Replies

Yep, government can screw anything up. I bet many decades back some do gooder types decided that government must get involved in marriage, you know to make sure us the unwashed did it right. They decided we needed those government marriage certificates so husband and wife could be proud that they met the government's standard. A priest, rabbi, or reverend (no they did not meet in a bar somewhere) saying you can kiss the bride just wasn't good enough. You needed more importantly, the thumbs up by some pasty face bureaucrat down at city hall. I would not be bold in speculating that the do gooders were church going folk back hundred years or so. They wanted government to get involved to make sure us sinners stayed on the straight and narrow. They thought the church just wasn't enough to keep us moral, so they got the government involved. Well hundred years later the law of unintended consequences has come down hard and led us to this current mess. And guess what, we will do it again with something else. That is get the government involved in people's personal lives, and pay the penalty for some monstrosity decades later.

What a GREAT post. AMEN. You said it, and you said it well, Brother FReeper. Especially:

I would not be bold in speculating that the do gooders were church going folk back hundred years or so. They wanted government to get involved to make sure us sinners stayed on the straight and narrow. They thought the church just wasn't enough to keep us moral, so they got the government involved. Well hundred years later the law of unintended consequences has come down hard ....

When government steps in to take over church duties, strife and wickedness is a necessary consequence. Welfare -- government taking over the religious duty of charity -- is a textbook example. Anti-libertarian Social Conservatives as much as any liberal Democrat WOULD DO WELL TO ACKNOWLEDGE IT. Government can indeed screw anything up. I am a limited government Christian conservative to understands the truth: Reducing government reduces the problem.

I bet many decades back some do gooder types decided that government must get involved in marriage, you know to make sure us the unwashed did it right.

Legally, marriage involves a whole lot more than just the declaration of a relationship.

Marriage evolved out of the natural mating behavior of humans, and the law evolved to provide a legal framework to provide protection to the children resulting from this biological relationship. If a person dies without a will, the law has already established through the legal framework of marriage how the estate will be distributed.

There is a lot of reason to believe that homosexuals want the legal protections of marriage to shield their estates from death taxes. By declaring that any two people can "marry", and that such "marriage" is equivalent to real marriage meant to produce and provide for children, there is a whole body of law that is being messed up. Unintended consequences will have far-ranging ripples here. Marriage fraud is about to reach heights previously unheard of.