Since the thread about "same-sex marriage" becoming part of a party platform has become an endless slug-fest about socialism and capitalism, I wanted to look at it from a different angle.
Among those who oppose granting "marriage" status to same-sex couples, some favor legally defining the term and preserving marriage as a state recognized and protected entity...others favor "getting the government out of it" altogether and keeping marriage recognized as a Christian institution within the Church, regardless of what the state says it is, or isn't. For that matter, the state shouldn't address it at all.
So my question to those who favor the latter, "Libertarian" view, is this:
What would this look like in practice?
What would the government actually do when people want to be married? Create a catch-all "civil union" (or whatever) legal status that any two (or more?) individuals can enter into, or exit from, that automatically confers some set of contractual rights upon the people in the union (property, inheritance, powers of attorney, custody, etc.)? Should people, married or otherwise, simply enter into legal agreements a la carte?
I'm genuinely curious. It sounds feasible in principle, but I'm not sure how people think it would play out. And please, don't get into protracted ideological debates about whether capitalism is evil, or whether Paul Ryan is the devil. Just stick to the topic.
Among those who oppose granting "marriage" status to same-sex couples, some favor legally defining the term and preserving marriage as a state recognized and protected entity...others favor "getting the government out of it" altogether and keeping marriage recognized as a Christian institution within the Church, regardless of what the state says it is, or isn't. For that matter, the state shouldn't address it at all.
So my question to those who favor the latter, "Libertarian" view, is this:
What would this look like in practice?
What would the government actually do when people want to be married? Create a catch-all "civil union" (or whatever) legal status that any two (or more?) individuals can enter into, or exit from, that automatically confers some set of contractual rights upon the people in the union (property, inheritance, powers of attorney, custody, etc.)? Should people, married or otherwise, simply enter into legal agreements a la carte?
I'm genuinely curious. It sounds feasible in principle, but I'm not sure how people think it would play out. And please, don't get into protracted ideological debates about whether capitalism is evil, or whether Paul Ryan is the devil. Just stick to the topic.