Posted On: January 19, 2005, 8:46 am CST

Posted By: Melissa

Ed,

Your asumptium regarding the effect of guay marriages on the number of heterosexual marriages and the increase of children born out of wedlock is unapplicable to a large number of countries. Many european countries (excluding Holland) as well as many states and canadian provinces have very large number of common law unions and children being born out of wedlock, and this happened a long time before the whole issue of guay marriages started. I think everyone should realize that marriage is a cultural thing... it is promoted in certain parts of the world and not in others. The financial burden of marriage and of divorce also weighs heavily in a couples choice. Let's face it, there are not that many advantages to actually getting married - that's what they are trying to do with this bill, create an advantage. But less and less people believe in the institution not because of guay marriage, but because of what heterosexuals have done to the institution - made it meaningless with multiple divorces and marriages. That's the culture in North America that we have created, so lets face up to the consequences and stop blaming it on people who have chosen a different lifestyle.