A few questions concerning homos...

[El Supremo]

...exuals.

(sorry for the eye-catcher :loveya: )

With all this Marriage Protection Amendment stuff today, I realized that I don't understand a few basic things. Like:

1) What is the difference between marriage and civil unions?

2) What economic (e.g. tax) benefits are there to marriage or civil unions.

3) What legal benefits are there to marriage or civil unions?


I am not trying to start a flame war. And I am certainly not in favor of any discrimination against gays or lesbians. I just feel like a dunce.

[patdem]

1. Would that be Homo Erectus...Homo Sapian..or Homo Phobia??

they are distinct Homos!!!

[Dookus]

2. a starter list ...

Hospital visitation. Married couples have the automatic right to visit each other in the hospital and make medical decisions. Same-sex couples can be denied the right to visit a sick or injured loved one in the hospital.

Social Security benefits. Married people receive Social Security payments upon the death of a spouse. Despite paying payroll taxes, gay and lesbian workers receive no Social Security survivor benefits – resulting in an average annual income loss of $5,528 upon the death of a partner.

Health insurance. Many public and private employers provide medical coverage to the spouses of their employees, but most employers do not provide coverage to the life partners of gay and lesbian employees. Gay employees who do receive health coverage for their partners must pay federal income taxes on the value of the insurance.

Estate taxes. A married person automatically inherits all the property of his or her deceased spouse without paying estate taxes. A gay or lesbian taxpayer is forced to pay estate taxes on property inherited from a deceased partner.

Retirement savings. While a married person can roll a deceased spouse’s 401(k) funds into an IRA without paying taxes, a gay or lesbian American who inherits a 401(k) can end up paying up to 70 percent of it in taxes and penalties.

Family leave. Married workers are legally entitled to unpaid leave from their jobs to care for an ill spouse. Gay and lesbian workers are not entitled to family leave to care for their partners.
Immigration rights. Bi-national families are commonly broken up or forced to leave the country to stay together. The reason: U.S. immigration law does not permit American citizens to petition for their same-sex partners to immigrate.

Nursing homes. Married couples have a legal right to live together in nursing homes. Because they are not legal spouses, elderly gay or lesbian couples do not have the right to spend their last days living together in nursing homes.

Home protection. Laws protect married seniors from being forced to sell their homes to pay high nursing home bills; gay and lesbian seniors have no such protection.

Pensions. After the death of a worker, most pension plans pay survivor benefits only to a legal spouse of the participant. Gay and lesbian partners are excluded from such pension benefits.

The above was taken from the HRC's website.

[El Supremo]

5. Wow, thanks.

I was aware of the spousal insurance. Aren't most companies allowing that now?

[buycitgo]

7. thanks, dookus

did anybody see Nightline's uncharacteristically excellent show last night?

wonderful clips of gay couples in the homes, speaking eloquently of how much marriage legalization meant to them

made me happy for them

even Ted Koppel was up to speed, defending, sorta, the concept of gay marriage with a minister, who kept accusing TK of using a utilitaran arguement for gay marriage, when the normative explanation, as well as biblical/moral sanctions were all that mattered, thus inarguable

it was a very hopeful show, except at the end, when they discussed the possibility of the Mass referendum in two years that might reverse the whole thing

what kind of fricking country do we live in?

what's it like in Europe for gay couples?

are they that insane over there, too?

[Lexingtonian]

15. The Reverend Eugene Rivers

is a public figure here in Massachusetts. He's a conservative black minister but moderate enough to be functional. He can make the best case for a whole bunch of conservative positions, so he was a very good person to ask to articulate the anti-marriage reasoning.

Koppel wasn't making an argument so much as prodding him to tell viewers why they should really not support gay marriage. Rivers did the honest thing and had to concede that the utilitarian/practical and pragmatic arguments are in favor of it, and had to outline the anti side's argument to be theological/theoretical reasons and traditionalism. The theological stuff was pretty thin gruel and leans on traditionalism too is what I got from the rest of the exchange. (Koppel didn't dwell on, or didn't have time to ask about, what the warrants for the traditionalist stance are and whether they hold up in the present.)

As a Massachusetts resident I can't guarantee you an outcome on the state constitutional amendment effort, but support for it fell under 50% in May and should be around 35%- politically dead in the state- at Inauguration Day. At the moment the middle 20% of the Massachusetts electorate don't want to deal with it at all- I'd say it's presently 35% support for the ban, 45% to keep gm legalized, and 20% Busy With More Important Things- and that will probably stay that way throughout the Election Year agitations, past Election Day. I'd say it's 70% odds in favor of gay marriage staying legalized at the moment, though, and improving.

Kerry winning the Election would pretty much evaporate the attention/respect given reactionaries in the public arena in the state- without reactionaries holding power in Washington people here find listening to them a complete waste of time. Kerry winning pretty much shoots support for the banning amendment to the 32% conservative base or below it- and the state legislature would kill it off next March. Should Bush win (1% chance of that)...tough call, I'd say the state legislatures chickens out and it fails at referendum in '06 because support for legalization continues to increase here as all over the country as a trend. So I'd say the odds are never going to be under 80% of gay marriage legalization prevailing.

[jdonaldball]

3. The main legal

benefit of marriage is for divorce lawyers.

[redqueen]

4. There are many differences

Search the web... marriage affords all kinds of benefits that you don't get with a civil union.

[dsc]

6. A short primer

Marriage is bestowed by states but has several federal rights that are granted by it. Those federal rights do not come with a same sex marriage due to DOMA. Thus a same sex couple who has married in Massachusetts doesn't have the federal rights of marriage that a heterosexual couple gets.

Under current legal norms there is no difference between a Vermont couple with a civil union and a Massachusetts couple with a same sex marriage as long as they stay in their respective states. If they leave their respective states, then the Massachusetts couple has the potential of having its marriage recognized by the around a dozen states which don't have DOMA of their own which the Vermont couple doesn't have. Neither couple has any federal marriage rights.

In addition, other states have less sweeping versions of civil unions which don't have all the state rights that marriage has. Hawaii is an example of that.

The amendment would have prevented states from granting marriage rights or any equivalent system of rights to same sex couples and thus banned civil unions.

In thoeory there could be a set up where civil unions and marriage were exactly the same. It would require a repeal of DOMA at least the part which covers the federal government and a law recognizing civil unions as entitling a person to federal marriage rights. Kerry is saying he would do that if he wins the Presidency.

On edit Rights bestowed to married people by the state include inheritence, joint custody of children, community property, next of kin rights for medical care, etc. Ability to take sick leave when a spouse is ill. Rights bestowed by the feds include tax free medical insurance if a company insures a spouse, immigration rights, social security sharing, and a host of others.

[jmowreader]

8. A few answers for you, you shifty slut

Fuckin' "homos..."

I oughta slap you, y'know that?

Anyway...

1) There really isn't much of a difference between a "marriage" and a "civil union" apart from the name. The Bible-thumpers believe marriage is a Christian institution, which of course it isn't; the practice of declaring two people from different families to be the same family (what we're really talking about) has been around long, long before religion. There were two bases for marriage: property--ever heard of a dowry?--and reproduction. By someone declaring that you *had* to hitch up with someone you're not related to if you wanted to have children, the "someone" solved the problem of inbred offspring in the families of the commoners. (That was reserved for the nobility and royalty.)

This "civil unions" shit came about because the Christians decided to act like spoiled children when faced with a new toy that wasn't theirs but they wanted anyway: "MIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNEEEEEEEEEEE! It's MIIIIIIINNNNNNEEEEEEEEEEEE! You can't have it! Mine! Mine! MINE!" By calling a marriage between two people whose sexuality the BTs hate a "civil union" instead of a "marriage," they hoped to defuse this.

I don't think it worked--but that's beside the point. The object was to separate the "religious" aspects of a ceremony that's almost completely about property from the "legal" aspects of it.

2) Married filing jointly, married filing separately and head-of-household tax rates are lower than Single.

3) Let's see...right off the top of my head
* You cannot be compelled to testify against your spouse
* Spouses can easily be granted full power of attorney and automatically receive limited powers of attorney
* It's much easier to do joint financial transactions with a spouse

[El Supremo]

13. OK...

So I read that Kerry says that he is for Civil Unions but not Marriage of same sex couples. What is this difference to him? Just religious?

And on No.2: My wife and I have been paying MORE IRS taxes throughout our marriage than if we were single. I think the government made it a little more equal in recent years.

[Walt Starr]

9. All marriages are civil unions

Sorry, but that's a fact. If sanctioned by the state, it's a civil union.

Marriage is the spiritual component and you need not be united in civil authority to be spiritully married.

[HallowsEve]

12. What about....this!

"The very idea of a Christian homosexual marriage seems incredible. Yet after a twelve year search of Catholic and Orthodox church archives Yale history professor John Boswell has discovered that a type of Christian homosexual "marriage" did exist as late as the 18th century.
Contrary to myth, Christianity's concept of marriage has not been set in stone since the days of Christ, but has evolved as a concept and as a ritual.
Professor Boswell discovered that in addition to heterosexual marriage ceremonies in ancient church liturgical documents (and clearly separate from other types of non-marital blessings of adopted children or land) were ceremonies called, among other titles, the "Office of Same Sex Union" (10th and 11th century Greek) or the "Order for Uniting Two Men" (11th and 12th century).
These ceremonies had all the contemporary symbols of a marriage: a community gathered in a church, a blessing of the couple before the altar, their right hands joined as at heterosexual marriages, the participation of a priest, the taking of the Eucharist, a wedding banquet afterwards. All of which are shown in contemporary drawings of the same sex union of Byzantine Emperor Basil I (867-886) and his companion John. Such homosexual unions also took place in Ireland in the late 12th / early 13th century, as the chronicler Gerald of Wales (Geraldus Cambrensis) has recorded.
Unions in Pre-Modern Europe lists in detail some same sex union ceremonies found in ancient church liturgical documents. One Greek 13th century "Order for Solemnisation of Same Sex Union", having invoked St. Serge and St. Bacchus, called on God to "vouchsafe unto these Thy servants grace to love another and to abide unhated and not cause of scandal all the days of their lives, with the help of the Holy Mother of God and all Thy saints". The ceremony concludes: "And they shall kiss the Holy Gospel and each other, and it shall be concluded".
Another 14th century Serbian Slavonic "Office of the Same Sex Union", uniting two men or two women, had the couple having their right hands laid on the Gospel while having a cross placed in their left hands. Having kissed the Gospel, the couple were then required to kiss each other, after which the priest, having raised up the Eucharist, would give them both communion.
Boswell found records of same sex unions in such diverse archives as those in the Vatican, in St. Petersburg, in Paris, Istanbul, and in Sinai, covering a period from the 8th to 18th centuries. Nor is he the first to make such a discovery. The Dominican Jacques Goar (1601-1653) includes such ceremonies in a printed collection of Greek prayer books."
For the complete article please click on the link below:

http://www.libchrist.com/other/homosexual/gaymarriagerite.html

[kerrywins]

10. i was about to go off...

:)

[Lexingtonian]

11. marriage vs cu's

Marriage is a federally recognized status in dealing with citizens. Civil unions are not- people in them are treated as individuals with a bunch of state rights (and obligations) individuals don't have.

Marriages confer pretty uniform legal rights nationwide- what state you try to get a prenup or a divorce or a change in child custody in matters a lot, but the (slow) trend is toward uniformity. American marriage status is generally respected internationally. Civil unions will vary, with legislatures and courts generally figuring out what their voters will agree with and setting the bar wherever that is.

In short, there is a 'separate but equal' kind of problem. People were willing to put up with it in 2000; the Massachusetts legalizing verdict Last November really was a breathtaking advance even supporters took some time to get used to. But civil unions are considered sort of the rusty '88 accident-damaged Chevy level of things on the pro-marriage side now here in New England- if that's the only thing available, it will do, but not otherwise.

The interesting thing about the Religious Right is that they claim to be religiously consistent, i.e. theologically justified. But they put up the fight against gay marriage not at their church door but at their state legislatures, courts, and the federal government. I've never seen the RR argument about why this should be so if they actually believe marriage is sacred and involves divine sanctioning, and thus the state-regulated/approval part of it is just secular legal contracts that they have no strict interest in. I'd guess it's that they know that if/when their state legalizes gay marriage it'll get past their church doors in short order due to their parishioners, no matter the copious and energetic misinterpretations of the Biblical material.

[kayell]

14. One really big difference

Marriage is a legally recognized relationship in all 50 states. Civil unions are not - they exist in ....Vermont.

There are @ 1000 federal rights, priveleges and obligations that come automatically with marriage according to a GAO report done in the late '90s. (I'll see if I can find it) Some of the biggies have been mentioned above. States usually tack on a couple of hundred other rights, priveleges and obligations that come with the marriage licence.

Can you imagine the chaos and time involved in trying to recreate an equitable version of marriage called "civil unions" that is only for gays and doing that state by state? Do you think there is ANY chance it could result in a true equitable situation?

It's the old seperate is not equal story.