual; or, more to the point, the government doesn't check the sheets for stains.

I guess the question becomes whether Canada benefits in some tangible way from people being coupled and therefore should be encouraging it.