I’ve been reconstructing and investigating the genealogy of our various family branches. Glaringly obvious is the connection that marriage plays in the progression and succession of families.
What are we to become... like dogs and cats, mating at will with no thought of who you are and what you came from?
This is like a bad sci-fi movie.
Unfortunately, it's most 'zackly like reality for more than half the population.
The few taboos still in place regarding relations between consenting adults-- incest, f'r'instance-- will last precisely as long as there are social and medical consequences-- and the latter are just about out. A vascectomized father might have relations with his consenting adult daughter, on the grounds that no genetically risky pregnancy could result; all that needs happen is to make that their "civil right"!
Oh, good grief!
That's like saying we would all be animals if it wasn't for government paperwork.
Families recorded marriages [performed at a church], births and deaths for GENERATIONS in the family Bible. Do you think our forefathers behaved like dogs and cats, mating at will with no thought of who they were or what they came from?
Keeping track of such things is the responsibility of individual people, NOT the government.
Some of us were discussing that very issue on a thread recently.
We were talking about how society has reached this point where so-called "same sex" marriage is even being considered and how married heterosexual couples led us down this road. The problem began with test tube babies, sperm donors, and surrogacy. Once society accepted couples going outside their marriage to produce children, the original purpose of marriage (human reproduction) was taken out of the equation. And, because those married couples would have their own names (not the names of the surrogate or anonymous donor) placed on the birth certificates, "same sex" couples in some states have won legal cases to have their names placed on a birth certificate, based on what married heterosexual couples do.
I can understand the plight of those married couples. But, the reality is, that's how we ended up in the situation we have today. Now, we're headed into the type of society where, as you pointed out, it's not considered important to know who your biological parents and siblings are. Eventually, marriage law will have to require a medical test to ensure the couple isn't related to each other.