Trigger words: married (9) marriages marriage
Indicator sentences: In my opinion, that isn't what marriage is about. Filling a box saying that you are married isn't what marriage is about. It is an emotional attachment to another person. No state can truly ever take that away from two people.
Negotiation parts: [STA-CITE]> The state doesn't consider them married. They get zero benefits to be married. [END-CITE]Do you need benefits to get married? If your perspective marriage is defined by the benefits that you receive from the state then your perspiration is distorted. I AM COMPLETELY AGREEING WITH YOU THAT THE CIVIL LIBERTIES OF A GAY COUPLE WHEN COMPARED TO THE CIVIL LIBERTIES OF A STRAIGHT COUPLE ARE NOT EQUAL AND THAT THIS IS A PROBLEM. However they still are married, not through the eyes of the state but through their own. in the u.s., a marriage is a legal contract between spouses that establishes rights and obligations between them, between them and their children, and between them and their in-laws. on a governmental standpoint, it has **nothing** to do with love. [STA-CITE]> In my opinion, that isn't what marriage is about. [END-CITE]Doesn't matter. Legally, that's precisely what it is about. It's taking two separate legal entities and joining them into one. Marriage is a social and legal construct, first and foremost. The concept of a marriage as a bond of love is actually quite recent. [STA-CITE]>In my opinion, that isn't what marriage is about. Filling a box saying that you are married isn't what marriage is about. It is an emotional attachment to another person. No state can truly ever take that away from two people. [END-CITE]Except if your husband or wife isn't a citizen and the only way for you to stay in the same country together is to be legally married so you can sponsor him or her. For bi-national couples, legal marriage is often the difference between whether they can live together as a family or not. It's a huge freaking deal. [STA-CITE]> I AM COMPLETELY AGREEING WITH YOU THAT THE CIVIL LIBERTIES OF A GAY COUPLE WHEN COMPARED TO THE CIVIL LIBERTIES OF A STRAIGHT COUPLE ARE NOT EQUAL AND THAT THIS IS A PROBLEM. [END-CITE]Okay, then your argument (or view if you prefer) is pointless. You are just saying that we shouldn't say that it's a marriage issue because by the definition you are using, they are already married. That's just silly. When I (and it appears most of the commentators here) say "marriage" we are talking about the legally sanctioned version of marriage which provides those certain civil liberties. Marriage has a legal definition, that's what we are fighting for and that is what the media is talking about. In short: The legal version of marriage is the only one that matters. Well said. They aren't married. At all. So when the state looks at their pairing at times like if one person is in the hospital and such, they are just two people. Their love doesn't matter. I get what you're trying to say here but if it was really the same you would see hetrosexual couples forgo getting married with actual marriage licenses, but you never see that happen. [STA-CITE]> It is an emotional attachment to another person. No state can truly ever take that away from two people. [END-CITE]That isn't marriage, that's love. A man and a woman who do not love each other can get married. A man who loves a man cannot get married in many areas. It would be very hard for a government to say "you cannot love people of the same gender", but it can say "you cannot sign a contract binding yourself legally to a person of the same gender." If you want to argue that marriage should not be a legal institution, that is a different CMV. Marriage, as it stands, carries significant legal benefits that cannot be conferred upon some gay couples no matter how strong their emotional bond is. I'm not entirely sure if OP came here to discuss his actual CMV topic. Nearly all of his comments in the thread are arguing about what marriage 'is' and whether it's a legal term or an emotional one.
Trigger words: marriage (4)
Indicator sentences: The term "marriage" is never used synonymously with "love;" there is always an implication that there will be rights and responsibilities granted to the couple by some larger organization, be it their church community, social network, or the government. It sounds like you're defining "marriage" as being what Americans would consider a "long-term relationship," which is something decided by only those two people, and can be broken without any external ramifications. If that's what the word means in Australia, then I agree that it would be silly for there to need to be a huge debate about whether homosexuals can date indefinitely.
Negotiation parts: Throughout history that hasn't been the case. I have put the source for a video where I got the majority of my argument from, it has a small amount of talk about religion however is quite good at explaining what I am trying to say: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQw0eLzfGNI "Marriage" and "love" or "long-term relationship" may have been synonymous back in the 16th century, like that video says, but language changes. Once legal rights and responsibilities were given to couples, it became the government's business who was married to whom. At some point in the past 500 years, it became accepted that "marriage" is an officially-recognized union. Trying to make everyone else switch back to a 500-year-old definition of "marriage" is like arguing that "awesome" and "awful" should both mean "terrifying." That is no longer what (almost) anyone means when they say those words, and using an archaic definition means you aren't understanding the debate.