Illinois to become 15th state to recognize marriage equality

[Optimistic Mysanthrope]

The marital institution is based on tradition friend. You cannot ignore this aspect.

I'm doing no such thing. That's why I addressed that very issue in my last two posts. I don't recall you providing a relevant refutation, however. Merely repeating that it's a tradition doesn't cut it btw

If you want to include everyone into marriage, you must do away with everything that has to do with marriage, including family values, importance of children, and the relation of marriage in respect to society and the state, and turn it into a purely "individualistic" concept that has shed itself of every meaning it held before.

And after you did this, what remains of this age-old institution that formed the basis of society?

Tell me again how that doesn't apply to heterosexual couple that choose not to have children.

Nothing. You can call it marriage, but it won't be marriage, it will be something else, an empty word.
Change for the sake of change is chaos. Some things are better left untouched, and in this case, unspoiled.

But it's not just for the sake of it, though.

They are fringe examples that have no relevance to the overall picture.

It's totally relevant. It undermines your position. But hey, why refute a point that compromises your argument when you can just dismiss it as irrelevant, right?

The primary function of the marital institution is to create stability, and to create stability for the purpose of allowing people to have and raise children in a stable environment, that is, having both a definite father and mother, a man and a woman, required for the natural procreation mechanism.

What purpose does it serve for society to allow people that are irrelevant to the marital institution to get married?
None, it serves none. Other than to drain the marital insitution of its purpose, its traditions, and its relation to society.

Yeah, that's right. Because procreation didn't happen until marriage was invented. Even today, there are no unmarried couples that provide a stable environment for their children. Oh, no wait, you're talking shit.

Marriage doesn't create a stable environment. An unstable relationship doesn't magically become stronger just because the couple in question get married.

But if 2 people can constitute a family, what does it matter if they're the same gender?

No, they can't.

Sorry, I must have misunderstood you when you said 'these do not go against the fact that marriage is connected to the institution of family'

So, you know, I just figured that if a heterosexual couple that doesn't have children is still connection to the institution of marriage, there would be no reason why a homosexual couple couldn't be connected to it as well.

Hang on, can you run that one by me again? I think your explanation must have been drowned out by homophobia.

Because they never were part of the traditions that have spawned the said family values. They were not even part of society until halfway of the 20th century, they lived out their lifestyles in secret, and participatd in regular society by means of conforming to its standards.
So they never had any part in the creation of its traditions, neither did they have any part in the marital and familial insitutions.

Again, I have already said why using tradition as an argument is insufficient. If you care to show me why I am wrong about that, please do so

And the basic natural fact that they cannot procreate and no child will ever be the result of a union of same sex couples simply adds to the reason why they never were a part of these institutions. They're simply not relevant.

And I refer you to infertile couples again. I think we're starting to run low on special pleading fallacies. Would you be a dear and order some more? They'll be none left for the theists at this rate.

I bet I can show you a damn sight more examples of dysfunctional families with heterosexual parents than you can with homosexual parents.

I bet you can, however it would not count as an argument.

Yes it would. It would argue against your claim that only heterosexual couples can provide family values and a stable environment for children.

Even the most dysfunctional family is more relevant, they can actually contribute to society via the creation of children, and providing the said children with more or less of a home, and more or less of a father-mother figure.

Oh, right. I suppose couples that adopt children aren't contributing to society either then? Are you gonna invoke more special pleading on behalf of single parents? After all, they're not providing their child(ren) with both a mother and father figure.

To have a child, you need a man and a woman, not two men, and not two women. This should give you an idea why the marital institution was based on men and women.

That's an extremely good point. I can't see that changing.

sperm cells created from female embryo

Scientists Create Sperm and Eggs from Skin Cells, Regardless of Donor Gender

Well, interpret it as you wish, I can't tell you how to think.
But marriage is not something that is built on interpretations, its built on traditions,it is built on its relevance to society. The relevance of marriage to society was to create an environment where the familial institution would flourish. That's about it. Its there to provide people with responsibilities, regarding society and the future of society, the children.

Great big hairy bollocks. Getting married doesn't make you any more responsible, it doesn't magically create a perfect family environment and I'm getting bored of calling you on the whole "tradition" thing. I'll give it another go, though:

England abolished clandestine or common law marriages in the Marriage Act 1753,[citation needed] requiring marriages to be performed by a priest of the Church of England unless the participants in the marriage were Jews or Quakers. The Act applied to Wales. The Act did not apply to Scotland because by the Acts of Union 1707 Scotland retained its own legal system. To get around the requirements of the Marriage Act, such as minimum age requirements, couples would go to Gretna Green, in southern Scotland, to get married under Scots law.
Marriages by Per Verba De Praesenti, sometimes known as common law marriages, were an agreement to marry, rather than a marriage.
The Marriage Act of 1753 also did not apply to Britain's overseas colonies of the time, so common law marriages continued to be recognized in the future United States and Canada. In the United States, common law marriage can still be contracted in Alabama, Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Montana, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, the District of Columbia, or under military law. Except for same-sex interpersonal unions contracted by habit and repute, all jurisdictions recognize common law marriages that were validly contracted in the originating jurisdiction, because they are valid marriages in the jurisdiction where they were contracted.
All other European jurisdictions having long abolished "marriage by habit and repute", Scotland became the last to do so in 2006

Hmmm, seems like this grand old tradition only really dates back about 250 years. I could find anything on Turkey, so maybe it's older there. But in England? Shit, our new institutions are older than that.

Civilisation is inseperable from marriage and family.

It was also inseparable form smallpox until 1977. You'll have to do better than that.

However civilisation cannot exist without people having children, and certainly not without having children in a stable environment(that is marriage and the traditional family) that includes the people that were involved in the baby-making process.

That's right, same-sex marriage will stop heterosexuals having babies.

So does marriage and family institution provide people with a set of responsibilities to raise children in a more secure and more stable environment, while keeping random-sexual relations at a minimum, and the population stable.

But the population isn't stable, it's fucking exploding (pun not intended). There's projected to be 10 billion of us by the end of the century!

What sort of a relevance does it have for us to grant marital rights to homosexuals?
It's not something that is done to benefit society, its done solely to please a minority.

Yeah, a minority that includes at least 150 million people worldwide

Source(s):
The Janus Report on Sexual Behavior - Samuel S. Janus and Cynthia L. Janus.
Homosexuality/Heterosexuality - David P. McWhirter, Stephanie A. Sanders, and June Machover Reinisch.
Sexual Behavior in the Human Male - Alfred C. Kinsey, Wardell B. Pomeroy, and Clyde E. Martin.
Sexual Behavior in the Human Female - Alfred C. Kinsey, Wardell B. Pomeroy, Clyde E. Martin, and Paul H. Gerhard.[/align]