(February 16, 2012 at 1:17 am)KichigaiNeko Wrote:Quote: Married people are afforded advantages that single people are not, such as tax exmption from inheritance, joint property, default power of attorney etcabout the only reason for people (of any persuasion) to get "married"
I agree with everything you said, and I'd just like to add another reason to the end of this bit if I may. When I lost my darling Sam back in 2010, I dutifully informed the Social Security office (among other things) as we were both in receipt of benefits etc. It was at that point that I learned that I was not eligible for Bereavement Benefit, since although we lived together as though married, which is usually a recognised distinction in these matters, we were not actually married. Traditional marriages, civil partnerships - same-sex marriages in all but name - these are recognised offically, but not what could be termed common-law partnerships. Basically what it boiled down to was this: for any aspect of the bereavement that involved my paying out, we were officially recognised as a couple. Any part which involved Social Security payments coming the other way didn't recognise our partnership.
Don't get me wrong, I would so much rather have my Sam back than a penny of their money. It just would have been nice for some sort of official acknowledgement of our partnership. Thus if I could change one thing (apart from the obvious) I would get us married like a shot.
At the age of five, Skagra decided emphatically that God did not exist. This revelation tends to make most people in the universe who have it react in one of two ways - with relief or with despair. Only Skagra responded to it by thinking, 'Wait a second. That means there's a situation vacant.'
