NJ Opts For Schmarriage
New Jersey has just become the latest state to move toward civil unions. The NJ Supreme Court just handed down an opinion saying
the Legislature must either amend the marriage statutes to include same-sex couples or create a parallel statutory structure, which will provide for, on equal terms, the rights and benefits enjoyed and burdens and obligations borne by married couples. We will not presume that a separate statutory scheme, which uses a title other than marriage, contravenes equal protection principles…. The name to be given to the statutory scheme… is a matter left to the democratic process.
All the rights and none of the dignity is not an acceptable result. I would like to see the legislature do the right thing and end civil marriage discrimination. I doubt they’ll do it, but that is the hope.
October 26th, 2006 at 11:16 pm
Hi. Im Xrlq and I’m a homophobe but I wont come out and admit it.
I’m still waiting an answer to my previous question. Tell me on a personal level why you are against gay marriage please? I don’t want your fucking diatribes citing case law from old Abe back in 1862. I want to know why you have 10 prior posts against gay cooties but haven’t bothered to explain why you think its wrong on a personal level.
I supported gay marriage myself when I was in my mid-20s, unmarried, and just plain didn’t know any better. I don’t anymore. I don’t think I’m the only person who falls into that category.
Thats a real convincing fucking argument after posting 10 posts against gay people for wanting to marry each other eh? You are not man enough to come out and admit that you don’t like gay people and find their lifestyle abhornt to your beliefs will you? You hide behind other peoples arguments without coming out and saying why you are so against this topic. Be a man and admit it.
October 27th, 2006 at 12:02 am
Brutal Hugger Says:
Well, I’m not married, so I don’t have first-hand experience. Google; however, is your friend.
(That’s the first three results)
BH:
Which is why I said:
October 27th, 2006 at 12:10 am
Okay, JustinB, listen carefully and allow me to blow your mind.
You don’t need to be homophobic to be against this method of installing gay marriage. You don’t even need to be disgusted by the actual sex act, nevermind just two guys being legally recognized. I’m bi (leaning heterosexual), and despite being turned on by the physical attributes, I can still oppose the legal ones and the methodology thereof.
Now, go pull your balls out of whatever jar you stuck them in, be a man, and actually deal with the argument on its merits rather than simply assume that everyone opposing your viewpoint has a mental condition.
October 27th, 2006 at 7:17 am
Xlrq, I won’t pretend to be a tax expert, especially a marriage tax expert. If you married folks are paying a tax penalty, you’d know it better than me.
Besides, tax benefits are only one of many benefits that married couples get. Just google marriage benefits to see. And a lot of those benefits will not automatically go to people in civil unions. It’s going to be a constant battle to maintain the equality of civil unions. For example, will a NJ civil union be recognized in Utah?
October 27th, 2006 at 9:06 am
JustinB: please stop posting comments on any topic. Every time you open your mouth the collective IQ of the blogsphere drops by 3-5 points. Just for the record, I don’t hate you for being gay. I hate you for being an idiot. Your gayness is, if anything, a plus factor, as it ensures you will not reproduce yourself, no matter how many renegade courts may rule you have a right to. Now crawl back into your cave.
BH: Actually, I don’t pay the marriage penalty because my wife doesn’t work. In fact, I pay less taxes than I would if we were unmarried, so I actually enjoy a marriage bonus instead. The reason for both is simple: by adding two people’s tax brackets together, you allow them to effectively allocate their income such that both individuals’ lower tax brackets get maxed out before either’s upper (more severely taxed) brackets get hit. That is the marriage bonus. The only problem is, the shared bracket of a married couple is smaller than double the bracket of a single couple, meaning a higher tax rate for couples whose incomes were in the same bracket anyway. That is the marriage penalty. There are only ways to avoid this conundrum: (1) adopt a flat tax so that brackets don’t matter, or (2) abolish joint income tax liability. The first option is a political non-starter; I like it, Steve Forbes, and just about no one else does. The second option is worse, as it would royally screw single- or primary-income families. Fairness to married/single people, fairness to single-income families, or progressive income tax. Pick two.
Returning to the original issue, I’m not sure why any particular benefits should flow to gay couples automatically. Not one of them ever flowed to straight couples that way. Each and every benefit (or, the case of income taxes, non-benefit) resulted from a deliberative process. I don’t see why it should be any different for a brand-new institution that may not even work in the long run, and which we certainly don’t know anything about – i.e., you know how it is supposed to work in the long run, but no one really knows how it will. Certain benefits, such as inheritance or visitation rights for spouses, should be a no-brainer. Others, maybe not. For any given issue that really does just boil down to fairness, it shouldn’t be that hard to pass it on its own.
As to interstate recognition, it’s not going to happen overnight. AFAIK Utah does not recognize civil unions, so it stands to reason that an New Jersey civil union shoudl not be recognized there. However, I see no reason why a New Jersey or Vermont civil union, or even a Massachusetts gay marriage, should not be recognized as a domestic partnership in California. That’s not the case now, but I have little doubt that the civil union states will work that issue out over time, just as the right to carry states are gradually doing now, and just about every state has done in the past for traditional marriage. As to a New Jersey civil union being recognized in Virginia, I can accept that result under/over any one of the following events:
1. Virginians miraculously voting down the marriage amendment this fall, and later, even more miraculously voting to adopt civil unions.
2. My dead body.
3. My Virginia concealed carry permit being equally valid and equally recognized in New Jersey.
October 27th, 2006 at 1:01 pm
Hey dumbass..im married and straight as an arrow…I just cant stand homophobes like yourself. Thought you had me pegged as one of them “faggots” eh?
October 27th, 2006 at 1:03 pm
xrlq=compassionate conservative
Xrlq Says:
Link to this comment
JustinB: please stop posting comments on any topic. Every time you open your mouth the collective IQ of the blogsphere drops by 3-5 points. Just for the record, I don’t hate you for being gay. I hate you for being an idiot. Your gayness is, if anything, a plus factor, as it ensures you will not reproduce yourself, no matter how many renegade courts may rule you have a right to. Now crawl back into your cave.
You really know how to win an argument dont you?
October 27th, 2006 at 1:30 pm
Bummer. Given your rabid obsession with the topic I thought you might actually have some stake in it. Guess I was a bit too optimistic about that. You’re still a moron, though.
October 27th, 2006 at 2:55 pm
Xrlq:
I’m afraid of living in an oligarchy where an unelected court sets itself up as the Supreme Soviet and does what it wants with impunity.
Like, for example, saying “Fuck due process in the state of Florida, let’s just pick the guy we like?” Nah…
JustinB:
For all his flaws (and they are many), I don’t think Xrlq is a “homophobe.” Sure, he’s a complete dickhead on this particular issue (yep, I just engaged in name-calling, it’s true), but I don’t think it has anything to do with any particular animosity towards, or fear of, homosexuals. If I had to make a guess at what it is, then, I’d say it’s a blind loyalty to the letter of the law, with absolutely no regard to what’s right or fair or just. If today were the 1950’s, I could just as easily see him arguing against court-mandated desegregation, not because of any racial prejudice, but simply because the letter of the law doesn’t require desegregation.
October 27th, 2006 at 4:15 pm
Bummer. Given your rabid obsession with the topic I thought you might actually have some stake in it. Guess I was a bit too optimistic about that. You’re still a moron, though.
I have several close friends that are gay and it pisses me off when someone opposes something that will not do anyone any harm. Try reading the WSJ editorial page Friday
10-27-2006 Darren Spedale/William Eskridge “The Hitch”…so much for the sky falling by letting “those people” marry.
I could just as easily see him arguing against court-mandated desegregation, not because of any racial prejudice, but simply because the letter of the law doesn’t require desegregation.
I agree to a point…although I think he and his supporters try to hide their prejudices beneath their blind loyalty to the letter of the law.