UK Parliament votes in favour of gay marriage

[Dino Velvet]

Good for you guys over there. Saw it on the news last night.

[fivekatz]

Yes indeed, which is why I support Gay Marriage; but I can't get excited about it either; it only applies to Registry Offices; it will be interesting to see if it is used as the 'this far and no further' by organised religion, as I don't see much liberalism on social policy in established religions as you also mentioned.

Not understand the politics of the UK and being a UD citizen who actually believes our nation is in danger of blurring the original concept of separation of church and state (as in the political power of the Christian Right in the US).

I personally see no problem with a law that ends up requiring the state to honor and allow marriage with all the benefits and protections of the law without an exception based on race, religion, creed or gender.

OTOH if that same law does not require any church to either perform or accept the marriage of any parties for any reasons that religion deems are religious, that is the essence of religious freedom IMHO.

I frankly see LGBT rights as the current fight for civil rights in my country and it is for the government to determine and define rights of all citizens, regardless of religion, and for the government to leave religion alone. It is for the members of any faith to change and dictate its convention, not the governments IMHO.

I applaud the UK for its movement in this civil rights fight and admit my ignorance on your politics and have only expressed opinons based on what I comprehended from these posts. If I have misread please forgive me, but I believe that the government should not dictate to the religions and that no religion should dictate to the government in regards to the rights of the people.

[Ben]

The 1960s civilized the cultures in America, the UK and other places....
And, too, this shows that applying pressure, through organizing etc., does have an impact.
Politicians do respond to what's going on in the culture, in society. Provided there is external pressure.
I mean, there are no gifts from above.
Take, say, health care in Canada. It took Canadians 15 years to finally get Tommy Douglas to institute public health care in the province of Saskatchewan. He didn't wake up one morning and decide to give everyone public health care. I mean, the doctors were quite antagonistic. They said things like: Public health care will turn Canada into a communist country.... And as we know our Northern neighbors are a communist country -- ha ha!
I mean, governments, like corporations, are not benevolent institutions. They just don't institute kind and moral and decent policies, as it were.... It does take popular pressure.

I mean, this is from 3 years ago:

David Cameron stumbles through interview on gay rights

Tory leader appears less than confident when asked about attitude of Conservative MEPs and peers to homosexuality:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2...les-gay-rights

[Ben]

Gay marriage: what the Tories are pushing is conformity not equality

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisf...y-not-equality

[Stavros]

Not understand the politics of the UK and being a UD citizen who actually believes our nation is in danger of blurring the original concept of separation of church and state (as in the political power of the Christian Right in the US).

I personally see no problem with a law that ends up requiring the state to honor and allow marriage with all the benefits and protections of the law without an exception based on race, religion, creed or gender.

OTOH if that same law does not require any church to either perform or accept the marriage of any parties for any reasons that religion deems are religious, that is the essence of religious freedom IMHO.

I frankly see LGBT rights as the current fight for civil rights in my country and it is for the government to determine and define rights of all citizens, regardless of religion, and for the government to leave religion alone. It is for the members of any faith to change and dictate its convention, not the governments IMHO.

I applaud the UK for its movement in this civil rights fight and admit my ignorance on your politics and have only expressed opinons based on what I comprehended from these posts. If I have misread please forgive me, but I believe that the government should not dictate to the religions and that no religion should dictate to the government in regards to the rights of the people.

The secular aspect of this is quite simple -gay people will be able to go to a Registry Office and get married like everyone else who does it.

The cleavage that has been widened is between secular society and organised religion, even though there are religious groups -the Quakers for example- who are not opposed to gay marriage- and members of other churches whose support is contrary to official policy. Most people in the UK claim to believe in God and belong to a religious body, which can range from the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church, through Islam, Judaism, Buddhism and Hinduism, to Wicca, and those people in the 2011 Census who said their religion was Heavy Metal, Satanism, New Age or Jedi Knight, although the latter has decline substantially since the previous census in 2001. Apparently, 2,418 claim to be Scientologists.
-there is an article on this here
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/de...n-jedi-knights

Only the Church of England is formally exempt from discirmination law and thus has no obligation to perform civil partnerships in a religious venue and is exempt from any law on gay marriage, although the Govt has confusingly said it can 'opt in' if it wants to, which is unlikely. Just last month the Church of England Synod, its parliament, declined to grant women the right to become Bishops, it is tied up in knots on the issue of homosexuality across the board from gay priests to the crisis in the African branch of the Church which believes homosexuality is a wickedness.

A practical example of the cleavage has been found with Registrars who are Christian and refuse to perform civil partnership ceremonies -the case of Lilian Ladele is also interesting because she worked in the London Borough of Islington, which has a large gay population, and though initially she worked around the rosters to avoid same-sex partnerships, she claims the Council would not amend their schedules to enable her to avoid them, and in addition she says she was bullied and harassed as a homophobe and was eventually dismissed -and though she won her case against unfair dismissal, she lost it on appeal and the European Court of Human Rights declined her appeal even though they understood that when she took the job there was no civil partnership law and thus her religious convictions were not likely to be challenged, and that the Council showed no interest in her religious beliefs after the law was changed.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19467554

As I said before, this is a hollow victory for the gay lobby -not only is there no consensus among gay people that marriage should be a right, there are deep divisions within and between secular and religious communities on the issue; attitudes have indeed become more accepting of diversity but this is being used a political football in the UK because they look at the re-election of Obama as a template for the next general election campaign in the hope that being liberal on social issues will win them seats, not the most morally pure reason to support equal rights in the law...

[sexyasianescorts]

I have nothing against Gay couples at all but I am not sure the government should interfere with the church. Maybe i am missing something as there are lots of elements about this matter that confuses me??

Chloe x

[fivekatz]

I have nothing against Gay couples at all but I am not sure the government should interfere with the church. Maybe i am missing something as there are lots of elements about this matter that confuses me??

Chloe x

Being from the US not only do I agree but it would be against our Constitution for the government to demand of by example (Mormon Church, Catholic Church) to perform marriages for gay couples if they have a strict religious belief against this.

In the US Catholic employers and the Catholic Church as employers have raised objections to the provision in the Affordable Health Care Act that requires that woman be provided birth control as part of their prescription insurance. And based on the separation of church and state the Obama administration is having to come up with an alternate insurance option for women employees who work for employers with legitimate religious objections.

I understand the feelings expressed about what is happening in the UK because here in the US some states tried creating "civil unions" that would provide many but not all the same legal protections and privileges as marriage. It took a gay friend to explain to me the objection was that it was still unique and separate and not full and proper recognition. Similar to, I suppose, the stupid premise Southern states in the US have with their "separate but equal" laws regarding education etc.

Change on the subject of LGBT rights in the US has come slowly though appears to be gaining great energy. As recently as 2008 the whole topic of same sex marriage was so toxic that neither Obama or the Dems would do anything but dance around it. 2012 was a different story.

The signs in "western world" are that as generations change, so to is the outlook toward a variety of civil rights and that those rights are not just a matter of race, color and creed but also sexual orientation.

Wonderfully encouraging. I suppose I don't understand the role that church plays in marriage issue in the UK, though I would think that the pressure for the church to change should come from the faithful and not the government.

Just my take as an outsider looking in.

[Stavros]

The point I would make is that the Church of England is explicitly exempt from discrimination law, but no other church or religion -not the Catholic Church, not Islam, or Judaism, which means that in purely legal terms, all religions and churches should be conforming with the law. It is up to the Church of England and the other Christian churches, and religions to change if the want to, but the fact that they may be falling foul of discrimination law is potentially where the rift between social attitudes and religious practice is at its most difficult and sensitive.

[fivekatz]

Yes indeed, which is why I support Gay Marriage; but I can't get excited about it either; it only applies to Registry Offices; it will be interesting to see if it is used as the 'this far and no further' by organised religion, as I don't see much liberalism on social policy in established religions as you also mentioned.

In the US we have seen this vary from church to church in certain sects while others like the Mormons are jeu dead set against it. They spent the vast majority of the money in California to create the constitutional amendment against Same Sex Marriage.

Acceptance by one's faith is no small issue but really churches slowly change and it is the for the members of the church and not the government to tell the church what to do.

And IMHO it is a huge step when a government states without exception or vagueness that all people are entitled to marriage and its legal protections and legal obligations regardless of their sex or sexual orientation.

If the choice was between having the government recognize your marriage if you are LGBT or the church by far the government is more important. It is the government who determines your inheritance rights, life-death issues for your mate, joint property rights etc. To me that is the real issue about marriage. Any two people can exchange their vows before their loved ones and God without the church or the government. It is government that protects equality in marriage not the church. So whilst many of the churches in the UK may not embrace this law, the law is major victory IMHO.

Just my take.