Gay Marriage/civil Unions

[BrassFusion]

i'll step in for a sec and say i think i've seen mark advocate EXACTLY what you just suggested, torn.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

TA - See my above posts. I am FOR a Federal Civil Union. For everyone, no matter their sexual preference. let marriage stay what it is and always has been. An Oath, between two lovers in front of family and Friends. Marriage is 10,000+ years old. "The Church" was an add-on (about 400 years ago) as was the government (in the last 200 years). The Church was invited to give a blessing on the marriage. When people started owning property without having a title... the government got involved. Before that.. it was just an oath in front of a few witnesses.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

BF- Read a book. Read a few websites.

There has been one culture in history without marrige.

and you know as well as I do that you cant prove a negative. Find me a culture in history that had marrige for gay couples and I'll change my view on that.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

and cultures that accepted gays as part of sociaty openly don;t count. They actually had to allow marrige.

[freydis]

BF- Read a book. Read a few websites.

There has been one culture in history without marrige.

and you know as well as I do that you cant prove a negative. Find me a culture in history that had marrige for gay couples and I'll change my view on that.

Gotta love a challenge.

I'll take ya up on that. Gimme a few minutes.....

[freydis]

Woman-woman marriage has been documented in more than 30 African populations, including the Yoruba and Ibo of West Africa, the Nuer of Sudan, the Lovedu, Zulu and Sotho of South Africa, and the Kikuyu and Nandi of East Africa. Typically, such arrangements involved two women undergoing formal marriage rites; the requisite bride price is paid by one party as in a heterosexual marriage. The woman who pays the bride price for the other woman becomes the sociological 'husband'. The couple may have children with the help of a 'sperm donor', who is a male kinsman or friend of the female husband, or a man of the wife's own choosing, depending on the customs of the community. The female husband is the sociological father of any resulting offspring. The children belong to her lineage, not to their biological father's.

Joseph M. Carrier and Stephen O. Murray, "Woman-woman marriage in Africa", Boy-wives and Female Husbands: Studies of African Homosexualities, ed. Stephen O. Murray and Will Roscoe, p255

Several indiginous North American societies recognised alternative sexuality by terming people as being of a third or fourth gender. They married as well. (Roscoe, Changing Ones: Third and Fourth Genders in Native North America, p140-141)

Pre-modern China has also has a history of same sex marriages. Do a quick search among scholarly papers, and within minutes, you'll find a plethora of examples.

(Pardon this moment of research geekery from your local tech-writer in training)

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

Well, I stand corrected. 2... in all the cultures of the world...

[freydis]

Well, I stand corrected. 2... in all the cultures of the world...

Oh, please.

I didnt want to bore all concerned by going into detail. If you run a quick search, as i said, you'll find plenty of examples. You want more, I can get em.

.....and I believe I mentioned 3, not 2.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

So you did. I saw the qoute, assumed it was from up the thread and so didn't read it.

I did say that I stoood corrected.

There have been a few. A very few when compared to the total number of known cultures.

[freydis]

So you did. I saw the qoute, assumed it was from up the thread and so didn't read it.

I did say that I stoood corrected.

There have been a few. A very few when compared to the total number of known cultures.

There is, however, historical precedence for it, and in several major known cultures. Whether or not today's America could ever accept it..... i doubt it. The mainstream American culture finds it too alien, i think. And you know how people treat what's different....

I stuck the big part in the quote because i sometimes find block quotes hard on the eyes....heh..

[BrassFusion]

The total of the cultures YOU'RE aware of, maybe.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

Bait

[BrassFusion]

It wouldn't have been baiting if anyone else had said it, I'm sure.

And I'm still waiting for sources on how old marriage is, exactly. I'd be surprised if we had records from before about 4000 BC.

Also, didn't the mormons used to practice polygamy, along with some biblical-type folks? That's a non-standard marriage by modern terms, one in which the women were basically married to each other. They probably never or rarely consummated the marriage sexually between the women, but sex isn't (or at least shouldn't be) a necessary requirement for a marriage as mandated by the state.