[mafree]

I've really been joking around but I'll be a little more serious and deal with your points in #196.

It is true that as long as we have laws against bigamy no one can legally marry more than one person. Therefore, those who in seriousness express concern that allowing same-sex marriages opens the door for legalizing polygamous and polyandrous marriages are missing the point.

However, I'm not as sure about those who fear that legal marriage to a child, an animal or an inanimate object is next. They could have a legit issue here. That to me would possibly justify some kind of constitutional-level codification of what marriage is and who can legally marry. Wouldn't stop those who love getting one court to overturn the decision if another court or a legislative body but it'd help us begon to clarify things.

[Dimensio]

However, I'm not as sure about those who fear that legal marriage to a child, an animal or an inanimate object is next.

Child marriage is the only remotely legitimate concern (and even then, it is, as I said, remote). Marriage is a civil contract between two individuals. It is impossible for an animal or an inanimate object to be a party in any civil contract. As such, you won't see anyone pushing for marriage to animals or inanimate objects until you either completely change contract law so that a non-human object is able to be a party (and I don't see how you're going to be able to show informed consent) or have animals and/or inanimate objects recognized as having the ability to consent and given the same legal righs as humans.

As for marriage to a child, my current response is "what is wrong with a 40 year-old man marrying a 9 year-old girl?" I ask this not because I honestly think that there's nothing wrong with it (in fact, I do not think that it's an acceptable pairing at all), but because I want to know exactly why you see it as a "bad thing".