Except, again, the paper said gay unions, calling it a precursor.
But the argument is that gay marriage destroys marriage, the marriage laws were not changed in any of those countries. Rather, separate laws were set up (as you've stated should happen) to cover the legal issues of same sex couples. Sure, the paper claims 'marriage like' but they never show how these civil unions are actually responsible for the Scandinavian marriage problems. All they show is a correlation of certain events and then state that proves correlation -- which is a logical fallacy. Worse, the paper even admits that marriage had bottomed out around the same time that civil unions became legal -- if these civil unions were causing the breakdown of marriage, and not other societal factors, there would be far more correlation between the breakdown, and not the bottoming out, of marriage in these countries.
We're only now seeing our first gay unions, and the argument is we should progress from there to gay marriage and that it will have no effect on marriage, when in fact we see that the deterioration of marriage is indeed associated with gay unions and marriage, even if we do not assume that gay marriage causes the deterioration of marriage.
Sorry, this isn't true. In fact, gay marriage has been legal in the Netherlands and Belgium for about as long a period as civil unions had been legal in Sweden when this paper was written. The problem is that the the same correlation doesn't exist between the marriage numbers and same-sex marriage in those countries.
It is an indication that the deterioration of marriage and the motivation for gay unions are related in some underlying way.
So you and the paper try to claim but neither of you every show how it causes it, you merely use the number to claim a correlation.
Please stop doing this "you're cherry picking" and so on. I am not, nor are others.
I never said that you are, I said the study is. It is quite apparent to most of us that read the paper that he went in with the conclusion, that same-sex unions destroy marriage, and then picked the data to support his conclusion. In fact, it is interesting he talks about Scandinavia in general (and Finland had civil unions for less than ten years when he wrote this) but then goes to one individual country to make specific points rather than showing how these same effects happened in every couple equally -- yet another sign that he was cherry picking the data to make his point. A good example of this is how he explains a leveling off of birth rate in the 90s in Denmark (older couples having kids) while Sweden's and Norway's birth rates were still declining somewhat -- he tries claiming that both the leveling off and the declining birth rates provide his "proof" against gay marriage, despite the fact in declined in a country that didn't have civil unions until the second half of the 90s while the country with civil unions the number leveled off. He can't have it both ways or simply wave away differences in the numbers.
And again, he claims the declining birth rates and unmarried first births being at record levels is "proof", but again we see the same type of records being set in the US where gay relationships are prohibited from being recognized by federal law and by constitutional amendment in roughly 30 states. If these were truly caused by legalizing same-sex relationships, the "records" would only be seen in those countries that have legally recognized gay relationships. Instead, since we see it in most countries regardless of the legal rights of same-sex couples, it shows that these rates are unrelated to same-sex marriage but rather caused by other factors.
You simply are not addressing the data, and are making distinctions without any relevancy to the issue and then accusing people of untoward things. I've presented you my concerns over and again. I am cherry picking nothing, nor have you demonstrated anything of the sort. In fact I posted something that BigBadWlf accused of being a lie no fewer than three times despite me posting the original study proving him wrong.
Again, I've not accused you of cherry picking anything or of anything "untoward". In other threads I've accused you of using logical fallacies but that is not a personal attack, rather showing the flaws in your arguments.
The problem is that the data does not show any correlation to the data he is attempting to present. First, he is stating this proves how bad "same-sex marriage" is (and that is largely the use you are putting it toward) when, in fact, these countries did not have same-sex marriage and there were differences in Scandinavian civil union laws and marriage -- particularly when it came to children. Since you continue to claim the main purpose for marriage is children/procreation, these laws actually were more along the lines of what you say should happen (give gays protections for their partners for medical/inheritance issues) while keeping marriage what you say it should be about.
As for the data, the data shows that marriage was already "destroyed" in Scandinavia. The fact is, he gives us no reason to think that the current numbers (especially since they are echoed in many Western Countries that do not recognize gay relationships) have anything to do with gay marriage/civil unions. In fact, the paper would be much more convincing if he would have shown that in Western nations that had not allowed civil unions these problems were also not happening -- but of course he couldn't because we could dig up similar trends as to marriage in other Western countries (like the US, where the birth rate for single mothers is also the worst ever) that does not recognize same-sex relationships. And these are the points that you continue to ignore.
People supporting your viewpoint certainly are not demonstrating to me personally any particular devotion to truth or to careful inspection of data, given that instance. He has done that also with at least one Bible verse I can remember which he stated was about rape that had nothing to do with rape.
You should long since have stopped concentrating on people's supposed personal shortcomings and started addressing the root concern of people who fear gay marriages and the deterioration we have already seen in families, and also the damage we have already seen that is done even apart from anything applicable to simple economics, such as the need for role models and the effect of lacking a father or a mother has been shown to have on children.
Another personal attack? Again, where have I focused on your (or others) personal shortcomings. Instead, I have addressed the claims made and the logic used without attacking the person (and if I made a mistake where I attacked someone in a post, let me know so I can apologize).
The fact remains that the damage we have seen are clearly and demonstrably related to heterosexuals and how they treat marriage -- and has nothing to do with same-sex couples becoming legally recognized. These problems you want to address are at least 40 years in the making. I'm not sure how trying to scapegoat gays for these problems (as the Scandinavian paper attempts to do) helps solve these problems.