Subject:	Ending marriages
From:		.jh
Date:		2009-12-06T01:45:56Z
Tags:		2009 blog marriage end

A friend of mine posted something on Facebook about gay marriage. Now
first of all I couldn't give a rats ass about this in the abstract; I
always said, if homosexual couples want to be as miserable as the rest
of us, let them. However I think what really needs to happen is that
marriage needs to go away, at least the state sponsored version. If
you're deeply religious and still want the ritual, then go get married
in a church; if the religion of your choice does not approve of your
lifestyle, well then perhaps it's time to rethink the whole religion
thing, just a thought.

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Marriage serves little or no purpose now-a-days except that it grants
you a bunch of neat tax breaks and legal protections. While I doubt
(m)any people will admit it, most people get married for these reasons
only. I didn't love my wife any less before we got married, marriage
changed absolutely nothing for us, except we now file our taxes
differently and if I die she's got dibs on the money. In the end
that's what all this really is about, few people care about the words,
what they want is equal protection under the law.

A simplistic solution I've been talking about forever is that the
government should get out of the marriage business altogether. They'd
issue civil union contracts to everybody regardless of the make-up of
the relationship. Marriage would be the privy of religious
institutions. However I wonder if it's possible to take this one step
further and remove the government from the equation all together.
Instead have legally binding contracts where each couple spells out
their wishes. This would require a major reworking of the tax code
though, which I can only see as something positive.